Sand Star eats live snails?

[dale and Gina]

Do sand stars eat live snails? Something is eating my snails. I have a sand star, 3 blue leg hermit crabs, 1 cleaner shrimp, two clown fish, 1 blue tang, and 1 Christmas wrass.
Everytime I put snails in, after a week in the tank, they're dead. Are they eating the snails?
What do sand stars eat? A part of its limb fell off too.

[RicksReefs]

sand sifting stars eat the bugs and bacteria in/on the sand. most end up starving and the limb loss may be a manifestation of lack of food.
I'd attribute your snail losses to the wrasse or hermits. I'd say wrasse first though.

[Tu Ku]

Yeah, a chirstmas wrasse can be one of those fish that just enjoy terrorizing. I would pay close attention to that, or it could be something that you didn't intentionally put into your system, i.e. live rock hitchikers

[LeslieH]

Sand stars start off by eating all the larger components of a sand bed - the snails, worms, smaller stars, etc. Once all those are gone they'll switch to detritus but that's not enough for them & will slowly starve to death. If you want to keep it alive you'll have to frequently target feed it with meaty foods.

[REEFERINDC]

Because if its pour or your salinity is high I have seen a starfish basically disintegrate.

[REEFERINDC]

As for the snails I would say the wrasse or the hermits.Hermits may be competing for food or want the snail's shell.