asterina

I got one on a coral, who knows where it is now, think on one of the pest sites they do list these as possibly eating some corals... not sure if it was sps or not.
 
wish i added a poll to this.

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I had a ton of them before. I didnt really mind until I noticed they were eating my coraline faster than it could grow. Gave me an excuse to buy a harlequin shrimp and havent seen one for in my tank in over a year... Until yesterday.
 
I've pulled several off my zoas. And the zoas were toast. I thought they were cool to have. Not now.
 
They can multiply to plague-like proportions in a relatively short time. Mine eat coralline algae so I see white spots all over my LR. My nutrients are in pretty good control (zero nitrates, low phosphates, and no algae) too. I'd get rid of him now before it's too late!
 
There are a lot of aquarists who think asterinia starfish eat corals. There are also a lot of people that think bristle worms eat their livestock. I've never seen scientific evidence that either assumption is correct.I've had asterinia starfish in several tanks and never seen evidence they eat corals. That's not scientific fact, just my experience.
 
I have many in my tank, do not seem to cause any problems. They keep the many small brittlestars and small bristleworms company.
 
I think they're kinda neat. Have a few in my tank for awhile with no issues. They haven't reached plague proportions and don't seem to munch on anything. adds to the diversity of the tank.
 
I had some and got to a number of just way too many. My coralline started turning white from them eating so much of it.

I have experienced them eating coral but not to where they will kill off a whole colony. You can allow them to grow in your tank and after some time get some harlequin shrimp. They are really neat to watch
 
Very timely post... i've recently seen a spike in my population too, after having virtually none for a couple years. It may be coincidence but I also lost most of a nice Zoa colony about the same time I noticed the population spike... also, to the previous poster's observations, they are eating my coraline... as such, they have become public enemy number one in my tank, kill on site.
 
I was in the camp that they are cool and harmless. I have had them in previous systems no problem. They popped up in my most recent system (almost 2 years old) and I just let them be. I never witnessed them bothering anything for 2 years. I recently fragged off a few polyps of space monster zoas (high end button polyps) and the stars went to town. I went from a very healthy, 75-100 polyp colony of zoanthids to 0. I was pulling them off of polyps every day and my wife was doing the same while I was at work. They eventually won and now I have no space monster zoas. These are not some cheap polyps either. When I was selling the frags I was selling them at $40 per polyp.

Do yourself a favor, take them out of your system. They can be fine for long periods of time until they decide one day to destroy your favorite coral(s) and cost you hundreds if not thousands of dollars in damage. There is little to no benefit having them in the system yet they are known to eat corals, regardless of scientific fact or not. Now that I waited 2 years I cannot keep up pulling them out of my system.. Wish I would have listened to the stories and started much earlier.
 
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