On the subject of worms

I was doing a safety stop at night somewhere around Alor and thought of Leslie when this worm swam into my view.

Cheers!

Looks like some kind of bristle worm - though it's whopper - a very long one!

I can't imagine why you thought of me in connection with a worm. How strange....

That was awfully nice. It's an epitoke, and an eunicid which makes it a relative of the well known palolo (or balolo depending on region). Lucky thing you didn't get caught up in a spawning event - you could have been mobbed. Take a look at these delightful shots taken by Paddy Ryan during a night dive in Belize. So many epitokes were attracted to his buddies' light that you can barely see the diver in the last shot.

http://www.ryanphotographic.com/epitoke.htm

Are these what we would call over bristle worms? I am sure there are species of these animals that sting, is this right?

Do you know what causes these blooms of these animals like shown in the added link above? I've seen this quite a few times and wonder what causes it and if there is any relavant factors that go towards when this would happen?

Polychaete is latin for "many bristles" so every polychaete is a bristle worm. The ones that sting are the fireworms. These are the large members of family Amphinomidae like Eurythoe complanata, Hermodice carunculata, Chloeia, Notopygos, Pherecardia, etc.

Some worms reproduce year round. The ones that produce epitokes tend to have mass spawning events usually tied to full moons. As with corals, releasing eggs & sperm en masse ups the odds of both successful fertilization and survival. Divers with their artificial moons fool them into spawning off schedule. So remember that no matter how much you're cursing them for ruining your shot or dive they're cursing you right back for ruining their love life.