Brittle star melting away?? Urgent

[maleks.reef]

Just got back from work and i find this. I noticed a small white wound on the star about a week ago but i thought its just an abrasion from the rock. Salinity is at 34 ppm but it has been this way for months now. Im increasing it very slowly. No other animals in the tank besides the snails and cleaner shrimp. I feed the tank a protein based and an algae based food 2-5 times a week. What could be the cause?

Tank is a 3 gal bowl. 4 months old. No fish. Sofites and inverts only.

Really devastated to see this, he was one of my favourite creatures. I think he will be dead before the end of the day...

 

[maleks.reef]

He is not dead yet by the way, still moving somehow.

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

I'm not sure, but the tank might be too new and too small and too underfed to sustain the star.

I try to spot feed mine usually about once a month, I use a turkey baster to drop a small load of pellets onto its arms.

That is a serpent star not a brittle.

 

[twentyleagues]

Serpent stars and brittle stars are not herbivores or algivorous. They are scavengers and omnivores mostly eating meat.

It is possible if you start spot feeding the star it may recover. Unfortunately the star is starving to death currently. You need to get some food to it. If it eats pellets give it some, they dont always eat pellets though. Chopped up fish, clams, mussels, krill, shrimp meaty things. I used to give mine a chunk of meat weekly, I had one like yours, 2 reds, and a brittle I would hand feed all of them once a week to make sure they got enough food. Yours I would try feeding it some bit of food daily until it heals then maybe 2 time a week.

What have you been feeding it?

 

[ColorMeGone]

Try some blood worms. My two luv them!

 

[maleks.reef]

Try some blood worms. My two luv them!

Will do that today, thank you.

Serpent stars and brittle stars are not herbivores or algivorous. They are scavengers and omnivores mostly eating meat.

It is possible if you start spot feeding the star it may recover. Unfortunately the star is starving to death currently. You need to get some food to it. If it eats pellets give it some, they dont always eat pellets though. Chopped up fish, clams, mussels, krill, shrimp meaty things. I used to give mine a chunk of meat weekly, I had one like yours, 2 reds, and a brittle I would hand feed all of them once a week to make sure they got enough food. Yours I would try feeding it some bit of food daily until it heals then maybe 2 time a week.

What have you been feeding it?

I try to broadcast feed the tank some protein based pellet-like food, basically tiny small pellets but I guess it has not been enough? I will try to spot feed some mysis/bloodworms tonight but realistically speaking, is it probable that it will recover? Unfortunately it deteriorated rather quickly over the last 12 hours. My fault for not spot feeding from the start, really loved this starfish and it took me ages to find one locally.

 

[twentyleagues]

Will do that today, thank you.

I try to broadcast feed the tank some protein based pellet-like food, basically tiny small pellets but I guess it has not been enough? I will try to spot feed some mysis/bloodworms tonight but realistically speaking, is it probable that it will recover? Unfortunately it deteriorated rather quickly over the last 12 hours. My fault for not spot feeding from the start, really loved this starfish and it took me ages to find one locally.

I got the brittle star I had with missing arms (2) and slight damage to the disk from what I would guess was neglect. It took over a year but it did heal. Get some frozen raw shrimp and make dinner one night. Save a couple uncooked shrimp and chop or slice them up and feed pieces daily.

 

[maleks.reef]

I got the brittle star I had with missing arms (2) and slight damage to the disk from what I would guess was neglect. It took over a year but it did heal. Get some frozen raw shrimp and make dinner one night. Save a couple uncooked shrimp and chop or slice them up and feed pieces daily.

I fed it a mix of frozen blood worms and mysis, will do it again today. It looks worse by the hour its crazy how quickly it went downhill. The cleaner shrimp isnt helping either he keeps picking on the open wounds. From what i know starfish take months and months to "starve" ive had this guy for about 6 weeks only so it is odd..

thank you for your insight.

 

[maleks.reef]

Update: 2nd day of trying to spot feed it frozen food, the cleaner shrimp and nessarius snail stole most of it i am not even sure if the starfish got any. He also "dropped" 2 of his arms around the tank. They were curled up in a ball on the sandbed. It seems to be getting worse exponentially faster..

 

[twentyleagues]

Update: 2nd day of trying to spot feed it frozen food, the cleaner shrimp and nessarius snail stole most of it i am not even sure if the starfish got any. He also "dropped" 2 of his arms around the tank. They were curled up in a ball on the sandbed. It seems to be getting worse exponentially faster..

Unfortunately it sounds like its not going to make it. One reason for the idea of feeding it a larger chunk of food is they can wrap it up and its harder for jerks to steal it. I would give the thieves something to occupy them also. If it has dropped arms that is a bad sign. Usually it does take some time for them to get bad like this. (going back to an earlier comment you made) You dont have any idea how long it was in transit or sitting in tanks not getting the proper feeding before you got it. So your 6 weeks which can start to show signs of decline, maybe 2-3 weeks in lfs, possibly a week or more in transit and a week or more at the wholesaler. More than enough time to kill a star.

 

[maleks.reef]

Unfortunately it sounds like its not going to make it. One reason for the idea of feeding it a larger chunk of food is they can wrap it up and its harder for jerks to steal it. I would give the thieves something to occupy them also. If it has dropped arms that is a bad sign. Usually it does take some time for them to get bad like this. (going back to an earlier comment you made) You dont have any idea how long it was in transit or sitting in tanks not getting the proper feeding before you got it. So your 6 weeks which can start to show signs of decline, maybe 2-3 weeks in lfs, possibly a week or more in transit and a week or more at the wholesaler. More than enough time to kill a star.

Yeah I guess the timeline you provided makes sense.. really sad about this one, it is arguable one of my favorite marine animals but then again I shouldve done more research. Let it be a lesson I guess. I thought it would be fine eating whatever dropped from the other animals/broadcast feeding but I guess a more mature tank would be needed for that.

Thanks all for the help, I will continue to target feed it anyway and we will see what happens.