Bristle worms
 

Just wondering about these guys. Just added the rock in today to my 5 gallon nano reef and these guys popped out. I've heard mixed things, the main worry is how big they'll get. Any advice would be awesome. Keep them or no? There's a few smaller red ones, kind of shiny. And then there's the big purple one.

There great scavengers and will tell you if you over feeding or to much detritus in tank as there number will rise and fall

Pull out the big ones

Free cuc

That's assuming you can catch the little buggers , when they're in the sand they are pretty quick.

Thanks guys. The biggest one right now, at least that I've seen, is about 3-4 inches. Then there's maybe 3 smaller red ones. I here they get rather large though, are they fast growers?

I have some in my DT and frag tanks, I would say don't worry about them. There ugly but are part of what's in the marine world. I say leave them alone as they serve a useful purpose as part of the cleanup crew. My opinion only. :wink:

One of them or maybe a few, ate the whole bottom of my small clam in only one night. The clam looked great the night before, then in the morning it was missing half of it. They can get into small clams and eat them, even if they are healthy. Large clams are not such a problem.

It's the only time I had problems with them but darn, that was one of my favorite clam. I also got my fingers full of needles a few times when doing maintenance.

Not that I doubt you but. Maybe it was fire worm?

Here's a picture of the other ones that are in there. Are they fire worms or just bristle worms? New to the hobby, so I'm rather curious :razz:

Here's a good video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_KbY2-hV_4

I for one really don't like them although generally considered peaceful and good CuC I really dislike the look of them and have strived to eradicate them as soon as I find them