asterina stars?

[blueboy]

i'm wondering what the prevailing opinion is here on those little beigeish lopsided starfish? i have quite a few of them and have heard conflicting opinions on them. i have never noticed them bothering anything. they appear to just scavenge the substate and rock.

[::pete::]

I agree with Josh and the ones that I have in my tank have never touched a thing. Also when I returned to NC to get the tank they more than multiplied :shock: and so did everything else in the tank.

I only pick out the ones that get to be 1/4" or larger and they go to the fuge.

[scuba_steveo]

Same here, I have never had any problems but I have heard of people who do have problems with them.

[Instar]

The ones I have in my reef have not touched another coral other than the two they messed up already. They are still in there and haven't touched anything but algae since. They ate algae before they did the damage too. Like I said, they park somewhere and eat. Its a statiistical thing really, like gambling. Odds are in favor of them not parking on the coral, but, sooner or later they might. There may be lots of species of stars, but, we are only talking about one species here. They are hitchhikers. But, someone with damage to a large acro should not confuse the damage done by a false acro crab with one of these stars. I did see a false acro crab in a members tank not long ago and it was eating away at the coral. One could have thought the spots were from the stars when they were actually from the crab. We caught the crab in the act and you can guess the rest.

[don-n-sa]

Hmmm...I have several in my system...never seen them eating my corals, but I do have cookies that mysteriosly disappear in the middle of the night....hmmmm maybe...lol

[scuba_steveo]

lol @ don

[GaryP]

Don,

That was Kim having a midnight craving. How is your supply of peanut butter, ice cream, and pickles holding up?

Gary

[don-n-sa]

gone...all GONE!

[Jenn]

Blueboy, mine do the same as you described. I was worried too, but now just leave them alone.

[Ram_Puppy]

well, they way i figure it, is it's all ok for now, none of my corals have been affected, and even if they were, none are so rare I couldn't replace them/ break off the affected portion and have it survive. So, if they do turn nasty, I have an excuse to buy a harlequin. :) We can name him/her "MAASTY" and share him/her between all the infected tanks. :)

[mathias]

anything that eat those little boogers????

[CD]

We can name him/her "MAASTY" and share him/her between all the infected tanks.


Heheh....Yeah, and MAASTY could be the club mascot! Cool :)

Wendy

[astrong]

Harlequin shrimp love to eat them, a good way to get rid of them if you want, but they are harmless.