Caught red handed (footed?)... asterina stars eating my Darth Mauls:
For as long as I've had my tank, I have believed these stars to be harmless, but now I'm not so sure... granted, it is possible that they were not actually eating the zoas but just "passing through" so to speak and happened to climb on the zoas in their quest for algae/other food, but as you can see there were two on my small colony (hardly seems a coincidence), and I've noticed these polyps haven't been opening fully for about a week now after initially being fine... then again, they could be munching on the polyps BECAUSE they are dying, not actually causing it...
ARGGHGH. What would you do? I already plucked those two off... but what about the other MILLION asterinas in my tank?
For as long as I've had my tank, I have believed these stars to be harmless, but now I'm not so sure... granted, it is possible that they were not actually eating the zoas but just "passing through" so to speak and happened to climb on the zoas in their quest for algae/other food, but as you can see there were two on my small colony (hardly seems a coincidence), and I've noticed these polyps haven't been opening fully for about a week now after initially being fine... then again, they could be munching on the polyps BECAUSE they are dying, not actually causing it...
ARGGHGH. What would you do? I already plucked those two off... but what about the other MILLION asterinas in my tank?