Host anemones allopathic interactions
- Thread starter OrionN
- Start date
Gary Majchrzak
Team RC
I've had an established and settled anemone suddenly get up and march directly down the length of an aquarium to do battle with a newly introduced anemone. (Others have had the same experience.) No, they don't have brains or eyes- they are moving towards a sensed source.
There are time lapse movies of anemones (and corals) SENSING and doing battle with neighbors IN A WIDE OPEN OCEAN (no less).
Why wouldn't they be able to "sniff something out" in an aquarium?
THEY CAN AND DO
There are time lapse movies of anemones (and corals) SENSING and doing battle with neighbors IN A WIDE OPEN OCEAN (no less).
Why wouldn't they be able to "sniff something out" in an aquarium?
THEY CAN AND DO
nogascans
Member
Not to take sides, but it is actual fact that Anemones have more in common in DNA to humans than a fly. When you think about individual cells in the human body that can see out invaders, heal tissue, etc... The anemone has some of these similar items, after all it is a multiple celled animal. So it's not hard to ascertain than genetically it has evolved a means of detecting others that could mean harm or competition for food ( as I believe most animals are hard wired for) and have a reaction to this stimulus.
I know I have a pair of anemones, one sebae, and one Caribbean anemone. Early in tank live cycle I had little rock, and they both managed to take sides of tank without seemingly noticing each other. After I recently added more rock as well as corals, the sebae seemed to have become more aware of the Atlantic carpet, and actually has taken over its spot, relegating the carpet to a less than desirable spot, which in turn has caused it to be on move, something it never did before. Just to be clear, I did not move any of existing rock, but simply added more, creating less open space, and at least in my mind, more competition for the remaining open space. (Kinda sounds familiar to another animal species, as in humans, huh?)
I can post some before and after as example for anyone interested in this.
Sincerely,
David
I know I have a pair of anemones, one sebae, and one Caribbean anemone. Early in tank live cycle I had little rock, and they both managed to take sides of tank without seemingly noticing each other. After I recently added more rock as well as corals, the sebae seemed to have become more aware of the Atlantic carpet, and actually has taken over its spot, relegating the carpet to a less than desirable spot, which in turn has caused it to be on move, something it never did before. Just to be clear, I did not move any of existing rock, but simply added more, creating less open space, and at least in my mind, more competition for the remaining open space. (Kinda sounds familiar to another animal species, as in humans, huh?)
I can post some before and after as example for anyone interested in this.
Sincerely,
David
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82ndengineer
New member
While I do agree with minh partially about a saturation of sensory cues, if you walk into a room that smells bad you can still find the source as it will always have a stronger smell the closer you get.
nogascans
Member
And flys and other clean up crews are genetically hardwired to seek out the smell of death, dying, and s@$&. Also, certain bacteria give off an odor that allows them to be carried from one dying host to a living one.
What is it they say? A place for everything and everything has a place?
There is so much that we as humans don't understand about the very planet we live on, and sometimes it makes you wonder why we look to the stars for answers.
Sincerely,
David
What is it they say? A place for everything and everything has a place?
There is so much that we as humans don't understand about the very planet we live on, and sometimes it makes you wonder why we look to the stars for answers.
Sincerely,
David
OrionN
Moved on
In the wild, animal can locate each other with scent. In an aquarium it is different.
Imagined you are in a locked air tight house with a 20 days old corpse. Worst than that, the house is single room with several large fan that turn over the volume of the house 10,000 times per hour. You are blind. In that condition, the only way you can get to the corpse is but stumble on it.
Outside, with all the fresh air and wind blowing around, even blinded you can follow your nose to the corpse but not in the house in that condition.
Engineer and David, that is what I am talking about.
Imagined you are in a locked air tight house with a 20 days old corpse. Worst than that, the house is single room with several large fan that turn over the volume of the house 10,000 times per hour. You are blind. In that condition, the only way you can get to the corpse is but stumble on it.
Outside, with all the fresh air and wind blowing around, even blinded you can follow your nose to the corpse but not in the house in that condition.
Engineer and David, that is what I am talking about.
82ndengineer
New member
No the source is always going to smell strongest. No matter the room size or circulation the smell will always be strongest where it emanates from. Especially to animals that rely on taste or smell alone not sight. It's like a shark smelling blood from however far away.
stickleback
Member
We as humans have evolved to us sight as our primary sense. Smell has taken a back set. Put a dog in that room that room and it would have no problem finding the corpses.
Take for instance the speed Nassarius snails and other clean up crew appear and head straight for any left over food.
But then this presumes that the source of the odour/chemical is being constantly given off.
If the odour/chemical/nematocysts or what ever are only given off in short bursts, which nems may or may not do! then any creature in my opinion would have a hard time finding it in our tanks as Orion states.
Gary Majchrzak
Team RC
if you don't believe anemones have allelopathic metabolites and you don't believe anemones can shed nematocysts what do you think causes this?
Gary Majchrzak
Team RC
Allelopathy doesn't kill fishes. Usually, when a stressed anemone with powerful nematocysts (such as H. magnifica) releases nematocysts en masse, all fishes in the aquarium suffer except anemonefish and other symbiotic fishes (if present). Not all reef animals are affected equally by nematocysts. (We've all seen shrimps walk across anemones.)
There are at least several reports of anemone/ fish kills happening on this website.
I'm sure that many more incidents remain unreported!
I've experienced one of these fish kills firsthand
To think that one anemone can sense another anemone of the same (or different) species in the open ocean but not in an aquarium is ridiculous.
(Not only can anemones locate another anemone in the same system, but so can corals. Have you ever seen a Euphyllia develop 8" sweepers in order to sting a distant neighbor?)
And fishes! These are animals that rely on eyesight... they can smell a piece of food hidden under hundreds of pounds of rockwork.
Surely something such sea anemones have fine tuned sensory organs. It just makes sense (pun intended).
It's really kind of moot, isn't it?
We are acknowledging something detrimental can happen when anemones of different species are placed together.
If not allelopathic metabolites or the defensive structures developed by these animals over the millenia what do you propose is causing the negative reactions we so often observe?
There are at least several reports of anemone/ fish kills happening on this website.
I'm sure that many more incidents remain unreported!
I've experienced one of these fish kills firsthand
To think that one anemone can sense another anemone of the same (or different) species in the open ocean but not in an aquarium is ridiculous.
(Not only can anemones locate another anemone in the same system, but so can corals. Have you ever seen a Euphyllia develop 8" sweepers in order to sting a distant neighbor?)
And fishes! These are animals that rely on eyesight... they can smell a piece of food hidden under hundreds of pounds of rockwork.
Surely something such sea anemones have fine tuned sensory organs. It just makes sense (pun intended).
It's really kind of moot, isn't it?
We are acknowledging something detrimental can happen when anemones of different species are placed together.
If not allelopathic metabolites or the defensive structures developed by these animals over the millenia what do you propose is causing the negative reactions we so often observe?
Gary Majchrzak
Team RC
quite honestly
quite honestly
"proximity effect" can easily be observed in my (sessile/ non motile) aquarium Scleractinians.
It would make sense that motile animals develop a heightened awareness in regards to "proximity effect".
quite honestly
"proximity effect" can easily be observed in my (sessile/ non motile) aquarium Scleractinians.
It would make sense that motile animals develop a heightened awareness in regards to "proximity effect".
OrionN
Moved on
Gary,
In case of anemone got chew up by a PH or pump, lots of stuff will be release into the water and it is not intentionally by the anemone.
I don't think that anemone intentionally release chemical into the water to fight each other. I think they do fight each other in close contact warfare. In the wild, they may even seek each other out to fight. There is chemicals release by the anemone, leaking out or intentional. In the wild there will be gradient of these chemical. That is how clown fish find their host.
In aquarium, there will not be a detectable meaningfull gradient of these chemicals that is enough for them to use to direct their movement to find each other. They did not evolve in a few hundred gallons of water but wide open water. An anemone that is 5 feet away is not a thread in the wild. Making all these energy intensive weapons and release them to hurt or kill an anemone 5 feet away in the reef is pointless and metabolically expensive and "dumb". Nature is anything but dumb.
In order to use gradient to direct direction, an animal need sensors on opposite side, and nerve connection to a central brain. The brain with the sensor input from various site will be able to tell which side, the concentration of the molecule is higher then the brain tells the muscle to move toward or away from the stimuli.
Muscle can transmit signal also, that is how the anemone coordinate its muscle so it move or bring food to the mouth. However it is not use for any higher form of information processing.
Gary Majchrzak
Team RC
what about when an anemone doesn't get chewed up but simply stressed heavily... lots of stuff gets released into the water. What gets released into the water?
The term "intentional" implies a thought process. These animals simply react. No brain is necessary. They have a nerve network.
and yet the defensive mechanisms of Cnidarians are known to exist
OrionN
Moved on
I suppose that if they get stressed and or injured enough they may release them due to lost of integrity of their body. In aquarium this can cause problem, which I think is what happen when my Haddoni having problem with a newly arrive Magnifica, but not in the open ocean. In open water, it just dilutes quickly and have no effect whatsoever on the animals close by.
By "intentional", I mean "for the purpose of". I do not think that release these chemical into the water in open ocean water will cause any harm to an anemone that is as close as 5 inches from it. Now if it move over and sting the heck out of the other animal, the metabolic cost to it is a lot less and the damage is so much more.
I do think that certain anemone may have problem with another anemone in our aquarium. However, I think this happen because of stress cause leaky anemone. This leakiness can cause problem with other animal but I do not think the function of this "leakiness" is to kill, maim or inhibit near by anemones.
There is no evidence to back up what I think what so ever. It just "not logical" IMHO.
By "intentional", I mean "for the purpose of". I do not think that release these chemical into the water in open ocean water will cause any harm to an anemone that is as close as 5 inches from it. Now if it move over and sting the heck out of the other animal, the metabolic cost to it is a lot less and the damage is so much more.
I do think that certain anemone may have problem with another anemone in our aquarium. However, I think this happen because of stress cause leaky anemone. This leakiness can cause problem with other animal but I do not think the function of this "leakiness" is to kill, maim or inhibit near by anemones.
There is no evidence to back up what I think what so ever. It just "not logical" IMHO.
reefkeeper2
Premium Member
I agree with Minh.
phender
Active member
I kept a gigantea and a crispa together for over a year. The gig was doing great and the crispa just so so. For some reason the crispa had a growth spurt. During that time the gigantea started to go downhill and never recovered. I can't prove the two things were related, but it sure seemed that way to me.
As far as the chemical gradient goes, the ink example doesn't really work. Our tanks are not buckets, they are more like a bucket with a hole in it that we have to keep filling. If it were a bucket we wouldn't be able to keep anything in our tanks alive. Our water is constantly being physically, chemically and biologically filtered. We know that our anemones are constantly producing slime. If the filters weren't taking it out of the water somehow, our fish would be swimming in jello in about a month. I don't know what chemicals make up the slime, but it would likely have a chemical fingerprint unique to the animal (coral or anemone) that produced it. To think that this slime might be irritating to other animals doesn't seem too far fetched. I know that the skin on my hand get irritated when I am near a BTA, but I don't have any problem with other anemones.
As far as the chemical gradient goes, the ink example doesn't really work. Our tanks are not buckets, they are more like a bucket with a hole in it that we have to keep filling. If it were a bucket we wouldn't be able to keep anything in our tanks alive. Our water is constantly being physically, chemically and biologically filtered. We know that our anemones are constantly producing slime. If the filters weren't taking it out of the water somehow, our fish would be swimming in jello in about a month. I don't know what chemicals make up the slime, but it would likely have a chemical fingerprint unique to the animal (coral or anemone) that produced it. To think that this slime might be irritating to other animals doesn't seem too far fetched. I know that the skin on my hand get irritated when I am near a BTA, but I don't have any problem with other anemones.
LeLutinBanni
New member
I have 8 maxi mini carpets.
DO NOT ADD A BTA...
The BTA won't survive.
DO NOT ADD A BTA...
The BTA won't survive.
OrionN
Moved on
I think Phil have a point. There are going to be some degradation of what ever chemical leaked/released by anemone. The question is how much or how fast this degradation is. If the 1/2 life of this chemical is very short then there will be a gradient while it is very long then there will be no meaningful gradient.
In the ink example, essentially this mean that there will be continuous water change, if it is in the order of a few cc per hour or 100% water change in a few minutes, or anything in between.
Even if there is a gradient in our aquarium and our anemone can use it to navigate to get to or away from each other, I still think that there is no logical reason why any sessile sea animal developed/evolved mechanism for remote chemical warfare because it is just impossible to cause any significant damage to another organism by just release toxin into the water.
In my 65 gal tank, 2 Malu, 2 Gigantea, 2 Maxi Mini, coutless Mini Mini and 1 BTA doing just fine together and healthy. I Had 3 BTA in there but sold the other two.
In the ink example, essentially this mean that there will be continuous water change, if it is in the order of a few cc per hour or 100% water change in a few minutes, or anything in between.
Even if there is a gradient in our aquarium and our anemone can use it to navigate to get to or away from each other, I still think that there is no logical reason why any sessile sea animal developed/evolved mechanism for remote chemical warfare because it is just impossible to cause any significant damage to another organism by just release toxin into the water.
In my 65 gal tank, 2 Malu, 2 Gigantea, 2 Maxi Mini, coutless Mini Mini and 1 BTA doing just fine together and healthy. I Had 3 BTA in there but sold the other two.
OrionN
Moved on
This is the anemone that prompts me to start this thread. My Haddoni got stressed from a stressed, recently acquired Magnifica and start moving. He got chewed up by my MP10. I was lucky that I caught it right away and he is recovering well. I removed the Magnifica and things settle down quickly and doing well again. Below is the picture of the full tank and the chewed up Haddoni. He is recovering very well and already stable and digs in.
