starfish

[SteveNMegz]

Hey guys
we recently just bought some frags and we found some starfish on them when we put them in our tank some were missing 2 or 3 legs are they dead?
and the one just sits at the water line at the top of the tank is this normal?

 

[Deyoe1118]

not dead...starfish can regenerate, they will grow back missing legs. I have seen many starfish stay near the top of tanks, esp choc ship stars. The only way to tell if they are dead is to flip them over. They will "right" themselves, or if they are just rotting away sitting on the bottom of the tank.

 

[SteveNMegz]

okay cool thanks

 

[AIMFish]

These sound like asternia stars, scroll down this page, if you didn't see them on frags you bought. If a few have less legs than others its because they just seperated. They get about 6-7 legs and then split in half to reproduce.