Red starfish eating goniopora

[rt67ghy]

I found my fromia indica clamped on to my goniopora.I removed it thinking it might be trying to eat it. Then a few days later I again saw it tightly hugging the goni. Upon removing it I found a V-shaped patch where my goni polyps were missing and a couple of holes in the rock from which I presume the polyps were pulled out. I'm wondering if anyone else has experienced this?

(I'm only keeping the star because it does a good job of eating my syconoid and other hitch-hiking sponges.)

 

[bundybear1981]

I lost 2 corals to my starfish. It got banished to the sump then. It killed a hammer overnight, and I lost my beautiful frogspawn to it (I caught it eating it, damage was too severe for it to recover)
IMO if you keep it in the tank you will lose more corals.

 

[rt67ghy]

I lost 2 corals to my starfish. It got banished to the sump then. It killed a hammer overnight, and I lost my beautiful frogspawn to it (I caught it eating it, damage was too severe for it to recover)
IMO if you keep it in the tank you will lose more corals.

OMG! That's terrible. What species of star do you have?

I had to put my goniopora on a tall acrylic table so it can't do it again. I have a lobophyllia hemprichii which the star hasn't touched and it doesn't do anything to the softies in my tank.

 

[Tweaked]

Like everything in this hobby, just cause it's listed as reef safe, some have had different experiences as in your case. It does state that supplementing their diet with meaty foods is encouraged. Maybe its starving and is trying to survive is all.