Is this an animal or a vegetable?

Gretchacha · Oct 15, 2023

I moved a rehabilitated pavona to my DT that I thought had some kind of red algae on it. But today after feeding the tank, I have a feeling it looks more like a filter feeder of sorts with two winged appendages. Could it be a sponge?

It’s about 5 mm long and 2-3 mm wide I would guess.

The coral had bleached in the DT months ago upon trying to improve the shimmer in the tank by increasing lighting. It slowly recovered in a low-tech Evo 13.5 with stock lights on a dimmer. But, there are still some uneven patches if growth, and I thought some algae/cyano/dino/diatom had gotten a hold of a raw edge. I used a dental too to scrape the edge before transferring to the DT, but this thing is still on it. And today I think it looks like an animal.

Friend or foe?

vaguelyreeflike · Oct 15, 2023

That’s a feather duster, friend for sure! It’s a species of worm that builds a tube around itself for protection, if you touch or scare it, it will suck the feather duster part back in.

Filter feeder who loves reef roids and similar sized foods, harmless to corals in my experience. You will see new ones pop up over time!

They can be super sensitive to meds like prazipro and any worm-targeting medications

Here’s a couple of the ones I have at work (there’s two sharing the tube)

EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal · Oct 15, 2023

vaguelyreeflike said:
That’s a feather duster, friend for sure! It’s a species of worm that builds a tube around itself for protection, if you touch or scare it, it will suck the feather duster part back in.

Filter feeder who loves reef roids and similar sized foods, harmless to corals in my experience. You will see new ones pop up over time!

They can be super sensitive to meds like prazipro and any worm-targeting medications

Here’s a couple of the ones I have at work (there’s two sharing the tube)

I'm fairly sure the OP is asking about the red "bulb" growing on the pavona...