Neptune Aquatics

Asterina starfish bad!

T

TNTFishy

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I’ve had these critters on and off but never have seen them do anything bad....

Until now!

Found a white spot in the middle of my playing monitors frag. Upon further inspection, there he was. Took him off, and there was a bald spot. What do you think?
 
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i thought they would be good too when my friend gave me one. now i have dozens and one seemed to have eaten my chalice.

Random bald spot with the starfish next to it... didnt see it do it but can only suspect. All other corals are fine though.


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I was gonna buy a Harlequin Shrimp, but netted about 15 of them out today. Will do this everyday unless it gets really bad. Lost a blasto but don’t know if it was them. Sps; cap coral; cyphastrea all fine.
 
It is a long-running discussion about whether they are eating the coral or just cleaning up dead spots on the coral. The best evidence of them eating healthy coral is with zoas, where they have convincingly been seen munching on them. But even then, it is only some types of zoas and only some asterinas, and seems like more when they get to plague numbers rather than just a few of them.

They also definitely eat coralline algae, which gets to be a problem when there are too many.

I lost some zoas and had a ton of asterinas, so I’ve been manually thinning their numbers (by the hundreds) and have seen improvement in coralline and zoas.
 
Yeah...I’ve got hundreds of em as well and keep thinking that I should thin them out as much as practical. Been too lazy though


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TNTFishy said:
How much are harlequins in the area? Do they multiply fast enough to keep him fed?
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I got mine at Ultimate Aquarium in San Mateo for around $30

I had a pretty bad outbreak and I'd say within a week or two they were all gone. I bought a starfish to keep in my sump and was going to cut off one arm for the harley to eat, but I got rid of a rock covered in xenia and he was apparently in that rock. sad. i miss him
 
JVU said:
It is a long-running discussion about whether they are eating the coral or just cleaning up dead spots on the coral. The best evidence of them eating healthy coral is with zoas, where they have convincingly been seen munching on them. But even then, it is only some types of zoas and only some asterinas, and seems like more when they get to plague numbers rather than just a few of them.

They also definitely eat coralline algae, which gets to be a problem when there are too many.

I lost some zoas and had a ton of asterinas, so I’ve been manually thinning their numbers (by the hundreds) and have seen improvement in coralline and zoas.
Click to expand...
Thinking about it. The Montipora was not doing so well for a bit and the bald spot is somewhat in the shade. It’s healthier now. Maybe there was a deadpatch in there the starfish found? Hmmm.
 
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