Continuation of Cleaners eating bristleworms.

Bob I · #1 04-01-2003, 03:12 PM

It has been decided that Bristleworms are a good thing, but I have some misgivings, and some form of control would not hurt IMO. In my case the 50 appears to have no more worms unless they are in the sandbed, or inaccessible places in the rocks. The tank contains two big, fat always greedy Cleaner Shrimp (a lot more fun to watch than bristleworms BTW).

When this knucklehead peeked in the 20 the other day with a flashlight he noted the tank was polluted with bristleworms. There are no natural controls in that tank, so the BW population has exploded. Some of these things are fairly large.

I am thinking some sort of bristleworm control would not hurt, but I don't want to lose them all. I suppose I could buy a bristleworm trap to catch a limited number, but that is probably awkward,

Any ideas

Quinn · #2 04-01-2003, 03:24 PM

throw a cleaner in for a few hours/days?

Bob I · #3 04-01-2003, 04:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by teevee

throw a cleaner in for a few hours/days?

I was looking for ideas, but I have to discard that one as unworkable. Even if I had a shrimp sitting around where it was easy to catch, it would not be feasible to remove him from the 20 once the work was done.

AJ_77 · #4 04-01-2003, 04:41 PM

(All these emoticons are going to drive me batty...)

Bob, the 'natural balance' in the 20 is out of whack. Add a single cleaner shrimp and leave it in. Feed it something other than bristleworms, and it should do fine, and won't decimate the BW population then.

It could work...

Aquattro · #5 04-01-2003, 04:44 PM

Put in a length of PVC pipe with bait attached (firmly) and wait for it to fill with worms. Then post them in the fore sale forum.

Bob I · #6 04-01-2003, 04:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AJ_77

(All these emoticons are going to drive me batty...)

aquamansilver · #7 04-01-2003, 05:28 PM

Thanks for the link.
http://www.crazypics.de/smilies/

smokinreefer · #8 04-01-2003, 05:39 PM

yeah, whats up with all the smilies lately?

anyhow, i agree that something is outta whack in the 20. one factor is food. the BW have to have enough food to sustain such a large population. so you may want to try cutting down on the feedings. and yeah, i believe cleaners are predators of BW, well atleast of small ones.
so the introduction of a cleaner may be a good idea...it can help control the growth and production of the little ones, the larger ones will survive and continue to breed, but their numbers will be controlled by the cleaner.
eventually if food input is controlled, some larger ones will die off, or maybe cannabilized by others, and you should at some point end up with a balance of large and small BW. make sense?

FWIW, i have rarely seen small bristle worms in my display, which has cleaner shrimp. i've only seen faily large ones in there, but my refugium has small ones in it.

HTH