tektite
Active Member
One of the more elusive inhabitants of my macro tank decided last night to come out before dark. My basket starfish, I got some pics and video 
A note about this creature - this is one of the hardest of all starfish to keep alive. Please do not even consider getting one without doing extensive research on them. They are extremely sensitive to any changes in water parameters, and are exclusive filter feeders. They are also nocturnal, so they must be fed after dark. Plus being nocturnal all you usually see of them in the day is a curled up blob of a million arms if they're visible at all. Getting up at 2-3am to feed them gets tiring fast
It had some arms that had fallen off in the LFS, now they're starting to grow back! Very cool. You can barely see the tiny new tentacle on the end of the arm:
Catching food, its arms curl up around food it catches and it holds the food there for awhile:
Once the arm has enough food, it curls up:
And takes all the food to eat:
Video if it grabbing some food. I didn't catch any arms curling up when they were full, but still cool. If you click on the vide and go fullscreen on Vimeo's site you can see a lot more detail:
Basket starfish eating on Vimeo
A note about this creature - this is one of the hardest of all starfish to keep alive. Please do not even consider getting one without doing extensive research on them. They are extremely sensitive to any changes in water parameters, and are exclusive filter feeders. They are also nocturnal, so they must be fed after dark. Plus being nocturnal all you usually see of them in the day is a curled up blob of a million arms if they're visible at all. Getting up at 2-3am to feed them gets tiring fast
It had some arms that had fallen off in the LFS, now they're starting to grow back! Very cool. You can barely see the tiny new tentacle on the end of the arm:
Catching food, its arms curl up around food it catches and it holds the food there for awhile:
Once the arm has enough food, it curls up:
And takes all the food to eat:
Video if it grabbing some food. I didn't catch any arms curling up when they were full, but still cool. If you click on the vide and go fullscreen on Vimeo's site you can see a lot more detail:
Basket starfish eating on Vimeo
