What Is This?

[mlipst]

I have had this little (1/2 inch) guy, in the center of the picture, crawling around my tank for the past several months. At first I thought it was a sea star, but now I'm not so sure. It has three sea star-like arms on the lower left side, but also three stubby appendages on the upper right side. It has not grown at all since I first noticed it. Anybody know what this is?

 

[LilMikey3]

idk i have something like that but extremely tiny and he looks like a fish but stays along the glass???

 

[quaddity]

That's an asterina starfish. They stay small and reproduce readily. My tanks have a lot of them.

 

[mlipst]

Thank you. Searched and checked out some pictures on line. That's it.

 

[strout]

I read somewhere they eat polyps and zoas, true or not?

 

[quaddity]

I read somewhere they eat polyps and zoas, true or not?

Rumored on the net but I've never seen them eat any coral and they've been right next to various polyps in my tank and left them alone. They probably feed on micro film algae is my guess. My 40's refugium has tons of them plus a some in the main tank, my 90 has quite a few as well.