Hi everyone, before I begin I want to share with you guys and gals my experience with my Blue Linckia.
About a year ago I decided that I wanted to fulfill my childhood dream of owning a saltwater fish tank! Without a long and drawn out story I decided to get onto this forum and reef central (booo right!), and along with BRS YouTube videos educate myself on reefing. I had never even owned a fish tank period! However, I figured, hey we have technology and I have common sense shouldn't be that hard right? So as I decided things that I wanted for my 90 gallon tank, I came across this beautiful creature called Blue Linckia sea star! Cool right, almost every reef enthusiast wants one right? So I did a TON of research online, and found honestly lots of different opinions on what the difficulty of care level and host of other things that people had formed opinions on in regards to keeping this invertebrate.
Overall I was convinced NOT to get one until my tank had been set up for a year or so! Well...that changed...about 3 months into me owning my tank. I read a lot where they talked about "consistency" within your tank. Steady water chemistry, things like ALK and CAL staying stable, and mainly the S word, SALINITY! So I tried by the use of machines make my tank as stable as possible...I wanted to take the human factor out of it, in this area at least.
Let me briefly go over the creatures in my tank. A scissortail dartfish, yellow clown goby, tanaka pygmy wrasse blue assessor, rainford goby, soon to be flame fin tang and later on a sun burst anthia. I think its also important we note to NOT have creatures in your tank that can injure and or kill your Linckia. So make sure you do plenty of research on this before purchasing them as well. We wouldnt want to get the star only to find out that something in your tank was not compatible with it right.
I went to a local saltwater fish store and ran across this beautiful, small to medium size Blue Linckia. I had no intentions on buying it really...however the employee of the store and something in my gut told me that if I followed the proper procedures for acclimation that everything would be fine. Well its about 6 months later and so far so good! He convinced me that they were just algae eaters...and I believed him.
My Blue Linckia has 100% completely thrived! It's as strong as an OX (knock on wood). I'm no expert but I want to just share with you how my tank is set up and maybe help on the "Myths" circling around this sea star. Okay first off...I have a Tunze Osmolator ATO. My salinity stays constantly the same, second of all, when I do my water changes I always make sure the temp and the salinity in my trashcan bucket is super close to the tank! My PH stays around 8.3-8.5 constantly, and I keep my nitrates under 10 at almost all times. Those of you that know me, yes now without using nitrate reducers like NOPOX! Doah! Long story for another time. When I got my star I acclimated him for like an hour...yeah thats it. I used a reef gently acclimation box. Make sure you ask the people at the store what the salinity is in there water. So once I did a proper acclimation lets talk about all the concerns I personally had. The first one, people saying this "Dont touch a seastar with your hand"...while yes, its probably best to handle them as least as possible, as long as you have not been playing with chemicals or other crazy things I have touched my sea star more times than I can count and no problems. The second one, dont take a sea star out of water or it will some how die...false. Mine has been out of water a lot. I will tell you why soon, and why I have handled mine before.
Moving on to eating...a lot of people cant figure out what they eat. Well I'll tell you what mine eat. Brown diatom algae! I guess thats what you call it. Its that algae thats brown that builds up on my tank glass after a week or so when I scrape the glass. I can tell you for a fact it eats this stuff...I see the trail left behind. I have NEVER since owning my tank had any algae out breaks, no GHA, no bubble algae, no red slime, nothing. Not even really anything when I cycled my tank (used red sea reef mature pro kit to cycle). My Linckia has only went onto the rocks in my tank intentionally twice that I know of! It stays at the VERY top of my glass and just does laps around the top all day and night. Never coming down from the water line, never! I also have a red sea star that does the exact same thing. So of course I had read that if they get exposed to oxygen they can die or something. Well when I would do my water changes the water would drop below the star and I would freak out. So I kept always carefully with my hand moving him down so it wouldnt be exposed to air. Well finally I said screw it, and stopped moving him. Guess what, there just like snails, they eventually say "Hey this water is dropping, I'm scooting down some", and thats what it does. So for the people that say dont touch them and dont expose them to air...ehhhh...okay, sure.
Lastly, when buying one! There are some things to look for. For one, look for a fat one...not a skinny one, unless you can clearly see that its stretching for something and it looks skinny because of that. Look for one with out any lacerations, "white spots" or white areas (thats tissue) parts showing, like it was picked at or wounded. Lastly, look for one with a squeezed up mouth! Dont get one where it looks like its stomach is messed up. Simply ask the employee to turn it upside down so you can look at it. Thats the center of the star for people that dont understand. Also look for good coloration as well! Lastly ask the store how long they have had it, if they say a month, I guess its safe to buy it :). Now when writing this I realize that many people say they live for 6 months to a year then die all the sudden...while I have talked to some people face to face and said they have lived much more than that. So while yes mine could die tomorrow, I believe that in my case at least all the things I mentioned above have worked in my favor. Thanks for listening, please feel free to comment.
About a year ago I decided that I wanted to fulfill my childhood dream of owning a saltwater fish tank! Without a long and drawn out story I decided to get onto this forum and reef central (booo right!), and along with BRS YouTube videos educate myself on reefing. I had never even owned a fish tank period! However, I figured, hey we have technology and I have common sense shouldn't be that hard right? So as I decided things that I wanted for my 90 gallon tank, I came across this beautiful creature called Blue Linckia sea star! Cool right, almost every reef enthusiast wants one right? So I did a TON of research online, and found honestly lots of different opinions on what the difficulty of care level and host of other things that people had formed opinions on in regards to keeping this invertebrate.
Overall I was convinced NOT to get one until my tank had been set up for a year or so! Well...that changed...about 3 months into me owning my tank. I read a lot where they talked about "consistency" within your tank. Steady water chemistry, things like ALK and CAL staying stable, and mainly the S word, SALINITY! So I tried by the use of machines make my tank as stable as possible...I wanted to take the human factor out of it, in this area at least.
Let me briefly go over the creatures in my tank. A scissortail dartfish, yellow clown goby, tanaka pygmy wrasse blue assessor, rainford goby, soon to be flame fin tang and later on a sun burst anthia. I think its also important we note to NOT have creatures in your tank that can injure and or kill your Linckia. So make sure you do plenty of research on this before purchasing them as well. We wouldnt want to get the star only to find out that something in your tank was not compatible with it right.
I went to a local saltwater fish store and ran across this beautiful, small to medium size Blue Linckia. I had no intentions on buying it really...however the employee of the store and something in my gut told me that if I followed the proper procedures for acclimation that everything would be fine. Well its about 6 months later and so far so good! He convinced me that they were just algae eaters...and I believed him.
My Blue Linckia has 100% completely thrived! It's as strong as an OX (knock on wood). I'm no expert but I want to just share with you how my tank is set up and maybe help on the "Myths" circling around this sea star. Okay first off...I have a Tunze Osmolator ATO. My salinity stays constantly the same, second of all, when I do my water changes I always make sure the temp and the salinity in my trashcan bucket is super close to the tank! My PH stays around 8.3-8.5 constantly, and I keep my nitrates under 10 at almost all times. Those of you that know me, yes now without using nitrate reducers like NOPOX! Doah! Long story for another time. When I got my star I acclimated him for like an hour...yeah thats it. I used a reef gently acclimation box. Make sure you ask the people at the store what the salinity is in there water. So once I did a proper acclimation lets talk about all the concerns I personally had. The first one, people saying this "Dont touch a seastar with your hand"...while yes, its probably best to handle them as least as possible, as long as you have not been playing with chemicals or other crazy things I have touched my sea star more times than I can count and no problems. The second one, dont take a sea star out of water or it will some how die...false. Mine has been out of water a lot. I will tell you why soon, and why I have handled mine before.
Moving on to eating...a lot of people cant figure out what they eat. Well I'll tell you what mine eat. Brown diatom algae! I guess thats what you call it. Its that algae thats brown that builds up on my tank glass after a week or so when I scrape the glass. I can tell you for a fact it eats this stuff...I see the trail left behind. I have NEVER since owning my tank had any algae out breaks, no GHA, no bubble algae, no red slime, nothing. Not even really anything when I cycled my tank (used red sea reef mature pro kit to cycle). My Linckia has only went onto the rocks in my tank intentionally twice that I know of! It stays at the VERY top of my glass and just does laps around the top all day and night. Never coming down from the water line, never! I also have a red sea star that does the exact same thing. So of course I had read that if they get exposed to oxygen they can die or something. Well when I would do my water changes the water would drop below the star and I would freak out. So I kept always carefully with my hand moving him down so it wouldnt be exposed to air. Well finally I said screw it, and stopped moving him. Guess what, there just like snails, they eventually say "Hey this water is dropping, I'm scooting down some", and thats what it does. So for the people that say dont touch them and dont expose them to air...ehhhh...okay, sure.
Lastly, when buying one! There are some things to look for. For one, look for a fat one...not a skinny one, unless you can clearly see that its stretching for something and it looks skinny because of that. Look for one with out any lacerations, "white spots" or white areas (thats tissue) parts showing, like it was picked at or wounded. Lastly, look for one with a squeezed up mouth! Dont get one where it looks like its stomach is messed up. Simply ask the employee to turn it upside down so you can look at it. Thats the center of the star for people that dont understand. Also look for good coloration as well! Lastly ask the store how long they have had it, if they say a month, I guess its safe to buy it :). Now when writing this I realize that many people say they live for 6 months to a year then die all the sudden...while I have talked to some people face to face and said they have lived much more than that. So while yes mine could die tomorrow, I believe that in my case at least all the things I mentioned above have worked in my favor. Thanks for listening, please feel free to comment.
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