monkeydad April 5, 2010 Share April 5, 2010 So I'm sittin' in my chair with a cup of joe watching life happen in my 14g nano reef tank with Fiji LR and I see an almost imperceptible movement of 'something'. Hmmm, what's this? It appears to be a slug, possibly a snail. It has a small, pink, oval-shaped shell that barely covers the body. It is about an inch long, and I can't believe I hadn't seen it until today (tank is two months old). So as I'm staring at this thing, I notice what looks like a starfish. I'm thinking, "I didn't put that in there"... Is it just a shell on/in the rock? So I stick my mitt in the tank and touched it. IT MOVED! Wow, not only did it start to amble off, but it changed colors! It has five points and is certainly not a brittle type with skinny long arms and button body. Its arms were fairly short and stocky at the base tapering to a point and were a bit stiff. Did I mention it changed color! When I touched it, it turned white, then slowly matched the background. Anyone know what these are (especially the 'starfish')?? As always, THANKS! On each picture, look for the starfish at the 7 O'clock position relative to the red colored epoxy/putty. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zygote2k April 5, 2010 Share April 5, 2010 it's an asterina. remove it now before there are hundreds... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
monkeydad April 5, 2010 Author Share April 5, 2010 it's an asterina. remove it now before there are hundreds... Wow that was fast zygote2k! It would be my luck to have a pest starfish! My googling revealed that they eat several varieties of coral that I want to have (and my GSP, which I already have) and that the multiply rapidly. Getting him out is going to be TOUGH. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L8 2 RISE April 5, 2010 Share April 5, 2010 The snail is a Stomella Snail. It's the best algae eating snail you can have and they are common hitch hikers. The star is an asterina star. Also a harmless benefactor to the tank. If you do end up with a lot of them, consider yourself lucky because you'll be able to get a harlequin shrimp and have it live naturally in the tank... for some amount of time. Basically, both are harmless, common hitch hikers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L8 2 RISE April 5, 2010 Share April 5, 2010 Wow that was fast zygote2k! It would be my luck to have a pest starfish! My googling revealed that they eat several varieties of coral that I want to have (and my GSP, which I already have) and that the multiply rapidly. Getting him out is going to be TOUGH. SUPPOSEDLY only certain types eat coral (ones with blue/red spots or something like that) but I have yet to witness it and don't know of anyone that has experienced this. Most likely you won't have issues with too many of them, but there is a chance that you will. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
monkeydad April 5, 2010 Author Share April 5, 2010 The snail is a Stomella Snail. It's the best algae eating snail you can have and they are common hitch hikers. The star is an asterina star. Also a harmless benefactor to the tank. If you do end up with a lot of them, consider yourself lucky because you'll be able to get a harlequin shrimp and have it live naturally in the tank... for some amount of time. Basically, both are harmless, common hitch hikers. Thanks L8 2 Rise, Google revealed conflicting info like I'm seeing here. They are either harmless or eat "GSP, acropora, xenia, green star polyps, zoanthids, and several types of soft leather corals." which is from a nano-reef.com information post. The Harlequin Shrimp look pretty neat, but I already have one peppermint and one fire/blood shrimp in my 14g nano-reef biocube and I want to be careful to not overload the bio filter. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chad April 5, 2010 Share April 5, 2010 I like asterina stars, although I have occasionally seen them increase to pretty large populations. There is also information the linkia stars eat them, I saw some pictures of this a few months back on RC. Likely there are several different species, each with their own dietary needs (some that dine on coral), but I have not had a problem with them in any of my tanks or the tanks that I have maintained (in fact, I wish I had more of them in my current tank!), perhaps I have been luck to get the happy detrivore versions! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chad April 5, 2010 Share April 5, 2010 Stomatella snails are awesome by the way... With a bonus that they reproduce prolifically in aquariums A couple of weeks ago I was watching my tank after the lights had gone out and was lucky enough to witness a mass spawning of them. At more or less the same time they all climbed to high points on the rocks, stood almost upright (hard to believe a snail could support themselves with such a small portion of their foot on the rock) and emitted cloudy spurts into the water column. It was cool Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jason the filter freak April 5, 2010 Share April 5, 2010 the stomatella leave them alone, they're fantastic cleaners, pretty easily breed in tank, and usually only come out at night so they don't clutter up your glass Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
monkeydad April 5, 2010 Author Share April 5, 2010 Very cool folks, thanks a lot. I was thinking if I wanted Harlequin shrimp, then I would trade my peppermint in on a mated pair of Harlequins netting a gain of only one crustacean. But as I did some more reading on the peppermint shrimp, I saw they eat aiptasia. I had one aiptasia on a coral frag, key word HAD. It was gone....hmm, I wonder if my peppermint ate it. I'm going to keep the peppermint! Maybe a Harlequin later. I'm going to keep the asterina and watch what happens. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L8 2 RISE April 5, 2010 Share April 5, 2010 In a 14 gallon, you'd be fine with a bunch of shrimp, trust me. I kept a small puffer and a goby/pistol shrimp pair in a 12 gallon as my first tank, would I suggest this now that I have more experience in the hobby, no, but they did fine for about 6-8 months before I broke the tank down for something bigger. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gmubeach April 6, 2010 Share April 6, 2010 I had the stomatellas in my old tank and they are awesome! I have astrainas in my new tank going to see how they fair. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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