carpet anemone

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zakiyya

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hi

My husband and i are quite new at marine tanks. we bought a 250l red sea around June and everything was going perfectly, till we were gifted a carpet anemone.

since than our tank was completely wiped out of all the fish we had, we believe they had white spots. we often found the fish in the anemone.

after a few weeks of having an empty tank, we found our anemone was not eating the food, it was either spitting it out and or our shrimp was stealing it.

over this past weekend we introduced 6 chromis, however yesterday and this morning we have been unable to locate 2 of them. last night we emptied the tank did a water change but just couldn't find the fish. this morning as well. i believe my anemone is eating it and that he has become accustomed to live fish which is why it is not eating its frozen lance fish.

please advise what we can do. we would ideally like to get rid of it but wouldn't want to pass on this problem to someone else.

regards zakiyya
 
Carpet anemones are very well known for eating fish. I would definitely get rid of it. Anemones are not easy to keep at the best of times, in spite of what LFS might tell you. I would stay away from them completely until you've got a couple years of experience under your belt.

Unfortunately Chromis are also well known for killing each other, particularly in a small tank. The dominant one will beat up the weakest until it dies and then move onto the next one until you're left with one fish.
 
Anemones need mature, stable tanks, i fear yours may be too new to house one. Carpet anemones also require very high lighting. They are predatory, but i dont think it would have eaten all your fish in such a short time. A pic of the anemone would also help.
Rather take the anemone to a shop and get a different species when your tank is ready.
 
Hi @zakiyya, welcome to masa.
Well, just to get the confusion out of the way... Carpet anemones are known fish eaters!!! Their tentacles are very sticky & i have heard of quite a lot of fish being eaten by them.
Their sting is quite potent & they will even catch quite large fish!

With regards to keeping a carpet anemone... They arent the easiest anemone to keep, & they should only be kept in pristine water in order to be happy, otherwise they will slowly decline in health, eventually bleach & die...

Feeding a carpet anemone is actually quite easy as they normally accept all meaty foods very eagerly except if they are already full, in which case they wont eat the food.

My advice would be to give the anemone to another masa member that has experience with anemones... (unless you are willing to ensure the correct water quality for the anemone)
 
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Hi

having a bit of difficulty uploading the pictures but will try again later. Says dimensions too big.

if there is anyone who would like the anemone please let me know. our water has been testing perfectly.
 
66335077d52809725.jpg
 
Many thanks Zakiya for uploading the picture. OK - so first things first. Except for the fact that this is NOT a carpet anemone, but rather a Long Tentacle Anemone (LTA), this nemmie looks OK'ish - seeing that it was fed. It has lost ALL of it's "zooxanthellae" (tiny photosynthetic cells that assist in giving the anemone energy and food / from inside it's own body - the usual healthy coloration of a healthy anemone, is brown'ish/darker yellow'ish/cream'ish).....

OK - so - this anemone definitely URGENTLY needs to be fed.

I would firstly suggest getting small pieces of pink shrimp - smaller than your fingernail, and also possibly some mussel, as well as lance-fish (tiny baitfish). And then, using a tongs of sorts, very lightly move the food in between the anemone's tentacles close to it's mouth. NEVER try and put food INTO it's mouth yourself.

Repeat this twice to three times daily.

In the meanwhile, you will HAVE to upgrade your lighting as well - because the standard lighting of the Red Sea 250 aquarium is NOT good enough to keep anemone's.

If you would rather give or trade-in this anemone at a pet shop/LFS, it might be a better idea. Or perhaps swap the anemone for some coral, with someone on MASA....

Good luck with the anemone.
 
hi thanks, we've been feeding it lance fish which recently it either spits out or our shrimp seem to be stealing it right from it. it definitely isn't hungry, it has eaten at least 3 fish that we are aware of and most likely the 2 missing chromis over the last few days.

its colour is about the same from when we got it, it did move itself from 1 side of the tank to the other.

we got it from a friend who didn't have the space for it in his tank so took it off his hands.

if anyone is interested in swopping please let me know.
 
Zakiyya - what size is the lance fish that you have been feeding the anemone? Whole? If so - please cut the fish into tiny 1cm pieces, and then feed these small pieces. Generically, anemone's don't like eating WHOLE fish. And they need to eat often.
 
Jacque

we have been breaking into smaller peices, about 1cm. we also feed about every 3 or 4 days.
 
oh forgot to mention we have been keeping our lights off for most of the day, due to the white spots, we only turn in on for about 5 hours in the evening.
 
I highly doubt that anemone is responsible for eating all your fish. How many shrimps etc do you have in your tank, youd be surprised how fast dead fish can get eaten and vanish without a trace.
Keeping the lights off is not a good idea. If you are keeping the anemone, then remove the fish and give the anemome the best possible conditions. Rather treat the sick fish in a quarantine tank.
 
Hi

We don't plan on keeping the anemone just need to find a new home for it.

We have 2 shrimp who have become very fat and are constantly hungry. Apart from this we have a hermit crab, goby and the chromis.

the lighting is the standard red sea. our water parameters have been testing perfect, we generally use the test strips and even when we use the proper test kit everything is within range. also had tested at pet stores which say its perfect.
 
@jacquesb, I might be able to help? I do have a BTA in my tank that is doing well. Tank almost a year old. Will need advice on how to help the nennie though
 
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Lighting as follow:
2 x T5 Odyssea quad 54w 1,2m
ie. 4 x 54w daylight & 4 x 54w actinic

Tank size:
1200mm X 430mm wide & 500mm deep
 
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