best fish to control bristle worms?

[Julio]

Hello,
can you guys recomend the best fish to control bristle worms? i hav ea large outbreak.
Julio

[Peter Schmiedel]

Hi,

this depends a lot of the size of the worms, the size of your tank and what are you keeping in it.

Most of the bigger wrasse eat them, but they also like to re arrange your tank.

Smaller bristle worms are eaten by the shrimp Stenopus hispidius.

We also have report "kills" of bristle worms by the psitol shrimp Alepheus bisinctus.

All have their advantages and disadvantages - depends on your tank setting.

[Julio]

well i have a 90 gallon reef and all i have in there are 3 tangs and 4chromis, oh yeah and 2 perculas. I was thinking of adding an orchid dottyback since they are small and relatively peaceful.
julio

[Peter Schmiedel]

Well, I was more thinking of corals ect.

Three tangs is quite a lot for a tank...

P.fridmani i really "relative" peacefull. You should consider to keep them as a couple.

[Julio]

why would 2 be best instead of one?

[Peter Schmiedel]

Thing of you being alone on a small island ... would'nt you go made without a partner and starting to beat up other plants etc ???

Any tank siezed coral fish which has the possibility of showing and "living" social interaction with the same species will most likly not turn out to be a "mad-new-fish-killer"

[Julio]

lol

[EdKruzel]

Julio,
Why do you want to rid your tank of bristleworms?

Of the thousands of species out there, only a few rare species harm sessile inverts.

Most are common scavengers. Bristleworms do not have mandibles; therefore they can only eat very tiny objects or decayed matter.
They are highly beneficial to most tanks.

If you must rid them from your tank, then try one of the following:

Pseudochromis
Banded Coral Shrimp
Arrow Crab

Take Care,
Ed

[Julio]

there are way too many and last night i saw them attacking one of my cucumbers.
Julio

[EdKruzel]

They don't attack live animals.

Check out this site:
http://www.rshimek.com/reef/sediment.htm

Here you'll read about the benefits of worms and other fauna within your system.

If you wish to thin the "heard", just place some shrimp or hamburger in a weighted nylon. The next morning you will have tons of them stuck with their bristles in the fabric. Just dicard the entire nylon and start over until you've reached a satisfactory amount.

Good luck,
Ed

[dragon_slayer]

IME bristle worms tend to overpopulate and then self reduce levels in the aquarium from time to time. i would just leave it alone and let nature take its corse.

if the population survives then you are overfeeding your tank or have something quite large decaying somewhre in the tank.

kc

[Julio]

well according to that link you gave me they have them classified as fire worms , not the dark looking one but the one with the bright red front segment of its body.
Julio

[EdKruzel]

Fireworms, bristleworms, they are all common names referred to the many closely related species of polychaete worms.

They are really nothing to worry about.

Take care,
Ed

[Peter Schmiedel]

Originally posted by EdKruzel

If you must rid them from your tank, then try one of the following:

Pseudochromis
Ed

Ed,

would you kindly go in more deatail on that? Which species?
I have never heard about that and are really interessed in more news.

[Peter Schmiedel]

Originally posted by EdKruzel

They are really nothing to worry about.
Ed

Ed,

I totally agree if they are small. But one the reached a size of more than 4 inch I consider them as a potential danger for my fish.

My Pseudanthias parvirostris suffer once in the while form very bad bite in the tailfin (deep up to the fin base). That only happend over night - except the huge bristle worms I have no other potential candidate for doing that.

We also have reports of huge worms killing Tridacna , Gorgonia and even eating corals. Of copurse I consider this as a unnatural behavior caused do to straving / not finding the proper food. What I want to say is, that they are not all potential killers, but you never know.

[Preds]

Pseudochromis such as P. fridmani and P. flavivertex are reported to eat bristleworms. I think they tend only to eat small bristleworms though.

I've never made any attempt to rid my tank of any bristleworms.

[Peter Schmiedel]

Thanks for the feedback.

P.fridmani really surpises me in that sence ??!! Have you ever seen them in the wild? They live in rather deeper water and mostly in caves. I often found them quite away from the next ground part. As I expect most britle worms live in the gravel it would be unusal that fridmani eat these worms.

Very interessting!! I will start a poll on the german forum to see if anyone had similar experience.

[Julio]

well this is not something new, atleast i don't think, i do remember when i had my orchid dottyback i never had a bristle worm problem, but now they are everywhere.
Julio

[EdKruzel]

Hello Peter,
These worms and others live in almost every portion of the sea, not just in the substrate.
Most species are harmless even at some of the larger sizes.
I have several in excess of 8''s in a tiny 37gal reef.
They are thick in the body and quickly appear each time I feed.
The body has some red but is mostly a beautiful silver/blue.

There is a coral eating species in the Caribbean; however it is rare due to the fact that it is illegal to harvest rock or hard corals from that area.

I have seen worms in tanks over 5' in length and still harmless.
With the exception of the above mentioned these worms do not have mandibles or any other device for biting or chewing.

The Pseudochromis family as a whole is good about eating these tiny worms (and any small fauna member) however awards go out in the order of P. spingeri, P. aldabraensis, P. flavivertex.

If you continue to have fish injured at night, I would set crab traps out. Many predatory crabs hitch-hike on rock and coral and go unnoticed for months and maybe longer before they are large enough to do damage.

Take care,
Ed

[nodtroll]

this is what i used to control my outbreak a coral banded shrimp an arrow crab and a sunrise dottyback but if you need a bigger fish to help i would try a bird wrasse it did wonders for my bro's tank well if this will probably get it done.:bum: :strooper: :uzi: :blown: :thumbsup:

[Julio]

thanks