Question about a serpent sea star

[Luis]

Al my fish were ok until I get a black serpent sea star, I've been loosing one small fish every week, first I started missing my firefish. Do you thing the serpent seastar could be the culprit or is just a coincidence? Any similar experience?

thanks

 

[Anonymous]

Serpent sea stars are notorious for preying on small fish. If it's hungry it will hunt. I would remove it just to be sure. If you keep loosing fish then you know it's not the star, but chances are it is.

 

[Anonymous]

Is it a serpent star or a brittle star? I've kept serpent stars with small fish before and no problems. Brittles OTOH are a different story and I've read that they will actively hunt small fish. A firefish would be a prime target. I kept a firefish with a serpent star before and they sometimes shared the same overhang. I'm also thinking I recall something about different sp. of brittles being more preadatory than others but I'm not sue on that. I agree that it's likely not coincidence though.

 

[Anonymous]

This goes to show there's barely any Reefkeeping Law" written in stone. I've had no issue while keeping brittle starfish

 

[Luis]

Well I don't know the difference between serpent and brittle seastar... here is the picture a tentacle is about 8 inches long, here is the pic of mine....

 

[Luis]

Hey don't focus in the aiptasias jeje I know I have a lot but they don't botter my corals I have very stinging corals ...

 

[Anonymous]

There are more stars than we really have good records for. How about you remove it and see if you stop losing fish? Do you have a sump you could drop it into? Or, start actively feeding it and see what happens (although I always think of Mothra when I think of feeding brittles/serpents, don't ask me why).

 

[FifeReef]

I have a Serpent Star in my 150 with no problems. My Green Brittle Star on the other hand was banned to the refugium after a firefish went missing and I found the back end of my cleaner shrimp slowly disappearing into his mouth.

 

[Anonymous]

Ahh.. Ophiarachna incrassata will do it every time.

 

[Anonymous]

There are more stars than we really have good records for. How about you remove it and see if you stop losing fish? Do you have a sump you could drop it into? Or, start actively feeding it and see what happens (although I always think of Mothra when I think of feeding brittles/serpents, don't ask me why).

I'd start feeding it with forceps/tweezers. If it is the star that's eating your fish feeding him will slow that down a bit. If it doesn't slow it down, they get so used to being fed they will come out of hiding to get the morsels of food and wrap themselves around the forceps. That makes it easy to remove it :twisted:

 

[Luis]

Please.... could you guys check the pic above and tell me if my starfish is a brittle or a serpent?

Thanks

 

[Anonymous]

Please.... could you guys check the pic above and tell me if my starfish is a brittle or a serpent?

Thanks

It's a few tentacle tips, Luis, that's not exactly much to make anything resembling a definitive ID on. But, you want an opinion, so here you have mine--I'm gonna bet it's Ophiarachna spp.. Or maybe Ophioderma.

http://www.wetwebmedia.com/brittlestaridfaqs.htm

http://home.att.net/~ophiuroid/html/aquarium.html