Asterina stars ?

[muggle0981]

I know they are not a nuisance in general

i sweat my asterina starfish keep eating my darn zoa frags

good zoa frags-then polyps start disappearing and find these little stars in the frags

i swear they are eating them…

anyone ever have zoas eaten by asterina?

 

[Reefer Matt Verified Media Partner]

In my experience, some eat zoas, some don't.

 

[vetteguy53081]

I know they are not a nuisance in general

i sweat my asterina starfish keep eating my darn zoa frags

good zoa frags-then polyps start disappearing and find these little stars in the frags

i swear they are eating them…

anyone ever have zoas eaten by asterina?

Theyre a nightmare. Was losing whole Bam Bam colony a while back and could not understand why and caught these guys (size of a nickle)

and a few smaller chomping on Bam Bams

 

[EpisodeMnH]

They most definitely will. Kill them on sight or get a Harlequin Shrimp to take care of them. Don’t wait til it’s too late like I did. I ended up essentially “renting” a Harlequin to handle it. Bought him and let them know up front that I wanted to be able to return him once he did his job, which they were more than okay with. It’s a shame tho, loved that little guy. Too much of a hassle to continue feeding something that eats strictly starfish tho lol. But to get back to my point, those little demons cost me hundreds in Zoas and wiped out multiple colonies. They started eating my GSP as well. And yes it is 100% confirmed it was them and they didn’t only eat Zoas that were already dying like a lot of people will try to tell you. I pulled them off of completely healthy Zoas multiple times and there were literal bite marks on the stems at the point of attachment. I know without a shadow of a doubt that they were 100% the cause.

Now it is also true that only certain species eat coral and some are harmless, but it’s not worth the risk of waiting to see which species you personally have IMO. Every now and again I still catch a stray one in my tank and they now get removed immediately no questions asked.

 

[muggle0981]

Was debating if i try harlequin shrimp

 

[Stomatopods17]

Harlequin renting will clean them out.

You'd be surprised how quickly they eradicate all the stars. Its impossible to keep harlequins long term with asterinas cause they just go through so many of them. If you grow attached you can feed them larger starfish.

Some asterinas are harmless (but breed like rabbits..) some are bad, its pretty difficult to tell without resorting to trial and error with the ones you have... and you probably figured it out by now.

 

[Ef4life]

Yes some will eat zoas, some in my tanks acquired a taste for birdsnest too. Really not too hard to manage the population on a smaller tank - a couple minutes a day with tweezers removing any you can find.

 

[PeterEde]

I know they are not a nuisance in general

i sweat my asterina starfish keep eating my darn zoa frags

good zoa frags-then polyps start disappearing and find these little stars in the frags

i swear they are eating them…

anyone ever have zoas eaten by asterina?

Just found one on my zoa and stupidly dropped it back in the tank

 

[muggle0981]

Ive been picking them out

now down to only pulling 2-3 a day

Might be close to eradication

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

Ive been picking them out

now down to only pulling 2-3 a day

Might be close to eradication

In the early morning they will be all over the glass. Do a water change, use the syphon to bump them off the glass, they are light enough that they will get sucked up. You can suck up hundreds in as much time as it takes to fill a 5 gallon bucket. In 2 or 3 days you won't see them anymore.

 

[exnisstech]

Ditto on the harlequin shrimp. I had one for a while to get rid of astrina that were covering the glass. I tried keeping it long term but got tired of cutting legs off of chocolate chip stars to feed it.

 

[TokenReefer]

I've been watching an asterina near my zoas this morning...waiting for it to....do something. So far nothing but I just don't know about these little guys any more lol. Opportunistic or predators of coral... Surely it'd be eating the zoa right now, right?. What to do!

 

[TokenReefer]

I've been watching an asterina near my zoas this morning...waiting for it to....do something. So far nothing but I just don't know about these little guys any more lol. Opportunistic or predators of coral... Surely it'd be eating the zoa right now, right?. What to do!

And now it's moved away from the zoas leaving them untouched... maybe they only like certain varieties? I'm up in the air on this

 

[ISpeakForTheSeas]

I've heard some species eat corals and others don't - I've seen convincing evidence for one species (a very darkly colored one), and one piece of somewhat convincing evidence for one different species, but the vast majority of these guys seem to be at least mostly safe.

With regards to whether or not the average "Asterina" (technically Aquilonastra - Asterina is a separate genus within the Asterinidae family) eat corals, it might be a species specific thing, it might be a you have way too many starfish so they're out of other food options thing, it might be they're eating the slime coat/mucus on the coral rather than the coral itself (see below), or they might just opportunistically eat unhealthy corals. Based on how starfish eat, it seems plausible to me that it may also be coincidental (i.e. the star goes to eat something off the coral and the coral just happens to be one that is able to be negatively effected by the star's everted stomach). Regardless, Zoas are just about the only coral I've heard about regular "Asterina" stars potentially going after (so them potentially going after a birdsnest coral is news to me).

A quote I like to refer to for this:

Timfish said:
It's an Aquilonastra spp. starfish and is a great scavenger. I see them with anywhere from 4 to 12 legs. The whole discusion around them seems to me excellent examples of misidentification, mistaken behaviour and assumed causality based just on heresay without looking at the research. Asterina spp starfish are preditary but only reproduce sexually and are shortlived so while it's possible some might get into a tank even if it did happen it's not going to be around long. Aquilonastra are one of the uncommon species that reproduce fissiparous or by splitting so are easy to identify by the different sized legs regrown after splitting. They perform an important function not only feeding off algae films but also feeding off microbial films including those on corals (at least ones that don't sting). FYI the mucus coating on corals ages and corals have to periodicely shed it to renew it and maintian healthy microbial processes (Ref 1, Ref 2). If Aquilonastra are feeding on zoas or softies I'll argue they are either benign or even beneficial as they may be reducing the unhealthy older mucus which can be full of unhealthy microbes which the animal is trying to get rid of and are far more likely to be the actual problem.

Here's an example, this Toadstool is doing one of it's periodic sheddings. The Aquilonastra have been in this system for years but only climb onto the Toadstool when it's shedding. In the first picture you can see the old mucus film, Aquilonastra starfish and areas they have cleaned off. The second picture shows the Toadstool a week later.

 

[TokenReefer]

Excellent information! Thank you @ISpeakForTheSeas as well as @Timfish. I'll admit I tossed a few in my early days reading mixed info but the ones remaining haven't been any real concern; this debate just enters my mind every time (rarely) I see one near the zoas... Verdict for me is...let them be

 

[minus9]

My experience with aquilonastras has been more of CUC and not as predators. I believe they are just cleaning up unhealthy animals (corals) that are on their way out or victims from another predator. I'm not saying there are not species that prey on corals, but if that was their primary food source, you would know it instantly. I think most of the aquilonastras that we encounter are merely cleaning up like bristleworms, which also get placed in the "bad" category from novice hobbyists. I've seen aquilonastras on zoas, but they were cleaning them up and after they left the polyp, it was fine and back to normal.

 

[AydenLincoln]

Theyre a nightmare. Was losing whole Bam Bam colony a while back and could not understand why and caught these guys (size of a nickle)

and a few smaller chomping on Bam Bams

This would make a nice little magnet!

 

[TokenReefer]

Ok new information has come to light... Some of my zoas were closed when I got home (these particular zoas rarely close in my system). Got out the magnifying glass and there were cuts in a few polyp stems and one looked to have been cut through and sure enough in the center was a tiny asterina. I've changed my mind now... One star gone rogue? Perhaps, but I'm on the lookout now for it's "clones"