Grey sticks?...

[ReefMole]

Does anyone know what the 1/2"-1" length grey or whitish (sand colored) 'sticks' I keep finding on my substrate could be? If they are worms they are apparently dead (don't move). Any help identifiying them would be greatly appreciated...thanks!

 

[Anonymous]

Sounds like tube worms. A pic would help.

 

[danmhippo]

Sound like tube worms to me too. Do you have small white tube worms on your rocks?

 

[H@rry]

I've seen these occasionly in my tanks but never knew what they were. The next time you looked they were gone. I figured they were waste from some of the critters.

 

[danmhippo]

Roll up your sleeves and reach down to feel the "grey sticks". Is it soft straw like (worm tubing)? Or is it mushy and disintegrates when you rub them between your fingers?

If its the latter, Congradulation, you have just discovered some fish poo.

 

[ReefMole]

-I'm pretty sure it's not fish-poo...I don't have any fish yet!

 

[tazdevil]

I believe they're peanut worm remnants, have seen many ( and some alive, will retract when light hits them-kinda roll into themselves like a sock) .

 

[ReefMole]

Here's a picture of them...dead worms??

 

[davelin315]

They also look a bit like discarded urchin spines. Take one out and snap it in half. If it's hollow, it's probably a calcerous tube worm's home. If it's not, it could just be a stick that was in your gravel, or it could also be the urchin spine I mentioned. If one end appears to be rounded with a little ring around it, I'd bet my money it was a spine. I can't be sure, though, since they look a bit wavy and irregular in your picture, if they are like that, then they're probably not spines. Or, they could also be old bits of macroalgae.