hitchhiker Help

[WhoDey]

I wish I could have got a photo of this one but it was to light sensitive so I will do my best to describe the animal.

I had a green chromis who had not taken food since being introduced into my display tank and unfortunately he checked out to the big school in the sky yesterday. I noticed this right after getting home from work. I had all intentions of getting him out of the tank right after getting changed but some other duties got in the way (i.e. passing out on the couch by mistake). I wake up around midnight and realize the fish still needed to be removed. I grab my flashlight and start looking for him on the sand bed where he was earlier, but I find him being held by about a 10 inch brown spiked tentacle protruding from my rock structure. The tentacle has wrapped once around the fish and gone into the gill plate. The fish was also covered with a inch think transparent gelatinous sack that i did not notice until touching pulling it out of the water.

I am going to try and get a picture of him in the future but this one is new to me.

 

[Anonymous]

Without a picture hard to say for sure but most likely of the Class: Polychaeta (bristle worm) mostly harmless, part of the clean up crew or it was the tentacle of a Class: Asteroidea (sea star) also mostly harmless, part of the clean up crew.

Regards,
David Mohr

 

[WhoDey]

That was my first thought and I have dealt with those in the past and can ID them (for the most part, some do elude me), it was the sac of goo it was excreting around the dead fish that threw me off. Do Bristle Worms do this?

 

[MartinE]

An animal "excreating" goo, or an extremely bloated dead fish?

 

[Anonymous]

I would say it's likely a bloated dead fish, probably a little fuzzy too.

Regards,
David Mohr

 

[WhoDey]

heh, I have removed my fair share of bloated and fuzzy dead fish in my days working various LFS for many years, this was freshly dead & the gelatinous sac extended an inch past the fish in each direction and also had surface tension to it. After 4 hours that amount of decomp will not take place.

The only thing I can do is try to get a picture of it feeding next time. I am going to attempt to bait it out over the weekend.

 

[MartinE]

Hmm Well I am at a loss then. Do take a pic when you can, sounds interesting.

 

[Anonymous]

If you get close, does it look anything like this? (If it does, you might want to avoid getting too close)

 

[MartinE]

:lol: Good one.

 

[WhoDey]

If you get close, does it look anything like this? (If it does, you might want to avoid getting too close)

Thats it! I knew buying Tatooine base rock was a bad idea :mrgreen: