Why do clowns bite and eat chunks out of rbt

[liven learn]

I have a pair of wild caught gold stripe maroons and my female always bites the rbt and swallows pieces of it. Im not sure why. She also does the same with my long tentacle. Anyone have experience with this?

 

[smtank]

It's common. The only explanation I have ever seen is it may assist them in maintenance of the protective mucous coating, not sure I buy that. Maybe someone has a better idea or alternative idea.

 

[liven learn]

Yea a couple years back my other maroon did the same, today when i saw it eat a chunk it shook while it was swallowing it like it stung its insides or something lol

 

[smtank]

I have had clowns that looked like they had swollen lips/mouth after mouthing the anemone tips. The issue always resolved on it's own.

 

[tribalturtle2]

My Gold stripe female did the same thing and her lips were swollen. I ended up taking the rbta out right away and put it in my 55 with my black misbar clowns. That was over a year ago, haven't tried to put another rbta or other anemone back in with the breeding pair of Goldstripes in case the female would try to attack another anemone again.

They do like to rearrange things and move stuff if its not to their liking. She'll pick up hermits and snails and move them to another area of the tank.

 

[madweazl]

I've had clowns suck on the tentacles but never bite them off.

 

[liven learn]

My Gold stripe female did the same thing and her lips were swollen. I ended up taking the rbta out right away and put it in my 55 with my black misbar clowns. That was over a year ago, haven't tried to put another rbta or other anemone back in with the breeding pair of Goldstripes in case the female would try to attack another anemone again.

They do like to rearrange things and move stuff if its not to their liking. She'll pick up hermits and snails and move them to another area of the tank.

Lol thats hilarious, mine do burnouts in the sand to make mounds for themselves.

 

[taylor t]

I have 3 "chocolate glazed" living in a mertens. (only supposed to have 2 clowns per tank, not the norm) The female rips off tents and eats them daily. Feeding the clowns more has not stopped this, only caused more cyno to come out. Tank is 210, with only 3 tangs, and a couple smaller fish, so overcrowding shouldn't be a cause. Not sure if the anemone would do much better if I removed her, but it's 2' across. Seems to handle the abuse ok. They have done this for a while now. I think I posted a question like this a couple months ago, but not much for feedback. Not sure it's all that common, or atleast most don't see it often?

 

[snorvich]

Clownfish and sea anemones have a symbiotic, mutualistic relationship, each providing a number of benefits to the other. The individual species are generally highly host specific, and especially the genera Heteractis and Stichodactyla, and the species Entacmaea quadricolor are frequent clownfish partners. The sea anemone protects the clownfish from predators, as well as providing food through the scraps left from the anemone's meals and occasional dead anemone tentacles. Biting or even eating anemone tentacles is common. In return, the clownfish defends the anemone from its predators, and parasites. The anemone also picks up nutrients from the clownfish's excrement, and functions as a safe nest site for the clownfish. The nitrogen excreted from clownfish increases the amount of algae incorporated into the tissue of their hosts, which aids the anemone in tissue growth and regeneration. It has been theorized that activity of the clownfish results in greater water circulation around the sea anemone. Studies on anemonefish have found that clownfish alter the flow of water around sea anemone tentacles by certain behaviors and movements such as "wedging" and "switching." Aeration of the host anemone tentacles allows for benefits to the metabolism of both partners, mainly by increasing anemone body size and both clownfish and anemone respiration.

Clownfish and certain damselfish are among the few species of fish that can avoid the potent poison of a sea anemone. There are several theories about how they can survive the sea anemone poison:

The mucus coating of the fish may be based on sugars rather than proteins. This would mean that anemones fail to recognize the fish as a potential food source and do not fire their nematocysts, or sting organelles. Some theorize that eating anemone tentacles is used to process sugar and maintains the mucous coating.
The coevolution of certain species of clownfish with specific anemone host species and may have acquired an immunity to the nematocysts and toxins of their host anemone. Experimentation has shown that Amphiprion percula may develop resistance to the toxin from Heteractis magnifica, but it is not totally protected, since it was shown experimentally to die when its skin, devoid of mucus, was exposed to the nematocysts of its host.