Anemone Not Adjusting to Tank

[andrew2937]

Hi everyone! I’m new to saltwater and everything has been very exciting but I’m concerned that this large anemone is hiding after adding it 3 weeks ago. It spends most of its time hiding under rocks and has circled the tank a few times. Sometimes it’s hard to see because of where it is but it looks like it spends most of the time shrunken down with its tentacles being very tiny sometimes.

Today it came out to the front of the rocks in the evening. It’s mouth opened super wide and this gross looking ball (doesn’t look like anything I’ve seen go into the tank) went inside the mouth, then the mouth closed. The anemone then moved back around and under the rocks and shrunk down again. What is going on with my nem?

I have tried sending frozen food towards its mouth before, I don’t think it reacted and caught any of it. It’s ranges from like 2 to 4 or 5 inches.

Tank: 45 Gal AIO
Lighting: Red Sea LED90
Fish: 6 small fish including 2 clowns that ignore it

Water
PH: 8.0
Salinity: 1.024
Ammonia/nitrite/nitrate: 0
Calcium: 300-320

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated!

 

[Saltyreef]

Your water parameters seem pretty skewed. Whats your alk?

Its likely suffering from rapid changes in its enviornment (not a stable reef)

 

[Peace River]

I’m sorry to hear about the challenges. How long has the tank been set up? How long has the anemone been in the tank?

 

[andrew2937]

Your water parameters seem pretty skewed. Whats your alk?

Its likely suffering from rapid changes in its enviornment (not a stable reef)

Are you looking at nitrate? I’ve been thinking it doesn’t make sense to be 0 based on what I’ve read on forums. I forgot to include we’ve also been testing for phosphate which has looked like 0 too. These are all with the API salt water test kits… are these inaccurate? Or maybe we got bad batches of test solutions?

I haven’t been testing for alkalinity but I’ll start asap. What test kits would you recommend? I’ll take a water sample to the hobby store near me to double check our current testing

Am I looking at a dying anemone or just an unhappy one until I fix this?

Any idea what that brown ball of stuff was?

 

[andrew2937]

I’m sorry to hear about the challenges. How long has the tank been set up? How long has the anemone been in the tank?

Thank you, I’m sorry for anything bad I’m doing to anything in my tank definitely want the best for them!

It’s been about 3 months, may have rushed the nem too much - I added it just under 3 weeks ago

I got advice to get it a bit earlier so that it could find a place to settle and then I could place coral out of its way.

For cycling, I used the caribsea live sand, 6 pieces of live rock, and microbacter7

 

[Saltyreef]

I would attempt to take it back to the store. Let them know you and the tank are not ready