Fan Worms in Canister Filter?

[Patriot76]

Just cleaned my canister filter today, for the first time in a few months- i have had some serious motivation issues as far as tank maintenance goes. anyway, i use the canister filter for carbon, de-nitrate, & phosban. when i opened it up to clean it it looked like there were dozens of small fan/tube worms growing on the plastic rings. is this normal? never noticed anything like this before. i cleaned the whole canister with fresh water, wondering if i killed them off?

 

[qwik]

I've seen them in my tanks darker areas also, I wouldn't kill them there just another form of free filtration .

 

[blange3]

Happens all the time.

Your cleaning activities may kill them, but I wouldn't go out of the way to do so.

You may need to clean them out if their tubes start to interfere with assembling and disassembling the filter parts.

 

[SirFragalot]

I have them in my canister as well and never go out of the way to scrape them off. A lot do come off though when I go over the sides of the canister during maintenance.

Blange3, Thanks for that tip about watching out for them interfering with the parts. Something I don't think about.

 

[Patriot76]

thanks guys. i actually see a bunch of them on the walls of my sump now too! which is always dark. i dont really have a way to clean the rings of the canister filter without using fresh water (outside with the house). maybe make up when i do a water change drain some the old saltwater into a rubbermaid tub and give each rings a good shaking underwater (if you know what i mean, hard to explain). seems like a pita tho, as if cleaning that canister and doing a water change is not enought of a pain.

 

[Paul B]

They are a good sign, leave them alone. You can read to them if you like :