Beautiful feather star
Himerometra robustipinna
Indian feather star
Stephanometra indica
About
The Indian feather star is a medium-sized feather star that is particularly common in the Indo-Pacific, from the Red Sea to Tonga.
Also known as: stephanometra indica
- Length
- 40 cm
- Depth
- 0–15 m
How to tell it apart
At night on top of corals, with the arms spread in a flat fan across the current; greyish white with bands of cream, brown or orange. Unlike Lamprometra palmata, the undersides of its arms are knobbly, and the long pinnules at the base of the arms are stiff and spine-like.
Appearance
Its colour is fairly variable; typically it is greyish white with concentric bands of cream, brown or orange. It usually holds its arms in two parallel planes, like a fan, rather than as a bush or a crown.
Habitat
Indo-Pacific from the Red Sea to the Tonga Islands, from the surface to 15 m and mainly in shallow water, though sometimes reported down to 73 m. It is found in tidepools, on rocky outcrops and under dead and living corals.
Behaviour
It is nocturnal. By day it hides under rubble and in the reef; at dusk it crawls to exposed perches such as the tops of corals and spreads its arms in a fan, more or less perpendicular to the current.
Diet
A suspension feeder.
Did you know?
It is extremely hard to tell apart from its close relative Lamprometra palmata, which shares its range and behaviour.
Log it in Into the Blue
Describe what you saw and we name it, then keep every species you find in your Oceandex.
