More New Additions - Clean Up Crew

Tuesday 22nd May 2007

Hard to believe the tank has been with me for almost 2 months.

The crabs (Henry and Margaret) have settled well. Quite amazed how they scuttle around. Constant movement under the shell. I've started adding some crab food (small pellets I got from LFS) to, hopefully, vary their diet a little. I'm looking to get a small selection of larger shells for them to move into when/if they choose to. Hard to tell what type to get and advice varies.

The number (and size) of the bristleworms is quite incredible now. Each time I add a bit of food (still using tropical flakes to keep ammonia ticking over) they all appear almost instantly.

Having been checking the chemical stats and finding nothing to concern me (ammonia spiked very very slightly just after crabs added but never a big number) I decided to add to the "clean up crew". Went to LFS and had a good look round. decided on turbo snails. Knew little about them except that everybody seems to have them as part of the CUC. Decided to take two.

Was chatting with LFS guy about the green starfish that were in the next tank. He explained that they were "common green starfish", they wouldn;t get much/any bigger and would make an ideal tank-mate for my crabs and snails, cleaning up "anything that hit the bottom of the tank". I usually like to do some research but in this case decided to take a starfish as well. It (not sure whether it is male of female) is a handsome brute (I'll post pics next time I'm at home). After a short struggle, he moved from his bag to my tank and I sat for ages watching him. He moves more like an octupus than a starfish. Incredible felixibility.
I was dead chuffed with it ... but read on.

NOW HERE IS TODAY'S LESSON.
LFS guy was not entirely accurate (put diplomatically).
There is actually no such thing, as far as I can tell, as a "common green starfish".
My starfish is in fact a "green bristle starfish".
A couple of hours after adding him to my tank one of my hermits went missing and strange lump appeared in the body of the starfish, almost hermit shell shaped. I later discovered the missing hermit well hidden in a rock but for some time I was suspicious that there had been a murder.
While posting to fishkeeping forum and searching through internet for info and to see if I had a problem, I discovered the truth.
The green bristle starfish will, many say, eat pretty much anything it can get it's hand on including small fish (which I do not yet have any of).
Lesson : LFS is there to make money (which is fine). Good, accurate, advice is a bonus, not a certainty.

I hope you'll agree, once you've seen the pics, that with a little care about what else I put in the tank, the amazing sight of this starfish moving around my tank is well worth the few hours of mild panic.

Quick update - he (the starfish) spends a lot of its time suspended up on it's legs inside "caves" in the rock - definitely looks predatory when it does that. Lump has gone, I saw a mass of fine gloop being expelled from under the starfish and assume it was getting rid of what it didn't want (cannot think of politer way to say it was "taking a dump"). Lump disappeared almost immediately. seems I have a lot to learn about this guy - looking forward to it.

Here is the tank as it is now. Looks a bit bland in the pic compared to how it looks "in the flesh".