Green Star Polyp...Mistake?

[hardimanm]

The wife has informed me she wants me to get coral growing on the live rock (or as she puts it the ugly rock). I currently have some zoas and other softies growing here and there. I thought of using GSP but am a little hesitant to do so. I have heard horror stories of this thing taking over a tank and being hard to get rid of. I have a few pieces of live rock on the sand bed secluded from the main aqua scape. I thought of putting some on there to keep it from spreading willy nilly. I have done this with my antheilla will good results.
So what are ya'lls experiences with the stuff...any suggestions

 

[nolen502]

gsp's are awesome, ive had some in all my tanks. imo they really arent that hard to get rid of either, just peel them up and cut them with scissors or a razor blade

 

[ToXIc]

an encrusting monti is another option..

 

[SaltWaterDave]

My personal opinon is if you can isolate the GSP to just one rock and keep it under control, then its a nice coral. It can and will sting other corlas and has a tendancy to take over if not kept in check. Just my 2 cents.

 

[pickupman66]

They can be invasive. I had them in my old tank and they grew on everythig except the clam. they look great on teh back wall of a tank. I have some Green Zoas now that are doing the same thing. they cover a dinnerplate sized area. to keep both the GSP and zoas undercontrol, you can peel them up or nuke them with some Kalk paste.

 

[Tomoko Schum]

I had a very difficult time with my neon green GSP. Mine does not come off rock surfaces easily at all (shredding into bits and pieces), especially if the rock surfaces are not smooth. They grew into a massive carpet over a few rocks and I had to get rid of the rocks. You can spot treat small patches of GSP with kalkwasser paste, but if it grows into a big patch, you need to be careful not to upset the water parameter. Not only a large amount of kalk paste can add a lot of alkalinity, but the dying GSP may also eventually foul up the water.

My advice would be to grow GSP (and encrusting corals including monti) on an isolated rock. Over the years I had green and orange monti digi spread over many rocks, too. Where an edge of an encrusting monti meet up with another SPS's base, monti usually wins and eventually encrusts over the SPS's base and a part of its branch.

 

[bct15]

Green star polyps are cool but very fast prominent growers. They will spread onto any rigid surface they can, and I have had them crowd out some zoas before. Infact, I recently had to break a rock to pieces to salvage what was left of the two large zoa colonies the GSP invaded(at least 100 polyps each). GSP add a cool sway to your rock work and are somewhat bright, just keep them isolated or they will spread. I have a hermit crab that hangs out in mine, he never comes out, it's beet watching him peek out thinking I don't see him. They do not spread so fast that they can't be stopped but will require more often pruning than most other corals.