thin hair sized tentacles

[tdtiger]

Hi Doc, need some help here. I got this large piece of lr that from one hole I can see 6 very thin tentacles about 3-4 inches long maybe longer. At first I thought they were seperate worms. But remembering that every few hrs or so something in that same piece of LR spits out a cloud of brown debry. They look like they have white dots. When one of the tentacles get some stuff attached to it it pulls that tentacle back into the hole. I cant get a picture of it cz they are so fine and light in color.

Any ideas?

[rshimek]

Hi,

More than likely they are hair worms (cirratulid polychaete worms) living in the rocks.

See this article (http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2002-06/rs/index.htm) to learn a bit about them.

:D

[tdtiger]

Awesome Dr. Ron. Thanks for the info. It looks very similar to Figure 2. Except not that many feeding tentacles. I can see it retracting a tentacle with stuff attached to it.

But they are a good thing and safe to keep because they are detrivores? I also have two tubes about 1 inch extending out from the LR with what looks like two antennas. But might be the hair worm described with two large feeding tentacles.

[rshimek]

Hi,

Detritivores are the majority of the so-called "clean up" crew. Yes, they are a good thing.

Re" The tubes with two tentacles extending from them" These are most likely small Phyllochaetopterus worms inside the tubes they construct. These worms are also generally beneficial. Read a bit about them in my article in the May, 2003, issue of <b><a href="http://reefkeeping.com" target="_blank">Reefkeeping Magazine</a></b>.

[tdtiger]

THANKS AGAIN DOC! It's great having someone like you with so much knowledge to help out others.