I think they are just what you called them - tube worms.  They are good.  I know there is something that eats them but cant remember what.  Welcome Shaun!

Vermitid worms.

They are good filter feeders and actually are part of the major group of beneficial organisms in the reef aquarium, which includes Bristleworms. Their difficulty for me is when I pick up a LR, I have to be careful or they stab into my fingers! Bristleworms are worse, though. The bristles irritate me for hours afterward.

Shaun, it is good to see you posting here!  (BTW, for everyone else, I have seen Shaun's tank, and he and I went to the last meeting together!  He has a couple of awesome clams and his tank is doing great, except that he has very little, if any, coralline algae!)

I cannot remember if you have a lot of crabs or not.  I remember quite a few snails though.  Possibly, either some more crabs, a sand sifting goby, or something like those things will keep those worms under control a little better.  I would not worry about them.

BTW Mark, bristle worms do not hurt me as much as these worms do (Unless you get one on your tongue!)

ssilcox wrote: Just FYI ... they are Vermetid Snails... Not actually worms.

Yes, thanks for the correction Shane.

I simply break them off. Either by rubbing my hand across the surface or with a stick. They are really a good thing. Just remove them from where you don't want them.

They are a little hard to remove from their protective calcareous tube, so a Sixline may not be effective and will eat so many other bugs that....  What organisms do you have in this tank. Please give us a list. Perhaps we can suggest a better predator. Coral for example, will capture and eat their larvae, Clams will not.

I have a sixline wrasse, purple tang, foxface, pajama cardinal, yellow headed pearly jawfish, blue knuckle hermit, blue leg hermits, brown cucumber, sand sifter, astrea snails and a porcelain crab. Then for corals I have a huge kenya tree, a big toadstool leather, alevepora, stylophora, hammer coral, green star pollup, xenia, nepthia, some christmas tree worms, organ pipe, some shrooms and  some zoos.  That would just about cover my entire tanks habitants, except for a possible mantis shrimp, I know he was in there 6 months ago. I could hear him through my acrylic, I saw hime and then I found his burrow. When I found his hole with him in it I tried to assisnate him but was unsucessful. I would imagine that he is still there but I havent seen him or heard him for months. I can always hope That he's gone that is

I guess I will just have to break them off, but they are resilient little creatures.

p.s. Mark why do you say that sand sifters are bad for your sand bed?

SS Stars eat the tiny critters that I want proliferating in my sand bed which feed coral and larger critters which feed larger inverts which feed fish...

Years ago, when we first started seeing SS Stars, the WMAS founder, Tim Weidauer, introduced one to his mature very well populated tank. Within months it had totally cleaned the sand which then had a negative domino effect on his entire system.

I believe SS Stars are useful for cleaning up the top layer of a detritus compacted sand bed, but should be passed on to another tank after the job is done.

Alternatively, I believe SS Cucumbers are helpful in the same way, but much less destructive in the short and long run. I have several.