Troubles With My First BTA - Please Help

[benjaminoliver]

Hello everybody,

I just bought my first anemone from my LFS, came with great color and everything. The anemone has positioned itself in my tank vertically, so one if its sides is closer to my light then the other. Today, after work, I noticed the the top side (closest to light) seemed to be bleached of its color. My one LED fixture on top of my tank runs at full strength for 12 hours of blue light, and 10 hours of white light (1 hour in the morning and night extra for blue). The bottom half of the anemone (farthest from light) seems to be vibrantly colored still.

My question is am I over lighting my anemone? Should I reduce light times, or strength of my lighting. Please help me out tonight so I can adjust my lights for tomorrow.

Thanks everybody in advanced.

 

[Wretched]

He's most likely acclimating.

 

[sjwitt]

It may have expelled some zooanthelle during acclimation but this would be consistant lightening across the whole animal. It may be that it's just expanded more in your tank so the part closest to the lighting just looks lighter because the light is shining through the anemone. Without a picture its very hard to help you.

The photo period doesn't seem too long to me.

 

[benjaminoliver]

Here are some pictures of it today. Yesterday, the anemone expanded quite a bit, and then towards the night, shrunk down to about the size of a half dollar and had its mouth open, expelling mucus. I have turned the lighting down today to about 20% (it was at 100% yesterday) Also, it completely closed last night after the lights turned off. The anemone was under mostly blue lighting at my local fish store, could its stress be being caused by my white lights? All my water parameters are where they should be, 0s in the bad tests, and balanced in the good. My clowns are not bothering it at all, they are tank raised and they pay zero attention to the anemone. I fed it mysis shrimp, soaked in some kent marine vitamins, and poked it a very little during feeding (more of a brush against its tentacles). I would really like to keep this guy alive, any ideas to help reduce stress of acclimating?

 

[bjledbetter]

That bta looks fine to me. I wouldnt feed it though for a few days and let it use its energy to settle in instead of trying to digest food.

 

[sjwitt]

Agreed... it looks very good. Let it alone and let it settle in. Ramp up your white lights to 50% after a week and see how it responds. It may shrink back some but see if it doesn't come out eventually. Leave it for a week or two then up to 75% and go through the same drill. If you want to be at 100% then go for it once the anemone is acclimated to 75%.