Pix & ID: Critters that come in your rocks: the good and the bad.

[TrenchToast]

OK heh as long as they are good. My tank is swarming with them and copepods. Mainly because I don't have any fish in it yet. They are still in quarantine.

[TrenchToast]

Was looking around my tank last night after the lights went out. Found this little guy that looked a little different from the rest. Any ideas? (I'm guessing a type of shrimp maybe) it's about a 1/8" to 3/16" long


Then there are these things.. (my guess is the beginnings of Fan Worms)


This is another questionable guy.

[Moeshi]

The last ones are vermetid snails. Harmless, but can irritate corals if their population gets too dense. Arrow crabs eats them, if they should become a pest.

[TrenchToast]

Originally Posted by Moeshi

The last ones are vermetid snails. Harmless, but can irritate corals if their population gets too dense. Arrow crabs eats them, if they should become a pest.

Good thing they are only on two small pieces of dry rock that I recently put in.. Tomorrow they come out and get scraped off and down the toilet they go. heh.

[TrenchToast]

Originally Posted by Moeshi

The last ones are vermetid snails. Harmless, but can irritate corals if their population gets too dense. Arrow crabs eats them, if they should become a pest.

Good thing they are only on two small pieces of dry rock that I recently put in.. Tomorrow they come out and get scraped off and down the toilet they go. heh.

[Difrano]

Originally Posted by TrenchToast

Good thing they are only on two small pieces of dry rock that I recently put in.. Tomorrow they come out and get scraped off and down the toilet they go. heh.

Please don't flush anything dead or alive on toilets, sinks, drainage etc . Is not a way to get rid of unwanted things in this hobby is cruel for the poor thing and if it survives (most of them do) can become an issue for our ecosystem. That's how the lion fish got to Florida waters and now we can't get rid of them and they are destroying our fisheries.

If you have something you don't want try to trade or give it for free there is always somebody out there. If not kill it and bury.

[Foley01]

Any idea what this is...the damsels don't bug it and it dosent bug them. It kind of folds itself inside itself. It lives in a hole on the rock and kind of sifts through the sand. It never fully comes out of the hole

[Sugar Magnolia]

Blurry pic. Might be a harmless peanut worm.

[TrenchToast]

Originally Posted by Difrano

Please don't flush anything dead or alive on toilets, sinks, drainage etc . Is not a way to get rid of unwanted things in this hobby is cruel for the poor thing and if it survives (most of them do) can become an issue for our ecosystem. That's how the lion fish got to Florida waters and now we can't get rid of them and they are destroying our fisheries.

If you have something you don't want try to trade or give it for free there is always somebody out there. If not kill it and bury.

Ok.... I understand fish and such but these things aren't even snails... I took the rocks out this morning and they are completely hard meaning they are probably some sort of fan worm like I suspected. They were scraped off and ground up with a knife and flushed. Don't get all sentimental on me over a freaking parasite.

[homer1475]

Originally Posted by TrenchToast

Ok.... I understand fish and such but these things aren't even snails... I took the rocks out this morning and they are completely hard meaning they are probably some sort of fan worm like I suspected. They were scraped off and ground up with a knife and flushed. Don't get all sentimental on me over a freaking parasite.

They actually are snails, Vermetid snails to be exact. They build hard tubes and cast a broad "net" to capture food which it pulls back into its tube to eat.

[TrenchToast]

OK I stand corrected. Either way they are gone... I don't want a freebie possible harmful snail endangering my paid for corals.

Thanks for the correction though.

[luisedumuller]

hi guys ...
is this aiptasia ?

[getyourbone]

I woke this morning to find a damsel stuck head first in a hitchhiker that came along with some LR.

Any idea what kind of anemone this is?- the flowery looking' thing... It's currently about the size of a nickel to quarter in diameter and its body when free of the rock is about 1/2 to 3/4 in tall. It moved around 3 or 4 times before settling into a hole where it is now.

I pulled the damsel out but he only lasted an hour or two. His whole face was screwed up and his tail was a bit messed up from me grabbing him to get him out.

Thanks for any info on this critter. I guess I now know what happened to my peppermint shrimp and a couple of crabs - both of which I have found misc. pieces of but no full body.


Steve


P1040567 by getyourbone, on Flickr

[chiefifd]

Hi I bought a piece of rock with a Gregorian coral on it. After being in my 90 tank for about 9 months it growing lots of green algae and has several feather dusters? Should I take these out of the tank or try to manually remove as much of the algae and feather dusters?
Thanks for any advice....

[Moeshi]

Sorry for the bad quality. I had to zoom quite a lot to get into the right angles of my sump:
This guy has been here since forever. He doesn't move, grow, spread or bother anything it would seem. I don't feed him.


Some kind of branching algae? It started off super tiny and pitch black. Now the colour has faded, but it has grown so much compared to the little string it started as.


Regular spaghettiworm I take. It's just that I haven't seen them on the rocks before.


This little guy is super tiny. About one mm. in width and two mm. tall. I haven't seen it before, and just above it (on the same rock, but out of camera reach) is a "colony" of 3 ones as well. They don't sway in the current, nor do they seem to move at all by themselves. Algae? Polyp?


I hope you guys can tell from the blurry pictures.

Thanks

[Barny]

Are these pests?



I think this one is some kind of flower anemone.


Thank you
Tad

[cloak]

The first picture looks like a sea cucumber of some sort. These are generally harmless, but there have been reports that if one dies in your tank it could wipe out the entire system. The link below might have more information regarding this.

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2003/1/inverts

The second picture looks like a Majano anemone IMO. (pest)

http://www.lionfishlair.com/hitchhiker/hitchhiker.shtml

[Barny]

The Majano has been removed and we'll see what happens with the cucumber.
Thank you

[Karliah]

I have a sea slug/nudibranch looking thing in my tank. Unfortunately I can't get a picture, as it's only about half a centimeter (5mm) long. It is clear with brown stripes (like the stripes of a peppermint shrimp if they were brown) and looks exactly like a slug you'd see on land, with all the tentacles and stuff on the face. It also has a "bubble" on it's back.
Just seeing if anyone can ID exactly what kind it is. Or maybe has ine and has been able to take a picture. My Live rock came from the gulf of California if that helps.

[cloak]

Originally Posted by Karliah

I have a sea slug/nudibranch looking thing in my tank. Unfortunately I can't get a picture, as it's only about half a centimeter (5mm) long. It is clear with brown stripes (like the stripes of a peppermint shrimp if they were brown) and looks exactly like a slug you'd see on land, with all the tentacles and stuff on the face. It also has a "bubble" on it's back.
Just seeing if anyone can ID exactly what kind it is. Or maybe has ine and has been able to take a picture. My Live rock came from the gulf of California if that helps.

Maybe these links will help.

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-05/rs/index.php

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2004/10/inverts

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2004/12/inverts

[Karliah]

Originally Posted by cloak

Maybe these links will help.



http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-05/rs/index.php



http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2004/10/inverts



http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2004/12/inverts

Thanks! But unfortunately none of those look anything like the one in my tank. They are incredibly small, and if they are "newborns" or "juveniles" then the color ai described nay just be temporary. Not sure though as I know nothing about this family of creatures.
Fortunately, I found a second one closer to the front glass, so I got some okay pictures of it. The pictures definitely don't show the color, but sort of the shape and features.
Coupled with my description above, hopefully someone can ID them.

[ScienceRulez]

These critters just showed themselves today. Can anyone ID them?

https://goo.gl/photos/oppEy643T7EHxLjp7

The usual apology about using a cell phone camera applied here.

[TrenchToast]

Just want to confirm. Flat worm right? good, bad, ugly?


Just a cool picture of a Munnid Isopod and Copepods. I think it's cool because you can see the green algae in it's gut.

[Karliah]

Best picture I could get. He/she is right on the end of a piece of algae, sticking out into the water column. And again the picture doesn't accurately show color.

[Shawn O]

Originally Posted by Moeshi

Sorry for the bad quality. I had to zoom quite a lot to get into the right angles of my sump:
This guy has been here since forever. He doesn't move, grow, spread or bother anything it would seem. I don't feed him.

I have some of these same creatures (mine are bright red) on my rocks which seem to have appeared in the last couple of months. Started out as one and in the last few weeks has become about five. They close up when touched. One, which I assume is the same species, seems to have caught a pellet and sucked it in. It's body had elongated during feeding, looking like a tree trunk beneath the head, and I can see the pellet inside. The trunk is a transparent orange now.