Coco worm question HELP

[jdiddy8384]

Do coco worms grow new tubes? I just picked one up from a LFS for real cheap. Everything was 50% off. He has no tube. Is he going to just die, or make a new tube? where should i put him in the sand bed or on a rock? Thanks for the help.

 

[Tennyson]

I have no experience with this, but I would get him to a safe spot asap. they build those tubes for protection, and without them they'r well, defensless and highly vulnerable to anything.

Seperate it from the main tank and good luck.

 

[Tennyson]

Oh yeah, could I ask you a question?

I have never seen a picture of any tube worm or feather duster out of its tube and I'm curious to see what they look like. could you post a pic?

thanks, and good luck again.

 

[talon4x4]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=12559971#post12559971 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Tennyson
Oh yeah, could I ask you a question?

I have never seen a picture of any tube worm or feather duster out of its tube and I'm curious to see what they look like. could you post a pic?

thanks, and good luck again.

Picture an earthworm.

I was moving some rockwork around and didn't realize the outter casing of the worm was attached to the rock. When I picked up the rock it ripped part of the casing off. It didn't harm it though, it's still alive today and this happened probably 6 months ago.

 

[jdiddy8384]

thanks for the replys it does look like a earthworm sort of, with the fans or crown coming off of one end. So far so good.

 

[LeslieH]

Tennyson -- here's a pic of one next to it's tube
http://www.nhm.org/guana/bvi-invt/bvi-surv/images/worm-08/h0128.htm

Diddy - is it a real coco worm, the kind that builds a hard calcium tube? Or a feather duster with a soft tube? It's easy for the soft-tube species to rebuild. True coco worms take much longer and like Tennyson said, need to be protected.

 

[jdiddy8384]

I have a feather duster and this guy looks just like a coco to me. In the tank he came out of their was a small piece of soft tube so im quessing thats what he was in. One of my friends has a hard tube coco, and my worms looked nothing like that. So their are soft tube cocos? So do they need to be in the sand bed to rebuild?

 

[LeslieH]

Cocos belong in the family Serpulidae - these all have hard calcium tubes. That includes the christmas tree worms. There's another family of fan worms & feather dusters called Sabellidae and all these have soft tubes. Sabellids produce mucus which solidifies into their tubes; sometimes they also pick up small particles or even shell fragments which are added to the tubes. They can rapidly rebuild or repair tube damage. Don't try to bury your worm in the sand. It can move around to a spot it likes to start rebuilding. Unprotected worms are just juicy sausages to fish and crabs so do keep it isolated and protected for a while.