Starfish For Algae Control?

Rcpilot

Reef enthusiast
So I've got these 5 legged star fish in my 30g DT. We talked about them ( I think some of you have them as well) and decided they were reef safe.

What do you think about snatching a few out of the DT and dump them in the 10g frag tank? I wonder if they eat algae?

Was it the astarina star?
 
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asternia stars, i think they eat coraline algae cause were every i have purple coraline algae thats were they are at in my tank.
 
I just read that too. I guess that explains why all the coraline in my tank is gone. :frustrat:

I think it's time me and these damn starfish parted ways. :fechten2:
 
Some asterinas eat coralline, some eat film algae off the glass, and a few eat corals. I have tons of them. I tried getting rid of them myself when they first started popping up (about a year after I last added anything to the tank, strangely), but to no avail. If you want to get rid of them, a harlequin shrimp is the way to go. I don't think there's any way to do it by hand.
 
The white asternias are OK and wont mess with your corals. If they are brown then those supposedly will I have a tankful in my tank and as mentioned before will eat film algea. They reproduce by dropping a leg and that leg will grow to another star. Here is some on my glass in the morning. Sorry for the dirty tank on the outside.

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Ive got a bunch too. They do eat coralline algae. I suck them out when I do my water changes. I also invested in a harlequin shrimp and they seem to have increased in population. He did eat my big sandsifting star though. One leg at a time.
 
Maybe that's why the harlequin shrimp seems to have created more of them. If he's taking bites and leaving them in pieces, then he's creating even more starfish. Huh. I hadn't thought of that before.
 
:grumble: I have the same problem with aiptasia right now. I got 10 peppermint shrimp to control them and I have hundreds now. Never seen a peppermint shrimp eating one at all! :grumble:
 
my tank was crawling with them when i dropped in my rocks (from biffs tank). those and the little brittle stars. i went on vacation for two weeks, came back and there were no little stars left in the tank. now in the last 3 or 4 weeks the brittle stars have made a huge comeback. i have no idea what happened. the only thing that happened in the time i was gone was that my salinity went pretty high. 1.030. sorry, i know i'm useless, just thought i'd share
 
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