help

[eddy]

HELP! I am new to the salt water world, I set up a 90 gallon tank in the end of December, slowly introduced live rock and some corals. I have 63 pounds live rock, some colts, shrooms, pulsing zenia, zoo's, toadstool, and a few other odds and ends. I recently added fish 4 clowns, 3 damsels, one jawboned and one royal gram., and one yellow tang I have about 18 hermits, 10 turbo snails, a peppermint shrimp and an arrow crab. One of the live rocks I bought had a small bta on it and its doing fine. I bought a long tenticle anen for my clown fish and for a week and a half it did fine. It now looks listless, fell face down off its rock once, I put it back, now its hanging on by a thread. Most of the tenticles are shruken and its mouth area is wide open. I tested all my nitrites, nitrates, ammonia and ph and everything is at the proper levels. What the hell is happening.

[snaggle]

I have heard not to but in an anemone for one year nd adding all that live stock in 2 months seem kinda fast to me. :eek: Just my $0.02 I would wait to try again on the anemone. aslo what kind of light do you have :question:


Brad

[untamed]

I agree...my first response to reading this was to think..."All that stuff has been added to a tank which started in December???" That's fast.

Anemones are very particular. This doesn't sound good and I'll wager that you are going to lose that anemone. Ensure it comes out of the tank immediately once you are certain it has died. No easy answer as to "why", but 1.5 weeks suggests to me that the shock of the new tank was too much for it. It may even have been in trouble when you bought it.

[Tangman]

you didn't mention your lighting , anemones need atleast 3 to 4 watts/gallon

[dirtyreefer]

Your tank has barely cycled and you have all that livestock? I would check your ammonia/nitrite levels.

[Bob I]

I would agree strongly with the above. I my experience even a tank which appears to have cycled will simply not tolerate the addition of large amount of livestock. I have found that keeping the livestock levels very low during the first SIX MONTHS goes a long way toward success. The best advice always is KEEP IT SLOW :rolleyes:

[mr_alberta]

If the anenome has a gaping mouth it is a bad sign. Also, the fact that it is no longer holding onto anything with its foot is another bad sign. Is the anenome expelling anything from its mouth? Possibly white curly strings? If so, then I would remove the anenome ASAP.

While an anenome *can* be saved and recover from this, it is very unlikely. Also, anenomes can take a little while to show signs of distress, so it may have already been ill before you brought it home or become ill shortly after being introduced into your tank.

Another thing to be mindful of is the agression between the 3 damsels and the 4 clowns amonst each other as well as the other tank mates.

[Aquattro]

not much else to add here. You put way too much in way too soon. Slow down, move some livestock out (especially the anemones) and read some good books.

[sumpfinfishe]

Oh and to addd one more thing-most things that happen fast in a reeftank are usually bad, the good things take time!

You really need to slow down, like mentioned above- read some good books and online articles before you dive into the deep end.

[eddy]

Thanks for the input, when I moved it back onto the rock it did expell a milky cloud, plus white stringy stuff. It had been expelling the white stringy stuff the day I brought it home from the store. There has been no aggression between the clowns and the damsels, they have divided the tank equally and I've never witnessed any aggression between them. All my other stock and corals are doing fine and have been growing rapidly in the time that I've had them. The clowns were in the annen within thirty seconds of me adding it to the tank and would actually feed the annen. I test my water reqularly and had tested it the day I noticed the annen having problems. All the nitrate, and nitrite levels, ammonia and ph levels are all at the proper levels. If the fact that it expelling white stringy stuff means that its sick, then it was sick when I brought it home from the store. And being new to the reef business, I found out that I've paid to much for it.

[Invigor]

:eek:

I'm still blown that you rammed all that stuff in there in under a month...

just relax and take it slow...it might be hard to do at first, but it's well worth it in the end.

as for ammonia and nitrite, have you monitored them enough to watch them peak and fall off yet?

[mr_alberta]

One last thing you can try to see if it is dead/dying is the sniff test. If you can somehow get a good wiff of it and it makes you eyes tear up and you want to vomit, then I would remove the anenome as that is basically the "point of no return."

If you can take a picture of the anenome and post it, maybe we can give you a much more accurate diagnosis.

[eddy]

it is still alive, it has been clinging to the rock, and about half its tenticles are expanded at any one time. The clowns keep going into its mouth and removing things. some one asked what kind of light I have, 260w compact flo. I was told by the sales person that this was sufficient for what I intended to grow. Apparently the salt water aquarium stores in the Edmonton area are more concerned about making money then helping a customer build a proper tank. Every one I talked to, I informed at what stage my tank was at and how long it had been running, and they had no problem suggesting things that I needed.

[snaggle]

just out of intrest what stores in Edmonton did you go to? if it was petcetra I would avoid it like the plage for a newbie. :evil: the one in sherwood park is ok a little pricy. just ask for Clayton or Yipwa.
( think I spelt it wrong) :confused: . Big Al's is ok but again kinda pricy. I dont get out to the other ones too much. so the other Edmoton guys will have to tell you about them.


Brad

[rusty]

If it has been said once it will be said a million times Canreef rocks! I have not been doing this hobby for very long either and it has been my experence that yes the stores care more about selling then helping. I am amazed that they did not try sell you the biggest metal halide system on the market. Talking to people that are not trying to sell you something is the best and read lots. I too have quit asking question at the stores when I go to buy something I dont want to get taken for a ride....again. :biggrin:

[mr_alberta]

Is there any update on the anenome situation? Is its mouth still gaping? Has it anchored itself firmly with its foot yet?

[eddy]

unfortunately it has gone on to a better life. It began expelling a fair amount of milky residue from its mouth and was no longer holding on. I decided to take it out before, just in case its death would have an adverse effect on the rest of the tank ie nitrate spikes or whatever else it might be putting into the tank. I figured it was better to loose the cost of the annen then the whole tank. The clowns are searching all over the tank for it, didn't take them long to build a relationship with the annen. I won't name the store I was at until I've spoken with them about the fact that it may have been sick before I brought it home. A friend told me that it looked fairly light and may have been bleached, something about not enough light. I bought a mature annen. at the store, may have been a captured one as opposed to a tank bred one.

[AJ_77]

hi Eddy, check out this thread , there's a great link in it:

http://www.canreef.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=10214

[Tangman]

Well, Ed you didn't have enough light either ,you said you have a 260w PC on a 90G tank and I assume 1/2 of that is atinic (blue) and you don't count atinic as total lighting ,so you only had 130Watts PC ,so that works out to only 1.4Watts per Gallon. You need at least 4Watts per gallon for an anemone,and also a tank that has been up and running for a year .And as every one else has all ready stated , to much to soon

[danny zubot]

Hey Eddie, The clowns keep going into its mouth and removing things.
I've seen that behavior before when clowns are introduced to a new anemone. Why clowns do it I don't know, but you have confirmed for me that is a sure bet that the anemone is dying.
Next time try a BTA (Bubble Type Anemone) they are pretty hardy. Also; and I might be blasted for this but.....I don't agree with waiting a year before adding anemone's. I've had several different kinds over the years in pretty new tanks with no loses. The difference is that I did a bit of research on them first. There are some out there that will live in lower light. Good luck! :biggrin:

[SeaHorse_Fanatic]

An anemone that lets go & wanders about a tank is an unhappy anemone. Puking out "white stuff" is a major stress response. In the future, if the situation is iffy, you may want to consider giving it or placing it temporarily to somebody who has a well established tank with good lighting. If one dies in your tank, it will turn to mush & could very possibly nuke the whole tank, so I'm sorry to hear of your loss but I'm glad you removed it before it mushed out. I've seen it happen in a LFS & they lost a lot of nice corals out of their display tank.

For the lighting situation, maybe consider switching out an actinic for more useable 10000k lighting.

By the way, I've also gone too fast in the past :cry: & I must concur with the opinions stated above that slowing down will save lives (fishes & corals) & save your $$. If you add 1 (or at least only a few small fish) at a time, it'll allow your system to adjust to the increased bioload. If you add too many at a time, you'll shock the system & cause an ammonia spike because the existing nitrosomal bacteria are not able to handle the extra fish waste.

Also, check out www.wetwebmedia.com. Awesome site full of good info & run by experienced reefers & fish lovers like Bob Fenner who aren't trying to sell you a bunch of stuff. Doing your research first will help you be more successful in this $$$ hobby. When you're at the LFS, if you see something you really like but aren't sure you can keep it alive, put it on hold, & do your research before you purchase something with almost zero survival rates. :evil:

Good luck.

Anthony

[doch]

The way that I figure it.... ask as many questions as you can while you're there... but take all the info with a grain of salt. Get as much info as possible, then go home and research it yourself on the net. My only problem with this is that I have yet to find a site that I fully trust, and it seems that a lot of the sites out there have varying opinions on everything. On that note... not to hijack... anyone have any recommendations for trustworthy sites?

[mr_alberta]

Online communities are usually pretty good. Places like Reef-Central, reefs.org, etc are huge online communities with millions of posts and thousands of users, so you're bound to find an answer to your question (though it can be quite difficult at times).

Also, sites like WetWebMedia (I think that's what its called) are also sites with a lot of useful information.

CanReef is pretty good too!

[doch]

For the record.... I see Canreef as a very good resource.... but sometimes you need to wait for a while to get the info that you need... I'm talking about a good site that has info ready and posted. From what I've found so far tehy all seem to have different info. Or different fish!!! Who knows.

[muck]

Patience is a virtue and a great asset in this hobby... :wink: