BTA's are shrunken - need some input

[jkobel]

Hey Everyone,

I have 2 BTA'a that were once active and healthy but one day they shriveled to the size of a marble and started to move around the tank.

At first I thought they were being attacked by tank mates and would eventually open back up. Then my tank crashed which masked many things. It's been about 4 months since the tank has been healthy again but these guys never opened back up.

Water params are all in check (Nitrite/Nitrate/Ammonia/dKH/PH)
pH - 8.2
NO3 Nitrate - 0
NO2 Nitrite - 0
NH3/NH4 Ammonia - 0
KH Alkalinity - 7.5 dKH
temp 80F

I run carbon and GFO and change it regularly.

The only thing I can think of is I had been using a hydrometer for mixing/testing my salinity and when it finally died I bought an ATC Refractometer. It now seems my hydrometer was WAY off and I had been mixing my salt to approx 1.018 as that's where my tank was at.

I've been slowly bringing that up closer to 1.025 so I'm hoping that they will open up but no dice yet.

Questions:
1. Has anyone had a low salinity experience/reaction like this and is it the likely cause?
2. Has anyone seen BTA's recover from being shriveled up for so many months?

Thanks!

 

[mcfa2403]

Question 1: I have not had this experience but keep in mind that anemones tank in and release water all day as that is how they maintain their shape, move, digest and expel food. Low salinity could cause the anemone stress in pumping water in and out. Also salt at 1.018 would be low in everything measured by specific gravity, so even if you dose calc, alk and mag up to appropriate numbers all of your trace elements were likely 20% or so low (don't feel like converting to ppt to give the correct percentage as the exact number is not important to the issue).

Question 2: Yes I have seen BTA recover from as bad as no tentacles, no color and 1/8th normal size because they had crawled under rocks after splitting. The last one I saw do this looked like a half dollar sized toadstool to a 6" rose, but it took 2 or 3 months to do this.

 

[addictedreefer]

I agree that the salinity issue is likely the cause. You seem to be addressing that correctly.

BTAs can be very hardy SOBs. I have had BTAs shredded to almost nothing regenerate from mere fragments.

 

[jkobel]

This is great feedback, thanks to both of you. Hoping they will recover.

Not even sure where I got the hydrometer from since I've had it over 10 years but they shouldn't be sold in the hobby.

What a terrible instrument. I can't believe I could have moved to the refractometer for $35 and avoided this entire headache.

 

[mcfa2403]

Learning in this hobby is a rough and steep curve, but in some ways it is one of the rewarding aspects. I tend to tell people getting into the hobby that the best advice I can give them is to budget their build in a way that allows them to buy all quality equipment and that saving money almost always costs money in the long run. It always seems to take learning this lesson the hard way though as almost everyone has a story like this, I know I do.

You are probably testing for these, but I noticed you didn't post calc and mag. I would recommend regularly testing these if you are not already. Maintaining these stable along with your alk will help speed up your recovery time.

 

[jkobel]

Thats great feedback. I have tested those in the past but my current kit doesn't test for that today. I'm going to have to get back to that.

Thanks again everyone