Sabellidae

Schraubensabelle ( Sabella spallanzanii )

The spring worms ( Sabellidae ) also called fan worms or leather tube worms are marine annelids that live sessile in tubes. The soft, flexible tubes are made ​​of organic material, often consisting of polysaccharides, which are rarely reinforced with hard particles, such as sand grains. There are 34 genera, which are usually larger than the related Serpulidae ( Serpulidae ). In contrast to this the spring worms have no tube closure.

Ingestion

Spring worms live on tiny organic particles and protozoa, which they filter with its crown of tentacles from the passing water. The particles are transported separately by size on three separate eyelash gutters to the mouth. The coarse particles are pushed away from palps who sit on the upper lip. The medium sized particles serve as a building material and stored until use in a pair of deep pockets on the lower lip. The small particles that are mostly organic and contain micro-organisms are eaten.

The species of the genus Osedax feed on Walkadavern on which they live. Take on their food over the foot, because they have neither the stomach nor mouth.

Riffbildung

On the east coast of Florida the only three to four inches long Phragmatopoma lapidosa lives in such a huge mass that a 320 km long, but only one meter high reef is formed. Its strength obtains this Sabellarienriff the fact that the worm in its tube intercalated sand and the old, lying down tubes are hardened by calcium precipitations.