Red worms on purchased live rock

Hey all, so today I came accross this good deal on live rock. I purchased 150lbs for $150u but when I got home right before I put it in this sw filled storage bin I noticed these weird red worms that's totally new to me. I wanted to get ur guys opinion on it and see if their safe, bad or good for the tank.

I did a bit of research on this site and my worms look like Hermodice Carunculata aka fireworm species.

Can someone help me out on this and if I need to get rid of them what methods do I take.

 

I can't be 100% sure, but given fireworms are known to prey on coral, you may want to get rid of it from your Display Tank.

If you have sump/refugium, you could leave them in there.

As for how to get rid of them, well I'd just scrub them off in a bucket of water. Fireworms can STING so where gloves!

 

The rock was left out of the water for about 3the hours easily. Think the worms are hardy to stay alive that long? They werent mobile when by the time I put them in water

 

Hard to say, I've got bristle worms, feather dusters etc that survived a long time out of water (8+ hours in transit), then a few days/weeks later they appeared. I now have 2 worms that are nearly 12" long!

Many hitch-hikers are very resilient, especially crabs, worms and mantis/pistol shrimp.

If in doubt, a quick dip in RO water (i.e. 5 mins) can often unsettle them enough that they fall off the live rock. The pH and salinity shock is often enough to dislodge them.

 

Ok ill deff try that this after noon. Ill scrub those that are visible and dip the water in ro water for a bit to see if they come off

you weren't kidding about them being hardy. I checked the bin this morning and I saw a few that were walking around the top of a reef saver rock right in front of the power head water flow. I deff got a project once I get off work today in getting rid of them if possible.

Ryan,

I just watched this youtube video:

to familiarize myself more on fireworms and the worms that I showed in the picture above does not look like a fireworm but rather looks more like the second worm the guy shows in the video. He explains that the second worm is good for your tank as they pretty much consume all dead or uneaten food and organic material.

What is your take on these. I personally think their creepy and to think that if I choose to change the design of my rock layout and have a few float and get stuck to my hand ughh. lol.

This video below is deff interesting

but I think all in all i'm thinking of getting rid of them so later they don't take over the tank and look creepy.

 

Those worms are in every reef tank I have ever worked on. There are 3 I have done to get rid of them. Get something to eat them, pick them all out manually (will take forever, there are tons of baby ones that you can't see yet), and fresh water dip.

It's a bit redundant if you want the 'live' portion of the live rock, but soaking the live rock in fresh water for a few hours should kill them off. I suggest doing something before they infest the sand in your system.

 

So far in my research I found that they are safe to touch. correct me if i'm wrong.

Also you strongly suggest for me to get ride of them or keep them.

If I dip the live rock in fresh water won't it kill everything on the rock. Ryan was suggesting to dip them for about 5 minutes.

Also yesterday I found Aiptasia in two small pieces of rock, I took the initiative to dip the rock in fresh water to see if they would fall off but little did I know they didn't, ok lesson learned. This morning before I took off to work I saw that one of the aiptasia relocated into a large rock below in the storage bin that I have all the rock in. I also saw two more aiptasias that were in the process go migrage into another rock as they were stretting out like a worm. I shined some light on them and they immediately hid. So I'll see if they did relocated once I get home.

I'm thinking of either picking up some Pepermint Shrint, Aiptasia X or Joes Juice here pretty soon. Not sure how effective lemon juice is.
LOL I was getting pretty close in busting out the hand held torch yesterday and burning them suckers lol lol.


So on the worms, what do you guys strongly suggest: OUT or LEAVE THEM? Safe to touch right?

 

IMO, the damage done by a 5 minute dip in Freshwater is very little. The bacteria should survive as long as the dip water has been dechlorinated.

For aiptasia, I definitely think Peppermint shrimp are the best solution, but you need to get the right species. Either Lysmata Vittata (more common here in Aus), or Lysmata WurdemannI are both known to eat Aiptasia. Shrimp will help keep the tank clean as well keeping the aiptasia in check.

I have 2 worms like the one in your second video. They're harmless scavengers. They keep the top of the sandbed clean. If they creep you out, you can remove them, but it's up to you.

 

cool deal thanks Ryan,

Yeah after much research I decided to keep the red earth like worms as they do good in the tank. Also their hardly ever seen as they are deep in the rock crevasses and only come out when they want to. So far I haven't seen any fire worms which is really good, only seen those earth like worms in the rock.

As for the aptasia, their small right now which I think it great for peppermint shrimp to tackle right now. I was debating in weather putting one or two piece of rock in a 10 gallon tank with the peppermint shrimp that way the shrimp is force to completely eat the aiptasia or dump some shrimp in the 32 gal brute container I have the rock storing right now. I personally think putting pieces of rock in the quaranteen tank with shrimp is better but yet again if I put the shrimp in the brute container they have access to all the rocks which they can tackle stuff I don't get to see from up above.

suggestion?

 

I'd put the shrimp in the display tank, no need to isolate the rock(s).

The shrimp will find the aiptasia.

I woke up one morning and was like "where'd it all go"

 

lol, good story there.