My clowns hosted a riterri but not my RBTA

[smp]

I bought my tank back in November and it came with a Heteractis magnifica which was on it's way out, definitely a sad and dying specimen. However, my pair of then juvenile A. Ocellaris LOVED it and tried to follow it out of the tank when I removed it.

Since the tank was still young and not anemone worthy I waited another month of two before introducing something more suitable for the small tank and modest lighting I had at the time (power compacts over a 29 gallon). The RBTA started out very small but quickly grew to double and then triple it's size and the clowns have ignored it 100% since it was introduced.

I know you can't force a pair of clowns into an anemone or anything and I've tried to target feed the anemone only to sort of draw the clowns to it .. and it works, so long as there is tasty krill or shrimp in there but they quickly ignore it once the food is gone (or free floating).

It has now been a good while, is there anything I can do to get my clowns to host? Maybe try another anemone (different type, although I'm limited with my space, I have MH lighting now though however). I don't want to give up my clowns, they are the only fish that I kept from the original system that I bought and I really like them .. they are a beautiful pair of ocellaris.

Has anyone had a pair of clowns suddenly move into an anemone 6 months after introducing the anemone? A year?
I've pretty much given up hope, should I just keep hoping?



edit: I'll also mention that the clowns were really small when I first got them but aren't as big as full grown yet (at least according to other, larger ocellaris I've seen). They do shimmy for one another and I think one of them is definitely the female but she is only slightly larger than the other. Maybe they aren't mature enough yet?
Again, they used to host in the magnifica so I'm at a loss.

 

[phender]

I had a pair of ocellaris take over a year to accept a large bta as their host. I just came home one day a boom, they were buried in the anemone. The tank was a 30 gal tall (20 gal. footprint) so they were in close proximity to the anemone for over a year.

I wish I could give you the magical answer.

 

[TGamel]

Clowns can sometimes be fickle and may not bond with an anemone for a while especially if they have already took up house with a surrogate coral. My clown did not take to my new anemone for a few weeks after it's introduction, and I have heard of others taking longer.

I have even had a friend whose clown refused to bond with an anemone when one was introduced as it had already settled down in a leather coral. Clowns do not have to have anemone's to thrive, however, I think given enough time your Clown's will eventually bond with your anemone. Best of luck!

 

[crsandoval]

I had the same type of issue. My clowns hosted in a ritteri, and then the nem died. After a while I tried a carpet and after a water change that nem died overnight. All the while I had a bta in the tank. The clowns went inside the bta but quickly backed out as if it bothered them. After a while I waited got rid of the bta and have had a pretty healthy ritteri for over 5 months now.

 

[smp]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7354804#post7354804 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by phender
I had a pair of ocellaris take over a year to accept a large bta as their host. I just came home one day a boom, they were buried in the anemone. The tank was a 30 gal tall (20 gal. footprint) so they were in close proximity to the anemone for over a year.

I wish I could give you the magical answer.

Well, that's somewhat comforting as I've had the RBTA for over six months now and no luck so far .. my tank is a 29 gallon (30" long footprint, sounds same as yours).

 

[N_Sarno]

I have a pair of false percs who host my mushrooms.. but I have a perfectly good RBTA for them.. its so annoying lol

 

[SumpDiver]

Decoy

Decoy

Try putting one of those suction cup lettuce clips that look like a clownfish near the nem. Maybe they'll get the idea.

 

[818]

IME a pair of percs wont host anything smaller than 4 inches. When I beefed up my RBTA to about 8 inches I threw it into my 60g and when I came home the same day BOOM! I guess these fish like to be spoiled?

Its a hit or miss man.

Good Luck

Sam

 

[rdmpe]

Same problem here. I have a false perc that is hosting a kenya tree and totally ignors my new rbta. It's a 180 and the kenya tree is at the opp end of the tank, so my clown never even goes over there. I've tried to feed over there to get the clown familiar with the rbta but no luck so far. It's been about 6 weeks I think...