Anemone and low-nutrients environment?

Anybody here with a success keeping an anemone in a low-nutrients reef tank?

I had a healthy anemone for more than 2 years now, it was expanding so much
it occupied 2/3 of hight of my tank. It quickly become a centerpiece in the tank.

I had constant problems with hair algae and red/brown cyanobacteria due
to the overcrowding the tank with fish and recently I started to fight with
this problem with a frequent large water changes to bring the nutrients down...
One time I used very small amount (under dose) of phosban to bring the
phospates down a little...

In the meantime my actinic lamp broke, did not have time to fix it or buy
new one so the tank was under 1/2 light intensity compared to normal...
Also, the only light source was 10000K white tube, no actinic blue.

Other than that, I lost pink sea cucumber (filter feeder one) and I did not
noticed this, so unintentionally I let it decompose between the rocks :-(

Unfortunatelly a lot of changes happened to my tank in the last couple
of months and my tank lost its ballance. Now I have no red cyanobacteria
but the tank is overwhelmed with brown single-cell algae growing everywhere.
Checked the algae under the microsocope and to my surprise the cells are
round and motile. Do not have better microscope to allow identification.

My invertebrates are sick. Pompom Xenia is almost gone. Reduced to white
dots on the rock - almost nothing left. Green and brown button polyps
are shrunk and do not look healthy. The biggest issue I see with the anemone.
My bubble tip, which was the center piece and my pride for so long is
now reduced to about 1/5 of its fully-pumped size and does not accept food.
Clownfish are still hugging it, nurture it, bring food to its tentacles
but the anemone is passive. It does go throught the cycles of being larger
and smaller - it seems to open its oral opening during feeding, but its
tentales do not fire and the food does not stick to its body...

I am worried I could lose it and I am not sure how to help.

I am scared of toxins after the sea cucumber decomposing (I read they
can wipe out the tank when they die...) so I continue doing water changes
but this moves my tank way more out of ballance and the brown motile algae
seems not disouraged. I detect zero nitrates now, little phosphates.
The salnity and calcium is normal (34ppt, 400mg/l).

I am affraid I have conflicting goals to achive now: I want to dilute
toxins from decomposing cucumber, but I do not want to dilute nutrients
for the soft corals. Am I correct I am causing more harm to the anemone
diluting nitrates and phosphates or they do just fine in low-nutrients
environment?

Any help or ideas would be appreciated.

Thank you.

If it's stickyness is gone, then it is in serious condition.

Have you not replaced your lighting yet? I would get that
lighting back up. I would be worrying over the lighting
more than the lower nutrients.

Wayne Sallee
Wayne's Pets



Pszemol wrote on 12/6/2005 5:30 PM:
Anybody here with a success keeping an anemone in a low-nutrients reef
tank?

I had a healthy anemone for more than 2 years now, it was expanding so much
it occupied 2/3 of hight of my tank. It quickly become a centerpiece in
the tank.

I had constant problems with hair algae and red/brown cyanobacteria due
to the overcrowding the tank with fish and recently I started to fight with
this problem with a frequent large water changes to bring the nutrients
down...
One time I used very small amount (under dose) of phosban to bring the
phospates down a little...

In the meantime my actinic lamp broke, did not have time to fix it or buy
new one so the tank was under 1/2 light intensity compared to normal...
Also, the only light source was 10000K white tube, no actinic blue.

Other than that, I lost pink sea cucumber (filter feeder one) and I did not
noticed this, so unintentionally I let it decompose between the rocks :-(

Unfortunatelly a lot of changes happened to my tank in the last couple
of months and my tank lost its ballance. Now I have no red cyanobacteria
but the tank is overwhelmed with brown single-cell algae growing
everywhere.
Checked the algae under the microsocope and to my surprise the cells are
round and motile. Do not have better microscope to allow identification.

My invertebrates are sick. Pompom Xenia is almost gone. Reduced to white
dots on the rock - almost nothing left. Green and brown button polyps
are shrunk and do not look healthy. The biggest issue I see with the
anemone.
My bubble tip, which was the center piece and my pride for so long is
now reduced to about 1/5 of its fully-pumped size and does not accept food.
Clownfish are still hugging it, nurture it, bring food to its tentacles
but the anemone is passive. It does go throught the cycles of being larger
and smaller - it seems to open its oral opening during feeding, but its
tentales do not fire and the food does not stick to its body...

I am worried I could lose it and I am not sure how to help.

I am scared of toxins after the sea cucumber decomposing (I read they
can wipe out the tank when they die...) so I continue doing water changes
but this moves my tank way more out of ballance and the brown motile algae
seems not disouraged. I detect zero nitrates now, little phosphates.
The salnity and calcium is normal (34ppt, 400mg/l).

I am affraid I have conflicting goals to achive now: I want to dilute
toxins from decomposing cucumber, but I do not want to dilute nutrients
for the soft corals. Am I correct I am causing more harm to the anemone
diluting nitrates and phosphates or they do just fine in low-nutrients
environment?
Any help or ideas would be appreciated.

Thank you.

"Wayne Sallee" wrote in message ...
If it's stickyness is gone, then it is in serious condition.

Yes, this is what bothers me a lot.
The animal was used to not eating frequently.
It was growing so fast I was limiting its growth
with limiting food intake. For month or two at the time
it was under only supervision of the pair of maroon clowns
without dirrect feeding from my side.
When I fed it, it was ALWAYS READY to accept food.
Current state is not normal and worries me a lot.
I can still see it is alive, it is expanding little
and its oral opening reacts to food, but its tentacles
seem to loose the stings to be unable to capture food :-(

Have you not replaced your lighting yet? I would get that
lighting back up. I would be worrying over the lighting
more than the lower nutrients.

Yes, lights are new. I am not happy with pinkish hue
of my new actinic bulb. I got 420nm "Sunpaq" and it
is not as blue as my old 460nm bulb. More pink... :-(

What's your watt's per gallon?

The sea cucumber is most toxic to the fish, so I don't
think you are realy batteling that. If a sea cucumber does
not get enough food, it will slowly shrink using up it's
reserve, and slowly shrink to nothing, and not pose a
risk. If it dies while a good size, it poses a risk, if it
gets chewed up by a powerhead, then it's a real searious
risk, but again, it's more toxic to the fish than the
invertabrates.

So there's something else that is causing your problem.

Consider the posibility of contamination.

Are you adding any additives?
If you are, then stop. Just do large 50% or more
waterchanges without adding extra additives.
Take everything back to basic, and see if things improve.

Wayne Sallee
Wayne's Pets


Pszemol wrote on 12/6/2005 9:19 PM:
"Wayne Sallee" wrote in message
...

If it's stickyness is gone, then it is in serious condition.


Yes, this is what bothers me a lot.
The animal was used to not eating frequently.
It was growing so fast I was limiting its growth
with limiting food intake. For month or two at the time
it was under only supervision of the pair of maroon clowns
without dirrect feeding from my side.
When I fed it, it was ALWAYS READY to accept food.
Current state is not normal and worries me a lot.
I can still see it is alive, it is expanding little
and its oral opening reacts to food, but its tentacles
seem to loose the stings to be unable to capture food :-(

Have you not replaced your lighting yet? I would get that lighting
back up. I would be worrying over the lighting more than the lower
nutrients.


Yes, lights are new. I am not happy with pinkish hue
of my new actinic bulb. I got 420nm "Sunpaq" and it
is not as blue as my old 460nm bulb. More pink... :-(

"Wayne Sallee" wrote in message ...
What's your watt's per gallon?

1x96W/34" actinic and 1x96W/34" 10000K white over 30g/36" tank.

The sea cucumber is most toxic to the fish, so I don't
think you are realy batteling that. If a sea cucumber does
not get enough food, it will slowly shrink using up it's
reserve, and slowly shrink to nothing, and not pose a
risk. If it dies while a good size, it poses a risk, if it
gets chewed up by a powerhead, then it's a real searious
risk, but again, it's more toxic to the fish than the
invertabrates.

So there's something else that is causing your problem.

I was always under impression that invertebrates are
more delicate and prone to toxins (see: copper) than
vertebrates/fish...

Consider the posibility of contamination.

Are you adding any additives?

No additives. I do not have hard corals, I do not
even dose calcium. Just water changes alone...
One time added very small dose of phosban to fight
red cyjanobacteria. Maybe dying cyano is contaminating?

If you are, then stop. Just do large 50% or more
waterchanges without adding extra additives.
Take everything back to basic, and see if things improve.

I am not sure how more can I go to basic...
I am pretty basic right now :-)
The problem is that I see low-nutriens affecting my
soft corals. Xenia is gone, green ricordia shrunk
from the radius of 2" to the size of penny coins,
same with green and brown button polyps...
And this poor anemone. I am sorry for that guy the most :-(

Pszemol wrote on 12/7/2005 12:26 AM:

I was always under impression that invertebrates are
more delicate and prone to toxins (see: copper) than
vertebrates/fish...


They are, but the toxins in sea cucumbers are to keep fish
from eating them. The toxins are more geared towards fish.

Wayne Sallee
Wayne's Pets

What kind of water are you using?

I supose you could buy some salt for some local reefer to
do a water change on their tank, and take their water, and
us it to fill your tank.

Wayne Sallee
Wayne's Pets



Pszemol wrote on 12/7/2005 12:26 AM:
"Wayne Sallee" wrote in message
...

What's your watt's per gallon?


1x96W/34" actinic and 1x96W/34" 10000K white over 30g/36" tank.

The sea cucumber is most toxic to the fish, so I don't think you are
realy batteling that. If a sea cucumber does not get enough food, it
will slowly shrink using up it's reserve, and slowly shrink to
nothing, and not pose a risk. If it dies while a good size, it poses a
risk, if it gets chewed up by a powerhead, then it's a real searious
risk, but again, it's more toxic to the fish than the invertabrates.

So there's something else that is causing your problem.


I was always under impression that invertebrates are
more delicate and prone to toxins (see: copper) than
vertebrates/fish...

Consider the posibility of contamination.

Are you adding any additives?


No additives. I do not have hard corals, I do not
even dose calcium. Just water changes alone...
One time added very small dose of phosban to fight
red cyjanobacteria. Maybe dying cyano is contaminating?

If you are, then stop. Just do large 50% or more waterchanges without
adding extra additives.
Take everything back to basic, and see if things improve.


I am not sure how more can I go to basic...
I am pretty basic right now :-)
The problem is that I see low-nutriens affecting my
soft corals. Xenia is gone, green ricordia shrunk
from the radius of 2" to the size of penny coins,
same with green and brown button polyps...
And this poor anemone. I am sorry for that guy the most :-(

"Pszemol" wrote in message ...
The animal was used to not eating frequently.
It was growing so fast I was limiting its growth
with limiting food intake. For month or two at the time
it was under only supervision of the pair of maroon clowns
without dirrect feeding from my side.
When I fed it, it was ALWAYS READY to accept food.
Current state is not normal and worries me a lot.
I can still see it is alive, it is expanding little
and its oral opening reacts to food, but its tentacles
seem to loose the stings to be unable to capture food :-(

This morning I tried to feed it again since I noticed
it looked better than recently... Light were still out.

I have defrosted some amount of frozen plankton from Sanfrancisco Bay
http://www.sfbb.com/product_popup.as...=Plankton&id=1
(very small pieces of crustacean planktonic creatures ~1/8-1/4")
and squirt it into the tentacles of anemone with a turkey baster.
As expected, sick anemone did not accept the food, tentacles
harpoons did not fire and the food did not stick to its body.
Sleepy fish picked up the food, gladly... There was nothing left
for the anemone to eat.
I have noticed again that "mouth" (oral opening) expanded
towards the edge of the oral disk where the food touched it.
There was no food there so the mouth did not pick anything...

I decided to try something I planed befo spoon feed it.
I picked up one small planktonic crustacean with a twizers and
placed it in one of the grooves of the still expanded mouth.
The food piece was very, very tiny but it stuck to the mucus.
It was dangling there for a minute or two and I watched it
afraid fish will pick it up or just blow it away with fins.
Fortunatelly nothing like this happened - anemone slowly
contracted the food piece in between ist mouth growes...
It disappeared inside it. So I think it has eaten it.

I will try to repeat this with larger piece of crustacean,
maybe defrost some of the krill - maybe it will eat bigger
piece and slowly recover this way from its sickness...

Lets see what happens.

Sounds good.

Wayne Sallee
Wayne's Pets



Pszemol wrote on 12/8/2005 11:47 AM:
"Pszemol" wrote in message
...

The animal was used to not eating frequently.
It was growing so fast I was limiting its growth
with limiting food intake. For month or two at the time
it was under only supervision of the pair of maroon clowns
without dirrect feeding from my side.
When I fed it, it was ALWAYS READY to accept food.
Current state is not normal and worries me a lot.
I can still see it is alive, it is expanding little
and its oral opening reacts to food, but its tentacles
seem to loose the stings to be unable to capture food :-(


This morning I tried to feed it again since I noticed
it looked better than recently... Light were still out.

I have defrosted some amount of frozen plankton from Sanfrancisco Bay
http://www.sfbb.com/product_popup.as...=Plankton&id=1

(very small pieces of crustacean planktonic creatures ~1/8-1/4")
and squirt it into the tentacles of anemone with a turkey baster.
As expected, sick anemone did not accept the food, tentacles
harpoons did not fire and the food did not stick to its body.
Sleepy fish picked up the food, gladly... There was nothing left
for the anemone to eat.
I have noticed again that "mouth" (oral opening) expanded
towards the edge of the oral disk where the food touched it.
There was no food there so the mouth did not pick anything...

I decided to try something I planed befo spoon feed it.
I picked up one small planktonic crustacean with a twizers and
placed it in one of the grooves of the still expanded mouth.
The food piece was very, very tiny but it stuck to the mucus.
It was dangling there for a minute or two and I watched it
afraid fish will pick it up or just blow it away with fins.
Fortunatelly nothing like this happened - anemone slowly
contracted the food piece in between ist mouth growes...
It disappeared inside it. So I think it has eaten it.

I will try to repeat this with larger piece of crustacean,
maybe defrost some of the krill - maybe it will eat bigger
piece and slowly recover this way from its sickness...

Lets see what happens.

"Wayne Sallee" wrote in message ...
Sounds good.

Around noon today anemone was shrunk too much to atempt feeding.
I will try to repeat the process tomorrow morning...