What kind of starfish is this?

[Khlim305]

I was cleaning my tank and saw this ony my rock. I do not know how it got there but it looked like a starfish. What kind of starfish is this? What is it good for? Please let me know.

 

[polyppal]

hard to tell from those pics but looks to me like asterina

 

[X-37B]

Looks like an asterina to me as I remove them weekly from my 120.

 

[vetteguy53081]

It is Asterina and you want to remove manually by hand or into a small net. They breed like mice and as in my case will take down a colony of coral in no time. Not to be trusted.

 

[Khlim305]

Thank you all. Are they harmful to anemone as well? I have 2 clown, 10 hermit, and 1 anemone in my 12 gallon tank. My kids saw starfish and they love it. Would it be safer for my tank to remove it as I find them?

 

[sp1187]

I have 1 in my tank (6 months now). I used to have a harlequin shrimp so I was adding 100+ every two weeks.
for some reason, and I don't know why, I have never had the mass reproduction others have experienced.
and when I was adding them to the tank I never had any coral loss to them.

 

[X-37B]

Thank you all. Are they harmful to anemone as well? I have 2 clown, 10 hermit, and 1 anemone in my 12 gallon tank. My kids saw starfish and they love it. Would it be safer for my tank to remove it as I find them?

If you dont take them out when you see them you will have many in a short period of time.
I have removed well over 2-300 from my 120 in 1.5 years.

 

[Billdogg]

Yes to asterina sp. No to removal. I go so far as to move them from tank to tank so that they have a decent population in all my systems. In more than 30 years of reefing I have yet to have them do any harm to anything in any tank (except to film algae and detritus).