Lamprometra palmata (Featherstar Crinoid): Propagation Guide

An honest propagation overview of the featherstar crinoid Lamprometra palmata, which is an echinoderm rather than a coral, why it rarely survives in captivity and how crinoids actually reproduce.

Overview

Lamprometra palmata is a featherstar crinoid. Crinoids belong to the class Crinoidea and are echinoderms, not corals; they are related to starfish, brittle stars, sea urchins and sea cucumbers. Unstalked feather stars (comatulids) carry feather-like arms supported by articulating ossicles and bearing smaller jointed appendages called pinnules, giving the animal its plumed appearance, with the mouth on the upper surface.

It is grouped with non-photosynthetic, filter-feeding aquarium animals because, like NPS corals, it must capture suspended food rather than rely on light. Crinoids are passive filter feeders, using their arms and sticky mucus to trap plankton and small particles of detritus, with cilia then moving the food toward the mouth.

Reproductive Mode

Crinoids reproduce sexually through broadcast spawning: the pinnules eventually rupture to release sperm and eggs into the seawater, where fertilisation and larval development occur. This open-water spawning is difficult to trigger or support in a home aquarium, especially for an animal that struggles simply to feed itself.

Fragging / Asexual Propagation

Crinoids cannot reproduce asexually through fragmentation. They are, however, capable of regenerating lost body parts: arms torn off by predators can regrow, and even the visceral mass can regenerate. Regeneration repairs an individual but does not create new animals, so there is no fragging route comparable to cutting a coral colony. The honest position is that this species is not propagated in captivity.

Common Challenges

The central challenge is nutrition: a captive featherstar needs near-constant fine particulate food in strong flow, conditions that are hard to maintain, and survival is rare. Because reproduction is by open-water spawning and the animal regenerates rather than fragments, there is no practical home propagation method, and the species is best regarded as one to leave in the wild.