Duncan eating feather duster

[mickeyfish]

So I have (had) a nice feather duster in my tank for the past 6 months. It was bright pink and had a hard tube. Pic below.

It has not come out of its tube for the past week or so. This is likely the result of beginning to dose with phosphate rx as other methods of phosphate control (GFO, Phosguard) has not been working.

In any case, tonight it either died or lost its crown, and my Duncan caught it and is eating it. Do you guys think the Feather duster died, or will it grow its crown back? Also, is this bad for the Duncan at all?

Everything else in the tank is in great shape.

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[mickeyfish]

Oh yea... my other dusters are fine.


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[homer1475]

More then likely it just shed it's crown. That is also a cocoa worm not a feather duster. Similar but they are slightly different. Feather dusters have a soft paper like tube and a single crown. Cocoa worms have a hard calcareous tube and typicality have 2 swirled crowns.



I have read that when they do this it's to grow a new smaller crown because their food source is not as abundant as it once was.

 

[mickeyfish]

Thanks Homer. I couldn't remember the name when I was posting.

Ironically, this happened the day my live phytoplankton was delivered. I knew it needed more of a food source, and I was a bit too late.

I guess I will target feed the tube the phyto and go from there.


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[homer1475]

Not a huge deal really. I have had several over the years shed thier crowns then grow then back just as big as before. Only thing you have to worry about is if you see the worm out of the tube.



OOH yeah they grow that crown back pretty quickly. Like in a couple weeks.

 

[mickeyfish]

That's encouraging. Thanks Homer.


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