Caught In The Act

Whats going back? the brittle star or the snails? Luna

 

I love my harlequin/banded serpent star. He's actually starting to show himself in broad daylight now to eat flakes that land on the sand near his hole, which is really cool to watch. You can spot feed them with some food and tongs if you need to.

The only problem involving my N. snails is that my pistol shrimp kidnaps them. If he's busy, and a N. snail is passing his whole, he grabs it and pulls it in. Sometimes he takes it back out and sets it down ever-so-not-gently, or the snail just crawls out of his hole a minute later like "WHAT THE HECK JUST HAPPENED..." The pistol has yet to kill/eat a snail, and it's really funny to watch. That's my only problem, and it's not even the snails' fault.

 

I have a green brittle star that almost eat my watchman goby. This star was fine for 5 months and one day I saw my goby's head inside the star mouth. The star manage to do this when the goby was sleeping propably. I was freak out and immediately took the star out of the water. Good thing I noticed it almost right away when I about to change the water. I think he was mad at me because I was trying to displace him with stick when feeding pellets to my nassarius snails. This type of star always comes out and locate the food all the time when feeding. And about the goby he is one lucky fish. the star is now in my sump.

 

There's some bad info out there on Nassarius, I read it all the time, and since the reason I post in the reef forums is that I'm out to set the aquarium world straight regarding snails.....

"The Nassarius Snails are scavengers and eat detritus, left over food, decaying organics and fish waste. When it is not eating, it will bury itself in the sand and sleep."

They absolutely do not eat detritus.
They do eat leftover food.
They absolutely do not eat decaying organics.
They absolutely do not eat fish waste.
When they aren't eating, they are lying in wait for a cue that there's something to eat, like the scent of something new in the water.
They are capable of killing, but they usually scavenge.
They are honest to goodness carnivores, meaty foods and nothing else.
They are beneficial as cleanup snails since they keep meaty food leftovers from decaying in your tank, or even starting to decay.
Large species are more likely to behave aggressively.

Hope that helps on the Nassarius front. I've been stunned at the disconnect between the malacological world and the aquarium world, and the fact that so much bad info gets propagated, especially when a lot of it is common knowledge amongst the snail guys. By the same token, I've learned that the aquarists know some things that most snail people don't, but again, they don't seem to share much info.

Back to the topic, sostoudt made a good point, and made it very succinctly:
"(T)he code of the aquarium {and ocean} if it fits in your mouth try to eat it." That's really how it works. The serpent stars are surprisingly good killers, and I gave up on keeping them a long time ago because of the number of different animals they killed.

Cheers, and Happy 2009,



Don

 

I'm confused. Do they or do they not eat fish waste? I would like to add several to my tank, if in fact they do.

It looks like the Nassarius are not they problem, it's the brittle star.

 

ive always keep them in my tanks they dont mess with nothing they clean up any left over food inturn my tank is cleaner and if a fish dies they got it cleaned up johny on the spot

 

sorry left out something i love starfish i would just go buy more snails

 

ditto what getinpora said. I have yet to see any of mine eat algae, I have yet to see any cleanup crew ANYTHING eat fish poop, except for the fish themselves. I'm sure my shrimp will eat it...but he's in his own little world anyways.

All my N snails eat is flake food, brine shrimp, anything dead in/on the sand, fish or other critters that die. I had a goby that didn't survive the trip home from the LFS too well...he went into the rocks and died after 3 days of being home. 2 weeks or so later, we find his skin attached to a rock. Everything else about him was gooone gone gone. Nassarius snails are very good at preventing ammonia spikes from something dying

 

I think the brittles will go back. I'll get more N snails.

 

I don't care what anyone says nassarius snails are some of the best additions to a reef aquarium. They clean up anything and are great overall janitors. I've never heard of anyone I know having any problem with them whatsoever. I have 70+ in my 55 with no problem. And they are my fav. snail to watch too!! Get rid of the star and buy more nassarius'!!