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Unread 04/25/2012, 05:50 PM   #1
ganjero
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Fire bristle worms or ?

These look to me like fire bristle worms, am I correct? or what kind are they?


Thanks


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Unread 04/25/2012, 10:11 PM   #2
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Yes those are bristle worms.


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Unread 04/26/2012, 05:43 AM   #3
ganjero
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what kind is what Im looking for?


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Unread 04/26/2012, 06:40 AM   #4
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Bristleworms. Definitely not fireworms.


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Unread 04/26/2012, 07:04 AM   #5
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Sugar Magnolia View Post
Bristleworms. Definitely not fireworms.
That's good to hear but how can you tell the difference? Most pics that I found online for bristle fireworms are very similar


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Unread 04/26/2012, 11:09 AM   #6
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ganjero View Post
Most pics that I found online for bristle fireworms are very similar
It's hard to differentiate the 2. When we say bristle, we normally mean Eurythoe complanata. What people refer to as fireworm, it's normally Hermodice carunculata. Assuming that's what you are trying to distinguish, there are a couple of things you can do:

1. Look carefully at the head of the worm. If the head shows the caruncle or fringe of tentacles, it's a Hermodice carunculata. This is a distinguishing characteristic from the Eurythoe complanata.

2. The other thing you can do is to observe it's feeding behavior. Hermodice carunculata has no jaw so feeding is a prolonged process where the worm typically swallow part of the corals and lick off the flesh. If you haven't observe the worm attacking your corals this way, it's probably not a Hermodice carunculata.

What you have appear to be a fairly harmless Eurythoe complanata.


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Unread 04/26/2012, 12:01 PM   #7
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I have a good pic of carunculata:



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Unread 04/26/2012, 02:45 PM   #8
ganjero
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Quote:
Originally Posted by dzhuo View Post
It's hard to differentiate the 2. When we say bristle, we normally mean Eurythoe complanata. What people refer to as fireworm, it's normally Hermodice carunculata. Assuming that's what you are trying to distinguish, there are a couple of things you can do:

1. Look carefully at the head of the worm. If the head shows the caruncle or fringe of tentacles, it's a Hermodice carunculata. This is a distinguishing characteristic from the Eurythoe complanata.

2. The other thing you can do is to observe it's feeding behavior. Hermodice carunculata has no jaw so feeding is a prolonged process where the worm typically swallow part of the corals and lick off the flesh. If you haven't observe the worm attacking your corals this way, it's probably not a Hermodice carunculata.

What you have appear to be a fairly harmless Eurythoe complanata.
I have not seen them out “attacking corals” , I found those in a rock that I took out of my tank and they started coming out. I also see I have a few in my overflow. I see that the Eurythoe complanata is a type fireworm but you say they are harmless?, I guess you never stop learning new things in this hobby.

Thanks for the info


Quote:
Originally Posted by Sk8r View Post
I have a good pic of carunculata:
Thanks for the pic, I also found your post that give a little more information about the nasty fireworms Hermodice carunculata, how they come from the Atlantic and are rare in the hobby since most of our stuff comes from the pacific; not sure if this has changed much in the hobby.

Can humans get stung by the bristles of a Eurythoe complanata?



Last edited by ganjero; 04/26/2012 at 02:54 PM.
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Unread 04/26/2012, 03:15 PM   #9
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yes you can be stung by them.


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Unread 04/26/2012, 03:19 PM   #10
dzhuo
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ganjero View Post
I see that the Eurythoe complanata is a type fireworm but you say they are harmless?
The term fireworms and bristle worms are used very loosely in the hobby and for good reason because they are hard to differentiate especially with just a few (blurry) pictures. For most of us, this isn't a problem because the majority of them encountered are Eurythoe complanata and they are harmless in the sense that they are not predator. Hermodice carunculata, on the other hand, can do lots of damage. For example, Witman (1988) calculated that tissue predation by this worm on Milleporid Hydrocorals exposed 12.9 cm2 per 1 m2 per day of skeleton to algal colonization. Hermodice carunculata has also been observed to feed on anemones and lots of soft corals regularly.

Quote:
Originally Posted by ganjero View Post
Can humans get stung by the bristles of a Eurythoe complanata?
You can get stung by both Eurythoe complanata and Hermodice carunculata. In fact, you can get stung by just about any Amphinomidae which both of them belong to the same family.


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