Nuisance Starfish (Asterina sp.)

L

luhring

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When I Googled them I saw several reports of them eating sps,
is there any truth to this?
Anything besides a Harlequin shrimp get rid of these damn things?
I have always had them in my tanks, but I had never kept SPS before.
I got a very nice frag of Blue Bottle Brush from a member and
I came in the other morning and they were all over it, like 4 big ones
and about 6 small ones. They were eating it, it died.
Really made me mad and I have been taking about this many out
a night. I need something to eat these damn things. I don't want the
Harlequin shrimp because I do have Sand Sifting Stars
in there that it would eat. Any ideas?
 
I've never had mine eat my SPS or zoas. Maybe I'm just lucky. They could have been eating the already dead flesh of your SPS. I know that was the only time I saw them on my SPS was when I had one of my SPS RTN'ing and they were eating the already dead flesh but never had them eat a perfectly healthy coral.
 
Gray ones are bad and are nit asterinas. White ones are ok and are asterinas. They look exactly alike except foe the color, just can't remember the name of the others off hand.
 
I think I have the gray ones, they are grayish green kinda like.
How do I get rid of them? Besides picking them out.
 
Idk which kind of starfish it is that we got from Muhammud "Monisa" b/c my lady wanted some so he gave us a few. But he did tell us that he has seen them on his sps eating them up. Another member "Shaggy" also told me that he saw them on his high end zoas but never on the cheaper zoas. I hope these starfish didnt make it into my new tank from when I moved rock over b/c I had some purple deaths end up missing and also a few heads of some AOG's. [smilie=thinking.gif]
 
A harlequin shrimp will eat every starfish in your tank but since that is there only food, you will have to buy it stars once it's done or pass it on to someone else.

http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/prod_display.cfm?c=497+525+749&pcatid=749
 
I had the gray ones in my tank, then they developed an appetite for my lunar eclipse palys...I got a Harlequin shrimp and it took care of all of em.
Fish2morow had a pair of Harlequins last time I visited if you're looking for some locally.
 
I purchased asterinas to put in my bowl because they make nice detritivores. Its interesting to hear of possible links between behavior and color, that would be a handy explanation for the stark differences in reports on them.

They maintain a perfect size in my pico reef and are the correct scaling but admittedly they are whiter than other types if that does matter. I notice them crawl over zoanthids, taking off floc from the mucus tunics etc but I have never seen them leaving rasping marks or bare spots

They are so slow in everything they do. I two armed one has been alive for about 3 straight years in the tank along with several other buddies will keep an eye our for larger ones or other color variants.
 
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