BTA or other anemone in 34G?

[boshk]

Opinions welcome

I have a Reefer 170, basically 35G.

Current stock:

1 Ocellaris clown
1 Saddleback black clown
1 Tail spotted blenny
1 Firefish
1 Cardinalfish....(zombie looking one...cant remember the name)
1 Yellow watchman goby
1 clown goby
1 mandarin
1 pepper shrimp
1 pistol shrimp
1 cleaner shrimp
1 blue tang (small 2cm)

I know I will get flamed for the tang but I can always sell it or give it back to LFS when it gets too big

In a tank around 35G, is it possible to have a BTA or other types of anemone with other corals ( zoa, gsp, brains, gorniopora, blasto, frogspawns, montipora ) and my current fish stock?

or will I end up loosing fish and coral to the BTA?

 

[Dkuhlmann]

Sure you can put a BTA in your tank, just remember that they are known walkers until they get settled, sometimes they don't.

They will sting everything that they come into contact with while walking around, so you'll have to make sure to move any corals out of their way.

From the sounds of it your tank is for the most part overstocked, but as long as you're not having issues with nitrates being too high, you're ok.

Also your mandarin will more than likely starve in that small of a tank, UNLESS you have a way to provide at least 6000 pods per day. You also might get lucky that it eats frozen foods.

IMO minus the tang your tank is at max for fish. JMO

 

[gibbous]

I would also keep an eye on that Saddleback, I had one once that would rub so vigorously into BTA's that I believe it killed a couple large healthy ones before I removed it. A small BTA already stressed by an environmental change could easily meet the same end if your clown behaves like mine did.

 

[SNAKEMANVET]

If you really like your corals I wouldn't put a bta in there.As mentioned they will move around killing any coral they come in contact with.I put one in my 28,but moved all my zoas to another tank.I now have 5 rbtas and a pair of 3 year old snow onyx clowns.I do 5 gallon water changes every week.

 

[boshk]

thanks guys

Ended up getting a BTA, not Rose colour. Hopefully it won't move much, it did do a circuit around the biggest rock and lodged itself sideways in full view.

Thanks Dkuhlmann, I thought about putting Mandarin in a small box and feed it mysis shrimp just until it starts eating it......I heard some get lucky with that.

 

[sam.basye]

I have a nice sized rbta in my 26g and the zoa's I have around it aren't affected by the bta in any way. The tentacles sway and rub all over the zoa's and they don't even close up. Not a danger to all corals.

 

[gibbous]

thanks guys
I thought about putting Mandarin in a small box and feed it mysis shrimp just until it starts eating it......I heard some get lucky with that.

I once had a mandarin that ate frozen, but it still starved. Occasionally it would find a lone piece of mysis on the sandbed and pick it off after staring at it for a while, but the vast majority of the frozen food that went in was eaten by the other fish because the mandarin just wasn't aggressive enough an eater to overcome even the modest competition in the tank. Personally I think mandarins should only be kept in very large systems that can support the pod population, or if they eat frozen kept in smaller tanks as a species-only.