anemones
Contents:
- [M] [COLD] Temperate Anemone Notes
by rbrown/bbn.com (Ralph Brown) (4 May 92)
by rbrown/bbn.com (Ralph Brown)
Date: 4 May 92
Newsgroup: alt.aquaria,rec.aquaria
This may be common knowlege to people, but I wish I'd known it.
1.) When I first got my anenomes (via UPS) one, a powderpuff was clearly
much more stressed than the rest of them. Completely collapsed, acontia (SP?)
all over, wouldn't stick to a rock. It would react a bit when I touched it.
I've often heard that amenomes degenerate very quickly and should be
removed at the first sign of problems. However, I decided to keep it and
watch it closely, so I moved it to a quiet spot under a rock. It remained
a mess for about 8 days, then very slowly started to open over the next
week. Now three weeks later it is the largest powderpuff in my
tank and has crawled up onto a very exposed position in full view. (All the
powderpuffs are at the dimmer end of the tank).
2.) I have both solitary and smaller aggregating anemones. The smaller ones
quickly moved around to spots they liked, generally on vertical rock faces
partially in the light of my MH. One of the solitaries did the same. The
other seems to hate the MH, and crawled down into a crevice and closed
most of the time, not eating. This weekend I carefully pealed him off the
rock and moved him to a quiet spot away from the light. By Mon morning
he was open and looking much better, I'm going to try feeding him tonight.
3.) On a happier note, one of my smaller aggregating anemones is in the
process of dividing. It started out about 1.25" in diameter, then stretched
itself into a oval about 4" long by 3/4" wide and is forming a second mouth
and thinning the center of the oval. This has been going on for 3 days so
far and looks like it's got another 1 or 2 to go. Pretty weird, but neat.
I guess my conclusions and other observaions are:
1) Temperate anemones are tough, don't give up on them too easily. If it
looks like position is the problem, they can be successfully moved with a
bit of gentleness.
2) Some like light others not. My giant green is directly under the MH
in about 10" of water and is wide open all the time. Some of the aggragating
are in pretty full light 14 - 18" down.
3) The aggregating anemones like to wedge into rocks on vertical faces
particularly with water flow past them. The smaller ones seem to like
very strong current.
4) It amazes me how much anemones move around, several inches a day isn't
uncommon until they find a spot they deem satisfactory.
5) Anemones aren't really very smart, for example, they'll attempt to
eat seaweed if it floats against them. They do seem to slowly learn
however as they stop after a few days.
The Krib
Marine/Reefs
The Krib