Featherdusters - A good sign, bad sign, or meaningless?

[Richmond]

Good morning;

I've noticed over the past few months that my tank has TONS of feather dusters in the sand. There are literally dozens of them in my 40 gallon mixed reef tank. My question for the group is whether this indicates a happy / healthy aquarium, that something is wrong, or if that's just normal and they always grow when there is salt water.

Thanks inadvance for the feedback!

 

[AcroNem]

I always take a growing population of microfauna and random hitchhikers as a good sign. With feather dusters being filter feeders it means you have an adequate amount of particulate foods in your system, either naturally or that you're feeding other corals in your system.

 

[BlueCursor]

If you have a ton, then you have too much food for them. If this is the only issue in your tank then you are good. For me it would be a warning sign that I am on the edge of having way too many nutrients in the tank.

 

[AcroNem]

Don't get caught up in the fad of starving your system...if you need to do water changes then do water changes, or skim wetter. Heavy import, heavy export are you feeding your corals any tiny foods? Also how big are the dusters?

 

[Jisko]

I agree with above about how it's more of a sign of high nutrients. I have a duster that came in but im super weird and try to feed it because I like the purple colors haha but thats just me... i love the little creepy crawlers that come out during feeding

 

[Richmond]

I feed "Oyster-Feast" two or three times a week for the corals, and alternate pellets and mysis shrimp for my clown every other day (orso, sometimes longer between feedings).

The feather duster population has been growing since the start of the tank. It started with 1-2 in the rocks, and now there are probably 30ish. They range in size (the feather part, not the tube) from dime to silver dollar sized. I'll try to snag a picture tomorrow AM.

I'm also not currently skimming at all. I've been doing weekly 10 gallon water changes and everything seems pretty happy. One of my birdsnest refuses to color up, but otherwise I'm thrilled with the tank.

Thanks for all the feedback. I'm going to take it as an "okay" thing and just watch for nuisance algae; though this morning I noticed a little bit of algae I wasn't thrilled to see. Will monitor closely. I just did my water change this morning, so I'm hoping it's because I was 2 days past due!

 

[brandon429]

open micro feather dusters is what brought on the API .25 equals zero tide, ie don't rely on API to make inferences about low level ammonia decisions in a reef tank. every stalled cycle thread out there is an API reading with happy animals in the tank already.

feather dusters nor any corals will open in a tank with enough pumping ammonia to overcome bacterial stores enough to still produce .25 unoxidized. I call micro feather dusters my favorite bioindicators

 

[Richmond]

open micro feather dusters is what brought on the API .25 equals zero tide, ie don't rely on API to make inferences about low level ammonia decisions in a reef tank. every stalled cycle thread out there is an API reading with happy animals in the tank already.

feather dusters nor any corals will open in a tank with enough pumping ammonia to overcome bacterial stores enough to still produce .25 unoxidized. I call micro feather dusters my favorite bioindicators

Can you repeat that in laymen's terms? Thanks!

 

[brandon429]

ha lol

it means when your feather dusters are open, they are indicating no ammonia present in your water. they'll stay closed up tight when literally any free ammonia is present



Open fanworms are neat bioindicators of ammonia chemistry. open fans=no free ammonia with no test confirmation needed.

Open fanworms also bioindicate the presence of nitrifying bacteria, though we can't see bacteria (amazing)

there isn't an instance where a piece of live rock will have open fanworms on it, and not be fully cycled with a complete complement of nitrifiers. It takes longer for the fanworm to grow off the rock and accrete to it than it does nitrifiers to grow in place. The only time this changes is during medication events, which we don't see in cycling posts.

So, fanworms that are living on the rocks we bring home from a pet store mean _don't cycle_ these rocks by spiking them with ammonia, the rocks already have the bacteria. the feather dusters and pods in the rock are the reason we do not add ammonia to live rocks brought home from a pet store, we add ammonia to dry rocks only.

We can make six page threads off what just micro fanworms indicate in the reef tank. I like them

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Can we see a picture of the feather dusters?

 

[happyhourhero]

I have tons of the red ones in my sump, overflow and random nooks in the tank. I never worry about them.

 

[Wolskinyc]

Hi I found feather duster on my acropora is good or bad ?

 

[92Miata]

Be careful with wording - lots of available food and high nutrients aren't necessarily the same thing. Some people run high nitrate/phosphate systems and don't feed much (but have low export). Some people run super high import/export systems that run extremely low nitrate/phosphate.


Tons of feather dusters means nothing is eating them, and that there's plenty of available food.

 

[Pharmasqueek]

Hi I found feather duster on my acropora is good or bad ?

 

[Pharmasqueek]

I brought home a sarmentosa acropora with a micro feather duster on it and haven't had any issues. I also have a little one on the rock with my first hammer.

 

[branlock101]

is this a feather duster?

 

[Seascapes]

is this a feather duster?

Yes, unless you see stringy stuff coming out. If you see stringy stuff you have a pyramid snail. Get rid of it, it will spread all over the tank.