The Official Asylum Reef Tank Thread

[sikk50]

My tank has bristle worms that are orange and you can see a blueish vein that runs down them. They're pretty fun to watch at night. They never harm anything, but when I'm cleaning and see them I generaly pull them out. They're quite the clean up crew though, when my shimp shed, they eat the shell. When a fish dies, they eat the body.

[Wolfgang]

Originally Posted by sikk50

My tank has bristle worms that are orange and you can see a blueish vein that runs down them. They're pretty fun to watch at night. They never harm anything, but when I'm cleaning and see them I generaly pull them out. They're quite the clean up crew though, when my shimp shed, they eat the shell. When a fish dies, they eat the body.

Yup standard bristle worms are great reef scavangers. In my experience they dont harm anything unless they over populate the tank which could lead to a nitrate problem. But all in all they are a GREAT cuc supplemented with snails (and SOME crabs)

For enyone interested here is an article identifying different types of polychaete worms.

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-04/rs/index.php

Interesting article on fireworms. The picture I took looks like it was the first kind and I also have thousands of the second kind. Who knows what else is in there. I have seen them spawn a few times.