Serpent Sea Star ???

[Led Bizkit]

Hello everyone,

Fast run down, I was doing saltwater for 25 plus years and then due to real life issue, I took a 10 years break but I'm back

I just bought a double mega flow Aqueon 120g tank and got this bad boy fired up. Aqueon Proflex 4 Sump (running as a refuguim), Reef Octopus OCT NWB150, Supreme Classic MD18, 2 Hydor Koralia 5 Magnum (1650gph) powerheads and 2 Hydor Koralia Evolution 1050 (not in yet, trying to decide what flow I need), 2 AI LED SOL Blue lights subject to change (maybe Vegas, woot woot), 162 pounds of LR, 120lbs of live sand, and up and running for 30 days so far. Oh I'm going mixed reef tank

MY question is I got a Serpent Sea Star and now I have lost a few Chromis so my thought is the Serpent took them out.

Is this possible due to the fact my LFS misguided me on the food requirements?

More to the story but lets start here

Thanks in advance :wavehand:

 

[amutti]

How big is the serpent? I'd assume it's possible if they were 'sleeping' somewhere. I had a serpent star that was about 12-15" from leg to leg, and it could devour a medium yellow tang if it was dead or dying, but never was the source of the death. . . My experience with Chromis is that they are fragile and don't survive shipping very well. My money would be on the serpent cleaning up.

 

[slojmn]

I've had my current servant star for around 16 years. The little fella keeps living!!! He has never taken out a fish alive that I know of and I am pretty fastidious about monitoring fish in my tank. He will clean them up if they dieand they are not removed. I do see him in his basket stance at night on ocassion, he use to do it more when he was younger, a trick to catch unsuspecting dinner items. But truthfully even my smallest of small fish are not tricked. Chromis are notorious for fading away...or stressing each other out in the hierarchy and killing each other off over time. I would guess they are succumbing to some other cause and your serpent star is cleaning up which is their job in the reef tank IMO.

 

[Led Bizkit]

Mine is around 5 to 6 inches leg to leg. I had purchased five Chromis and five dominos. I had two Chromis struggling within 48 hours (swimming high, rapid breathing, hiding) but they are the only two that survived lol.

The other ones swimming good, eating great, playing, very strong, and 7 of those disappeared during the night. One domino, I was watching him playing then 30 minutes later dead on the ground and one of the snails had him (this was in the early evening hours). It seems that I was losing one every night or every other night. Not to mention, the loses started when I got the Serpent.

Strange, very strange.

Also the LFS told me to feed him/her brine or mysis.......When really should be feed small pieces of chopped meat, shrimp, mussel, fish

 

[Badbrad8500]

Those Chromis are pretty fragile. I've had several die from stress. That being said, I have been told by the LFS that if Sea Serpents aren't sufficiently fed, they'll take out small fish during the night when the fish are asleep. Might want to up the food and then try again.

 

[Monkeyfish]

If it's one of the green serpent stars, it very well may have eaten your fish. Whether or not they were dead before being eaten is the question and they are known to eat small sleeping fish.

 

[Led Bizkit]

I got the red one

Now that I'm back into this, you start remembering things not to do like trusting what the LFS guy tells you :headwally:

 

[kissman]

i had one that was 12" to 14" tip to tip and it would try and catch the fish so I got rid of him.