[Narmical]

I am new to the hobby and am still in the information gathering stage of setting up an aquarium.

My goal is to keep a Chocolate Chip Starfish. I will most likely keep it and the clean up crew, and nothing else. As such, i was wondering what kind of clean up crew animals would get along with this starfish. It is my understanding that snails are one of the things this type of starfish eats.

so i would assume that snails are out. is this correct?
what other options are there.

I'm planing to have a tank in the 50-60 gallon range, so any suggestions on the amounts would be cool too.

[leebca]

The Chocolate Chip Starfish is a very robust carnivore. It is also very aggressive, which is probably one reason it does so well in the aquarium.

It doesn't 'eat snails' per se, but it won't refuse one if the Star is hungry. Basically the Starfish will eat whatever it can grab. Keeping one of these presents a problem regarding a cleanup crew.

In general, shrimp can escape from the Starfish. Some crabs can be caught by the Starfish (and I wouldn't recommend hermit crabs anyway). If you're planning a tank of 180 gallons or more, an appropriate cucumber would do well with the Starfish.

Sand sifting fishes and fishes that are detritivores should be able to get out of the Star's way, too.

You can keep snails, but you'll need to prefer the large ones and to keep the Starfish well fed.

[Narmical]

Where can i find a reliable list of detritus eating fish? would these fish also need to be fed as well? if so what kind of feeding do they need?

[Narmical]

What about worms? are they compatible?

[leebca]

The live rock should come with some worms of the bristle type. You can seed the tank with these and other kinds of worms too. However, the Starfish will disrupt some worms that send out tentacles to feed. This Starfish is a bit difficult to 'live with.'

I can't help you with detritvore fishes. I know little about them. You might try to find info on them through the Internet.