Possible Hydroids?

[farfromsea]

Hello all,

These things popped up on my live rock last night. Please excuse the copious hair algae. When I saw them my first thought was hydroids. However further research makes me think this is not correct... hydroids seem to have more of a thicker brown tube and the digitate hyroids are seemingly longer. I also read that hydroids do not like areas of high flow. This particular area is fairly high flow in the tank. I am running one powerhead of 3000L/H (approx 792 gallons/H) in a 55 gallon tank so that means about 14.5x turnover if my math is right. This is excluding the return pump obviously. The powerhead is pointed on the opposite wall of the hydroids. Any insight is appreciated.

I thought we had a pest/hitchhiker forum or sub-forum but I can't find it.

Thanks!

 

[Animagus]

Check this out.

http://www.wetwebmedia.com/hydrozoanfaqs.htm

Don't forget to check out the other links at the top of the page. (Hydrozoan identification, Hydrozoan Behavior etc)

 

[farfromsea]

Thanks! I don't know why I didn't think of checking wet web media myself. Always an excellent resource. So yes this look like a positive ID. Going to try to vacuum them out tomorrow with my water change and work on reducing the hair algae/nitrates/phosphates in hopes of eradication. Not exactly the easiest to tweeze hydroids out of the bottom of a cube so I'm hoping the extra long gravel vacuum I have is sufficient...