How and what do you feed starfish?

[auntkaren]

We got our cleaning crew established safely in our 24 Gallon Nano last Saturday and we cannot figure out what and how to feed the starfish! He is not a brittle he is pink with sort of alligator skin creases. He is moving about the tank successfully but we feel guilty when we feed the crabs and shrimp and don't know what to do about the poor starfish. Help! :notsure:

 

[dea_mt]

i woudn't worry about feeding the cleanup crew unless they're the only thing in the tank.
they are on a strick diet of hair algae and fish poop!!!

 

[auntkaren]

Right now they ARE the only things in the tank. Our tank cycled for 5 weeks and then we waited another week just in case. LOL It got tiresome watching the plants grow! Could you possibly ID the starfish by my description? I remember seeing it printed on the tank at the store but they didn't list what things were when we bought them... sheesh!
so..... since they are the only things in the tank... what and how do I feed that poor starfish!?

 

[murph145]

ur guna need to add some kind of food to the tank then so the clean up crew has soemthing to eat right now cuz usually they eat leftovers or waste
as for the star its hard to tell what it is .... could it be a serpent starfish?
does it have long arms like a brittle and move fast...??

 

[dea_mt]

just put pinch of regular flake food like you had fish. if there's no algae present i'd throw a veggie clip or something in there ever once and a while

 

[unleashed]

if its a serpant star you should feed it some mysis shrimp and small foods they are very simular to the brittle star and when you do finally get fish they are very opritunistic feeders will eat fish that hide where they sleep(lost a few fish to my brittle) as all inverts do they require good calcium levels inthe tank traces of strontium idodine and magnezium.i feed my fowlr tanks and reef . reef advantage calcium suppliment testing is a very good idea when doing anything in your tank to ensure proper levels.as they get older they will eat full silver slides krill and even small fish as i stated above.here is a link to a very good website about starfish
http://www.starfish.ch/reef/echinoderms.html

 

[auntkaren]

Ok, the starfish is rather smooth, rather rigid and has much thicker arms than the brittle or serpent starfish. He looks much like the starfish that non aquarists would recognize as a starfish except his surface is smooth and has a leathery pattern. He is pink with much darker hues along the leather markings.
We are feeding the crabs and shrimp daily, I cut tiny pieces of frozen talipa fish (the kind we had for dinner tonite LOL). The shrimp and crabs just love it. I only feed them fish about every three days and on the other days I feed veggie flakes that include seaweed etc.
I really wish that I could find a pic of our starfish but OH!!!!!!!!!! The starfish's SHAPE is like that of a chocolate chip starfish.

 

[auntkaren]

There is plenty of algae in the tank. When you say "feed him a pinch of flake food just like you would do with fish" does that mean that I just let it float around as I would for fish or do I need to somehow get it to stay near the starfish? He has been climbing rocks like crazy does that mean he's eating algae from the rock now? :thinking:

 

[ophiura]

I suspect it might be a sand sifter star then. This is unfortunate, if it is. It is detrimental to a sand bed, and in time they will starve in most (not all but most) tanks. Few will take to any sort of feeding.
FWIW, I will add that if this were a serpent/brittlestar, then I absolutely would feed it regardless of whether it is a "clean up" crew or not. We have A LOT of clean up animals in our tank relative to excess food in many cases. Brittlestars can and WILL find other things to eat, IMO, if they are not fed enough (though feeding may not prevent predation either).

 

[auntkaren]

Thank those of you who attempted to help with my starfish question. I found the identity of the starfish... it's a Fromia starfish.... and I found the exact picture of it right here on swf.com. After hours of searching archives I found how to feed it too. I just wanted to post what kind of starfish it is so the other viewers who couldn't respond would have an identification so that they could maybe answer questions they had and were looking for in this thread.
Thanks for the help!

 

[ophiura]

Fromia stars, like Linckia, need lots and lots of LR and a mature reef tank. IMO, at least 100lbs of LR though I suspect their diet may be more specific than Linckia (sponges). Many if not most will starve in tanks within a year, if they do not have enough rock.

I am afraid this tank size will not be suitable.
Did this star really come as a clean up crew? They definitely do NOT eat algae (eg nuissance algae) or detritus. :notsure:

 

[auntkaren]

If they don't eat ditrius and don't eat algae then what DO they eat? I've been putting fish near it and under one of it's arms but it shows no interest. But it has been moving along the rocks and hanging on the back wall of the tank. It's very active as far as I can tell. He's got great color too.
And no we didn't get it as part of a clean up crew package. We got it with a halloween crab, a red crab and an electric blue crab.... BTW the electric crab just loved the hair algae we had in the tank! We also got a conch snail, a turbo snail and several other snails (for a total of 7 snails).
So what can I feed the starfish and HOW!?!?! (this was my original question LOL).

 

[auntkaren]

If they don't eat ditrius and don't eat algae then what DO they eat? I've been putting fish near it and under one of it's arms but it shows no interest. But it has been moving along the rocks and hanging on the back wall of the tank. It's very active as far as I can tell. He's got great color too.
And no we didn't get it as part of a clean up crew package. We got it with a halloween crab, a red crab and an electric blue crab.... BTW the electric crab just loved the hair algae we had in the tank! We also got a conch snail, a turbo snail and several other snails (for a total of 7 snails).
So what can I feed the starfish and HOW!?!?! (this was my original question LOL). We plan to put it into a larger tank when we get one next year.... we are looking reeeeeeeeal hard at 125 or 150 gallon tanks. So if i can keep him going and happy for a year he will have all the LR he wants!

 

[ophiura]

Their specific diet is unknown but is thought to include microscopic bacterial/algal films (nor macro or nuisance algae like slime, hair, etc), the critters that feed on it, and other encrusting things (eg sponges). Success is highly correlated with the amount of LR (and thus the size of the tank).
Unfortunately if they ate algae or detritus people would have no problem keeping them for years, and this is definitely not the case.
In short, the only way to feed it is to provide it with a lot of LR and surface area in a mature reef and it will fend for itself.