starfish fever!!! (splitting question)

ok i've been reading up a lot about regeneration and starfish splitting... i have a few chocolate starfish and african ones...

From what i see, I can literally take some scissors and cut one into 5 as long as i get a piece of the mouth with it..... Is this in fact true or murder??? lol And i know some starfish are different than others... would it work for mine i listed above??

I'm itchin to try it... maybe cut one in half, for fun...

yes! they are kind of like nems! (anemonies)
as long as you split from the mouth or every piece you cut has a peice of the mouth theyll be fine! i mean yeah theyll be pissed that you cut them in half but theyll be fine and regenerate!

will they grow out to be a normally looking starfish or will there be discolorment or shorted limbs lol. also how long does it take?

Holey Rock of Texas wrote:

will they grow out to be a normally looking starfish or will there be discolorment or shorted limbs lol. also how long does it take?

Ditto...do they grow back into a five limbed star? or six or whatever the parent was?

i guess depending on how you water is and your lighting lol
it should normally grow out to its original 5 star shape otherwise ppl wouldnt by em if they came out all retart. i know some LFS's split stars and Nems they already have grow out the frags and sell em when theyre ready.
so im sure if they didnt come out rite they would do it for profit in the 1st place

Okay...dumb question....is the mouth the little star shape in the center of the underneath of a star? I have one sand sifting star and he is pretty cool. I would be scared to cut him though, lol. I have bunches of the little brittle stars but they are max size of about a quarter around.

wildbeanerz wrote:

Okay...dumb question....is the mouth the little star shape in the center of the underneath of a star? I have one sand sifting star and he is pretty cool. I would be scared to cut him though, lol. I have bunches of the little brittle stars but they are max size of about a quarter around.

yes thats the mouth! to be safe just cut from the exact center of the star! just to be sure, you bound to get it from the center lol

thanks alk... that's what i figured... and yes i know they will grow back normal, cuz after i wrote this question i went to LFS and they said they do it sometimes and it takes like 2 months to grow back normal... they said try it on your cheaper ones.. just try cutting it in half, it will look retarded for a few months but it works...
cuz i have 7 dollar ones and a 40 dollar one, will NOT be trying it on him lol

LOL nice!

you should post a thread on how your going to split it!!!
post pix aswell!!!:)