Bristle worm problem

inadaze · #1 08/25/2006, 01:16 PM

Hello,
I have a 50 gal tank with one Astrea snail, 5 or 6 tiny hermit crabs (blue leg mostly), a false percula clown and a coral beauty(only 1 week in the aquarium) and a pretty serious bristle worm problem.
I have been seeing them in my aquarium for a few months now and I thought it was a good thing until I came across an article about them. The article said that they were a menace in the aquarium and I continued to search only to find lots of complaints on forums and the like about how bad they are. So....
I read a few ways to get rid of them:
-some dottybacks or wrasses
-arrowhead crab
-Scarlet shrimp (i think that was the name)
-and various traps along with actually physical removal.

Could anyone suggest a method that they may have had some success with? I would try the crab or shrimp but they seem to be just as big a problem with eating fish and inverts. I was planning on putting a dottyback in eventually, is there a specific one that is good?
Any help is appreciated,

thanks
Jason

drillsar · #2 08/25/2006, 01:18 PM

To my knowledge bristle worms are good some are bad but very little are, I think if they get big then they could be a problem.

They have some traps they sell. Some people buy bristle worms.

Reefer421 · #3 08/25/2006, 01:19 PM

Do you get bristles in your fingers when you clean the tank? Just a question because that happens to me and I am not sure why.

ahmer1781 · #4 08/25/2006, 01:50 PM

ummm getting bristles and bristleworms are very different...do NOT touch the bristleworms EVER....they can be venemous and can cause serious skin allergy, i have one rather large bristle worm and the other day i noticed another one, i bought Trap'Em bristleworm trap, it trapped one of them and another, then by the time I woke up the next morning...they were gone....i tried the trap a few more times and no luck, for now i'm leaving the worms in there until they cause me problems, other than that they do keep the nitrates down

Sk8r · #5 08/25/2006, 01:52 PM

They sting people, not corals. I have maybe a hundred or more in my 52g sps/lps fishtank, and value them extremely---they probably saved me from losing corals this summer when a mega-snail died under the rockwork: clean by morning, and no nitrate at all.
There are a couple of bad worms, but they don't occur in groups: they may in fact eat other worms, so if you've got a lot of worms instead of one nasty fat single, you've got the common Pacific Bristleworm, an asset to your aquarium.

bertoni · #6 08/25/2006, 02:17 PM

In any tank with live rock, there are probably thousands of bristleworms. Most all of them are good to have. This article might help:

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

Reefer421 · #7 08/25/2006, 02:23 PM

I get small clear bristles in my fingers when I clean the tank. Even just cleaning the filters if I do not wear gloves. They almost look like cactus spines and break easily when you try to remove them. I can not seem to find out what they are. Someone suggested bristle worms one time, but I have only seen 1 bristle worm ever. I don't even see them in there in the middle of the night.

Does anyone have any idea what could be causing these bristles?

druce · #8 08/25/2006, 02:44 PM

I've gots dozens of bristleworms and never had any issues.

Reefer421 · #9 08/25/2006, 02:47 PM

I was also told it may be a type of sponge. I just don't understand how they get all in my filters. I really want to fix this problem. Any suggestions are appreciated.

inadaze · #10 08/25/2006, 03:04 PM

oh great! I was really starting to worry because I have an uncountable number of them in my system. And I have seen them clean out a dead snail's shell really fast so I guess they are an asset.

Thanks,
Jason

Sk8r · #11 08/25/2006, 03:07 PM

Bristles in the fingers: very likely bristleworms. Wash some latex gloves [removing any talc] and dry them: wear those while working and they should be ok.

Reefer421 · #12 08/25/2006, 03:16 PM

Is this a common problem? Why do some tanks have them and others do nat have the bristles? I have ahd people with 100's of worms tell me they do not get bristles. I don't understand. I guess this is one of those things I may never really know for sure.

druce · #13 08/25/2006, 03:20 PM

unless you start with bare rock and dead snad and meticulously clean everything that goes into your tank, I think at one time or another you'll probably get them.

They hide in rocks and probably bases of coral, so if your LFS has them in the tank with the rock/coral you may end up with them.

I suppose if you got livestock that ate them and trapped all you could find, slowly you could erradicate them.

Not a bad thing tho, they keep your sand stirred and your dead creatures eaten

Reefer421 · #14 08/25/2006, 03:26 PM

I don't mind the worms at all, I just hate when I get stuck with these thorns. I don't think about getting gloves and grab the filters to rinse them and get between 1 and 100 of these thorns in my fingers.

SeanySean · #15 08/25/2006, 03:28 PM

I have hundreds of them and never had problems with bristles in my fingers, however, I have had something sharp stab and cut my finger before from picking up LR, I just use the gloves from my LFS that are really long like I am working on some radioactive experiment.... Gfriend hates them

silversnake · #16 08/25/2006, 09:44 PM

the neon dottyback is best bristleworm eater it is their favorite food. Its also a very beautiful fish.

familyreefer · #17 08/25/2006, 11:31 PM

I remove every one I find with forceps. At one time I had what seemed like thousands of em. I feel like for every 1 you see there are 10 that you don't. We all have em but I don't want to see em crawling all over the place.

antdog · #18 08/26/2006, 09:25 AM

I've found that I have a few in my tank as well. I know that for the most part they're beneficial, but I have read that the larger ones can be a problem. I came across a fairly decent sized ones after I added some LR to my tank. I found a lot of info about bristle worm traps but the simplest one I found was a homemade one made from a tall plastic coke/water bottle. Just take the plastic bottle. Cut the top part of the bottle off right below where it starts to get small towars the top. Cut it to where you can invert the top and stick the funnel shaped portion down into the bottle. Then all you do is put some food in the bottle before lights out and lean it against a rock (you may have to put a small rock to keep from floating). When you wake in the morning you should have bristle worms in the bottle! Also, another tip would be to drill or make some sort of whole in the screw on cap of the bottle, so that only bristle worms can get in and NOT your snails or crabs. Hope this helps!

KH971 · #19 08/26/2006, 04:16 PM

How are you getting bristles in your fingers? Are you actually picking up the worms? The bristles from a worm are not hard and should not be able to penetrate skin.

bertoni · #20 08/26/2006, 05:46 PM

The spines in fireworms are calcium carbonate, and can penetrate skin. That's one reason I wear gloves when working in the tank.

mfp4073 · #21 08/26/2006, 11:29 PM

I have picked up several of my bristleworms and never been stung or gotten "spines". Are some species more unfriendly to handling than others?

essexboy73 · #22 08/27/2006, 05:40 AM

the red ones are the bad ones...

Reefer421 · #23 08/28/2006, 12:05 PM

The only one I have seen is pink.

daveverdo · #24 08/28/2006, 12:51 PM

Just curious.

How big is a BIG bristleworm? Are we talking the Alaskan Bull worm that even Sandy cound not handle?

Seriuosly, how big is big?

Dave

bertoni · #25 08/28/2006, 05:15 PM

I've seen one at least 12" long in my tank, with more in the rock. Several feet long is not that uncommon, I guess, for some species.