3rd Fish MIA in 2 months???

good points screwtape. Was there bodies? If so, then it probably wasn't the star. But you say fish went missing, I'm assuming there was no body. Were they all chromis?

 

Yes but I went to several sites, some very respectable, and they all say the same thing. Brittles are carnivores. They may get along just eating left over fish food on the bottom, but they say all of them, being opportunistic feeders will eat any fish or inverts if they can.
I have had fish die before but this is different. I have 5 fish at night before bed, turn of the lights get up the next morning and I have 4. Then I have 4, turn off lights go to bed and the next morning i have 3. So it's definitively a nocturnal thing.

 

Just as another idea ... maybe, you could move him to your refugium (if you have one and it's big enough).

Might not be a permanant solution, but might get you by 'til you can figure out if he is the problem or not and find someone to take him.

 

The first one was my new baby clown. the other 2 have both been chromis. I started leaving the moonlights on, per my theory stated earlier. Will see if this helps. He is so cool I really don't want to get rid of him. Its not every night, it can be weeks between deaths. All fish where healthy and eating like pigs the night before they went MIA.

 

As for fish that have gone missing see my other post. Fish left are 1 b&w clown, a pj cardinal, a yt damsil. And the ones that went MIA came form different sources except the chromis, got them all at once. Im trying not to jump to conclusions but threw the process of elimination its looking bad for the star.

edith ya and the last chromis of the 3. Also up until this point I haven't had a fish death in over 4 months. The fish that are going missing are small, so I doubt its old age.

 

Also none of the fish where new. They had all been in the tank for at least a month 1/2 to 2 months.

 

OK, so the first one was a small clown, how small? AFAIK smaller clowns have a lower survival rate in captivity. It might have been a natural death. The other two were chromis which happens all the time, if you search around a little bit about chromis aggression/shoaling etc you will find that it happens constantly.

Lots of fish will probably die from natural causes at night, just statistically speaking it's night for a good portion of the 24hr day so things happening at night doesn't necessarily mean nocturnal predator.

Also many fish when they are ill or unhealthy etc will tend to hide, this may mean that they just don't come out of their sleeping spot the next morning. They may still be alive but just not visible. Unless you find a dead fish it can be difficult to say whether a fish is actually alive or not, that's part of having a reef with lots of hiding spots unfortunately. Plus if it does die overnight there's a good chance the brittle star or some other cleaner will come along and do their job on the dead fish.

There are lots of reasons why fish die, just like people. Diseases, infections, heart attacks, other major organ failure, leftover damage from improper collection (which sometimes doesn't show up for a while) whatever. Eating "like a pig" doesn't necessarily mean it can't die within the next few days.

Also, have you looked at what you feed and how often you feed it to be sure the fish are getting everything they need to be healthy? Not every fish food is created equal. I'm not saying you're feeding poorly, but perhaps it could be something to improve on. It might be worth looking at if you haven't already, before you go tearing through your tank on an assumption that it's a predator.

I'm not saying that the brittle star is definitely not the source of the problem I just think there are lots of other likely scenarios that could be taking place and I think it would be a bit hasty to presume that it's a brittle star hunting down live and healthy fish.