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New to hobby, a few ?s

967 Views 12 Replies 5 Participants Last post by  yardboy, 
G
Hi everyone, I am new to the hobby, and have been reading alot, but come across alot of conflicting information, so I thought I would ask you all and hopefully you can help me.

I dont really have a reef going yet, I have a mushroom, and a anemone, the rest is fish, inverts, live rock. Anyhoo....

When I shut my lights out, a couple of flat white worms come out of the rock and swim around. They are small, less than a half inch. Any ideas that they are? Harmful? Also in the rock I have seen a pink worm looking thing, kinda looks like little spines all over it.

The live rock that was shipped to me, has alot of brown anemones on it, I think someone called them bat anemones. I was told they can be harmful? I tried to remove them, but they suck down into the rock. Are they harmful? If so how could I remove them?

A live rock I bought from a petstore has a brittle star fish in the hole (unknown to the store clerk so was free, I didnt notice till I got it home) I heard they will eat small hermit crabs, true?

One of the conflicting stories I am getting is coral banded shrimp, I have one, and a peppermint, they seem to leave each other alone, but I hear coral shrimp are agressive? The place I got it from said no.

Anyhoo I know thats alot of ?s but I just want to do this right. I appreciate any suggestions. Thanks for your time
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G
WELCOME TO TRT!
#1 sounds like flatworms to me...if they are white the eat the dreaded brown ones...consider your self lucky...
#2 that was a bristle worm great deterivore in the tank
#3 sounds like apstsia... kalk em with a syringe or add more peperments they eat then as well
#4 how big is the star fish... i get tons of quarter sized ones...harmless once again great deterivore
#5 i have a coralbanded, 3 peperments, 1 pistol, i blood, and 1 cleaner shrimp all in a 55 gal...there harmless
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G
Ty for the answers. I dont know if I said what size tank I have, but I have a 55 also. The starfish is not too big I guess, maybe a little larger than a quarter with long arms obviously. Again, thanks for the response.

As for the apstsia, they are pretty big, will the pepermints still eat them? Some of them are probably half dollar in size.
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G
mine did....other wise make a strong kalk paste and get a syringe and inject the buggers
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F
My peppermint shrimp ate all _but_ the largest aiptasia (in a 2.5 G). Kalk should take care of it, but post a pic if you can.

Clint missed nothing except:

WELCOME TO TRT!!
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G
look at my first post bud! ;)
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Alice
Welcome to TRT! :)

It's amazing the critters that will pop out of the rock; the good and the bad. Most of them aren't harmful, just rather wierd and amazing. You might trying looking in our archive file TRT and at this site Hitchhiker FAQ

Have you tried looking in your tank at night yet with a red-covered flashlight? :)

Oh, instead of buying expensive commercial Kalwasser powder to make the paste with which to inject the aiptasia anemones, you can use Mrs. Wage's Pickling lime. It should be available at most grocery stores now during the canning season.

Alice
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Geoff
Welcome to TRT!!!

:wavey:

all sounds good so far, but i do not think your white worms are flatworms. i do not know exactly what they are, but they are not the red flatworm eating white flatworms. the ones you have come out everynight and swim to a different spot. i think they are just another species of bristle worm, just smaller and not coloured. in any case good stuff.

G~
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G
Pic coming, I will take some now and post in a few. I am new to this, and my tank probably isnt nothing special, but I am happy to say I have only lost one thing (a green chromis) since I set it up, everything else seems to be thriving quite well, but again, I am still learning and a nervous wreck about adding things. I know this is a reef forum, but I dont even have close to a reef yet, just a mushroom, what looks to be polyps, and a carpet anemone.

Anyway I will post a pic shortly, but wanted to say thank you all for being kind to me, I am sure I will have plenty more questions as I go, and I appreciate the help.
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G
Ok, I think I got it right this time, pic of aiptasia

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Alice
Oh boy, you've got a good crop going there. :( I'd say zap the ones you can see with kalk, check water paramaters and be ready to do a water change if anything gets out of whack and get 2-4 more peppermint shrimp to clean up the aiptasia you *can't* see and to eat the new ones that pop up.

Aiptasia are a pain in the hiney....
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G
Thanks Alice. The kalk....will it harm anything else in my tank if I botch it? I am suppose to get the stem right? Wont they just suck into the rock like always? Im sorry to keep hounding with questions, but its all greek to me.
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Y
Best think to use is a syringe with a needle,a little tricky to get as the most common ones are for diabetes patients are too small, but will work. Then you can just chase'm right into their holes. I'd go kinda slow with it. Kalk is an additive in your tank for calcium, but with as much as you'll use, you could overdose!
And my goodness, do they really get that big!!!!!
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