Thousands of tiny starfish????

[Elmac1]

I have had my 92 gallon corner tank running for a couple of years now. I have about 150lbs of live rock and maintained FOWLR until about a year ago, at which time I removed all non reef safe animals. Over the past 6 -8 months, I have noticed hundreds, maybe thousands of tiny grey / sand color starfish in the live rock. They put their legs out to collect food when I feed. At first I thought they were some kind of worm but occasionally the come all the way out, and they are clearly starfish.

The biggest ones are about the size of a quarter from leg to leg. They are in every rock in the tank. They also reside in proximity to my green star polyps and green button polyps.

Can anyone tell me what these are? Are the harmful to corals? Are the otherwise beneficial?

 

[sbeane]

They are Micro brittle starfish, from what i am told they are fine not harmful.

 

[Maxi]

Yep, they are brittle stars. 100% reef safe, and cool looking. Keep an eye out for those with the red bands instead of the grey bands, those look really cool!

 

[Gold Stripe]

If you can catch a dozen or so I'll give you $1 a piece plus shipping!

 

[woodiecrafts]

Same here, if you decide that you have too many and want to unload a few, just let me know.

 

[jnewman]

are all the arms the same length? do you have any pics. with out an image they can not be I.D. I have star fish that came in as hitchhikers and have multiplied rapidly. My daughter loves star fish so I figured I am lucky right well I come to find out that these starfish can eat coral and so I have been hunting stars at night when sweety is sleeping. (she would freek) So post Pics get good answers and be patient.

 

[Elmac1]

How does one catch these? I see legs poking out of the rock all the time but only occasionally see the whole starfish.

Any traps available?

 

[cdness]

if you trap some send them my way...