well to be honest, i highly discourage sea stars in this hobby. like tony already pointed out, we don't even know what they eat! how on earth could we manage to properly care for these things. there are only a few we can care for, and those are fine, but the majority of stars are complete mysteries to us. i **** myself whenever i hear "what starfish can i keep in my nano?" :bad-word:

btw lickias are notorious for dying off quickly. over a few months in a tank is a good long time for them. blues are less hardy than the red but red is still not easy to keep alive long either.

orange marble
 

Since I started this thread I left the starfish alone and it is now doing fine.(makes me wonder about the tank I purchased it from.) The limb stopped dissolving and has now completely healed. Just over the last couple weeks this starfish has really started "cruising". Maybe I lucked out with this one.

Great to hear!! :biggrin:

I've had a sand sifting starfish in my 46 g for more than four years. It's doubled in size and is very active. I've never had any issues (knock on wood).

Well I guess that explains why I have not seen my bright red star fish this month. He has been cruising around in my 28 gallon for about eight months and just recently I noticed I had not seen him in a while. I have been looking for him this past week and there is nothing.

So what happens to the bodies of these things? I have now had a red star fish as well as a false perc disappear, never to be seen again. No skeleton - nothing. Where do the bodies go?

Good news on your orange starfish. I hope he does well for you!

I've also had a sand sifting star for a very long period of time, since I started in this hobby, and he's grown, does a great job of cleaning my sand. He used to never be able to keep more then 4 limbs at any given time, but now he looks more like a true star with 5 limbs.