Bubble Tip Anenome help

[brandon999]

Hi, so I just started my 15g AIO cube with a friends 8 year old sump live rock that’s got tons of bacteria on it and copapods. I was given as a gift 2 clowns and a green bubble top nem. Tank is only a week old with the 8 year old rock, bacteria filled sea water filled, and dr Tim’s was used as well for bacteria.

I acclimated the 2 clowns and the nem but I’m afraid I’ll end up killing it due to not having established parameters and ecosystem even with all that I have to help. The nem walked about 2 inches where I placed him and now he seems to have found his spot and seems to be enjoying itself. The clowns are ready paired with it so they’re also cleaning it. Any advice to try and make sure I don’t screw up with it? I’ve done a lot of research but it’s my first salt talk and I have no experience keeping coral or nems. Close friends have told me who have reef tanks there’s a high chance it’ll die and I’ll have to do a pretty large water change if that’s the case unless I catch it before bit I don’t even know what a healthy or stressed nem looks like. Any advice would be awesome.

 

[Stevorino]

In my experience, BTAs are not that hard to keep if you can keep nutrients steady and under control. It looks good in the pics.

When I have overstressed them in the past, they split into multiple anemones. But I've never had one nuke the tank.

I'd keep an eye on ammonia for a few weeks....even though it probably cycled quickly with that rock, it's still something to keep an eye on with such a fresh tank.

Going forward, I'd just check parameters weekly (at least) and do regular water changes and you should be fine.

 

[ReefLife_Guy]

So long as you have adequate light, flow, and stable water parameters, it should do fine. As far as its current state, it appears healthy but will likely continue to move. It appears to be stretching towards the light source which tells me it will probably decide to move again. Not sure if the lighting is full intensity but you could try to increase it a little to see how it responds.

In my early days of keeping nems, I have had sick BTAs melting in my tank before I found them and never had them "nuke" my tank. I think if they get shredded into a bunch of pieces maybe they could cause havoc in the tank and there are definitely anecdotes out there of dying nems causing havoc. I think if it starts to die and melt away definitely remove it, as all it will do is be an ammonia source in the tank and why risk it?

Here are a few indicators of health that I wish I knew before keeping my own:

1. Color - white or clearing of the tissue might indicate bleaching which means the zooxanthellae are dying off or being expelled by the anemone
2. Tentacle morphology - extreme retraction where they don't even look bubbled anymore, elongation is ok
3. "Mouth" or Oral disk open vs. closed - for the most part BTAs should keep their oral disk pretty tight/closed up, even when feeding they don't usually make their mouths gaping they kind of just force it in. They will expel waste but it shouldn't be gaping open exposing their inner cavity
4. Overall "fullness" - they will inflate and deflate periodically to cycle the water throughout their body, expel waste, etc. but they should not be deflated for long periods of time.

 

[GDiaz]

If you have a wave maker, get yourself a nem guard. This will prevent the anemone from getting shred into it. This picture was one of mine who took a walk, but that guard protected it from going into the actual wave maker.

 

[ReefLife_Guy]

Just a few visual examples for reference. This was one thing I struggled with because it is easy to find really sick nems on the forum but you don't always see healthy nems doing normal behaviors that can sometimes be alarming to an inexperienced reefer if they haven't seen it before. I felt like I was always asking myself "Is this normal?" and I would wait it to either find that it was or was not and at that point it was too late to save the nem.

2. Tentacle morphology

This is what I mean by shortened/retracted tentacles, compared to the elongated one behind it. Also this is a good example of color loss, if you look close at the front anemone the tentacles are starting to become translucent and not as color as it once was (see picture on the right which is the same nem before it got sick).

Full and Healthy in their own ways (bubble morphology and elongated morphology)

3. "Mouth" or Oral disk open vs. closed

The white wrinkly stuff in the top center of the nem is the nem inverting its oral cavity outward and is a sign of stressed anemone. Even though you can see 2 big strings coming from it and might think it is expelling waste this is not a normal way of doing this.

Another example of "gaping mouth" (i.e. stressed nem)

4. Overall "fullness"

This is stressed nem with gaping mouth and deflated overall. This is not a "normal" deflating/inflating that anemones do. Stressed nems like this usually take a long time to reinflate (if they do):

This is a healthy nem that is just deflating and will reinflate within a few minutes. As far as I know this is a normal behavior and all of my nems do it periodically.

Side Note:
Also don't be surprised if they look like this because they sometimes also close up like this at night. I'm not actually sure if this is a normal natural thing they do, I know it is a defense mechanism when they get attacked but some of mine do this at night and some just shrink a little but not deflate, just depends on the day and the intensity of the moon lighting

 

[GDiaz]

Just a few visual examples for reference. This was one thing I struggled with because it is easy to find really sick nems on the forum but you don't always see healthy nems doing normal behaviors that can sometimes be alarming to an inexperienced reefer if they haven't seen it before. I felt like I was always asking myself "Is this normal?" and I would wait it to either find that it was or was not and at that point it was too late to save the nem.


This is what I mean by shortened/retracted tentacles, compared to the elongated one behind it. Also this is a good example of color loss, if you look close at the front anemone the tentacles are starting to become translucent and not as color as it once was (see picture on the right which is the same nem before it got sick).

Full and Healthy in their own ways (bubble morphology and elongated morphology)

The white wrinkly stuff in the top center of the nem is the nem inverting its oral cavity outward and is a sign of stressed anemone. Even though you can see 2 big strings coming from it and might think it is expelling waste this is not a normal way of doing this.

Another example of "gaping mouth" (i.e. stressed nem)

This is stressed nem with gaping mouth and deflated overall. This is not a "normal" deflating/inflating that anemones do. Stressed nems like this usually take a long time to reinflate (if they do):

This is a healthy nem that is just deflating and will reinflate within a few minutes. As far as I know this is a normal behavior and all of my nems do it periodically.

Side Note:
Also don't be surprised if they look like this because they sometimes also close up like this at night. I'm not actually sure if this is a normal natural thing they do, I know it is a defense mechanism when they get attacked but some of mine do this at night and some just shrink a little but not deflate, just depends on the day and the intensity of the moon lighting

This is great context and very informative. Thank you for sharing. Question.. Is there anything from your experience that would have made the anemone in pic 1 sick? Also, why do some go bald and lose their tentacles? I have seen them do this then grow back like nothing ever happened.

 

[ReefLife_Guy]

This is great context and very informative. Thank you for sharing. Question.. Is there anything from your experience that would have made the anemone in pic 1 sick? Also, why do some go bald and lose their tentacles? I have seen them do this then grow back like nothing ever happened.

That particular anemone was stressed to the extreme and was one of the unfortunate victims of a move/upgrade. The nem seemed to do well for a while when transferred from its original 55 gallon home to a temporary holding trough but all the stress of transferring and probably not great quality lighting and water quality before my new 150gallon was ready probably stressed it too much. It expelled a lot of zooxanthellae in the holding trough but my hands were kind of tied because the new tank wasn't ready yet.

As far as the tentacles, they don't really lose them per se but the tissue kind of retracts on itself. I'm not sure the exact mechanism or reasoning for this but I suspect it's some kind of way to reduce energy expenditure. One of the anemone experts on here has posted something in the anemone forum in the bookmarked articles and he kind of has a scoring system for sick anemones. Part of this scoring is their responsiveness to touch and whether they have retracted or shortened tentacles. It's possible the anemone is trying to concentrate the remaining zooxanthellae into a more compact area to help itself heal but I'm not sure exactly.

 

[Jesse Sunday]

If you have a wave maker, get yourself a nem guard. This will prevent the anemone from getting shred into it. This picture was one of mine who took a walk, but that guard protected it from going into the actual wave maker.

I love the inadvertent selfie!

Is that guard 3d printed? If so, do you mind sharing the file?

Thanks so much! Beautiful Nem!

 

[GDiaz]

I love the inadvertent selfie!

Is that guard 3d printed? If so, do you mind sharing the file?

Thanks so much! Beautiful Nem!

Hi thank you. Yes this one is a 3D print. I purchased it though Etsy. I inserted the link below

Anemone guard: Hygger wave maker

 

[GDiaz]

That particular anemone was stressed to the extreme and was one of the unfortunate victims of a move/upgrade. The nem seemed to do well for a while when transferred from its original 55 gallon home to a temporary holding trough but all the stress of transferring and probably not great quality lighting and water quality before my new 150gallon was ready probably stressed it too much. It expelled a lot of zooxanthellae in the holding trough but my hands were kind of tied because the new tank wasn't ready yet.

As far as the tentacles, they don't really lose them per se but the tissue kind of retracts on itself. I'm not sure the exact mechanism or reasoning for this but I suspect it's some kind of way to reduce energy expenditure. One of the anemone experts on here has posted something in the anemone forum in the bookmarked articles and he kind of has a scoring system for sick anemones. Part of this scoring is their responsiveness to touch and whether they have retracted or shortened tentacles. It's possible the anemone is trying to concentrate the remaining zooxanthellae into a more compact area to help itself heal but I'm not sure exactly.

I see. I feel like they are tricky. For me the less I tinker with my tank the better they do. They don’t like anything outside my normal routine.