The Red Knob Sea Star: All you need to know
- Oct 09, 2020
- Anshika Mishra
- 6002 0 0
This starfish looks awesome in any tank. They will definitely strike for people seeing in your tank, they are going to be like; "dude, look at that starfish, it looks gorgeous." This is the Red Knob Sea Star also known as the Red General Starfish. Other names for it is the African Sea Star and the Red Spine Star.
RED KNOB SEA STAR
PRICE: You will normally see them for about $40-$60. They are a little more extensive form of star fish. You sometimes have to spend more money on them if you want to get a larger one.
TANK SIZE: Starfish don't need a specific tank size. Just don't let us catch you putting this 6-feet long Starfish in your little 10-gallon. Obviously, that is not gonna be good for them. A lot of people keep this fish in 55-gallons with plenty of live rock to run around and they are seen to be really happy in there.
KNOW YOUR FISH
CARE LEVEL: They are super easy to take care of, you don't have to be a professional to start with these gorgeous creatures.
TEMPERAMENT: They are a very peaceful starfish.
REEF COMPATIBILITY: Definitely not, these fishes will eat your coral. A lot of people make a huge mistake by thinking how pretty these fishes along with corals will look in the tank. But the end of the story doesn't go as anticipated, they start running around and eating the coral right away.
Now, there might be some people who claim to keep these guys with coral, but seriously when you know how the story goes then why risk your beautiful corals anyways. So, you definitely want to watch out on getting these.
WATER PARAMETERS
TEMPERATURE: You want to keep it for 72-78.
dKH: 8-12
pH: 8.0-8.4
SALINITY: 1.023-1.025, make sure you keep it stable, you should not have big fluctuations with your salinity because it can definitely hurt your Starfish.
So, whenever you first get them to make sure you acclimate them very slowly, however, you normally will acclimate your fish, you basically want to double that. Make sure they get used to the water not too fast.
MAXIMUM SIZE: They can get a foot-long, the can measure up to 12-inches, these guys can eventually get really big and so they will need to be in a pretty large tank for them to roam around comfortably.
COLORS: They come in a very bright red color and they have a white design that makes it look really cool.
FOOD AND COMPATIBILITY
DIET: Whenever they are young they will tend to eat algae but once they get older they tend to turn more into a carnivore. So, at the end of the day, they are an omnivore. It will feed around the tank eating left over algae and then you have to hand feed.
Just get shrimps of little frozen packs, peel them off, and little piece upon its leg. They will grab that piece with their tentacles and begin it to its mouth. It is very easy to feed it but you do want to make sure that you hand feed them.
They do like eating other things like clams, in a nutshell, anything meaty that you can get down there to them so that they can grab it. It will work out really well for them.
ORIGIN: They do come from Africa and some from Indonasia area.
COMPATIBILITY: You can house this one with all the other star fishes all the time, you will have no problem with that. People sometimes complaint of these chasing other starfishes in the tank but this will never happen if you will feed all your Starfishes properly.
MAKE SURE
SLOW ACCLIMATION
Make sure whenever you do acclimate these guys, don't let them touch air it can really hurt them. It hurts them in the acclimating process when they are not used to it so you have to put them in a bowl and then just carry that whole bowl over into the tank and then release them under the water.
Slow Acclimation will help your Starfish to be good and healthy in your tank.
STAY AWAY FROM SPIKES
Make sure to keep your level down, stay to on your water changes because spikes of nitrate or Ammonia in your tank can be lethal to them. So just keep your water clean, keep your salinity good and your fish will really be happy.
NO COPPER
Make sure not to dose copper with these guys. Copper is a medicine that can really harm them. It is a little to strong for this fish to take in. So, if you have to dose copper make sure you take them out first.
TANK MATE
Make sure to keep them away from aggressive preditors, things like Puffer fish and Trigegr fish. they might see these guys as a snack and a lot of time people want to put them in htier predictor but tank but it doesn't end well.
One time these sea star will do really goof in tank that are fish only tank. A fish have bunch of Tangs and Angels, these star fish do really well in those.
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