It's so big...

[alienzx]

For a small 5 gallon tank I just saw the largest bristle worm ever. Must be at least 4" long and rather thick. What worries me is that I seem to remember somehting about them going after small fish. And I just added a Royal Gamma as the sole inhabitant.

Should I be worried?

 

[alienzx]

Well, something got the gamma last night. D*mnit. Guess I'll have to go fishing for bristle worms, unless you think a Fire Shrimp could be the culprit.

 

[Fozza]

I have bristleworm"s" around that size and have a small clown goby and they haven't touched him.

 

[wade1]

It would be very rare for a detritivore like a bristleworm to go after a fish... unless its already dead. I would think its the tank itself or the fish's poor health to start that are the culprits.

 

[alienzx]

I would tend to agree, but everything in the tank is thriving, and I watched the royal at the pet store over a week, always ate, not really skittish. Acclimated him nice and slowly with a dripline. Saw him in the rocks the day before and his skeleton the next.



I just thought cause it was such a small tank maybe the bristle had an easier time getting to it.

 

[wade1]

Main issue is that they don't have any mechanism by which to capture or do damage to a fish. They don't have giant pincers or poisinous rays or the like.

Its one thing for them to eat a coral, quite another a healthy fish. Even the first nibble would have set the fish to running.

I'm still voting on another factor.

Wade

 

[Fozza]

You may have a hitchhiker crab or something, I really don't think its the bristleworm.

 

[yoh]

bristleworms are friggin HARMLESS!!!

 

[alienzx]

Fair enough, I'll see what I can find when the lights go out, look for other prospects.