Question
The pic of worms
Hi there, i have some fibrous orange worms in my tank. The worms are bright orange, as seen in the picture. The strange thing is that you cant see the whole worm, you can only see the "tentacles" that stick out of the head of the worm. i have seen the whole worm only once, it looks like a normal earthworm of about 2ml wide at the rear for about 6cm, then the next 2cm are the head, which is about triple the width and looks hairy with the tentacles on it. At any given time you cant see the whole worm, only a spiderweb like tentacle formation on the rock where it lives. The tentacles are also bright orange and can be seen moving at all times. i have recently had the death of two clowns in the tank, and i am not sure what caused them. These worms are troubling me as in the many years ive had a tank ive never seen then before. This is a picture of the worms in question, u cant see the body, only some of the Tentacles. Thanks very much for the help.
AnswerHi Omi,
The vast majority of worms will prove to be harmless or at the least, a predator of other small worms and pose no threat to the larger life forms that we place in our tanks. Of course there are exceptions. While some worms can grow large and seem threatening they are in fact a vital part of the clean up crew, taking care of unseen livestock deaths and left over food. It is this clean up service that they provide that has led to some species being labeled as fish killers as they are usually blamed for such fish losses when they are seen on the corpse of the fish doing their job of cleaning house.
Regarding the species of worm in the image you provided. It's hard to visually see from the image, but since you mentioned it was orange in coloration, and resembled an earth worm, then perhaps it's a Capitellidae species, which are found to be orange, brown, red in colorations.
The capitellids commonly known as "lugworms" resemble earthworms. They burrow in various grades of live rock or sandy mud, inhabiting mucus-lined tubes.
If you can take a better image of it, send it in, it may help to fully identify the worm.
Regards,
Dave
All Experts - Editor
http://ocreef.com - Director
biocube 8
Questionive been trying to get some questions answe and
Dead Rock with exsisting tank
QuestionQUESTION: Dear Paul, Can I put dead rocks with
sick dragonfish
QuestionHello. Ive been reading a lot about sick dragon
another question
Questionangel
QUESTION: Another question, this i
About to Buy Lights
QuestionListen, i set up a 38 gallon Aquarium, its basi
