Not-so-bubbly personality

Tentagirl · 11-07-2009, 11:17 PM

The next installment in the saga of the anemones. Here's my question of the day: our bubble tip anemone seems to be getting smaller. What can we do to help it? Thanks!

Phishnoob · 11-08-2009, 12:12 AM

Wow there are a lot of variables.

Anything change in your tank, did the anenome move, how old is everything and did water or another parameter change.....

Also define getting smaller. My anenome shrinks up now and then just because and then will fill out again.

Pictures will help.

Tentagirl · 11-08-2009, 12:16 AM

By getting smaller, I mean the surface area of the oral disk seems to be shrinking. I'm seeing that the bubbles increase and decrease, and the entire thing shrinks up at times, but this just seems to be different than that normal cyclical change in size.

The tank is 3 months old. The BTA seems to have been shrinking since we put it in 1.5 months ago. There is a clownfish in the tank. There's also a long-tentacled anemone who survived an intake incident and now seems to be doing fine. It's attached itself and eats krill. In fact, the bubble has moved over to be next to the LTA.

The bubble doesn't seem to eat anything. I feed krill and also add phytoplankton.

Tentagirl · 11-08-2009, 12:30 AM

I think I have enough posts so I can put a picture up. I'll do that tomorrow.

Jnicho · 11-08-2009, 01:23 AM

What kind of lighting do you have?...and that's a pretty young tank for nems...I would guess the nem my be having issues with fluctuations in such a new tank...there are lots of changes we don't really even notice going on for the first 6-12 months in a new tank...nems are one of the most susceptible animals to these...generally a nem that is "shrinking" and not reacting well to food is slowly dieing...it takes a long time as they have a very slow metabalism...that's not to say that it can't be turned around, but without a more mature tank it may be hard...getting it to eat small meaty foods like mysid shrimp would be the best bet for improving it's health IMO...it can be quite hard to target feed a nem that is not sticky/does not have a good feeding response...especially if you have fist or inverts that will steal the food...an ailing nem can be very slow in intake the food...a 2 liter bottle cut down or some other means of "protecting" the nem for a little bit after target feeding can be very helpful.

Elegance Coral · 11-08-2009, 08:55 AM

I responded to your other thread about the anemones. You really need to separate them. LTA's can pack a pretty good punch. I'm not saying that's your only problem with the BTA, but it certainly could be a major contributing factor.

biowheel · 11-08-2009, 09:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tentagirl

I think I have enough posts so I can put a picture up. I'll do that tomorrow.

Can't wait

. Pictures ,pictures

Tentagirl · 11-08-2009, 01:32 PM

OK, I think I have attached pictures of both of our anemones. As you can see, the bubble tip is in pretty bad shape. So is my career in fish photography, evidently.

The phosphate level in the tank is at 0, pH is 8.4. Ca+ is at 380, but I'm adding more today. Nitrites are at 0, nitrates at 7.5, Ammonia is 0.

Tentagirl · 11-08-2009, 04:32 PM

For the pictures above, the disk of the bubble tip is about the size of a quarter. The LTA is about the size of a softball.

Tentagirl · 11-08-2009, 08:36 PM

I moved the bubble tip away from the LTA, and put it on the rock. I just checked it again and it's quite a bit bigger than it was earlier, and it's foot is spread out attached to the rock. Maybe it just needed to get away from LT?