Feather Duster...Dead??????

[terrence]

I just took delivery of my clean-up crew and 3 FDs from SWF.COM, followed directions and put all the criters in my tank. After about a half an hour....one of the Dusters opened up fully and a little after that the 2nd one opened about half way. The 3rd one did nothing for about 2 hours, then my serpant star put one of his legs up into the tube and pulled the worm about 2 1/2 inches out. I moved it to another rock and it has just hung there for another 2 hours. A litte 'bud' on the end which hasn't opened and the worm hanging out of the tube......doing nothing.
How long do I give it before I pronounce it dead.....will it start messing up my water soon????
This is my first attempt at both the 'crew' and the 'dusters' my tank has been running for 10 months now. Comments please!!!!!

 

[fshhub]

it may be dead, but if all is ok, a dead tube worm ina d 75 gallon should not give you problems, jsut wait and see.
Had the star not gone after it, I would not worry, but possibly it was dead or is now

 

[k-dawg]

I agree. If dead in a tank that size I wouldn't worry about it. Yeah you would rather take it out if you knew it was dead, but if not sure it really wouldn't hurt to wait it out. Somedays go by that I never see my feather duster out. I may not even see it out for a number of days at times but it's always still there. Also if you see the feather part of the worm floating in your tank free of the tube don't assume it's dead. From time to time they drop those and start to regrow them, sort of like when you see a crustation shell you can't asume it's dead. When this happens often times you well not see the worm pop out for a good number of days and then finally a very small duster show to replace it. Just a heads up

 

[terrence]

fshhub & K-Dawg....Thanks for the replies.
It's ALIVE....ALIVE!!!!!!!!
After about 24 hours the worm went back inside the tube, this was the first time it did anything.....I was going to toss it....so Thanks!!!! Terry