FishyReef
Broke Reefer!
And yet another casualty of my tiny tank debacle! I bought a dwarf feather duster two weeks ago, same order as the infamous brittlestar. The worm poked its crown out very briefly when I added it to the tank, but it had been well over a week and a half since I had seen the crown. Today I saw two nassarius snails poking around near tit, so I decided to go ahead and pull it to see if it was dead. Well, turns out that the worm had buried itself deep under the rocky ledge I'd put it near and was in the process of building a very long new tube, attached to the one it arrived in. I pulled out probably an 8" tube made largely of black sand, and unfortuanetly dislodged the worm in the process, destroyed its new tube, and pulled over half of the worm out of its tube. It was still alive, twitching in my hand, probably wondering what the heck happened. I ended up putting the worm and sad remains of the tube it had built back into the tank in the same location, but had to kind of curl the destroyed tube up on itself, and just propped up the worm with some rocks. Most of the worm no longer has a tube and of course will more than likely die now. Nassarius snails were already going for it when I left, and the poor worm was twitching whenever the snails would get on it. I don't think it was dying before, I just think the snails were going after a part of its tube it was no longer using.
Tonight when I got home I could still see the tip of the worm where I left it, but no crown. Snails were no longer near it. Maybe it shed its crown, or the snails ate its crown? Is there any chance this thing will recover, or did I officially commit second degree feather duster murder?
Tonight when I got home I could still see the tip of the worm where I left it, but no crown. Snails were no longer near it. Maybe it shed its crown, or the snails ate its crown? Is there any chance this thing will recover, or did I officially commit second degree feather duster murder?