Blue Linckia Starfish Not Looking Great

original poster i would try and see if you can return it and maybe get a sand sifter if you want a starfish..or get some corals or something when you return it..you may be able to sell it someone locally through craigslist or a local forum if you have on

 

I'm thinking about just starting a thread on a local board and giving it away...
But I'm wondering if that's a good idea if it's dying.

If it goes to the right tank, will it recover?

 

If you find an older (over 1 year at least) he may make a recovery. Mostly like it was starving way before you got it. Hard starfish to keep IME.

 

I think he was asking "how could you determine that?".

I was obvious to me as well. All that equipment in the picture(s) (heater, thermometer) is squeaky new and clean; ie - the tank is young.

AT LEAST 6 months of age is the min for reef starfish, but a year is better. And, as stated, the bigger the tank the better.

You can see this isn't a huge tank, and that's a big linckia.

Honestly, it's probably already doomed; whether you return it or not probably won't make any difference.

You say you drip acclimated. While this is important and essential, so is keeping it underwater at all times. How did you transport from the bag to the tank? Did you expose it to air? Once the mouth of a linckia (or a fromia for that matter) is exposed to air, they tend to slowly melt away.

 

A sand sifter will fair no better (eventually) unless the tank is huge. It'll melt away too once it runs out of food, leaving you with a decaying star and a sand bed depleted of all types of useful critters.

 

Yeah, I was careful not to let the mouth touch air in the whole process.
(Though I've since read posts saying that that's a myth. Why not be safe, you know)

I put it in a bucket, to acclimate it, not touching air.
Then I took it from the bucket into another bag, and then into the tank.
No air.

I think in the future I'm going to just stay away from starfish.
Even after 2 weeks, the novelty kind of wore off, as it spent about a week under the rocks anyway.

Too hard to keep.

So I guess I'll just keep it in the tank and see what happens if it's already doomed or won't have a decent recovery rate.

 

+1. It happened to me on a new tank.

 

I would love if LFS had a "Special Room" for just expert stuff.
You would need like a badge to gain access.

This would help me out...:Looking:

I had to swap back a coral I bought a few days ago too, where I was told "Yeah it should be fine..." and then I got home and found out it needed to be target feed like 24/7 live food, etc etc.

"They're fairly easy" and then I look it up and see "Experts" saying that they're too difficult even for them.

 

The positive note is that you now know more than the guy at the LFS. That is why it is so important to research and not buy impulsively. Easy thing to say hard thing to practice even for people with experience.

 

True.
Lately whenever I go, and I find something I don't know about I just look it up on my iPhone as opposed to asking.

It's just annoying when the LFS person knows (From you telling them) that you don't know what your doing, and still doesn't tell you something important.

For instance I bought a Carnation Coral, and wasn't told about all the Non-Photosynthetic info. Though when I took it back he covered himself by saying, "I said it wasn't the easiest to feed".