Flower anemone advice

[seanothon]

I just bought a red flower anemone and am wanting to boost its color, if that is at all possible. It has really nice green in the middle when i bought it but it stretched out to full size once i got in my tank and now you can't really see much of the green. Any advice?

 

[elegance coral]

What lighting do you have? They are little pigs, so feed it often.

 

[seanothon]

What lighting do you have? They are little pigs, so feed it often.

I have two coralife 48" t-5 with full spectrum lighting. Any particular food?

 

[garygb]

The red coloration on flower anemones (Epicystis crucifer) is due to pigmentation. I don't know if food will make much difference, but perhaps feeding with foods such as krill since they are red in color. Full spectrum lighting will keep the zooxanthellae healthy which will keep the anemone from bleaching and deepen the color.

 

[elegance coral]

They will brown out if lighting is insufficient, so my first response would be to slowly increase the amount of light its receiving. The anemone builds these pigments with protein, so feeding the anemone protein based foods like fish, shrimp, squid..... will give the anemone the building blocks needed to build more pigments. You could also try soaking the food and/or dosing the tank with amino acids.

 

[seanothon]

So far i have not seen it eat any of the foods i have given it. I have tried krill, shrimp, and snelt. It may have gotten some cyclops. It looks like it took in some phytoplex because it swells up after i spray it