Brittle Star Removal??

[kng]

Should I remove this Brittle Star? It is a little smaller than a quarter. It has stayed in the same spot in the picture for about a week. It hasn't bothered anything yet but I just bought some Yellow Polyps and I don't want him bothering them.

 

In the same rock there is another one (I don't have a pict). It is about twice the size, but is white with pink/orange stripes.

 

I have looked in three books and did a search, but can't really decide if it is "bad". I thought about taking the rock out and putting it in a freshwater bath (there's not a lot of life on this particular rock anyway), hoping it would fall off.

 

Any thoughts would be appreciated!

 

Here's the link in case the picture doesn't load:

http://home.hiwaay.net/~kgoble/brittle.jpg

[technoshaman]

I wouldn't. The large brittle / serpent stars get too big for a nano (sub 20g) most I see for sale ar about 1" disc diameter with 3-5" arms. The small ones are supposed to be very good for your sandbed and are not harmful afaik. I have some of these in a piece of live rock I have also and am not 100% convinced they are even the common sandbed variety of white brittle since I have never seen one leave the rock yet just waving it's arms around. Green brittle stars and a few other varietys are opportunistic predators and will trap and eat sleeping fishes and invertebrates if they can. It's really neat to see a large one go after a piece of food dropped in the tank , they move really fast (the green variety) looks like something out of a bad sci fi movie.

[AzSnake]

I have both the "hairy" type like in the pic above and the greens that I picked up diving in Mexico. Both have been model citizens so far. (They are in my 80 gal main tank, not my Nano) My key to success with them is to make sure they get food and lots of it. My "hairy" brittle is about 24" from tip to tip. I call him the Cracken.