Every NEM in my tank is down right now.

[Reefahholic]

One Mag went down and it only takes about 2 days and it will spread to the others.

So got all the mags out, and then all three of my gigs go down. One got sick and the next morning another went down.

This morning I wake up to my last Gig and Haddoni deflated.

They all in HT's. I'll post a pic shortly.

 

[asudavew]

Sorry to hear.
Never ending battle I guess ?

 

[D-Nak]

Sounds like allelopathy. Have you been using lots of carbon? Having all those nems in a 90 gallon is a risky situation. Have you considered keeping species specific tanks instead?

 

[blackgate]

ouch, that sucks. good luck, I know its going to be a hassle

 

[Reefahholic]

Sounds like allelopathy. Have you been using lots of carbon? Having all those nems in a 90 gallon is a risky situation. Have you considered keeping species specific tanks instead?

Yeah, running carbon. Change it pretty regular.

One of the Frags got sick, and got all the other mags sick within a few days. Gigs didn't catch it.

Then one of my gigs went down a week or so later and got Minh's gig sick. My other gig and Haddoni deflated, but reinflated later. I'm watching them. Have HT's ready. Thought they were sick too, but we'll see.

Never considered a species only tank. My goal is to keep all these in one tank. I feel that if I can get them all used to each other then the Allelopathy should decrease, or maybe they'll build up tolerance. We'll see.

 

[Reefahholic]

Sorry to hear.
Never ending battle I guess ?

Ups and downs...learning as I go.

A lot of these Nems are new. Getting them stable can be quite a challenge and expensive.

 

[Reefahholic]

ouch, that sucks. good luck, I know its going to be a hassle

Yeah, it's gonna be a hassle, but I'm pretty prepared.

 

[Reefahholic]

 

[Reefahholic]

 

[Reefahholic]

 

[Yuri Barros]

I don´t have experience in keep these anemones.......

By I have a Theory........

You are in face of a high M.O. load............leading to a bacterial boom.......and ending with generalized infection..............

My theory is that you have to increase aerobic filtration..............using Trickel Filter............Dry-Wet..........

I found an intresting self cleaning model..........used in fresh water heavy stocked tanks........

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xbWQeZ6AzvM

This could be used with siporax.............to increase the area of aerobic filtration.........but a good quality Bio Ring works well...........

The skimmer I think that it is best used before the Bioreactor...........once the skimmer remove M.O. before it be metabolized in the Bioreactor..............

This could be suplemented with an ATS.........to deal with Nitrate excess and Phosphates.........

Also I think that the sand bed contributes to harmful bacteria grow in anaerobic conditions..............specially in a tank full of Anemones in healing process............

DSB is OK for most of systems..........but the system designed to Mags........I prefer Bare Bottom......................and a large plataform used as a hard scape.........to a perfect anemone settling.............

I think that Bare Bottom tank..........with a agressive filtration............is the best choice to deal with this kind of Organic wastes...........that came from anemone mucus.......or healing wounds from the split............

As well as the heavy feeding............

I do not trust in only Skimmer.......Live Rocks......and DSB.............

I think in someting little more agressive............like Dry Wet + ATS...........

You can use a remote DSB...........this avoid detritus traping as occours in Display DSB...............

Its just my theory..............about the link between filtration and infecctions...........

Passive filtration = infecction...........Agressive filtration = health..........

With no anaerobic spots in the tank...........

OBS : The light system have to respect the Saturation point at 400 micromols........

350 is a nice PAR reading................this is about de Zooxanthellae colonies..........

In Haddon´s tank.........or LTAs tank......you have to keep a DSB...............but deal with Mags I think in different approach...............

Its just theory.........

 

[Reefahholic]

I believe your right. I've actually increased my LR to add more filtration.

I'm going to update my skimmer to a life reef. They're awesome.

Really been thinking hard about a huge UV Sterilizer.

I think going bare bottom would help, but I stir my sandbed and it's super clean. Plus I like the light a white sand bed gives off in a room.

I'm think about taking the LR rubble out of my sump and adding Marine Pure Bio balls. I have a Marine Pure Block and love it. Very Very Porus and does not clog.

I have pretty large area for cheato, and believe it does help a bit with nitrates.

I don´t have experience in keep these anemones.......

By I have a Theory........

You are in face of a high M.O. load............leading to a bacterial boom.......and ending with generalized infection..............

My theory is that you have to increase aerobic filtration..............using Trickel Filter............Dry-Wet..........

I found an intresting self cleaning model..........used in fresh water heavy stocked tanks........

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xbWQeZ6AzvM

This could be used with siporax.............to increase the area of aerobic filtration.........but a good quality Bio Ring works well...........

The skimmer I think that it is best used before the Bioreactor...........once the skimmer remove M.O. before it be metabolized in the Bioreactor..............

This could be suplemented with an ATS.........to deal with Nitrate excess and Phosphates.........

Also I think that the sand bed contributes to harmful bacteria grow in anaerobic conditions..............specially in a tank full of Anemones in healing process............

DSB is OK for most of systems..........but the system designed to Mags........I prefer Bare Bottom......................and a large plataform used as a hard scape.........to a perfect anemone settling.............

I think that Bare Bottom tank..........with a agressive filtration............is the best choice to deal with this kind of Organic wastes...........that came from anemone mucus.......or healing wounds from the split............

As well as the heavy feeding............

I do not trust in only Skimmer.......Live Rocks......and DSB.............

I think in someting little more agressive............like Dry Wet + ATS...........

You can use a remote DSB...........this avoid detritus traping as occours in Display DSB...............

Its just my theory..............about the link between filtration and infecctions...........

Passive filtration = infecction...........Agressive filtration = health..........

With no anaerobic spots in the tank...........

OBS : The light system have to respect the Saturation point at 400 micromols........

350 is a nice PAR reading................this is about de Zooxanthellae colonies..........

In Haddon´s tank.........or LTAs tank......you have to keep a DSB...............but deal with Mags I think in different approach...............

Its just theory.........

 

[D-Nak]

I don't mean to be a downer, but I think in the long run, you will always run into these issues because your water volume isn't large enough to support all of those nems in one tank. You can add all sorts of filters, carbon reactors, a UV, etc. but I think the nems will always be under some sort of stress. 90 gallons is barely enough for one gigantea IME.

I'm sure you know this, but sometimes it takes someone else to tell you for it sink in.

Obviously you have the experience to try it and you have the room to QT all of them separately. But, the reality is that no one can cheat nature. Any filter you have cannot quickly process the waste that the nems produce, nor can they quickly eliminate chemicals that cause allelopathy. The only way I can see it possibly working is if you have a continuous water change set-up.

Keep in mind that when it comes to gigantea, there are males and females. We don't know if there is aggression with either sex, but if you look at photos of gigs in the wild, you rarely see them together. Animals that are solitary typically require a minimum amount of space. Even with my baby gigantea, I recently had to separate two of them because I think one was acting aggressively towards the other -- both were in Septra treatment, but one did well and is now in the DT, but the other progressively got worse. It's still in QT and I think I might lose it. Of course, it could be that the infection in one may have been a lot worse than the other, but we know that gigs typically transmit their infections to each other. Both looked exactly the same when I received them. One would think that if one gig was sick, the other would get sick.

Many magnifica are colonial anemones, and can tolerate being close to each other. According to Fautin & Allen, "In western Indonesia, several small individuals of identical colouration may cluster together, resembling one large animal. Elsewhere (e.g. Maldives, Malaysia, French Polynesia), tens or hundreds of identically coloured individuals form extensive beds; presumably they constitute a clone." Yet, many believe that there are also solitary forms, and we see these photographed all the time -- large individuals on a reef crest with no other anemones near them. We don't know why some are solitary and others are colonial, but we can assume that chemical cues in the water column play a part. Conversely, we cannot assume that this will either 1) stop in a closed environment, or 2) other nems in the tank will get used to it.

Again, I'm sure you're more than willing to give it a shot. But if it continuously happens I think you may want to change your game plan. Watching your nems go from healthy to sick and back again is extremely heartbreaking! I hope they make a quick recovery.

 

[marc price]

^ +1, good advice D

 

[Reefahholic]

I don't mind treating. The problem is that eventually, these bugs will become resistant to antibiotic therapy. Then...I'll start loosing my favorite animals.

As for allelopathy, I don't believe that a 500/G is much better than a 90/G. These animals use their defense mechanism (chemical warfar) in the ocean and are affective. Why would we assume we can have a tank big enough that their defenses would be ineffective. Most of the talk about these animals is arbitrary. They haven't been studied enough. They only way that I see to really understand them is to experiment and document. Trying to establish a pattern.

If I pull the 3 gigs, and nobody gets sick for months, but put them back in and Nems start going down, I would say that it would be highly likely that chemical warfar is taking place between the different species.

Just recently, Antonio texted me and told me that he lost nearly all his Magnifica. I'm pretty sure that he doesn't have any other Nems besides mags.

Here's another arbitrary thought. Are sub-species fighting within their own kind? Are they competing for light, flow, the high rock, etc.?

These are things that we just don't know yet. All we can do right now is wonder, study, test, & document.

Cheers!

I don't mean to be a downer, but I think in the long run, you will always run into these issues because your water volume isn't large enough to support all of those nems in one tank. You can add all sorts of filters, carbon reactors, a UV, etc. but I think the nems will always be under some sort of stress. 90 gallons is barely enough for one gigantea IME.

I'm sure you know this, but sometimes it takes someone else to tell you for it sink in.

Obviously you have the experience to try it and you have the room to QT all of them separately. But, the reality is that no one can cheat nature. Any filter you have cannot quickly process the waste that the nems produce, nor can they quickly eliminate chemicals that cause allelopathy. The only way I can see it possibly working is if you have a continuous water change set-up.

Keep in mind that when it comes to gigantea, there are males and females. We don't know if there is aggression with either sex, but if you look at photos of gigs in the wild, you rarely see them together. Animals that are solitary typically require a minimum amount of space. Even with my baby gigantea, I recently had to separate two of them because I think one was acting aggressively towards the other -- both were in Septra treatment, but one did well and is now in the DT, but the other progressively got worse. It's still in QT and I think I might lose it. Of course, it could be that the infection in one may have been a lot worse than the other, but we know that gigs typically transmit their infections to each other. Both looked exactly the same when I received them. One would think that if one gig was sick, the other would get sick.

Many magnifica are colonial anemones, and can tolerate being close to each other. According to Fautin & Allen, "In western Indonesia, several small individuals of identical colouration may cluster together, resembling one large animal. Elsewhere (e.g. Maldives, Malaysia, French Polynesia), tens or hundreds of identically coloured individuals form extensive beds; presumably they constitute a clone." Yet, many believe that there are also solitary forms, and we see these photographed all the time -- large individuals on a reef crest with no other anemones near them. We don't know why some are solitary and others are colonial, but we can assume that chemical cues in the water column play a part. Conversely, we cannot assume that this will either 1) stop in a closed environment, or 2) other nems in the tank will get used to it.

Again, I'm sure you're more than willing to give it a shot. But if it continuously happens I think you may want to change your game plan. Watching your nems go from healthy to sick and back again is extremely heartbreaking! I hope they make a quick recovery.

 

[Reefahholic]

 

[Reefahholic]