I bought a GBTA (my first anemone) about a month ago and put it in my tank. Over the space of a couple of days, it moved to a spot underneath a ledge and seems firmly attached there with its oral disc in a vertical position, although it doesn't seem to get much direct lighting on a lot of its tentacles. It seems to go through a roughly 24-hour cycle of expanding and shrinking, where it contracts in the early morning to the point where you can hardly see the tentacles at all and then opens up fully after the lights come. When it's fully expanded, the mouth is almost always open to a degree, but not totally gaping. I've never seen anything coming out of the mouth. What really concerns me though, is that I can't seem to get it to eat. I've tried feeding a slurry of frozen mysis with a turkey baster, and by dropping pieces directly onto the tentacles. I've tried pieces of frozen krill and silversides which I've cut to about 1/4" or so. I've fed it with the lights on and with the lights off. No matter what I do, though, it never grabs the food, and it just floats away to feed the hermits. When I touch the tentacles, they don't seem sticky at all. I've tried to be patient, but I'm starting to become concerned.
I've seen vidoes of other BTAs eating, and mine is nothing like those that I've seen. I've read and researched all over the place, but haven't found any info on situations like this. Should I be worried? Should I take some sort of action here?
Tank info: 4' long, 20" high, 65 gallon, 15 gal refugium, 4 T5s. Ammonia, nitrite = 0. Nitrate < .25. Spg = 1.025, alk =8.0, calc = 400, mag = 1360, pH = 8.3. All these parameters are pretty consistent, although I will admit the alk moves around a little bit. Other inhabitants: 1 Ocellaris clown that hasn't discovered the nem yet, Midas Blenny, a few ricordeas, a small torch coral, a few hermits and nassarius.
doug
I've seen vidoes of other BTAs eating, and mine is nothing like those that I've seen. I've read and researched all over the place, but haven't found any info on situations like this. Should I be worried? Should I take some sort of action here?
Tank info: 4' long, 20" high, 65 gallon, 15 gal refugium, 4 T5s. Ammonia, nitrite = 0. Nitrate < .25. Spg = 1.025, alk =8.0, calc = 400, mag = 1360, pH = 8.3. All these parameters are pretty consistent, although I will admit the alk moves around a little bit. Other inhabitants: 1 Ocellaris clown that hasn't discovered the nem yet, Midas Blenny, a few ricordeas, a small torch coral, a few hermits and nassarius.
doug
