yellow ball of string animal?

[electrikat]

We noticed that we had several yellow legs sticking out from a shroom. I moved the shroom aside and discovered a string animal. It looks like 20 or 30 pieces of string balled together. It is yellow with black stripes going across the strings. It has a mass at the center that i'm assuming is the body and has a snout like an elephant. It's about 3/8" in the body with the strings being 1" plus. No pictures it's too small. Any ideas?

 

[steve-s]

Can ya norrow it down a bit... ie "looks like" worm, nudibranch etc?

Cheers
Steve

 

[electrikat]

Looks like a ball of string. Literally.

 

[Fluff]

It's not mobile?

 

[electrikat]

Yes it decided to move over a few inches when I started messing with the shroom he was under. The strings are like legs of a serpent star in that they are yellow with black horizontal stripes on them, only there are 20 or so of the legs and the body has no shape other than the several strands of string look.

 

[Fluff]

A sponge perhaps like the one in this thread? He said his has moved too. Something like that?

http://www.aquariumadvice.com/viewtopic.php?t=53651

 

[MantisFreak]

Sounds like a medusa or spaghetti worm. http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2002-06/rs/
http://www.susanscott.net/OceanWatch1998/jan19-98.html

Usually they plant their body in the rock or sand and all you see is their "arms" moving around looking for food. However, when you see the entire body, they do resemble a ball of string.

If that's it, you're lucky. They are great little janitors. IPSF sells them as mama mia worms for people with sandbeds.

 

[electrikat]

This definitely looks like what it probably is. When I bothered it, it decided to move over some and built a new pile of sediment around it's body. Now, once again, it is just a bunch of legs coming out of a pile of sand. It is on a piece of base rock that is not porous, so it's never going to find a hole to get its body into unless it moves to one of the regular live rocks. Thanks to everyone for the help. I guess he gets to stay.