Very frequently these are seen at the scene of the crime---a dying coral, dead fish, etc. And the new hobbyist assumes this must be the culprit
Actually not. Don't worry if your micro-hermit hangs for days around a troubled coral, picking at it: he's cleaning it and helping it---it may contract now, but it will come back better in a while. Ditto worms. When a coral's in trouble, it may have slime, goop, and generally collect detritus, which the worm or crab will remove, keeping a wound clean, keeping abandoned skeleton (with stony coral) from getting algified, so that the coral can retake what he'd shrunk away from.
Very often the real culprit in such losses isn't even a living thing: it's water conditions, or lighting, or sometimes an actual little ding during cleaning or positioning.
Observe, and generally let nature take its course. Lps corals don't 'care' when a crab hikes across them. They mass very little. They have tiny feet. You may have a crab that parks for weeks---in which case you may have a female with eggs that some night will release them all.
Once you've gotten a tank with species that are recommended to be together, just kind of trust it. Bristleworms, worms in general, and microhermit crabs are fine. Asterinas are not generally harmful unless you have zoas. In general even aiptasia, while a nuisance, is not a raging emergency---they're sting-ey little nuisances, but corals also sting, and tend to hold their own long enough for the owner to try several intervention schemes (I favor pep shrimp) without a general demise of corals. Again---don't fret too much. Corals can't actually kill them off, but they don't thrive well where there's, say, a determined hammer coral.
Just prepare to observe nature in action: generally there are very, very few pests EXCEPT ich, flukes, and other fishy problems that you should be quarantining to catch. In general, free worms are good; free crabs---well, not so much. Free little starfish and tiny anemones, not so much. [Asterinas and aiptasia.] Most of the critters that hitchhike in are good stuff: sponges, little crustaceans, the occasional barnacle or such. Beware of macro algae with roots: these can get way out of hand and take over your rockwork. Snails with only a saddle for a shell are great (stomatellas) but slugs and similar things with no shell are not great (flatworms.)
Get a photo if you can, and put it on via a free account on Photobucket and that little mountain/sun icon you see in your message toolbar: that'll let us see what you see, and we can ID it for you. Also there's a monster file up there in the stickies id'ing things you may see in your tank, a kind of animal whatizzit file. Hope that will help you.
Actually not. Don't worry if your micro-hermit hangs for days around a troubled coral, picking at it: he's cleaning it and helping it---it may contract now, but it will come back better in a while. Ditto worms. When a coral's in trouble, it may have slime, goop, and generally collect detritus, which the worm or crab will remove, keeping a wound clean, keeping abandoned skeleton (with stony coral) from getting algified, so that the coral can retake what he'd shrunk away from.
Very often the real culprit in such losses isn't even a living thing: it's water conditions, or lighting, or sometimes an actual little ding during cleaning or positioning.
Observe, and generally let nature take its course. Lps corals don't 'care' when a crab hikes across them. They mass very little. They have tiny feet. You may have a crab that parks for weeks---in which case you may have a female with eggs that some night will release them all.
Once you've gotten a tank with species that are recommended to be together, just kind of trust it. Bristleworms, worms in general, and microhermit crabs are fine. Asterinas are not generally harmful unless you have zoas. In general even aiptasia, while a nuisance, is not a raging emergency---they're sting-ey little nuisances, but corals also sting, and tend to hold their own long enough for the owner to try several intervention schemes (I favor pep shrimp) without a general demise of corals. Again---don't fret too much. Corals can't actually kill them off, but they don't thrive well where there's, say, a determined hammer coral.
Just prepare to observe nature in action: generally there are very, very few pests EXCEPT ich, flukes, and other fishy problems that you should be quarantining to catch. In general, free worms are good; free crabs---well, not so much. Free little starfish and tiny anemones, not so much. [Asterinas and aiptasia.] Most of the critters that hitchhike in are good stuff: sponges, little crustaceans, the occasional barnacle or such. Beware of macro algae with roots: these can get way out of hand and take over your rockwork. Snails with only a saddle for a shell are great (stomatellas) but slugs and similar things with no shell are not great (flatworms.)
Get a photo if you can, and put it on via a free account on Photobucket and that little mountain/sun icon you see in your message toolbar: that'll let us see what you see, and we can ID it for you. Also there's a monster file up there in the stickies id'ing things you may see in your tank, a kind of animal whatizzit file. Hope that will help you.
