anemone's......what is the deal (good?..bad?)

[slb11106]

the question i have is :
is it good to have anemone in your tank, ?
what is the plus and minus on these creatures, i have received mixed opinions from my LFS and i think they are neat but i am starting a reef tank and want to know before i get something that would have to be removed ??

[blue_eyes53813]

I hear that alot too. I have never had a bad experience with one.. They do need alot of light (which Im sure you know). You do have to watch them close as far as touching other corals/livestock, becoming sick/dieing they need to be removed Immediately.moving around -they will get sucked up in powerheads or any intake. Ive had the same anemone for 5 years and it is ok. I think it is more of a person preference, People that dont like them probably have had bad experiences. I actually have a red Bubble tip coming this week. They do need to be acclimated very slow as well.Good luck

[Dragon Wrasse]

Its been said that you don't want to mix corals and anemone's. I added a Long tentacle to my tank before I ever had any corals, the LTA moved around my tank so much that I started calling it Mary Poppins....it just floated around for maybe eight weeks, looking like Mary Poppins, every now and then it would find a spot on or under a rock but that would only last a couple of days. a couple of times Mary Poppins took a trip into my over flow and into my wet/dry and then one day she was sucked up into one of my Maxi-jet 600's, I had to cut her free, mind you this was while I had my two Clarkies (I was hopeing they would make there home in the LTA) I thought she was beyond repair, but in the end she recovered nicely. Well it's been over a year now and she has quadrupled in size, she has gone from 3" to almost 12" (see my gallery) and that is before she streaches and fills with water. She is in a 4" DSB and a couple of weeks ago she let loose of the bottom, I had to stand ready to save my corals...I was in fear that she would start her old tricks again and float around stinging my corals, but she repossitioned and is now attached to the bottom again. I would say it is up to you if you want to mix but I suggest a DSB for it to anchor it self in and have a plan in cause it wants to take a cruise around you tank, hope this helps.

[Cougra]

Anemones are very demanding creatures that do require prestine water conditions and a lot of light. I think the two things that most people forget are :
1. They are mobile inverts. If they don't like the place that you put it, it is going to move. It doesn't care if there are other animals in it's path or that you had planned to have something else in the place it chose to live, if that's where it wants to live then that's where it's going to live.
2. They are predators. They will eat other fish or inverts if they can catch them. If the anemone eats your prize $500 fish, well that's what it would do in nature as well. You can't train them NOT to try eating something should the opertunity arise.

Personally, I don't like seeing them sold in stores as most of them end up dieing a slow death. In nature they can live hundreds of years, in a tank their life expectancy is a dismal 1-2 years. Yes I know there are "success" stories that someone had it live for 5 years but how many others have died? If they are wild caught, they are very delicate animals that are doomed to death before it even arrives in the store due to poor collection pratices, the stresses of holding and transportation, and physical damage from mishandling (merely touching some with your bare hands has the potential to burn them because of the pH differences).

Before you get an anemone, learn as much as you can about keeping a reef tank in balance, make sure you have all the equipment necessary to keep one, and do as much research as you can on anemones in general and the species you are interested in specifically. Don't assume all anemones are the same because they aren't.

[Dragon Wrasse]

Outstanding words of advise Cougra....the main point being "learn as much as you can"...that's the best advise for this hobbie in general, I have enough information and notes on saltwater tanks, I feel I can fill a book as thick as a phone book on the subject. I wounder if I can get a degree from the local college in marine biology??? LOL

[reefjitsu]

Excellent post Cougra. I agree and will add that anemones do better in mature tanks (over a year old).

I wounder if I can get a degree from the local college in marine biology??? LOL

Marine biologist don't do and don't have knowledge about things that most people think they do. Try marine invertebrate zoology instead.

[BoomerD]

Well said Michelle. I've kept BTA's and other anemones for about 20 yrs. They are not easy animals to keep. They require a well matured tank, (1 yr or more), extremely pristine water conditions, Better than average lighting, (many require metal halides to thrive), and as mentioned, are VERY opportunistic feeders. I've seen numerous tanks where the reefer came home to be missing a prize fish, only to find a bit of it sticking out of the anemone. Expensive meal for the "nem"...
If you REALLY want one, wait for your tank to mature, read, read, read, and learn as much about their care as you can. My last tank was a "rose garden". Set up primarily to house rose BTA's, although I did have a couple of fish in with them. Beautiful animals, truely "flowers of the sea".

[cheeks69]

I would also add that in particular BTA's can become a plague when they start to split regularly, putting your Corals at risk. Just from 2 BTA's that I had they became 8 and when they wander around they will be problematic. I ended up removing all of them except one Rose BTA.

[Dragon Wrasse]

Great Pic BoomerD, and here I thought my Mary Poppins was big LOL

[blue_eyes53813]

Oh my god that is huge. Wow.

[Shells]

I have a Rose BTA that got caught in on of my maxi 1200 3 times!!!
The third time he split! Ever since that third time, which was about 3 weeks ago, they have stayed put. Well today, one of them decided to move, but its stayin in a 5" radius area. I also have a big BTA that stays
put for the most part. Every couple weeks it goes in the back behind the
rock and peeks through a small hole to reach the light.

Here is a pic of one of the roses after the split:


Here is a pic of the Big BTA:


if you look to the forgrond of the pic, there is a rock, I have the following
image there, the tenticles of the anemone touch it from time to time with
the current, should I move the frag to another location or is it ok to leave it there??

[BoomerD]

When my rose split the first time, the clone parked on top of a nice pink birdsnest frag, and within hours it was dead. I've also lost other frags the same way. Anemones just kill corals when they touch in almost all cases. IMO, if you want to keep it, move it.