Do You Fancy Finding One Of These In Your Aquarium?

I know I certainly wouldn’t – If I saw this I would run a mile.

Aquarium staff from Cornwall, UK’s Blue Reef Aquarium have located a huge 4 foot worm in one of their display aquarium which was attacking corals and fish within the aquarium.

For many months the staff were unable to indentify what was attacking the corals and fish. In many cases the corals were nearly cut in half!

The staff laid numerous traps around the reef however when they checked them they found that the traps had been destroyed.

The aquarium staff eventually came to the decision that they must find out what was causing the damage and therefore started to dismantle the reef. Half way through they found the culprit – a four foot long polychaete worm!

What was worrying was that the traps the staff had laid was full of bait and hooks and the worm must have simply digested the lot – hooks and everything.

The staff eventually managed to lure the worm out of it’s hiding place using fish bait where it was captured however the worm did put up a good fight and even bit through a 20lb fishing line.

The coral reef display has now been put back together and is starting to recover. The worm, now known as ‘Barry’ and thankfully not destroyed now lives in it’s own aquarium and the staff can only presume that it arrived as a small worm hiding in a live rock shipment.

Message to you all – check your live rock – you never know what’s hiding in there.

Source : Daily Mail (UK)

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