How to catch a brittle star

Andrew225

Andrew225

A little bit of everything
Jun 26, 2007
166
0
0
Colorado
I've started a 12 gallon nano-reef, and some liverock (Courtesy of a good friend of mine) came, fully cured, to start it off.

In said liverock was not one, but -three- Ophiure protoreaster ( http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/prod_display.cfm?c=497+528+1741&pcatid=1741
)

The site i've found them on says they get to be eight inches, and something tells me that's bad...

Rightn ow, they're probably only an inch acrossed, arm to arm, but i'm afriad they may grow too quickly.

What should i do?
Will they grow so slowly that i don't need to worry?
Or should i just try to keep one?

Catching them, as you probably know, is dang near impossible. Their arms just shoot off and that's that...

Anywho, any advice is helpful.

Thanks!
 
You probably have just a few micro brittle stars. They stay very small and are good. They will filter feed from anything they can catch as well as picking up any food they find off the bottom. Leave them in. And even if you were to remove three, you most likely have more. :headbang2:
 
Ahh, thanks mate..I jsut didn't want to wake up one day to have all my future residents dead! (I have yet to start fully stocking the reef)

Although i do say...Bristle worms, Brittle stars, amphipods and what looks to be a small, clear anemone have all already appeared on my LR....Tha,t in combination with a few tests, tells me my water quality ain't half bad :P
 
Well, it is in fact an aiptasia...
And upon reading, i have found it are bad :p

However, i was already planning on adding your standard cleaner shrimp into the tank, and i have read that they tend to take care of aipasia.

Are there any other, possibly quicker, techniques that anyoen could recomend?
 
WEll, i just tried the lemon juice technique, and i'm fairly certain i nailed it.
I'll have to wait a few days to see the final results though.
 
I usually use Kalkwasser for those buggers :P
I have to do 1 or two tiny ones today, actually. :D
 
They are a pain, aren't they?
I had to try three times to nail the guy

I'm hoping I got him and that'll be that. I'm afraid the other people in the house are getting concerned about me walking around a needle mumbling about how the dang thing won't die :p
 
You should see how people react to you when you go the the veterinarian's office asking for a pack of insulin syringes and psychotherapeutic drugs for my aquarium. I had to provide hard-film pictures (proof on the back of the pics) of me standing and pointing at the seahorses, all in close enough range to accurately show them. All of this before they would believe me :cry:.
 
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