polychaetes as food?

[stepho]

Hello everyone.

I have been reading some very old books about stomatopods. Most of the names have changed, like Gonodactylus bredini is now Neogonodactylus wennerae or Neogonodactylus bredini, and O. havanensis is no longer considered a O. brevirostris, but it is quite interesting to read.

I believe the name of the book is: "Memoirs of the Hourglass Cruises: volume 3 part 2 Stomatopod Crustacea" by David K. Camp

It is a scientific research study from the west coast of florida in 1973. One of the things I found particularly interesting, they made a chart of the stomach contents for various species. Most of the species had eaten polychaetes, and some spearers seemed to have preyed heavily on polychaetes.

That got me thinking. Since most of us have reef tanks brimming with polychaetes, think we could catch some and offer them to our stomatopods to make their diet more natural?

[Koshmar]

I've got a question. What are polychaetes?

[ritter6788]

I've got a question. What are polychaetes?

Worms

[Gonodactylus]

Many species will eat polychaets. I sometimes buy pile worms at local bait stores and feed them to Hemisquilla. In the field, I've watched Hemisquilla foraging on a variety of annelids.

Gut analysis tricky. Much of what you find in a stomatopod's stomach is so macerated that it is impossible to identify. However, some hard parts do persist such as polychaet bristles and fish scales. This can give a misleading view of what and how many items the stomatopod has eaten.

Roy