My Sea Star Does Not Look Good

[svirid]

Hi Guys!

2 month ago I bought one of my corals and found sea star attached to it.
It had only 3 legs and I decied to keep it.
For the last couple of days I have noticed some white spots on the end of its legs.
Can u please advice me .
Thank you

 

[Colin_T]

it looks like it has developed a bacterial infection. Do you have any harlequin shrimp or crabs in the tank? They might have tried to eat it and now it is infected. If the water is in good condition and nothing else tries to eat it then it might recover.
Do you feed it at all? You can try feeding it small bits of prawn. The starfish should crawl over the food and put its stomach out and envelop the food. It's kind of interesting to watch

 

[SkiFletch]

Cross your fingers? Wish I could offer better advice

 

[svirid]

Thanks, but is it dangerous to keep it, can it infect my tank?

Yes I have hermits, and I have one fire shrimp. I have never tried to feed it. Not sure how.

 

[Colin_T]

If the starfish starts to break down then it will cause the ammonia levels to go up and could cause problems to everything else in the tank. If it stops moving around the tank and white stuff starts coming out of the ends of the legs, then I would take the starfish out and destroy it.

To feed it put a small piece of shrimp next to its body. The starfish should crawl over the food and digest it.

 

[SkiFletch]

How big is this starfish? Tough for me to say without a point of reference but it looks small to me?

 

[svirid]

How big is this starfish? Tough for me to say without a point of reference but it looks small to me?

Apx 4cm, I wanted to fill a small bucket and move her in there, feed a little. I cant do it in my tank.
The shrimp runs like crazy to get the food.

 

[Colin_T]

sounds like you need to feed the shrimp more.
If you put the starfish in the bucket change the water everyday and have it well aerated.

 

[svirid]

sounds like you need to feed the shrimp more.
If you put the starfish in the bucket change the water everyday and have it well aerated.

Not really sure how much to feed a shrimp but while I am feeding my clowns 3-4 times a day she gets
lots of the brine meat. She was hungry for food all the time since I got her.

 

[Colin_T]

does the shrimp get anything else beside brineshrimp? Same question for the clownfish.
They should be fed a variety of food to provide a more balanced diet. Marine mix (prawn, fish & squid) can be used along with mysis shrimp and daphnia. There are also plenty of marine pellets available these days.
If the shrimp is getting some food each day then that is fine. A lot of people just let the shrimp scavenge and quite often they starve. But if its getting fed several times a day it should be fine.

 

[steelhealr]

Not much I can add here except that you should remove it quickly if it dies. I had a star once...they are NASTY when they break down. SH

 

[n3ont3tra]

Yeah, mine just died, I actually think it started breaking down BEFORE it died. Because there was 0.25ppm ammonia when I took it out, and it was still alive. There was nothing else to cause ammonia so I'm assuming it was the star.