What are these tube things on my LR?

[calveezzzy]

Are these harmful? I'm going to transfer these rocks to help establish a new tank and I've never seen these tube looking things before.

 

If you can't see them, one is towards the top, on at the bottom, and one on the left side.

 

[gulfsurfer101]

They ate not harmful on a small scale but in the wild, they are a nuisance and detur growth of older coral. I had them before. Just take a glob of superglue gel right into the hole and that's how to handle them.

[calveezzzy]

They ate not harmful on a small scale but in the wild, they are a nuisance and detur growth of older coral. I had them before. Just take a glob of superglue gel right into the hole and that's how to handle them.

 

Thanks for your response. A few of my LR have several of these on them, and I want to transfer them to my new 6g Pico. Should I remove them manually before putting these rocks in my new aquarium? Or maybe put a hermit crab in my new aquarium to take care of these?

[gulfsurfer101]

Good luck with both those methods. I found them to be as hard as cement and manual removal is not practical, and out of the hundreds of hermits in my 75g not one has yet to eat one. Like I said, superglue gel right into the hole is the sure fire way to kill these. They will expel a nasty string of mucous if left alone and that will bother nearby coral.

[Mariaface]

Vermetid snails.

 

They're filter feeders, and send out strings of mucous to catch detritus and organic matter in the water. Technically, that's helping out. But if the water pushes their 'nets' towards corals, the corals will be irritated a bit. And if you feed fine-particle foods, the snails will happily eat those.

 

If you remove only part of the tube, you may not get the entire snail (or any of it, since they retract into the base of it as soon as they sense something's near). There's only one opening to each tube, so people suggest putting cyanoacrelate over each opening and letting them die inside.

[calveezzzy]

Good luck with both those methods. I found them to be as hard as cement and manual removal is not practical, and out of the hundreds of hermits in my 75g not one has yet to eat one. Like I said, superglue gel right into the hole is the sure fire way to kill these. They will expel a nasty string of mucous if left alone and that will bother nearby coral.

 

 

Vermetid snails.

 

They're filter feeders, and send out strings of mucous to catch detritus and organic matter in the water. Technically, that's helping out. But if the water pushes their 'nets' towards corals, the corals will be irritated a bit. And if you feed fine-particle foods, the snails will happily eat those.

 

If you remove only part of the tube, you may not get the entire snail (or any of it, since they retract into the base of it as soon as they sense something's near). There's only one opening to each tube, so people suggest putting cyanoacrelate over each opening and letting them die inside.

 

Perfect. Thanks for all the info. Before I put these LR in my new aquarium, I will superglue them shut.

[gulfsurfer101]

Perfect. Thanks for all the info. Before I put these LR in my new aquarium, I will superglue them shut.

That would be best. They spread like wildfire and really muck up the look of a good tank with all that poopy string everywhere.

[amphipod]

Not all species spread like wildfire and they only irritate a few corals, I notice most coral irritation complaints are from sps owners with corals right next to vermetid.

[cromag27]

I usually clip them at their base with wire cutter and them superglue over what's left over.

[SgtBhaji]

I'm battling these in all my tanks. I hate them with a passion as they spew crap all over the tank when cleaning. I'm still trying to find something to eat them (hermits don't seem interested at all), so if anyone has any tips for something that will take them down, I'd love to know.

 

They're in too many nooks and crannies to glue them all down without taking out all the rocks.