Reef safe starfish.

I was woundering if there was any reef safe star that is active during the day and can be seen. I would like to get one for my wife and she loves the Blue Linkia stars but have always heard they dont last. But something in that same catagory as far as being able to see it 99% of the time and that is active. Thanks in advance.

 

There are alot of good choices at saltwaterfish.com Not sure if they are all active in the daytime good luck..

 

I have the purple Linkia and so far so good. Had it since last April. It seems as with any star, as long as you don't have huge pH & SG swings, it'll find stuff to eat. Mine's all over the tank. One minute you'll look and he's on the glass then you look back over and he's on the other side of the tank on a rock. They need a good long, slow drip acclimate time, which I think is where people go wrong with them. I did mine for 2 hours.

 

i would say linkias are you best bet, serpents hide in the rock, sand stars live in the sand.
brittle stars may catch fish.

for better health of your star fish give it a algae wafer once a week, if there is no algae present in the tank. its pretty cool most will swallow it whole.

 

WRT drip acclimation, only do this with purchases from your LFS. Internet purchases take time to ship, obviously. During transit, oxygen is used up and waste builds up. During that time, ammonia in the bag is largely represented as NH4, the less toxic of the two forms [In the (relative) absence of oxygen, the hydrogen tends to move and attach to NH3.] When you drip acclimate something that has spent a good amount of time in a bag, the water becomes oxygenated and that extra hydrogen atom on the NH4 (it is unstable and carries a positive charge) leaves to try to create more H2O, leaving the ammonia as NH3 rather than it's less toxic, ionic form NH4.

So, when I get something off the internet, I do the ten minute temperature acclimation and dump it in, just for that reason alone and especially with inverts. There are some companies out there that will void their 'arrive alive' guarantee if you acclimate by the drip method.

 

I was not aware of this. very good to know

 

I wasn't either at the time I bought my linkia. I am thinking I helped kill it. I drip acclimated it and three weeks later, it was done. Beautiful starfish. Huge. THEN I read that they required expert care and a very mature tank on top of it. Horrific impulse buy. That was my last mistake of that sort.

 

Yea i may try a linkia. had one long time ago but tank was to new impulse buy i guess haha man the things you learn as you get into the hobby more. lol thanks everyone opinions are still open.

 

I also hear if they touch air when you move them into the tank they will die.

 

I have also heard this and the first one i had never touched air so idk it was to new of a tank and didnt acclimate it the correct way. Whats the longest anyone has ever heard of a linkia surviving in captivity??