pest alert

[tazzy695]

well I seem to have acquired some pest stars specifically zoa eating astera stars anyone know of a fish or something that will eat them but leave my larger brittle stars alone

[iyachtuxivm]

Harliquin shrimp will devour the asterina starfish. Your brittles should be safe but its a gamble. My harly didnt bother my serpent star but I have heard stories so......

[tazzy695]

anyone know of any other critters that would work against them

[Tom@HaslettMI]

I can't think of any others. If you have a refugium you could put your brittle stars in there while the shrimp finishes off the asterinas. Or you could try manually removing the pest stars... if there's not too many already.

HTH,
Tom

[iyachtuxivm]

tazzy if you pull and bag em I'll take as many as you are willing to pull! Ill even pay you to pick em we can talk prices through pm or phone lmk

[tazzy695]

only problem is most i can see are pinhead size right now and is one reason i cant get to them

as for putting my 3 brittle stars in the sump that would be near imposible without destroying my curent rock work



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[Tom@HaslettMI]

only problem is most i can see are pinhead size right now and is one reason i cant get to them

I don't know this for sure but it seems like the stars would need to be bigger than that to inflict damage to zoas... do you have a positive ID? What about using an air hose and siphon them out?


as for putting my 3 brittle stars in the sump that would be near imposible without destroying my curent rock work

No chance for trapping or night hunting? After lights-out put a little food in and they'll probably come out where you can catch them.

What about housing the shrimp in a nano/pico and moving the zoas in to get cleaned.

I realize these are probably not the solutions you're looking for but there doesn't appear to be another predator to deal with these.

HTH,
Tom

[tazzy695]

all good sugestions tom

as for catching the large stars they dont come out from their rock holes even at night they just stick the long legs out and catch the food

nano idea would work but i like living (mean wife) lol

and for the sugestion of sucking them out i was already planning this beeing as i was doing a wc today any how

the babie ones i dont think would do much dammage but at the same time they get bigger and yes i do have a pos id on them as i caught an adult one chomping on the one coliny of zoas but he and all the other adult ones i could catch yesterday are drying out on a shelf in my canopy



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[Tom@HaslettMI]

I'm only allowed one tank as well, so I feel your pain there.

What about a plastic cage in your tank with the shrimp in it?
Like this one: http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/detailed_image.cfm?pCatId=21546&large=/images/Categoryimages/larger/lg-71629-51579-reptile.jpg

minus the light and hermit crab of course...

[tazzy695]

well lets see how many people would want a tank like that inside of their display tank I know I am not one of them

oh well I will just keep crushing the tiny ones and remove the bigger ones when I can get to them

heck I can consider my self lucky that this is the first real pest (algae not included) I have gotten out of all of them out there

[tazzy695]

iyachtuxivm you have a pm coming

[tazzy695]

Ok here are pics I took tonight of the stars

This pic is of the safe type
http://i281.photobucket.com/albums/kk212/marcp3/SatFeb27212843EST2010.jpg

This one is of the blue colored ones that eat zoas
http://i281.photobucket.com/albums/kk212/marcp3/SatFeb27212833EST2010.jpg