Changes

Starfish eat almost anything that cannot easily escape, but mainly [[bivalves]]. They eat these by using their tube feet as suction cups to prise a small gap in the bivalve’s shell, and then everting their own stomach through their mouth opening and extending it into the shell, using their digestive juices to liquefy the creature inside and then sucking it in. Starfish help the intertidal [[ecosystem]] stay in balance by eating mussels, which would otherwise push other organisms out. <ref> http://oceanlink.island.net/ask/echino.html </ref> The crown-of-thorns starfish (Acanthaster planci), which feeds on [[coral]], is decimating [[coral reefs]] off the [[Philippines]] and [[Australia]].