My BTA split... why?

[kware]

I recently switched substrates, from crushed coral to sand. During the whole process my anemones, mushroom corals, and live rock all sat in a 30 gallon rubber maid bin,Withheat, a powerhead, and my tomatoe clown for about a day and a half. When I put everything back in,everything looked great. Then about 16 hours later I noticed the BTA completely split in two. It took a few days for both halfs to fully open. Now they both look great and are even eating small pieces of shrimp. I've heard of stress causing anemones to split but don't know much more than that. I would love to hear if anybody else has had a similar experience.

 

[Chaloupa]

We had to catch a really nasty Lemonpeel angel...took out most of the rock, in pails etc with water, put it all back in (anemones didn't get taken out, just moved around with their rocks) lots of sand was moved so had some levels go a bit wonky I'm sure but nothing tragic...and next few days we went from 2 BTA to 6....all 6 now have been the same for several months and eat, inflate etc but it was a bit worrisome.....

 

[kware]

So I'm thinking that BTA's will split when under stress, as a last ditch effort to reproduce. I wonder if anybody ever purposly stresses out their anemone to get them to split?

 

[tmz]

I think btas splitting is quite common. Mine do. I don't know if stress has anything to do with it but have never heard that before.

 

[Coral C's]

I recently purchased a beautiful RBTA from a LFS, I put it into my 120 Gallon tank hoping it would stay were I put it. By the next morning it had moved where it looked like it was being squashed under a rock. After a few hours it started separating and "wha la" it was three. I have heard of them splitting but didn't realize they could split into three at one time. The smaller of the three looked a little peeked but this morning all of them were bubbling again and even eating a little. Yeah!

 

[tmz]

Yes mine have done the three split.

 

[Joe LoPresti]

I started with one RBTA, the first time it split I woke up with 4 RBTA's. One of the four just split again 3 days ago and I now have 7 RBTA's!! Apparently mine are gonna split like crazy!

My ocellaris clowns are happy though, it's like they live in an anemone mansion!!!

 

[trdofwrkin]

mine has been moved twice in the last 9 months and hasnt split at all...It just moved further down on its rock

 

[tmz]

I've had mine for over four years, It split a year and a half ago and again last month.