Dennis Taylor asks about quillworms. Being a common name, it may have been
applied to more than one genus, but one of them is certainly Hyalinoecia, a
polychaete annelid of family Onuphidae. The quillworm's tube is tough and
whitish and organic, and the worm drags itself along the seafloor by
extending processes out of the tube, which is valved to protect the animal
from predators. Animals that ordinarily live on hard substrates, like
brachiopods and sea anemones, sometimes grow on the back of the tube.
Quillworms live in very cold water (close to 4 degrees C) at bathyal depths
along much of the continent's edges, and also at relatively shallow depths
(10 m) in boreal areas such as Norway. I collected many of them during my
dissertation work off southern California. (The L.A. County Museum has the
specimens in ethanol.)
 
Andrew K. Rindsberg
Geological Survey of Alabama