The Incredible Shrinking Brittle Star

A tank as young as yours can have any number of things going on. For the first year of a tanks life there are a host of changes it must go through as unseen things grow and flourish and then die back to be replaced with other organisms. The few parameters you have mentioned are just the basics. Thos parameters actually give very little clue as to the complexity of life and death occuring at the microscopic level.

With that said, providing adequate food/nutrition is one of the most common causes of many problems in new tanks and small tanks. It's a matter of maturity. Older tanks have had time for lot's of unseen things to grow and develop. But even in mature tanks, Sea Stars are not always provided for.

Have you seen the current thread about Chocolate Chip Stars dieing. As you may be finding, Sea Stars are not the hardiest of animals. Considering the situation, there may be nothing you can do to stop its disolution.

One thing that might make a difference is determining the amount of calcium available to replace that being used up.

What is your substrate?
What other Calcium using organisms do you have?

We may not be able to stop the disintegration of the Star. I've always figured that legs break off and stars diintegrate because they aren't getting sufficient calcium combined with some other unknown variable(s).

I assume the Florida live sand is aragonite? (Aragonite is the mineral name for Calcium Carbonate)
What company makes it?
How deep is the substrate bed?

My opinion, based on what I've picked up over the years, is that the calcium level we end up measuring is an indication of the calcium equilibrium in the water. It's like a tug of war. Calcium using organisms tug Calcium out of the water and the water then tugs it from ?
We hope that the substrate gives up calcium to the water, but what if it's easier to tug it from a Sea Star? Then the Sea Star gets weak, breaks apart and eventually dies.

This great need for Calcium in the reef aquarium is why a Calcium Reactor is so good. It's also why a lot of good fine particle, easily dissolved, aragonite substrate is good. The reef aquarium needs Calcium Carbonate substrate that dissolves into the water to replace what was taken. If there is no source of Calcium such as the substrate, calcium additives or a calcium reactor, then the organisms suffer. Because water is stingy; it doesn't let go if it can't get more!

To help illustrate my point, in the pic below is Halimeda/Cactus Algae. It is a big user of Calcium. A few weeks ago I saw a large bunch of it in Renee and Damon Weimers tank. Come to find out, they got it from FSpackman. The bunch they got from him was about the size of the bunch in the pic. This happens to be a pic of FSpackmans tank on 11/29/03, just a little less than five months ago. Yet the Weimer's tell me he had at least this much still left after giving them some!



In FSpackmans aquarium are some other organisms that I've never seen living so well, including a robust growing Pipe Organ Coral. Apart from his normal use of calcium additives, I believe the reason for this robust growth of Calcium using organisms is his six inch bed of Oolitic sand, a fine Aragonite substrate. In this case it is Utah Oolitic Sand!

The only way that calcium carbonate substrate can dissolve is in a low pH/acid environment. That environment cannot normally exist, except where Oxygen is low and Carbon Dioxide is high. I believe that environment exists in the bottom depths of a sand bed and inside of LR.

Sorry this post is so long, it put me to sleep when I was proofing it , but I hope it makes sense.

Edited by Mark Peterson

I read somewhere that these sea stars are very sensitive to changes in salinity.  I believe that I have also read that you don't know if your sea star will thrive in your aquarium until it has been there for 6 months to a year.

They seem to be quite fragile.

Oceanic is good salt. I'm told that Kent Salt will soon be the same stuff when they sell all their old stock. In the past, Kent bought and repackaged Instant Ocean. Now they have their own manufacturing facility which is the same as Oceanic, both owned by Central Pet Supply. (Thanks to Randy Olsen of MSM for this information.)

I should mention that I too have a brittle/serpant type star that has been around for more than a year but looks like it's on the way out. I'm not sure what to do about stars. I'm not getting any more. Like Jared said, they are too fragile. And I cannot provide enough of the right food.

I don't recommend buffering actually. Most tanks, if set up properly, do okay without any extra help from chemicals.

Feeding also adds lots of good stuff.

Edited by Mark Peterson

Well, thanks for all the opinions!  I have bumped up the calcuim additions, and the food additions, so I hope he can recover.  I will watch my calciums levels very carefully since it sounds like that may be a crucial thing for brittle stars.  I am starting to see more bugs wandering around the tank, especially at night, and I am taking that as a good sign regarding the health of the system as a whole.  Am I right?

A

Thanks for the encouragement!  Sadly no, no refugium.   They are at the mercy of the clownfish, and he is at times quite merciless to the bugs.  But he rarely leaves his corner of the tank, where his anemone is, so if they avoid that place, they will be ok.  I think a refugium would be a great addition at some point though.  The only question would be how to do one on so small a tank.  I will have to put some thought into that, and check out the archives for some ideas.  That would be a great place to put some marcoalgae.  (Which is thriving by the way, thanks Mark!)

Speaking of tricky inverts and clownfish, I had heard that tank-bred clowns may not take to anemones.  Well, mine is tank-bred, and took to his within 48 hours.  He was scared of it at first, but then he decided to shoo away the interloper by swimming at it in an intimidating fashion.  The anemone was unimpressed.  Orudinot (the clownfish) then upped the ante by spitting sand at it.  The anemone was unmoved.  Finally, he decided to risk swimming into it, then back out for more scary glaring.  After several hours of this, he decided this was his new best friend, and now he spends considerable time in it.  This fish is seriously amusing.  And the anemone is great too.  It may not be the prettiest of the anemones, but it is perfect for a beginner.  Not fussy about light or water quality, not agressive in any way, and thus far it has stayed right where I put it.

It is a Pseudoanemone elasticus.  I hope the picture comes through ok.

 

Amy,

Two things.  First off, did you make that pseudoanemone, and where did you get that idea?

Second.  I have a small tank.  For a refugium I used a powerfilter with biowheels. Then I took out the filter pads and the biowheels, and added sand and rock in it. Stuck a home depot light on top.  This gives me a little 3 gal refugium hanging on the back of my tank.

Adam

Dibs on the first split!!! Very creative Amy.

Thanks everybody!  Adam, I love the refugium idea.  I think that is the way to go for sure.  The pseudoanemone was inspired by The Reef Aquarium Vol. 2, by Charles Delbeek and Julian Sprung.  At least I think it was Vol. 2.  Somewhere in there they mentioned that clownfish who had been kept with rubber band anemones took to real ones more easily.  Or something like that.  Anyway, I didn't want Ruddy to pine without an anemone, but I am not equipped to house a real one, so I thought what the heck, and got a big bag of chunky elastics.  They are super easy to make.  I just cut the elastics in half, superglued them together in the center in a 'starburst' pattern, then attached some of that marine epoxy stuff for a base.  I read (also in Vol. 2) that A. frenatus usually house in the Entacmaea quadricolor anemones, so I tied knots most of the elastics to give it that bubble tip look.  I guess if you could find pink elastics you could make a Rose BTA!

Getting back to the brittle star, last night I put some fish food (Marine S) right outside his lair.  He snatched it right up, and hauled it down in, so I am hoping that I can keep him fed this way. 

Amy

ps- Hey, where's my ding* for that great scientific name?

OK, Question:

When you talk about a shrinking brittle star do you mean it is shrinking but looks exactly the same propotionally or that the legs are getting shorter.

The reason I ask is that I have 2 faily large searpent stars.  I see one of them fairly often and I believe I still the the other occasionally.  One at my office seems to be loosing lenth to some of it's legs, but I figured that was from getting it caught in rock somewhere or something like that.

Anyway, I just rearranged some of my rock to add a cool new one I've had curing (recovering for Mark,) in a bucket for a couple weeks.  Anyway, I picked up a rock that I fully planned on taking out of the tank and taking to the office tank and underneath it was a baby serpent star.  It is about 1/5 the size of the others in the tank.  Just a small little guy.  I don't care what others think about brittles, (my wife thinks they are creepy,) he is as cute as a button.

Edited by wsinbad1