Urchin pic

[greenstarman]

A newly discoverd creature was found in my tank today. He is located in my overflow box so right now he is well enough away from my corals. Can anyone tell from the pic if he is bad?


Click on pic for large view.

 

[ophiuroid]

Wow, that is a small urchin! Just a baby, probably the "rock boring" urchin Echinometra a very common hitch hiker. Hard to know for sure though. This will get larger, and as with all urchins in time may be a bulldozer of poorly attached frags and such. All urchins, IMO, have some risk of eating soft corals - zoanthids or encrusting things in particular, but this is a limited risk, IMO. I don't see a particular reason to worryl.

 

[greenstarman]

What do they eat... I take its eating the coraline algea.

 

[iamwhatiam52]

Urchins eat algae.
The one you have may be a Diadema, long spine urchin. It,s hard to tell from the pic. I had one that size that now has spines 8 inches long. It does topple a loose frag from time to time, bit it is beautiful so I keep it.