At what point, if any, do you remove a bristle worm?

[Reffetsevla]

Researching fire and bristle worms I was curious if anyone, at a certain size (or other reason), starts removing bristle worms? Obviously you want fire worms out if possible IMO. I have a 20g AIO and there are two exceedingly large bristle worms in the tank, never hurt anything but obviously loving the extra feeding I was doing when I was trying to raise my NO3 and PO4. Now that the tank has established more, there is far less excess for them to eat. I don't expect they would harm anything, I've never had one do anything egregious. However I am a bit curious if some people remove them to allow smaller ones to take it's place and get into smaller areas, or if they just let them go?

FWIW, I've always just ignored them unless a fireworm or a suspected one. Ugly little guys but scavenge well!

 

[jonnythekid]

Yeah I have a 20 aio as well I usually leave them alone but when there’s too many I’ll remove 2or 3 to keep the pop low. I don’t mind them because I feed like crazy and they help

 

[ZoWhat]

When they stick their heads out of the water and ask

"Whats for dinner?"

 

[G Santana]

I know I have a few, but I would only consider removing when they become unsightly having reached plague proportions. At that stage they become easy to remove with a simple bottle trap.

 

[MtnDewMan]

Keep them, even if large they are great sifters.

 

[Reffetsevla]

I don't have any reason to remove them per se, just curious what everyone else does. If common place to do so at a certain size I would definitely consider. Seems to be the consensus to just let them do their thing and don't remove unless you find an actual reason to, same info based on research too. I like peoples opinions though, soooo many ways to do things in this hobby. Always fun finding out how other people are achieving success, or failure in most my cases lol

 

[Sink_or_Swim]

I don't have any reason to remove them per se, just curious what everyone else does. If common place to do so at a certain size I would definitely consider. Seems to be the consensus to just let them do their thing and don't remove unless you find an actual reason to, same info based on research too. I like peoples opinions though, soooo many ways to do things in this hobby. Always fun finding out how other people are achieving success, or failure in most my cases lol

I have one that has grown pretty fast (it's maybe 5-6" right now but not 100% sure because I've never seen it come all the way out of its rock). As far as I know, it is the only one in my tank. Creeps me out. If it gets really big, I'll probably be coming for it with a trap, lol.

 

[Anemone_Fanatic]

When the family cat goes missing.

 

[DHill6]

I take them out when I see them. I don’t need them in there for scavenging, there’s a lot of red banded trochius for that. After the Eunice experience, all worms must exit!

 

[Sean Clark]

Constantly. I have a little trap in my smaller setup that I remove daily full of them. Not that they are bad, just unsightly.

One of the reasons I am so strict on qt for the new systen now.

 

[Nemo&Friends]

In my LRWFO tank I leave them alone. In the tank where I am trying to grow macroalgae, I remove them as they eat it.

 

[kdx7214]

I don't have any and would love to. Hate to have to pay to get a couple, but might have to.

 

[DHill6]

I have a small 3 d printed trap, purchased from someone here. It floats, had to put a rock on it and I didn’t catch a thing. I use tweezers and catch those tiny things when I see them.

 

[Soren]

I don't have any and would love to. Hate to have to pay to get a couple, but might have to.

How did you start your tank? It does not seem hard at all to obtain bristleworms in this hobby.

Maybe you can get some cheap from those that trap them. If I knew a good way to ship them, I'd be glad to send some extras even though I do not mind them and want them for the clean-up crew benefits.

 

[areefer01]

Researching fire and bristle worms I was curious if anyone, at a certain size (or other reason), starts removing bristle worms? Obviously you want fire worms out if possible IMO. I have a 20g AIO and there are two exceedingly large bristle worms in the tank, never hurt anything but obviously loving the extra feeding I was doing when I was trying to raise my NO3 and PO4. Now that the tank has established more, there is far less excess for them to eat. I don't expect they would harm anything, I've never had one do anything egregious. However I am a bit curious if some people remove them to allow smaller ones to take it's place and get into smaller areas, or if they just let them go?

FWIW, I've always just ignored them unless a fireworm or a suspected one. Ugly little guys but scavenge well!

When? Never.

Every reefer has their own limits but with regards to bristle worms the more the merrier.

 

[LeftyReefer]

I don't have any type of creepy crawly worms in my tank either.
Only type of "worm" I have in my tank is spirorbids. They got through my QT process before I knew what they were.

I would remove a bristle worm if I ever saw one in my tank.

 

[Double monti 61]

Don’t kill the whale it’s good for your system small life makes the hobby more interesting.

 

[Nano sapiens]

I usually let them be, but do remove some of the population when I notice the worms stealing food from the corals.

Interestingly, my aquarium's long standing bristle worm population has been drastically reduced ever since my sand bed became well populated with spaghetti worms (due to competition for food, no doubt).

It's quite interesting to see the negative reaction that some people have to these beneficial cleaners. Being an 'old school' reefer, I welcome any help with the cleaning up that I can get

 

[Double monti 61]

I do not believe that the coral are bothered by them and it may be possible that they are more beneficial than detrimental and yes the spaghetti worms do affect the population of bristle worms but I think they keep each other in check and the population of each stabilizes according to how the system supports them not including other things that survive in your system

 

[kdx7214]

How did you start your tank? It does not seem hard at all to obtain bristleworms in this hobby.

Maybe you can get some cheap from those that trap them. If I knew a good way to ship them, I'd be glad to send some extras even though I do not mind them and want them for the clean-up crew benefits.

I mostly used dry Marco rock, but did get 25 lbs of Florida aquacultured live rock, although it was from a company I won't be dealing with again. The quality of the rock was pretty bad, and there no good hitchhikers at all.