What's eating my starfish??

AmberL · Oct 22, 2011

My sand sifting starfish has been chewed on! Four of its legs are half missing. One of those has part of the chewed-on piece still attached. What could have done this?? I currently have 2 clowns, 1 goldrim tang, 1 diamond goby, 3 blue damsels, 1 midas blenny, 1 cleaner shrimp, 2 porcelain crabs, and 2 sand sifting starfish.

The starfish is still alive and moving around the tank. Will it regenerate its halfway missing limbs? Can I do anything to help it out?

Is it possible that I have a mantis shrimp? Could that be the culprit?

ReefDreams · Oct 22, 2011

If I remember right. They do that when there dieing. As far as doing anything to help them I'm not sure on that.

FishLipz · Oct 22, 2011

They do kinda just fall to pieces as they die.

AmberL · Oct 22, 2011

Why is it dying? I've had it for several months and it's constantly moving around the tank. My parameters are fine.

FishLipz · Oct 22, 2011

I've never had one, but from what I've read, unless your system is large and has a deep sandbed they just starve slowly over time.

Saltgator · Oct 22, 2011

The legs will regenerate if it's not dieing. Any powerheads that could have allowed the starfish to have it's legs modded by the prop? Mine found a koralia sometime throughout the night. Only way I found out was a it did it again and I happened to stop it half the way.

Rockadile · Oct 22, 2011

FishLipz said:
I've never had one, but from what I've read, unless your system is large and has a deep sandbed they just starve slowly over time.

+1 this is exactly what happens. there are far better things to use then these starfish as they seldom live long and usually do more harm then good.

AmberL · Oct 22, 2011

Rockadile said:
+1 this is exactly what happens. there are far better things to use then these starfish as they seldom live long and usually do more harm then good.

What harm do they do?

AmberL · Oct 22, 2011

Saltgator said:
The legs will regenerate if it's not dieing. Any powerheads that could have allowed the starfish to have it's legs modded by the prop? Mine found a koralia sometime throughout the night. Only way I found out was a it did it again and I happened to stop it half the way.

I don't think it could fit through the covers on the powerheads.

Raggamuffin · Oct 23, 2011

it is dropping legs, it is starving. from my understanding you need something with a footprint of a standard 180 with a 3+ inch sand bed to keep a small one or it will starve. the reason behind dropping legs is that it is doing everything it can to save energy to stay alive. As for the harm they do, they wipe out the smaller sand sifters you had and then die and make a mess.