Fire worms are highly venomous, and are not usually found
in reef tanks. Regular bristle worms iritate you with a
mild venomous spines, but fire worms will make your hand
swell.


Wayne Sallee
Wayne's Pets



Tidepool Geek wrote on 3/25/2006 10:29 AM:
Hi Folks,

Many people are uncomfortable with 'scientific' nomenclature but it
really comes in handy for avoiding confusion in discussions like this
one.

When we say "Bristle Worms" we're talking about Polychaete Annelids
and usually 'Errant' (free living) polychaete annelids. There are
something like 10,000 known species of polychaetes and likely
thousands more that haven't yet been described. Setting aside the
sedentary (tube dwelling) polychaetes there are still many thousands
of different bristleworms out there.

The vast majority of the worms that are seen in aquaria are, at worst,
neutral and most of them are definitely beneficial as scavengers and
detrivores. There are a few predators in the wormy world but most of
them are fairly easily identified.

Fireworms are one group of polychaetes (around 120 species) that are
quite common in reef tanks and, like polychaetes in general, are
mostly beneficial.

The original question on this thread was something like "My bristle
worms have disappeared. What should I do?" First, if you haven't
already, look at your tank after the lights go out using a red
filtered flashlight. Many of these worms are pretty strictly nocturnal
and are almost unbelievably good at hiding out during the 'daylight'
hours. If you still can't find any worms in your tank, I'd suggest
looking into one or more of the Detrivore Kits that are available from
various sources. If you have access to a local aquarium club, I'm sure
that other members would be glad to help you out - especially since
there are still a lot of aquarists that assume all worms to be bad
actors.

If your worm population did indeed disappear, I would take that as a
sign that you may have been underfeeding your tank. I'm assuming that
you don't have a large population of worm predators (Arrow crabs?).
Once you get the worm population reestablished you might find it
beneficial to, not only the worms, but the rest of your animals to up
the feeding just a bit.

Here are links to a series of articles on worms in general and worms
in aquaria:

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-03/rs/index.php
http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-04/rs/index.php
http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-05/rs/index.php

Vermiciously yours,

Alex