The mystery of the reluctant RBT

red deacon

red deacon

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Morning everyone and all the best to you all for 2016.

I have a situation I would appreciate some advice on. I run a RSM 250 and I am having hassles with one of my Rose Bubble Tip Anemones. My system is mature and I have an Inferno in the tank too. I have had the RBT for approximately 15 months and the Inferno for 2 months. The inferno is thriving while the RBT is struggling. I feed lancefish twice a week and at feeding time the Inferno disposes of the lancefish I feed in seconds whilst the RBT takes up to 5 minutes to accept the food and then takes another 5 minutes to ingest the food. This was never the case previously. I notice that after feeding the RBT there are excessive amounts stringy brown waste being expelled from the mouth. The inferno has nice inflated tips whilst the RBT has a straggly appearance. I have tried moving the RBT to different areas and heights in the tank and nothing seems to be working. I would appreciate your advice.

I attach some photos that display the difference in health of the 2 Anemones. Because they are both in the same system where one is thriving and the other not, I have not bothered giving parameters.
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Hi @Junior no the problem was there before the inferno got introduced. The two are not close to one another so there is no chance of any interaction of any sort
 
Whilst it may nt seem important but the health of your water is the provider of health of your corals etc.

Having said that. Alot don't understand the concept of slow death caused by bad water quality. Your BTA may be doing just that, suffering a slow death were as the inferno is new and wnt show signs just yet.. but over time the inferno will suffer the same fate if the problem is not sorted

I always belive that anything is possible . But for how long, that's the question
 
I follow a strict 10% one week, 20% the 2nd week water changes. Have been doing this for 15 months without incident. I also have pin cushions, zoas, kenya trees and zenia in the system and these are healthy and showing no signs of distress in any way. I will go and get my water tested at a reputable lfs as I do not trust the home kit readings that I have. I sincerely doubt that it is the water seeing that everything else is healthy but it is the logical next step in the elimination process. Along with the water changes I do a partial sand vacumn (half one week the other half the second week)

Insofar as dosing, I have been using the Prodibio Biokit maintenance kit for nano reef for a year now without incident.
 
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Are you running carbon?
 
I would suggest running some. There might be some chemical warfare going on with the other nennie and leathers in your tank and the carbon may be the thing to help absorb some of the toxins.

How big are the pieces of lancefish?
You may also be feeding too much and too often (evident by the expelling of waste - brown goo). Nennies can go without food for a while so maybe cut down to once every two weeks.

How old are your lights?

In the long term I would also suggest only keeping one of the nennies, the 250 may be too small to have multiple nennies in it (other than those that split).

Good luck and hope that your nennie comes right!
 
Stolen from another forum:

Anemones don't poo brown stuff unless they eat something brown. They don't have dead blood cells, or bile from a liver to turn their poo brown. Like Chalkoutline said, they only poo what wasn't digested. Like bones, scales, and exoskeletons. The brown stuff that's often discharged from anemones, and coral, is actually zooxanthellae (The algae that lives within them.) This is very common with newly introduced critters. If the anemone came from a low light environment, it's likely to have a large population of zooxanthellae. The anemone can't survive in a brighter lit environment with such a large population. It must discharge a portion. This is what we see as brown nasty looking stuff coming out of the mouth. Many hobbyists simply brush this off as being poo, and don't give it another thought. This can be a big mistake. The animal is stressed and trying to make adjustments to alleviate that stress. If the stress continues, the relationship between the anemone and its zooxanthellae can break down, causing the anemone to discharge all of its zooxanthellae. In other words, it bleaches. It's important for us to determine why its discharging such a large portion of its zooxanthellae and fix the problem. Most of the time, its a simple case of reducing the amount of light the anemone is exposed to.

My question is if the anemone is getting too much light why is it not moving?

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I don't think it is to much light in that it has been in your tank for some time now. Like tekkengal said, put in a bit of carbon to help with any toxins in the tank, and then also cut back on the feeding. I don't even know how often I feed that's how little I feed my nennies.. I have seen no change from when I used to feed once a week to now other than a slow down in growth but ever so little. Then definitely get your water parameters checked out. I have found nennies to be rather hardy and have seen them do miraculous recoveries... Hang in there
 
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So I went and had my water tested. Results are as follows:

pH - 8.2
Salinity - 1.024
Ammonia - 0.0001 ( thats the correct decimal ... )
Calcium - 412
Alkalinity - 7.8
Magnesium - 1268
Iodine - 0.04
Potassium 403
Nitrite - 0
Nitrate - 2.7
Phosphate - no reading obtained


I was told that my magnesium was a little low. Was told that other levels were within spec and that the only thing slightly low was salinity but this was not a concern in their eyes.

I am going to do the following:

1. Add some carbon
2. Change one of my t5 lights from white to blue

Will keep you guys updated.

Thanks for the assistance, I would appreciate views on the water parameters. In particular the effect the low magnesium may play? ( grasping at straws here )
 
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Magnesium is not too bad, ideal level is about 1300 to 1350 so you're not far off, but it's not that low to be a major cause for concern. Magnesium is very important in keeping Calcium and Alkalinity in balance so it is always a good idea to keep it topped up. The other parameters are all fine, alkalinity could possibly be bumped up a bit to about 9 or so, 7.8 is bordering on a little bit low but is still an acceptable level. Personally, when I had anemones, RBTA's in particular, I liked to keep my salinity slightly higher at about 1.026.

As others have said, run some Granular Activated Carbon and stop feeding the anemone for a while. They can survive perfectly fine with just light, manual feeding is an optional extra for anemone's. ;)

How old are the T5's in your tank?
 
parameters look fine for BT. I never feed my BT only my manificas, my BT survive from normal fish feeding and filtering of water. Depending on your livestock it should be enough.
 
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So a quick update, I woke up this morning and the RBT had split. After doing all the changes listed, I have slowly but surely won the fight to nurse this back to health. Happy camper
 
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