Asternia stars. now with solutions, and stray voltage

Nano · #1 01-11-2012, 06:25 PM

Found this guy munching algae lastnight, wanted to make sure he's the good kind
How can you tell?
Dark on its back

Lightish colored mouth

rstar · #2 01-11-2012, 06:57 PM

I have a whole pile of these guys, don't seem to harm anything, they like to roam around the glass and munch algae.

Nano · #3 01-11-2012, 06:59 PM

yeah he was munching algae, I just want to find out if hes the good one for sure or the kind that mow down corals

rstar · #4 01-11-2012, 07:09 PM

I've never seen any on my corals and have hundreds of them, and have had them for over a year.

Nano · #5 01-11-2012, 07:12 PM

Yeah this is the first time I ever saw this little guy. I was going around with a flashlight in the tank last night and boom! micro turbos and asternias! Naturally I was up for like 2 hours looking for info on them all lol. I sure hope this isnt the coral munching kind

Madreefer · #6 01-11-2012, 07:37 PM

IMO they're all bad. Here's a little read for ya.

http://www.garf.org/STAR/starfish.html

linz8392 · #7 01-18-2012, 02:42 AM

paddyob on here has hundreds in his tank...he lives in edmonton and he found they killed a lot of his zoas.

Maybe PM him to ask him about it.

mike31154 · #8 01-18-2012, 03:06 PM

A word or two on voltage & meters. First, there are some things to be aware of when using an analog vice digital multimeter. The old analogs are actually not bad & I don't consider them trash. There are some things that are better measured with them than a digital meter. One thing in particular to keep in mind when using an analog meter is that you definitely need to be on the correct scale for what you intend to measure. If you're not on the correct scale with a digital, it will usually flash the display at you prompting you to change scales.

So with your analog meter & serviceable test leads, you should be able to do anything a digital can. For your tank, the best is to start with the lowest AC voltage scale. If the meter goes off the scale at that, you know you have some excess. If there's only a slight deflection, don't sweat it. If you're measuring the voltage in your house electrical receptacle with an analog, you need to do this with the scale on the high range, over 200 preferably. If you plug the analog into the wall on a lower scale, you'll peg the needle & the meter will probably be trash after that!

When using the AC voltage scale on any meter, digital or analog, you can totally ignore which is the positive & which is the negative... it's AC voltage, alternating current! This means it's a sine wave that changes from positive, through zero, to negative at whatever frequency the alternating current is. In the case of our homes, that's 60 times per second. So no matter whether the positive or negative goes into the water & vice versa with the electrical receptacle. Positive & negative probes are important when measuring DC voltage, you then need correct polarity to measure.