Polyp Hitchikers And Other Thing

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The things on the left look like hydroids, although it's hard to tell.

Cone snail. Get rid of it, very venomous.

It is not possible identify a snail from such a vague text description. There are a number of other groups of snails having similar descriptions, including several completely innocuous ones. A picture is really a requirement here to make any sort of serious guess at the ID. While I can't say that a cone snail is a complete impossibility, I will say that those snails are so incredibly rare as hitchhikers that I have never actually heard of anybody ending up with one since I have been in the hobby. Therefore, I would find it quite incredible if that is what this snail is. It is far more likely to be something like an olive snail (Olividae) or even some types of whelks like in the Busycon genus.

EDIT: missed a post.

So are coral shrimp good predators for bristle worms. Call them what you will but I have seen them eating my polyps and have been un able to catch them before they retreat. I saw one that was at least 8 inches long.

Yes and no. Really big bristleworms are immune to most common animals except for quite large hermits that will possibly be more destructive than the worm just from clumsiness (like Dardanus megistos). The best approach for removal is usually to lure out the big ones with bait and manually remove them with tongs, while having something like a CBS or other medium-sized Crustacean to control the smaller worms. I have used both small and large Stenopus species for bristleworm control in tanks. They don't often catch the worms they chase, but restricting access to food is a big part of the battle to keep worm populations under control - and coral banded shrimp are most active at night when the worms are also most likely to come out.

Do be cautious about blaming the worm. While it is possible for them to go after perfectly healthy corals (I have seen it), it usually only happens when the worms experience a population boom and then are starved. More commonly worms will go after decaying organisms, and it's not always clearly visible when coral tissue starts to go south. Another possibility is that you have something like a Hermodice worm instead of one of the other, much more common species of spiny/fluffy-looking bristleworms. It would be impossible to tell without a good picture.


Top middle of this photo there is a an oyster of sorts with polyps on the top of it, anyone seen it before? I'm hardpressed to find any info on it and should I be feeding it?

I can't make it out from the picture. It is a common thing to see though and there are several types that show up. Often they are pretty hard to keep alive unless you throw a lot of filter feeder food at the tank; target feeding usually fails. Usually the tank either has enough food for it or it doesn't, and adding sufficient supplements can give you water quality problems pretty fast. It's not so bad if you've got a bajillion filter feeding things to feed, but with just one little clam a lot is going to go to waste.
 
My CBS is really neat. I went with him over the arrow crab because of size and being nocturnal.

I'm trying to design a DIY plankton reactor/doster, so far I have been tossing in 2 cap fulls of Dr.G's live Phytoplankton. Tons of other filter feeders came on my TB LR that I would also like to keep alive. I have a journal up if you care, it has some more recent happenings of my tank http://www.fishforums.net/index.php?/topic/405901-29g-low-tech-lpssofties/page__p__3415735__fromsearch__1#entry3415735

Also, I cannot read tests to save my life. Red/green color deficiency, and they go and make nearly all the tests work off those colors >_<" . Nitrate is impossible for me to tell until it hits 40ppm. I might be having some ammonia and/or high nitrates in my tank but I really couldn't tell ya.
 
Also, I cannot read tests to save my life. Red/green color deficiency, and they go and make nearly all the tests work off those colors >_<" . Nitrate is impossible for me to tell until it hits 40ppm. I might be having some ammonia and/or high nitrates in my tank but I really couldn't tell ya.

Bummer! Can you take a picture and post it with the scales in the same shot? It won't be as accurate as an in-person reading obviously, but someone could definitely get in the ballpark to give you an idea of what (if any) spikes are happening.
 
Here is the album took several pics with different light I don't have the SW card for the nitrate so I use this http://cdn.saltwaterfish.com/3/39/39d25c7e_2.JPG


http://imgur.com/a/cuG44
 
Look for a natural way to remove the Aptasia such as a true Peppermint shrimp before trying chemicals.
If chemical is the way you're going try injecting vinegar into the 'foot' using a proper syringe and needle like diabetics use (you can get these from a pharmacist but be prepared for some questioning)

Never ever try to scrub them off or pull them off as they multiply by fragmentation so one Aptasia broken up results in 10's of baby ones.
 
Ya, lol. I didn't use vinegar. I have been squirting the ones I see with boiled bottled drinking water. The PH of the water is 6.5, so i figure it gives them a nice Ph shock to aid in protein denaturingm ;). Although it sometimes bleaches the rock around it.
 

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