Eunicid worms - are they all bad? Anyone have a bad experience with this one?

[SFREEF3R]

I was a little puzzled at first because I couldn't see the signature white band near the head or the antennae. I wasn't sure if it was just contracted. In the image below it was something like 3 inches, which is much smaller than it extended when searching for food.

 

[SFREEF3R]

Mystery solved - a few hours later (lights still full on) I was looking in the tank and found its head walking aimlessly about. As best I can guess, it had started to extend into the neighboring rock where the Zoas live and when I removed the rock it was torn. In trying to handle the tail of the worm, I was shocked at how fragile these things are - trying to pick it up with tweezers as gently as I could I still managed to break it into multiple pieces.

Since it never comes out in the day time I can only imagine it was totally disoriented after being sheared in half.

I quickly reached in and scooped out another inch or so of worm. Pretty sure I lucked out here as I know they can grow back from a fragment.

 

[Chrisv.]

 

[Chrisv.]

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[monicalooze]

I have at least two of this variety of what I believe to be Eunicid worms. That was my best guess using this helpful guide (please weigh in if you have a different ID!):

Worm Hitch Hikers

The identification of Worms found within live rock and live sand

chucksaddiction.thefishestate.net

Poking around in forums it looks like folks generally freak out if they found one of these, but my understanding is that there are 100's of species and most are harmless (though some can grow large and be a problem like the infamous bobbit worm).

Has anyone had an experience with one that resembles this guy?

Looks like it makes some kind of mucus, but it doesn't appear caked in sand as I've seen in some other examples. I mostly see it chomping away at the rock and haven't seen it actively eat anything of size. It's not tiny though - the exposed portion in the most fully extended picture was 1.5-2" or so (so presumably it's quite a bit larger).

I wish I could help, but I don't know. However, I'd love to know where you purchased the live rock. I'm going this route for my new build, and your rock looks like it's teeming with life.

 

[Goaway]

Sorry the worm decided your zoas are good food source. Thank you for updating. This may help others if they want to try and keep a eunicid sp.

 

[SFREEF3R]

I wish I could help, but I don't know. However, I'd love to know where you purchased the live rock. I'm going this route for my new build, and your rock looks like it's teeming with life.

I got the rock from Gulf Live Rock. I highly recommend.

I opted to have the rock shipped in water and picked it up myself from the airport to minimize any shipping delay. Some of the macro that came in has been consumed and few species of sponge didn't make it long term (not unexpected) - but most stuff is thriving 8 months in. There are some more images of the rock on my build thread here.

 

[monicalooze]

I got the rock from Gulf Live Rock. I highly recommend.

I opted to have the rock shipped in water and picked it up myself from the airport to minimize any shipping delay. Some of the macro that came in has been consumed and few species of sponge didn't make it long term (not unexpected) - but most stuff is thriving 8 months in. There are some more images of the rock on my build thread here.

Thanks! I'm gonna check out your thread. Im planning on shipped in water as well. It's just hard to know which place to choose!

Are you happy with the porosity and the shapes?

 

[SFREEF3R]

Are you happy with the porosity and the shapes?

For the most part yes - on all but one small piece all the surfaces were covered with tons of nooks and crannies (the one smaller piece had a few flat surfaces with no holes)

It is however quite dense - I tried to break up one of the pieces with a chisel and gave up. It required so much force I was worried I'd kill everything in the process.

Communication was a little spotty with the contact there, but they were able to accommodate some requests around size and shapes of the rock.