Feather Duster Problem

J

jaabc

So I have this feather duster.... Ive had them before with no trouble, and I have a Coco worm that is doing quite well.
It looks like part of his tube has disintegrated. He is alot shorter than he was before. And the tube was like a dark sand color, now looks dark brown.
I dont know what to do.... I just noticed it today. Is this normal? Ive never heard of one of these doing this.
I tried to bother him and get him to go back into his tube, but he can barely retract.
Let me know what you think.
 
Sometimes they leave their tube and move to go build another one somewhere else. Mine did when my jawfish kept hitting it and bumping and biting it. So the feather duster left his tube and crawled under the rock to build a new home. They are pretty vulnerable however when they leave the tube. But if it's chosen to move on it's own it should start building a new tube. It's feather head should still stay open, too, and look normal.
 
Coco worms build a calcerious tube by pulling Ca from the water just like a snail for it's shell or coral it structure, soft body feather dusters need to be on or in mud or sand.

Couple considerations:
Hermits are known to pick on the tubes of dusters and some fish are know to nip on them so try and keep the tube protected.

The natural envirnment for the soft body dusters is in mud flat or soft sand. Feather dusters with soft bodies build there tubes with a mixture of mucus and mud or detritus. Simply put whithout access to mud and/or sand they can't repair or build a tube.

http://www.reefpedia.com/index.php/Hawaiian_Feather_Duster

HTH
 
@jaabc wrote:
thx for the info. when i got him he was stuck to that rock.... should i detach him? said:
that may cause more bad then good - see if you can turn that rock a bit and place it where the duster is on the sand bed then carfully pile a little sand over it
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