Feather Star

[BeccaB]

Does anyone have one? what is a good price ro pay for one?
What other info can you give me?

I am thinking about getting a feather star and I cant find any info on it, they have them at my lfs for $50. but I am not sure if thats good or not and of course the guy at the lfs says they are reef safe but I want to double check before I get one and I cant not find any info online.

Thanks in advance.
B

 

[philter4]

They are extreamly difficult to feed. I have kept them in the past,(I'm travelling too much right now to care for one) and was successful for more then 2 years. The availability of filter feeding commercial foods has increased to the point where we will see more long term success.

Some things to consider before buying one are the health of the animal before you get it, make sure it is hiding while the lights are on at the LFS, they are all nocternal and if they are open or active in the light, something is wrong to make it that way. They usually only feed at night, so you have to feed when it is activly trying to get food, that means several hours after the light are off. They need a perch where there is current to gove them an feeding spot. The arms are evtreamly delicate, and sticky so you do not want to touch them as they stick to your hands and break off. Aslo I wouldn't expose them to air, when I collect them I never let them touch air and I have had the best of luck with ones that were put in the collection jar and never moved until I got home.

I love them and as soon as my situation changes to the point where I can give one the time it needs I will get another one, but just be aware of what it takes to care for one before you get it.

 

[dendro982]

Philter4:
Please, post more: I'm also trying to keep feather stars.
Photo (it seems that stars with long, not too fluffy arms, ~20, doing much worse, than fluffy-feathered ones), food, amount and frequency of feeding, natural seawater or not, salinity, alkalinity, temperature.

Were yours collected locally or imported from Indo-Pacific?

BeccaB:
My information is here.
They are generally considered as difficult, as most difficult non-photosynthetic corals. Here is example of feeding, practically continuous, special food and efficient filtration.
HTH

 

[philter4]

The ones I collect are the native golden crinoid, which is a "not too fluffy" star that can be any color from ghost white to brilliant gold. I have only collected ones that I could get into my jar without touching them. Usually when I see one on the underside of the ledge or cave, or at night when they are out feeding, I take my knife blade and use it to seperate the animal from the surface. Once it is in the water column I open my collection jar and allow it to float in and keep it seperate from all other collected animals.

Once home and in the tank, which is natural sea water, so I don't really test the parameters much, I feed nightly on a drip system. I have a 2 gallon jar with an airline ball valve siliconed into the bottom. You can buy them for watering chameleons, but I just made one. In it I put fresh water with the food which consists of baby brine (live and frozen) oyster eggs, DT's, cyclopese, frozen rotifers and frozen cyclops along with H2O's coral vital, I usually mix 3-4 different ones and change it around each night, and after the lights are off I drip this into the filter chamber right at the return pump. I have kept 3 at different times and all have exibited growth of the arms and one got so big in my 40 gallon tank that I had to give it to a friend with a big tank because when it opened to feed it was touching the glass sides of the tank and couldn't fully expand.

I don't have any right now, so I have no photos, but I will get another one and then post both the animal and the feeding station I use.

Hope that was enough because that is all I have for right now.

 

[dendro982]

Thanks! Very informative. I'll try to find this jar or valve, to make a device for continuous feeding. Have almost all food, that you listed, it worth to try to improve.

Only mine are all Indo-Pacific, and in artificial salt water, alas.

 

[dendro982]

philter4:
I'm trying to find the valve: is it the same, as Plastic 2 Way Valve? Airline valve with round rotating part.
If it is the same, how prevent it from clogging by food, that eventually settles at the bottom of feeding jar?

If you will be able to make a photo of drawing of the feeding device, it will be extremely helpful. Most continuous feeding devices are cost hundreds dollars.

 

[philter4]

It is a simple green connector with a spinning pin valve on top. It clogs quite frequently, and I just push a streightened paper clip through it while it is fully open. To help preventing it from clogging I use the whole gallon and light food, this dilutes the food so only a small amount goes in at a time, and I have a small air pump with airstone in the jar to keep the frozen and cyclopeeze from settling on the bottom. I could draw you a picture, but I'm not sure how to post it.

 

[dendro982]

Thanks!
I think that I understand how to, but picture could be helpful too.

Posting image at RC , but I usually use photobucket.com, free image host, upload pictures there and copy-paste string for forums in the Reply.

 

[philter4]

I use photobucket to upload photos, it is just that the tank is not up and running so I would have to draw a picture, I guess I could draw the diagram, photograph it and then post a pic, we'll see if I get off my butt and do all that though.

 

[dendro982]

Any operational system, PC or Mac, should have basic drawing program, like MS Paint. It allows at least this:

Crude, but gives an idea. Pencil should be free drawing, line- straight lines, and basic geometric shapes - separate tool. But it's your choice

 

[philter4]

Here is a simple drawing, hope it helps, I just fill the gallon jar with fresh water and add the amount of food that I want to feed, by diluting the food and putting an airstone it seems to keep the food from just settling on the bottom and the valve from clogging too much, though like I mentioned in an earlier post, I still have to unplug the valve occasionally.

 

[dendro982]

Can you re-post it, please?
I see the empty box with text: "Image has been moved or deleted".

 

[philter4]

Dendro, I redrew it, but for some reason I can't download it to photo bucket, if you pm me your e-mail I'll send it as an attachment, that should work.

 

[dendro982]

Here it is:

Thank you!

If you will have any more observations about feather stars and tips on their keeping, post, please.