basket star on the move

[hobogato]

heres a still of the basket star this morning, and a short video clip.

http://i30.photobucket.com/albums/c329/hobogato/basket1.jpg

http://i30.photobucket.com/albums/c329/hobogato/th_basketvid1.jpg (http://s30.photobucket.com/albums/c329/hobogato/?action=view&current=basketvid1.flv)

[GaryP]

I didn't know you had one. Hmmmmm! I thought they ate corals? Maybe I am just thinking of te crown of thorns basket star. What does this guy eat?

[hobogato]

this is the kind that lives in gorgonians and spreads out at night to filter feed. during the day, he attaches to the underside of the rocks, and at night he spreads out in a high flow area to filter feed.

[GaryP]

Very cool! It feeds on zooplankton?

[hobogato]

i guess. i have switched to adding my liquid "coral food" (chromaplex, zooplex, phytoplex and microvert) at night.

[Richard]

Very cool! If you can keep it fed it should be fine. That's the only thing I've ever heard that is hard about keeping them.

[Richard]

You should try direct feeding it at night with just one food at a time. That way you can see it's response and maybe you can figure out what size food it likes.

[GaryP]

Ace,

You may want to consider switching to frozen zooplankton. I think that in the long run its a better food and cheaper as well. A bar of cyclopeeze lasts a looooonnnggggg time. I feed cyclopeeze, rotifers, brine napuli, and daphnia.

[Richard]

You may want to consider switching to frozen zooplankton. I think that in the long run its a better food and cheaper as well. A bar of cyclopeeze lasts a looooonnnggggg time. I feed cyclopeeze, rotifers, brine napuli, and daphnia.


LOL, that's where I was trying to lead him to by trying to figure out what size food it likes. That kent stuff is pretty dilute and get real expensive compared to frozen. If it turns out it likes real little stuff like phyto then you can get tahitian blend cyropaste concentrate. A $25 bottle would make the equivalent of quite a few gallons of phytoplex. I hate paying high dollar for water.

[hobogato]

richard - i do one type of food per day, and so far, it reacts the same way to each.

gary - where do you get those?

[GaryP]

From Richard! Funny how that works out, isn't it? I use the Tahitian blend he recommended for phyto too. Its equivalent to couple thousand dollars worth of DTs or phytoplex.

I thaw out a couple of days worth in salt water in a jelly jar and then just feed a little every night. The cyclopeeze is probably to big for SPS, but I bet the star will like it. My sea apple did.

[ratboy]

I had one years ago and it ate pretty much anything I fed it (no cyclopeze-type stuff around back then). It disapeared after a trip where I dont think it was fed as regularly as it was used to. It was cool to feed and watch it open up like 18" across in my tank though....

[GaryP]

They remind me of sea apples. As long as you feed them they will do well. Like all filter feeders, the trick is learning how to feed them so they don't go down hill.