HELP! First Anemone

[rmud]

My dad recently introduced a BTA to our first ever marine aquarium and I'm not sure how it's doing.

First of all, the tank (80L) itself is around 8 weeks old and its parameters are listed below:

Nitrates 50+ ppm (I know this is insanely high but we are in the process of removing nitrates with BioNitratEx for 2 weeks now)
Nitrites 0-1ppm
Ammonia 0ppm

The tank has two t5 lamps and one blue lamp. We leave the t5 lamps on from 12am- 4pm and the blue lights one from 4pm-11pm.

Our tank consists of one piece of coral (I'll attach a picture of it because I don't know what type it is) and a green chromis- both of which were introduced to our tank 7 weeks ago- they seem to be doing well.

We introduced the bta 3 days ago- it wondered around for a solid 8 hours before finally attaching itself to our live rock and its foot seems securely attached and not damaged.

My concern is that it's mouth seems to be protruding or quite puffy sometimes (if you can imagine a person with pursed lips then that's how it looks like). Also, it's tentacles tend to become very thin and it will start to close up- especially around an hour or two before the blue lamp turns off for the night. Yesterday it started closing up before it released two short brown strings (I couldn't see if these came out of its mouth, they were kinda wrapped around its tentacles). Around half an hour later it was kinda back to normal (I.e. Inflated but not as inflated as in the picture down below). Is this normal..? I'm not sure if it's dying or digesting food or just pooping!

I've read one too many horror stories of anemones wreaking havoc when they die and I've worked so hard to cycle our water that I would like to avoid starting over. I know that we probably shouldn't have gotten an anemone this early but my dad isn't as patient as me.. :/

Any help/ advice would be kindly appreciated!

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[rmud]

I should add, at no point have I seen it's mouth wide open (which I am very thankful for)!


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[spiraling]

I'm not a nem expert, but that one looks fine for now. he do poop, which might be what you saw. Your other coral is a zoa of some sort. Nice rockwork.

Your lighting schedule seems strange to me. 12am to 4 pm is 16hours a day. That's a lot.
Your nitrAtes are very high and you will probably get a ton of algae to battle because of it. any nitirItes is bad, possibly deadly, and would suggest you are still cycling.

How often are you doing water changes and how much each time?
How much and how often are you feeding the tank?

 

[rmud]

I do a water change every week, considering how much water evaporates I would say I change 10%.
I feed my chromis garlic flakes and brine shrimp. 1 small flake and a 1/4 cube of frozen brine shrimp (thawed) a day as prescribed from the people who sold us our tank/ fish and coral


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[nanoreefing4fun]

to ReefSanctuary, a real Sanctuary of reef forums, with lots of very nice members


Start a tank thread & share your tank with us so we can follow along, we love pics

some great nem info here too

http://www.karensroseanemones.net/

 

[rmud]

I'm not a nem expert, but that one looks fine for now. he do poop, which might be what you saw. Your other coral is a zoa of some sort. Nice rockwork.

Your lighting schedule seems strange to me. 12am to 4 pm is 16hours a day. That's a lot.
Your nitrAtes are very high and you will probably get a ton of algae to battle because of it. any nitirItes is bad, possibly deadly, and would suggest you are still cycling.

How often are you doing water changes and how much each time?
How much and how often are you feeding the tank?

My apologies, the t5 lamp is on from 12pm to 4 pm [emoji23]


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[spiraling]

I feed my chromis garlic flakes and brine shrimp. 1 small flake and a 1/4 cube of frozen brine shrimp (thawed) a day as prescribed from the people who sold us our tank/ fish and coral


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ah - 12 - 4 is much different, might not be enough for the nem, but again I'm not an expert, maybe others will chime in.

You may be doing everything fine - but this seems an odd statement to me:

I do a water change every week, considering how much water evaporates I would say I change 10% considering how much water evaporates I would say I change 10%..

You should be topping off with fresh water to keep the salinity stable, then changing 10% (2 gallons for you tank) once a week. If that's the case your nitrates are high, if not check your salinity.

I feed a 1/4 cube to 3 fish and coral about 5 days a week. I used to feed more and had algae and a huge overpopulation of bristle worms. I'm guessing you are overfeeding and that is causing your nitrate. I don't have a chromis, but my clowns eat about 6 mysis each when I feed.

 

[rmud]

Ohh so you top the water off first before doing a water change..? My dad and I weren't sure how to do it so we took into account how much water had evaporated, did a 5% water change and then filled the tank to the brim again. Your way seems to make more sense now that I think of it..


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[spiraling]

nems do like stable water parameters. You should be topping off for evaporation daily, then do you water changes with the same salinity weekly. What are you using to test your salinity?

 

[rmud]

I do have a salt water refractometer but I haven't really used it


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[rmud]

My dad came back from a weekend trip and I got him to feed the nem with a bit of brine shrimp- it seems to be doing better now that it's been fed [emoji5]

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[DaveK]

...

First of all, the tank (80L) itself is around 8 weeks old and its parameters are listed below:

Nitrates 50+ ppm ...

The tank has two t5 lamps and one blue lamp. We leave the t5 lamps on from 12am- 4pm and the blue lights one from 4pm-11pm.

....
Any help/ advice would be kindly appreciated!
...

Your going to hate me for this, please do not take this personally, but the best advice I can give you is to return the anemone to your LFS and get something else. You just have too much working against you.

At best a 80l (about 21 US gal) tank is minimal. It's very small for an anemone. This small size makes it easy for the anemone to get tangled up in the equipment in the tank and it's very hard to maintain the stable water conditions an anemone requires.

You also have a new tank. This is going to be very unstable for many months. You'll usually see algal blooms and so on. Typically you want to wait about a year to make sure the tank is stable.

You also have a very high level of nitrate. With it so high you would need to make some major water changes to deal with it. However, that would tend to make the tank less stable.

Anemones like lots of light. I'd start with running all your bulbs for at least 8 hours a day, and plan to increase this if there are no problems.

The bottom line is that right now you have many problems with attempting an anemone. Now if you had one of them I'd say maybe, but as matters stand, you are better off with out the anemone.

 

[ApolloRoma]

Anemone can be tough and resilient. Great way to jump into the hobby, try to keep it alive. You have alot to learn. Have you thought about types of anemone fish?

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[DaveK]

Anemone can be tough and resilient. Great way to jump into the hobby, try to keep it alive. You have alot to learn. Have you thought about types of anemone fish?

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I hate to blast someone that's making their first post, but this is some really bad advice when we are talking about a BTA in a new tank and other issues with the tank. If we were talking about some zoas, or maybe a rock anemone, then maybe. A BTA is a lot more tricky.

This is a very bad "way to jump into the hobby".

 

[ApolloRoma]

Understanding the Nitrogen cycle, anatomy of BTA, reef tank water parameters, and maintaining frequent water changes and routine testing will be the least you can do. The chances of survival are slim yet not impossible for it to recover in the long term. Maintaining a healthy saltwater ecosystem is tricky in any size tank.

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[spiraling]

My dad came back from a weekend trip and I got him to feed the nem with a bit of brine shrimp- it seems to be doing better now that it's been fed [emoji5]

I also like to feed my RTBA once a week. Fascinating. If the tentacles are sticky and it eats a couple of mysis shrimp its still doing good. I have heard its bad to overfeed them.

Dave is correct in his advice that you and your tank may not be ready for a nem. The general recommendation of 6-8 months for the tank to mature is usually given. If you can bring it back to the store for credit or have them hold it until you get things under control, it may be better for all of you.

RBTA are hardy when given stable tank parameters, but can turn pretty quickly, die, and nuke the tank under other conditions.

If you choose to keep it then you and your dad need to get saltwater savvy pretty quickly. There are lots of threads here, and many other resources on the net for both tank care and nem care. The more you know the more likely you are not to kill it. Feel free to ask questions on the forums. There are a lot of helpful people, but always double check advice from strangers.

My first recommendation, if you keep the nem or not, would be to get your tank stable and not add anything for at least 2 months. I know that is really hard as a new reefer, but it will be the best for the nem and the chromis. If you are patient now you are much more likely to have long term success.

Learn to measure your salinity. It is really important. If your salinity is out of whack, bring it back slowly to the correct parameter - as in over the course of a week, not in a few hours. Salinity swings, or any ammonia or nitrite, can very will kill the nem and chromis. Doing any sudden changes to the environment like huge water changes, big changes in lighting, or big rock scape reworking, can kill the nem. That's why you want to wait a few months and get everything stable. Once the tank has matured a bit it will have more of the helpful bacteria to keep it stable as you add fish and corals, and you will have more experience with how your tank is doing.

A few clean up crew members, such as a few snails or a hermit, to help with algae might be fine. See what others think on that. I love watching my hermits, but they do tend to kill snails so you might want to go one or the other.

Top off your tank with fresh RO water daily. Are you using RODI water? If you are using tap water that might be contributing to your high nitrates. You can make a mark on the tank so you know how much evaporates each day. Eventually you will want an ATO (auto top off). Do a 10% water change once a week with saltwater that matches as best you can the temperature and salinity of your tank.

Let us know what you decide to do!

 

[DaveK]

...
Learn to measure your salinity. It is really important. If your salinity is out of whack, bring it back slowly to the correct parameter - as in over the course of a week, not in a few hours.
...

I will also add that if you salinity is off, you will skew many other parameters, including calcium, alkalinity, magnesium, and others. That is why it's important to get salinity correct before you start altering the others.

 

[rmud]

Wow.. lots of information to sift through.
Well, my dad and I aren't planning on getting rid of the nem yet. My dad got the nem from a friend he works with whose nem had started to split so, if need be, we can always take it back to him- but it seems to be really well right now so I don't see that happening.
I visited my local aquatics centre yesterday and we are working more closely with them to get our water stable. They guy at the aquatics centre gave us 10 hermit crabs to help with the algae blooms and we are going back there tomorrow (Thursday) so they can do their own water test (we've been using Bio NitratEx for 3 weeks now to reduce our nitrate levels so they're just checking if our at home test kit is accurate or not). They are also going to teach us how to control our salinity so, hopefully, we will get things running smoothly.
In response to ApolloRoma, we haven't looked at getting any other fish for now until the nitrates are under control, but we are interested in maybe one clown- our tank is quite small so we are keeping fish to a minimum .


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[rmud]

Update- Just checked our salinity
1.025 s.g.
35ppt
I will be taking these results to my aquatics centre tomorrow and they'll probably tell us what to do.


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[spiraling]

Awesome! Those params looks good.
It's not impossible to get your tank right for your livestock. It will just take some work,some knowledge, and some patience. It looks like you are on a good path!

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