WHAT is THAT???

jencheung

AC Members
Jan 22, 2007
194
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Cambridge, MA
I was relaxing, having breakfast, staring at my tank calmly enjoying my morning and admiring the new Xenia I brought home yesterday... when all of a sudden this white THING comes shooting out of the rock and starts zipping around all over the tank. I mean clearly free swimming and really fast. It's about an inch and a half long. I got lucky and managed to catch it and take some pictures. On closer inspection it's clearly some type of worm, segmented and with two very prominent eyes. It has two distinct sections, a sort of head/body section and a sort of tail section. It swims with an eel like motion, with the hair like things rippling along the side of the tail section. I've attached photos for your enjoyment (2 when it stopped swimming in circles for just a brief second and you can sort of see the swimming motion in the third). Can someone please please tell me what on earth this is, if it's something I should worry about, if I'm going to see more of these erupting out of my rock etc? I've got the serious heebie jeebies! Thanks!
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I had something similar to that. it wiggles crazily all over the tank,but the one i saw was only about 1/4" long
 
I like his two litle eye balls at the end. freeky looking thing, something like blonde bristle worm, but super fast one
 
Pretty disgusting looking if you ask me. I wish I could provide you with an answer, but all I can really say is I would be looking for a way to kill it and make sure there aren't anymore in my tank.
 
Its what is commonly called a "swarmer", which is the reproductive mode of many polychaete worm species. In some species, the front section of the worm will convert to being nothing more than sperm or egg filled vessel in which to carry its payload up into the oceanic currents where it will rupture and release its payload into the ocean. Such swarmers lose all internal organs becoming nothing but a living cargo container.
For more information about such critters, please see the worm section of my hitch hiker pages.

A Hitch Hikers Guide to the Reefs

Chuck
 
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