My Rose BTA Is a weird dark Color and gaping mouth... What's wrong?

[Angleiu]

I have a Nano 29 and we have had a Rose BTA for about 6 months. Everything has been great until two days ago. It has recently been what I would call "sagging" while still inflated. Also the base is darker than the tenticles. And today I got home and the tips are still inflated and pointing down, but the mouth was gapping. I did move the tank to a closet over night (Because we were having the room carpeted). Would this move be the reason? Please let me know if anyone has any suggestions.


Thank you!

Karyn

[CarmieJo]

Hey Karyn,

What are your parameters? If you emptied the tank in order to move it you could have had die off from the rock being exposed to air. The other thing I wonder is if the carpet is outgassing and the chemicals from it could be causing problems. Either way I would do a water change and run carbon.

[Angleiu]

Sorry, I have to move the tank back before I can test the water levels again. I know that as of yesterday my nitrates were 0, phosphates were with in normal range. and the salinity was 1.024. I can't get in the base of the tank until we get all of the funiture back and know where the tank is going to stay.

We actually didn't empty it to move it. We will have to figure out a way to move it back though. (Rollers won't work so great on carpet.) But The carpet definately smells funny. It could be that. I am going to try a water change. I just gave it a piece of Silverside, and it took it. Are BTA's really sensitive to temp changes. The water might be a few degrees colder because it's under the stairs right now.

Also will feeding them possibly make the problem worse??? (something I should've asked 5 min ago.) Will they eat if they aren't hungry?, is my question I guess.

I will have the water measurements tomorrow.

[CarmieJo]

A water change is a good idea. Do you have any carbon? I'd run some of it too to help absorb toxins. I would not feed the BTA any more if its mouth is gaping open. If it doesn't digest it and just spits it back out it will just make the water foul. They can be sensitive to temp changes but if you have a heater in the tank that should keep it the same temp no matter where it is.

[Angleiu]

Alright so I think that I figured out what is wrong and now I need to know how to fix it if it can be fixed....
I noticed that the rocks had shifted after the move...(my husband moved the tank). I saw the Anemone today and it looked a lot better. But then I noticed that a section of it was very ill colored still. I believe that part of it may have gotten smashed/torn. I am a newer tank owner. I have only had the tank since late May2010. I don't know if I can nurse this or even where to start.

I love my BTA.... If there's anyway to save it can, please let me know. It is a bout 8 inches when open, and I would say about a 1/4 of it is affected. I will put pictures on tonight.

Also is there a safe way to take it off the rock, so that I can see if the foot is torn???

Karyn

[CarmieJo]

Hi Karyn, a torn foot is a serious injury but they can be nursed back to health. It is a good sign that it looks better today than yesterday. You will need to keep the water quality really high. I would change a gallon of water every day. This will help maintain great water quality. I'd not feed it if the mouth is gaping. Once it is no longer gaping you can feed him small bits of food.

[Angleiu]

Thank you Carmie!!!

I was hoping to hear that. I am going to post some pictures I took Today. I did a water change yesterday and measured the levels....

Yesterday:
Before the water change Nitrates were @ 40.
I did a 25% water change, and they went down to 20. Then Phosphates were .25, and Calcium was 320.

Today before the water change the levels were
CA 300
KH 179 or 10 dKH
Phosphate .25-.5
Nitrates were back up to 40.

Going to do a water change again. Here are some pics...
Notice that half of the anemone is almost normal, and the other half is darker and much smaller than the other half.

One of the pictures is a picture before the move.

[CarmieJo]

He doesn't look horrible so I think you have a good chance of saving him. The nitrates are a problem though. As you saw water changes are only temporary, but keep doing them. Are you running the sponges and bio-balls in the tank?

[Amphibious]

Carmie is taking good care of you, Karyn. I’d just add, your Calcium is quite low and dropping, 320 before water change 300 after. You will need to get that up to 450 or more. While Anemones don’t utilize Calcium for structure, maintaining water parameters at optimum goes a long way in keeping all reef critters healthy.

The pictures really help us in determining the overall condition of the Anemone. I’d say considering all that has taken place, he will survive. I would not feed it anything for a week or two. Let him heal using his current available energy. Feeding him at this point, while seeming like a good idea, would be detrimental as he would have to expend energy to digest the food or (more likely) expelling it back out in a few days. When he is healed begin with small portions of food. Anemones don’t require great amounts of food to thrive.

[Angleiu]

Thank you both of you! Yep I have bio-balls built in. I Might add an extra carbon filter to help to hopefully help with the nitrates, (but i won't keep it in two long. I know the anemone needs some of the bacteria to survive.). and I just got a new air stone. I also added some liquid reef (to bring up my calcium levels). Will check the water levels tomorrow, after a filter change tonight. Thanks for all your help. You guys are awsome. He's looking a lot better everyday.

BTW I'm not going to add anything until I get the levels steady. But i was looking for recommendations on some fun things to add to my tank. I would like it to be mostly soft Corals. I have 2 clowns, an anemone(6-8 in, But has stayed in the same place for the last 4 months), frogspawn, 5 hermit crabs, 2 turbo snails, several smaller snails, and 2 small snails that mostly surf under the sand (they had babies). Plus a star polyp (doesn't do so well because the clowns keep knocking it over. and the stem broke of in some concrete glue.)

I really like the yellow headed goby I had, but it had parasites, so I took it back. Do either of you guys have any suggestions??? I don't think I'm over stocked, but I am new to this too.

Thanks,
Karyn

[CarmieJo]

Anemones are very demanding of good water quality and I think that your nitrates are probably stressing it. I'd really work hard at getting them down in order to have long term success. You may want to look at adding a refugium (either a hang-on-tank or by converting one of the sump compartments) where you could grow some macro or even adding a clump of chaeto to the display. Here is a good article about BTA's. http://www.talkingreef.com/forums/sh...=8801&p=104735

The bio-balls are a very efficient environment for nitrifing bacteria and the end source of this is nitrates. Most people with a nano use a shallow sand bed so the only denitrification is what your rock can process out. Since the amount of rock compared to the surface area of the bio-balls is small nitrates build up. In my opinion, you would be wise to start removing them a few at a time. I run my nano with just rock and sand and my nitrates stay under 10 ppm. Running the carbon will help remove toxins from the water but won't reduce nitrate. In fact, a bag of carbon becomes another environment to grow nitrifing bacteria. I use carbon all the time in my tanks, I just run small amounts (a couple TBS) and change it weekly.

Soft corals would do well in your tank and many like to have some nitrate in the water. I definitely would not add anything new until your BTA is better. I'd also encourage you to quarantine new arrivals for a month before adding them to your display. That helps avoid introducing disease or parasites into your display. A fire fish would be a nice addition to your tank.

[Angleiu]

I Just measured the water again and all seems to be getting better. The nitrates are still 20, But the calcium hasn't gone up even with the liquid reef I added.

Funny you mention the quarantine Idea. Because yesterday I bought a 8 gallon Bio cube. to use it as that. But unfortunately my hubby told me not to the second tank. He said I could use it on my desk at work. =/ But I am curious as to how to set one up on/in my bio cube. I'm guessing before I set up my 8 Gallon, that I should take out the bio balls, eh? the more and more research i am looking at they seem to do more harm than good in the long run.

There is someone selling some Chaetos from their tank for $6 on craigslist. Is that a good thing? I don't know what to look for to see if they are healthy (or if they might not be...) I will call him tomorrow to see if they are still available.

Also Someone on another site said he thought it looked like my anemone might be trying to split. Have you guys ever seen that? They didn't seem very experienced, so I would be surprised if he was right. I still have to ask since I have never seen an anemone split before.

PS should I set up the 8 gallon? Or should I return it to the store? Don't know that it is really big enough to be a quarantine tank for anything.... but they are discontinued, and it was their last one(Impulse buy).

[CarmieJo]

I am not familiar with liquid reef is it a kind of a 2 part solution? Have you measured your magnesium? Alk and Ca are inversely proportional, but Ca and Mg are proportional. Your alk is on the high side of normal so you could try just adding Ca until alk falls a little bit and see if you can increase Ca that way. If it does not I suspect low Mg. What kind of salt do you use?

I use a standard 10 gallon tank for a QT (quarantine tank) and I think that an 8 would be OK as long as you don't overdo it. There are two ways to do QT. One is to have a tank that you put up and down as needed. This is what I do. The other is to run a spa QT that is set up all the time. It sounds like your hubby may like option 1 better. However, you do have to be careful, one day it will get set up and never be taken back down. My 10 is now a snail breeding experiment and I can't get any new fish because I don't have a QT. Good thing I have an old 20 and 29 in the garage.

The only time my BTA split I was away on vacation. However, I believe that they split through the oral disk.