Originally Posted by
florida joe
http:///forum/post/2567832
I am quoting R. Fenner the various Linckia and Fromia choices seem to feed on algae detritus and microbes in the rocks and in the sand
Their specific diet is poorly known but what is clear is that success is HIGHLY correlated with the amount of mature live rock.
If they ate algae and detritus, then they would do fine in small dirty tanks forever. And they do not.
They quiet possibly feed on bacterial films or perhaps more likely the critters that feed on it or perhaps more likely encrusting organisms like sponges, bryozoans, etc. They do not appear to eat nuisance algae, and the statement that "they eat algae" is quite misleading.
Fromia, in fact, may have an even more specific diet, feeding primarily on certain sponges.
The continued promotion of these animals as eating algae and detritus is not a good plan, IMO, because as a general statement it does not appear to be true. As mentioned, if true, then they should survive in nearly ANY tank and they do not.
Clearly their diet is tied to quality substrate for feeding - in the case of Fromia and Linckia that is live rock. In the case of sand sifters, it is a large sand bed.
So all I am saying is that if you think they will survive just fine in a small tank with limited live rock because they'll eat excess food (which is part of what detritus is) you are in for a sad day. They do not...if they did, why don't they take to spot feeding? They are not scavengers...again, which would be stars that would eat prepared food (eg a chocolate chip star).
So simply: what we KNOW about Linckia and Fromia (and we DON"T know much) is that they appear to need very large amounts of LR to survive beyond 18 months. In large systems providing this they are pretty tough once acclimated. Yet they are not tough in smaller tanks with or without LR where most will starve even if there is plenty of detritus or film algae...it is a correlation, but don't you think we can draw some assumptions from that?
