BTA: not "bubbled"?

Has anyone restricted their BTAs to very low flow to see if they bubble back up? I noticed that the one in my last tank bubbled while I was waiting on a return pump replacement and once I replaced the pump it lost its bubbles again. In that interim time flow in the tank was greatly reduced.
 
I think you're on the right track, but I believe the opposite is true. It would make more sense that the anemone would have longer arms when searching for food.

I have experimented with this twice in my tank. I have a RBTA that was bubbled when I got it. I didn't feed it and within a week it lost its bubbles. I started feeding it again, EVERY DAY (consistency is key), and about 3 weeks later it was fully bubbled. I missed 3 days of feeding and it was back to no bubbles, which I fixed by consistent feedings. Now I'm getting it to split by denying it target feedings (a process that's worked before, I think because it slightly stresses the animal). Since I'm not feeding it right now, the arms are long.

Get some fresh shrimp and cut a little piece off every day, about the size of a fingertip, and mash it up until its kind of a paste. Just squeeze it a few times between your fingers. You're basically "chewing" the food for the anemone. Remember consistency is key. You gotta feed it every day, and at the same time of day.

These are techniques that have worked for me, and I can control my anemone's behavior very effectively with them.
That's really interesting - because you'd think energy would be required to make the bubbles.
 
I had 40 anemones in the lab and about 75 in the wild.

I kept them under lighting ranging from 50-720 µE•m-2•s-1.
I kept them with 0,1, or 2 fish.
I tried different size fish from 1-15 cm.
I supplemented with ammonium.
I increased and restricted water flow.
I fed them.
I starved them.
I looked at anemone size.
I even pinched their tentacles to simulate predation.

Sometimes they would bubble and sometimes they wouldn't, but none of these factors alone showed any meaningful correlation to the frequency of bubbling.
 
It is a deeply rooted conspiracy in the bubble community. You have to join, kind of like the masons, if you want to find out the truth. Talk to your bta and see if you can be sponsored. Then wikileak it. ;)
 
I bought mine from a local and it didn't bubble in his tank. I placed it in my tank and it almost immediately bubbled. It moved all around the tank with the bubbles before the clowns even hosted. Then they did and it still stayed bubbled.

It has been in the middle of my tank for months now. Right under a 250W MH, directly in front of the output of my Vortech MP40 with two clowns constantly hanging out in the tentacles. The bubble tips are as bubbly as ever :)
 
Most in the wild don't have bubbles most of the time, at least at my site. It was rare to see more than 3 bubbled on the same day and it generally wasn't the same ones bubbled from day to day.
 
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Most in the wild don't have bubbles most of the time, at least at my site. It was rare to see more than 3 bubbled on the same day and it generally wasn't the same ones bubbled from day to day.
That's interesting to know! You see so many photos with them having bubbles but maybe people like to take bubble pics more.
 
Absolutely. My two favorite shots in my tank so far are these two :)

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/14049800@N00/4761098177/" title="IMG_9519 by RVAE34, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4079/4761098177_91ac65dd1c_b.jpg" width="1024" height="684" alt="IMG_9519" /></a>

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/14049800@N00/4761731850/" title="IMG_9523 by RVAE34, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4142/4761731850_4156ff1ca0_b.jpg" width="1024" height="684" alt="IMG_9523" /></a>
 
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