Need an ID on this worm...

[stemonia]

Take a look at these worms? I just noticed them on a couple of the rocks in my reef. They seem to have popped up out of nowhere and there are a lot of them. I've popped a couple of them off the rocks and they are stony in structure. Are they dangerous? If so, is there anything I can add to the tank that might prey on them?

 

[Paintbug]

see other thread!

 

[Zucker26]

I'm onboard this thread too, because I just noticed a few of those in my tank as well! I'm interested to find out what they are, because they're in a very difficult spot to reach.

 

[Anemone]

Vermetid snails. An "attached" snail that feeds by putting out a web of mucous (kind of like a spider web). Can irritate corals with their mucous, but otherwise not a problem. Be careful while cleaning around them, those shells are pointed and can cause a nasty puncture wound (can get infected).

Kevin

 

[barbra]

Ahhhh! It's a vermetid!

 

[Aquarist007]

never seen these before--would you recommending getting rid of them and if so how?

 

[justinl]

Id leave them in. they'll catch small pieces of detritus from the water column.

If they do get to the numbers where they're bothering coral (a case i havent yet seen myself) I imagine you could find them and smash em. or just up water changes to export nutrients and starve em out.

 

[stemonia]

There are a number of them on my rocks and they have started to irritate one of my corals. I crushed some of them yesterday and seem to have decreased the population slightly. I have not seen any any mucous like web around any of them as of yet. Thanks for the info. I've had some tell me not to worry about them and some have given me a very gloomy outlook on having them in the tank. I'm going to take the middle of the road attitude and crush them to keep them under control. The last thing I need is to have them take over my reef and kill livestock.

 

[HBtank]

I had two large ones that severly irritated a colony of zoas and anything nearby. I epoxied them shut and the colony is healing.

The small ones never seemed to bother anything.

I think there are many species, so it is really hard to determine other than jsut seeing the reaction of nearby livestock.

 

[Zucker26]

Wow, mine haven't caused any problems yet, but I only have a handful. They do string out some mucous here and there, but luckily I don't have any coral nearby. The only thing they could really irritate would be some mushrooms.