Marbled sea-star

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MarkW19

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Mar 25, 2004
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I'm thinking of getting one of these for my 40gal.

Are there any issues with them eating/harming fish, hermit crabs or shrimp, and do they have to be target fed?

How big do they get?
 
Do you have the latin name of the star? There are many "generic" names used for starts and this one sounds like a Bahaman species that would not be safe for sessile inverts.

Cheers
Steve
 
If it's a Fromia then you might want to get a lot more LR first.
 
Given the tank size (29 gal?) I would actually stear clear of these types of stars. They feed primarily from algae film and bacterial slime so a smaller tank would not be able sustain it long term. Generally speaking a larger (100+ gal) system loaded with LR would be a better option for this star and similar species.

Cheers
Steve
 
Aww...ok.

My tank is 40gal, not a massive amount of live rock. What sort of star would you recommend for me?
 
If I did decide to keep the Fromia, I at least need to add quite a bit more live rock to my tank?
 
MarkW19 said:
My tank is 40gal, not a massive amount of live rock. What sort of star would you recommend for me?
If I did decide to keep the Fromia, I at least need to add quite a bit more live rock to my tank?

Even if you where to put in close to 2 lb/gal of LR it would still fall short IME. These types of stars do not actually "hunt" for food in the sense we recognize. They more or less stumble upon it and there needs to be alot to accomodate their needs. What you need is a reef safe star that can forage for foods easily and be target fed. That would mean either a brittle or serpent star. Just be careful to stear clear of the green brittles. They are quite the aggressive hunters. The only drawback to these stars is they hide quite a bit but they are great surface substrate cleaners.

An Orange seastar (Echunaster sp.) ?
Linkia, Fromia and Echinaster are all basically the same when it comes to feeding requirements. If you had a larger (well matured) reef tank this wouldn't be an issue but with only a 40 gal tank I wouldn't risk it.

Cheers
Steve
 
Mark, from the choices you've mentioned I don't really think you'll be happy settling for a brittle star.. You might aswell wait till you get the bigger tank so you can go for the one you really want.
 
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