Are sea stars really reef safe?

[plancton]

I want to buy an echinaster sp. That I saw at my local fish store, it is really pretty, it has 6 arms, and it looks supper healthy on a rock.

I know echinaster sp is probably the easiest of the colorful sea stars that are reef safe. Sand sifting stars are not appealing to me.

Will I have any trouble keeping this echinaster sp. which is supposed to be reef safe?

 

[ophiuroid]

What size tank do you have?
How old is it?
How much Live Rock do you have?
What tank inhabitants?
SPECIFIC water parameters?
How do you know this is Echinaster?

This star, if it is Echinaster, is basically equivalent to Linckia, meaning it needs a very long slow acclimation to a tank with pristine parameters, IMO at least 6 month old full reef with at least 100lbs of LR, minimum. They can not, in general, be spot fed, and often die either in a month (acclimation shock) or of starvation in a 8-16 months. Success should not be considered until the star has survived at least 18 months in a tank (you will see many say "I've had no problem for 7 months" or something...but these animals take a long time to starve, and show no obvious signs of trouble).

Not all seastars, of course, are reef safe....

 

[plancton]

I know it is an echinaster sp. Because it says "echinaster sp" on the fish store, plus it looks just like the echinaster sp picture on liveaquaria.com

According to liveaquaria echinaster sp is "easy", while linckia is "difficult". I bought a linckia once, and it was pretty much dead with its guts out, but I bought it anyways and it obviously died. I did a research and found out that linckias die in the 90-99% of the cases.

But this echinaster sp. is hanging on a rock, and its guts are not showing, it looks healthy. Therefore I believe its true what liveaquaria.com says about echianster sp being easier than linckia.

My tank is 70 gals, Its full of liverock, I dont know the exact amount because I think in kilograms, not pounds, but it is a lot. Parameters are perfect in every sense, with the exeption of phosphates which are a little bit high.

The tank is 14 months old.
It does have a lot of hair algae because of the phosphates will an echinaster eat it?.

Fish are: 1 royal gramma, 2xocellaris clowns, 1xblue tang, 1 yellowhead sand sifter gobie, 1 mandarin.

Echinaster is supposed to be reef safe, but some people say they choke corals.

 

[ophiuroid]

There is NO "easy" reef safe seastar, IMO... note that I am not trying to get your money, as that site is. They don't sell a lot of things if they say "yeah, this is real tough to keep."

This animal is VERY closely related to Linckia and you must basically assume that it has the same needs. In fact, in the hobby it is called the "orange Linckia."

As a general rule, place little certainty in both the identification and information given on these websites (meaning those that sell animals) or the LFS frankly. Basically, they simply don't know for sure in many cases, IMO. I can tell you that I studied brittlestars exclusively for nearly 10 years, and most of these sites can not identify them properly to species/genus.

Echinaster on that site is labeled not easy but "moderate" and I disagree that they are not reef safe and pose a risk to clams..sponges perhaps, but I disagree on the clams in general.

Their comment on the texture makes no sense whatsoever. That is really confusing.

Echinaster will not eat algae such as nuisance algaes (caulerpa, hair). They are not algae eaters in that sense. They also do not eat "detritus" as that site claims. If they did, then nearly anyone could keep them, in small tanks, in young tanks, in dirty tanks...and this is not the case. Ditto it they ate algae.

Their assertion that they can be spot fed is also misleading. Not all individuals will take to spot feeding. I would not rely on that, though I would recommend trying for sure.

If you wish to try, just have no illusions that they are "easy" or that they will eat your algae.

 

[Cody Ray]

I'm confused by your statement that they won't take to spot feeding. If you know what they feed on it should be a simple matter of placing it within their grasp.

 

[ophiuroid]

We do not know exactly what they eat and what we think they eat is not conducive to being put within reach. But I suppose you are right in the sense that we know they eat stuff on LR, so if you want to "spot feed" them, you need a whole lot of live rock. But otherwise, in terms of taking a hunk of fish or whatever and giving it to them? That rarely rarely works with most Linckia, Echinaster, etc.

 

[lfjewett]

I don't mean to highjack a thread but I was looking for data about keeping sea stars in a 180G. I've read that alot of stuff most of it contradictory.. So if there are some experts here, what exactly do we think they eat? Do they eat live stuff on the rock, dead stuff on the rock, or a type of algea on the rock? What is their life expectancy in the wild? Thanks for any help!

Louis

 

[ophiuroid]

I would need to know what kind of seastars you meant, and what fish you wanted in the tank. The question is to broad I am afraid. Some seastars are predatory, making them relatively easy to care for...others are definitely not easy to care for though if this is a 180 reef with live rock, you will likely be OK for some. The reef safe types do not generally eat algae in the sense of hair algae, slime or caulerpa, nor, IMO, do they eat "detritus" (or dead stuff so to speak).

It has been debated whether seastars show any signs of, or die of, "old age" in the wild. Their lives in captivity may be far shorter than in the wild on average.