Bristleworm and Snail Friends

Arrow points to the bristlewormWhile watching the reef aquarium with A tonight, I watched as the enormous turbo snail padded along the front glass.  He’s grown a lot since he was added to the tank; he’s at least 2.5 inches across.  Then I noticed- there is a small bristle worm living in his shell!  I tried to take a picture that would really show the two, but my stupid camera would not focus on the right spot and by the time I went to read the owner’s manual, the snail had shuffled off elsewhere.  Too bad, or I would have found a cutsie interspecies picture page and posted it.

Hopefully the tank’s not too infested; bristleworms can either be harmless or can grow to be a giant nuisance.  Speaking of infestations, my tank is so full of Aiptasia that I’m considering giving up on keeping any other sessile animals.  The remedies I have tried are either ineffective or they require injecting each anemone.  Anyone with an infestation can tell you that it would take hours to inject all 300+ of them, and who knows if it will work, or just release stinging cells into the water and poison the tank.

Buying a copperband butterfly (Chelmon rostratus) to eat them just seems irresponsible, as the butterflies often die soon after their natural food is gone.  I recently read that the seagrass filefish (Acreichthys tomentosus) is hardier, plus they are such unusual fish.  I can’t find anyone who sells them though.

Does anyone have any bright ideas?

6 thoughts on “Bristleworm and Snail Friends

  1. joes juice or you can use kalkwasser which is 500% cheaper and works identically. To kill them you should not inject just sprinkle it all over their face, thats it. Don’t forget to turn off all filtration. With the kalk. use a 1 oz. size resealable bottle, fill it 2/3 W/ kalk. then fill w/ tap water and shake, and you have joes juice for pennies. Sprinkle is best when applied W/ a syringe w/ an attachable plastic tip. when finished seal 1 oz. bottle and clean syringe w/ tap water. Happy Aiptasia killing KK

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