Marine Depot Forums / TEAM Marine Depot / Marine Systems and Husbandry – by Anthony Calfo / Fragging BTA's / Latest Posts

RE: Fragging BTA's

teco — Sun, 10 Jun 2007 02:05:19 GMT

Ah, thanks Anthony for pointing out my mistake. I have always been compleatly under the assumption that anemonies could easily be overfed and that 2x a day could be excessive since if the food was too much to digest excess energy and associated stress with regurgitation?

I can see your point with waterchanges if temp, ph etc are the same, makes sense.

OK, back to Anthony's book of Prop 101

RE: Fragging BTA's

Reefski — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 11:56:56 GMT

thanks for the quick response, nice to see you back on the board.

i have made an inquiry from coralfrenzy.com about where/how to obtain it. right now i am using the Borneman recipe for feeding. i have a couple of different recipes, with and without the bigger items, (chopped clams, shrimp, fish, mussels, etc.)

my anemones do seem to like either one but i am not cutting them in half yet. i am also target feeding them lots of Mysis. is that good?

i am looking forward to seeing you at MASLAC next month.

Carl

RE: Fragging BTA's

Anthony Calfo — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 11:34:27 GMT

since the anemone mouths are usually cut/healing, etc... I prefer super fine foods (coral-frenzy.com, golden pearls, etc) so the matter sticks to the mucous/tentacles and still gets digested (secondarily). Heavy fish loads are very helpful too (grouper or eel in the anemone tank)

RE: Fragging BTA's

Reefski — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 11:31:21 GMT

Anthony-- what is your favorite food or mix of foods for anemone farming?

RE: Fragging BTA's

Anthony Calfo — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 09:03:19 GMT

yikes... I'm not being grumpy here teco, but you are categorically wrong in every statement here:

I'd guess you are likley feeding too much and possibly doing too many waterchanges. Anemonies like many other photosynthetic creatures dont require multiple feedings per day. They wont shrivel away on you. 50% waterchanges daily can be a big stresse

I will define my qualifications on this topic by saying I have farm cultured many hundreds (maybe over 1000) anemones... consulted aquaculture farms in Sri Lanka and Tonga on anemone farming, answered unnumbered posts on this subject, etc.

salient points:

- no such thing as too much or too large of a water change. Consider the tides and these tidal reef creatures we keep. If the saltwater is simply the correct pH, temp, salinity... its all good (I do 100% WCs weekly on my farm tanks for over ten years now)

- anemones need heavy feeding (daily or nearly so) if there is not a heavy fish load to support them. On the scale of autotrophy... these are staggeringly hungry cnidarians

- the reason that underfed corals and anemones don't "shrivel" is because they are starving from a daily (however small) deficit. They swell in time to pan for more light and expand their tissue to hopefully trap more food on their tissue/mucous. Its a sign of hunger... not growth.

RE: Fragging BTA's

forestal — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 17:08:27 GMT

Liza, first off, the anemonae may not visibly grow, but if they healed from the initial cuts and are feeding that shows they are doing ok.

twice a week 50%water changes I do not think are excessive, but do make sure the water is aerated and the proper salinity and temp to minimize stress

What are you feeding them... you want small particle ground food/cyclopeeze/rotifers/mysis or mixture of various things, but it must be small...

BTA's will regurgitate the waste as they have only one opening...so expect a lot of poop

signs of stress of BTA's often include inflation of size, swelling of mouth...if the color is brownish and they are not swelling, then they may actually be doing quite well...

a major key to propagtion is to be familiar with the care of the animal first (not trying to be critical) and to keep the animal in a stable environment for 3-4 months stable and feeding well before cutting...once this is good, you can safely cut 1-2x/month

pictures would also be great to see your setup as well as helping assess your little ones.

RE: Fragging BTA's

teco — Sat, 02 Jun 2007 11:45:45 GMT

Hi, not Anthony here, I'd guess you are likley feeding too much and possibly doing too many waterchanges. Anemonies like many other photosynthetic creatures dont require multiple feedings per day. They wont shrivel away on you. 50% waterchanges daily can be a big stresser also, especially if the temp or other factors are off a bit.

Anemonies are pretty messy animals to begin with so the more you feed the more the water quality will reflect that. I would shift feedings to every few 3-4 days or so and see where that takes you. Also, if you havent, a good quality skimmer would make a huge difference. What you are seeing goo wise is probably waste or uneaten digested food, best to get that out of there.

Good luck and read all you can on the subject, and remember to be patient.

RE: Fragging BTA's

thinthinlizzy — Fri, 01 Jun 2007 18:56:23 GMT

Hi Everyone,

I am propogating a rose bubble anemone and for the last month and a half or so I have been religiously doing a water change twice a week (50%), feeding them twice a day, providing water flow (through an air pump) and lighting (four 40 watt bulbs over 30 gallon tank). I am confused as to why the anemones have not been feeling well. I cut them about 2 months ago and wanted to grow these until they are about 5'' before I cut them again. But they really don't seem to grow at all or very little.

Most of the day they are sort of brownish/pale color, deflated, and are not too responsive to food. On occasion (usually after the water change) they open up and start suddenly grabbing food out of my hands but then return to their depressed state. I also noticed that there's brown goo comming out of their mouths (i think usually during the nighttime because i see it in the morning when i turn on the lights on the tank). My boyfriend is a reefkeeper and he thinks they are throwing up. Now I only feed them when they look good but they turn brown again once I feed them!

I am sort of confused and not sure how I can help them. Any info would be appreciated.

I'll post some pics later,

Thanks,

Liza

RE: Fragging BTA's

chrismo — Sat, 12 May 2007 11:57:13 GMT

Hello,

I have been slowly fragging my anemones for a few months now, and until today, I had been cutting them on a big glass plate. Today I used a plastic cutting board and I must say it is so much easier, which makes for a cleaner cut I believe. The anemone doesnt slide as much on plastic. The glass doesnt have enough friction.

So if your cutting in a bowl, or on a plate, try a cutting board! I don't cook, so I had to buy one. They are worth the $10.

Chris

12 Red, 4 Green BTA's

RE: Fragging BTA's

Anthony Calfo — Wed, 25 Apr 2007 20:27:51 GMT

It was Jay that replied, Liza (not me, my friend).

But as Jay has pointed out, please check the archives first as we have a wealth of information waiting for you there. Go to the top of my forum here and click on the sticky called "Favorite links" and inthere you will see a lot of articles and information. The "discussion" post down the page is perhaps most useful of all since it has alphabetized and detailed thread entries for almost any subject you can think of.

Kindly, Anth-

RE: Fragging BTA's

thinthinlizzy — Wed, 25 Apr 2007 15:55:27 GMT

Thank you for replying Anthony.

I do read everything I can find on this subject. Thank you for the link.

What exactly do you mean by "fish waste"? What exactly can i feed an anemone that is small enough for it to absorb it through the skin? And can i use it as a tease right before feeding? (to train them to be ready to eat at the same time each day).

-liza

RE: Fragging BTA's

Jaymeany — Wed, 25 Apr 2007 02:48:10 GMT

on a quick look I believe this is the link http://forum.marinedepot.com/Topic44257-13-1.aspx

RE: Fragging BTA's

Jaymeany — Wed, 25 Apr 2007 02:45:47 GMT

Liza,
Please check out the sticky posts atop this forum. I have found so much info on there (someone asked a similar question to yours and I believe it is in there). Also use wetwebmedia.com I spend countless hours on there. If the nems haven't formed a mouth yet they cannot eat chunks of food. However, they can absorb food through their "skin". Fish waste and small foods dissolve easily for the nem. Try adding a hardy fish, something other then a clownfish or domino damsel due to it hosting in the nem. Make sure you are doing big water changes and that the new water is a near perfect match to the aquarium water. Sorry if any of this is redundant or doesn't make sense, my puppy got me up at 4 this morning.

RE: Fragging BTA's

thinthinlizzy — Tue, 24 Apr 2007 16:34:45 GMT

Hi Anthony!

I recently set up a small saltwater fishtank for propogating rose BTA and I've been told by my boyfriend (who's a regular contributor to all kinds of marine forums including this one) about you. We are very excited to try and propogate these anemonies but he is more into hard corals and fish and does not know much about a rose BTA. I was wondering if you could give us an advice.

The tank is just 30 gallons but it seems to be more than enough for our first 4 anemonies. Last Monday, I made the first cut. The only thing is that they've been sort of wondering around and not healing very fast. I am concerned that I am doing something wrong. A 30-gallon tank is a pretty small tank and i've had 80 watts of lighting right over it (thinking maybe lack of light is causing them to move all over the place; they were literally moving one on top of the other!). Do you think adding 80 watts more to what i have will make them happier?

Also, how many days does one have to wait to feed an anemonie after it is cut? I fed it a tiny piece of frozen raw shrimp next day; it "grabbed" it out of my hand and seemed very happy but then, over the next few days, it turned brown. They are now getting better but I would like to avoid doing the same mistake.

And one more! If the anemonie is not really responding to a piece of nice fresh shrimp you are trying to feed it, does it mean it is still full after its last meal? (last meal was a week ago)

Eagerly waiting to hear back from you,

Liza

RE: Fragging BTA's

Anthony Calfo — Fri, 17 Feb 2006 10:53:08 GMT

well said, my friend... it's great to hear of the success stories, but we must be careful about promoting them. Specifically, the problem is that if many good aquarists try to "save" sick, stressed, bleached, etc ritteri anemones because they are inspired by such stories... it actually does more harm! Even if they overcome the challenge of rescuing an anemone for the LFS, it saves only one life at the expense of more than a few others. This is because the sale of such anemones usually spurs the LFS to order anotrher one. But more than one anemone will die in collection, holding or transit on average just to get one viable one to the LFS. This is the dark side of "saving" creatures. IMO, the best thing we can do for the reef and such species at large is to send a message to the merchants that we (consumers) will not buy inappropriate animals. The merchnats only obey ecomonics... and unwanted specimens are lost profits. We must allow inappropriate species to stay unsold even if they must die. It will serve the species better in the long run and has been proven to train merchants to order better (as evidenced by the reduction of obligate coral polyp feeding butterflies, spanish dancer snails, etc.)

RE: Fragging BTA's

Jadran — Fri, 17 Feb 2006 02:51:23 GMT

Well, thats politically correct and I agree with that statement.. I wasn't aiming fot it, but tricked in buying one.. Soon enough I realised it wasn't Entacmaea but at that point I was already stucked with it.
It was badly bleached and generally in sad shape but I decided to give it a try and after two years I can proudly say I brought it back form the dead and have an healty specimen... Still, I know succes stories are fiew, and that one shouldn't encourage people to do the same.. It might be good idea to make sticky thread about animals generally to be avoided,

pm,

M.

RE: Fragging BTA's

Anthony Calfo — Thu, 16 Feb 2006 20:43:00 GMT

I'm almost sorry you asked since you are giving me the opportunity to soapbox, but...

I will not publically recommend the keeping of magnificnt anemones. They are one of the very few reef creatures that I think should be limited or restricted from collection. Their rates of survival in transit are poor, their percentage of survivors in captivity that survive to see a few months in aquaria, let alone one year, is simply dismal... and above all, their sustainability in the wild is horrifying even if none of the aforementioned were an issue. Rates of reproduction in the wild are extremely slow... and rates of recovery from collection are to be measured in years/decades... not weeks/months as with Acropora and other (very) suitable species for aquarium use. It's tragic

I simply do not see the use of this particular living resource as serving the greater good. And I do not think we will get enough specimens into private hands to develop propagation programs anytime in the near future.

Instead... most folks like yourself use them casually (not breeding attempts). Worse still is that they get put in garden reef tanks with corals. I'm not exaggerating when I say that to ponder this reality makes me sad

PM me and I will give you specific advice for your already captive specimen.

RE: Fragging BTA's

Jadran — Thu, 16 Feb 2006 09:09:50 GMT

"ritteri"/magnifica" anemones do not seem to be as amenable to date. That is largely do to the poor condition most are imported in or living in aquaria. In the latter case, few people give them enouhg light (very demanding!)..

sorry for off topic question: I was wondering what would you suggest as sufficient lighting for magnificent sea anemone? Mine is directly under MH 400w (giesemann 14000K)... At first I wanted to get 1000w one but decided not to..

thx.

RE: Fragging BTA's

Anthony Calfo — Wed, 15 Feb 2006 22:11:44 GMT

fabulous to see and read updates. Thanks kindly!

RE: Fragging BTA's

Mark — Wed, 08 Feb 2006 02:06:39 GMT

Looks good! Congrats.

RE: Fragging BTA's

Hoopsguru — Tue, 07 Feb 2006 18:38:53 GMT

Just an updated picture of one of the healed up halves. I have since cut another with the same success.

RE: Fragging BTA's

Mark — Fri, 20 Jan 2006 23:27:03 GMT

Would the optimal prop tank be bare bottomed?

IMO, not for anemones. An optimal anemone recovery tank would:

Provide crevices/overhangs/substrate (depending upon the type of anemone) that allows the anemone to keep its entire pedal disc and column in an unlighted area; and
Provide an appropriate attachment point for the pedal disc (the anemones are much pickier about this than I suspected); and
Provide lighting and flow similar to the conditions that existed in the location from which the anemone was removed.

- Mark

RE: Fragging BTA's

Mark — Fri, 20 Jan 2006 23:09:27 GMT

Despite having kept this E. quadricolor anemone and it's clones for a number of years and having witnessed many splits, I'd never been able to observe how they move or how they heal after splitting to my satisfaction. Manually splitting the anemone provided the opportunity to do both those things, so I went to the trouble of setting up a dedicated hospital tank specifically to be able to observe the recovery. I don't want to dilute this thread with a bunch of details, but suffice it to say, I had to take about a hundred pictures to get the ones shown above.... particularly the one of the column.

The anemones are amazingly good at cinching the cut sides together and moving such that the slit portion is never exposed to the light. Shortly after being cut, they're quite "clumsy" while moving around, almost as though they're not aware that a portion of their pedal disc is missing. I'd love to understand more about the neurology of these animals.

In any event, I manipulated lighting, flow and available attachment points to coax the anemones into positions for the pictures. It's a process I believe could be very stressful for the anemones and isn't something I'd recommend.

- Mark

RE: Fragging BTA's

Hoopsguru — Fri, 20 Jan 2006 22:36:39 GMT

Would the optimal prop tank be bare bottomed? I was hesitant to do so since all the BTA I see at the LFS in the holding tanks, even under reef lighting, do not seem to expand. I couldn't help but put in so LR rubble but it has made it a bit difficult to photograph and monitor progress.

RE: Fragging BTA's

Hoopsguru — Fri, 20 Jan 2006 22:28:33 GMT

Mark

Excellent pictures! I wasn't quite far enough in thinking to establish how I would take pictures of the healing process. Did you remove yours to the bowl to get the pictures....any observed stress from going from tank to bowl and back?

One, I am all but positive, has all but healed as it has an observable round column again....going to give one more day to take a closer look and see if the oral disc is reformed.

RE: Fragging BTA's

Anthony Calfo — Fri, 20 Jan 2006 12:52:40 GMT

Indeed.. "ritteri"/magnifica" anemones do not seem to be as amenable to date. That is largely do to the poor condition most are imported in or living in aquaria. In the latter case, few people give them enouhg light (very demanding!) and most people mix them with corals. Both are ticktets to poor success in propagating them IMO.

Most other anemones, including carpet/saddle species, have respeonded very favorably to such fragmentation. This all presumes of course that we are farming from hardy, well fed, established animals.

RE: Fragging BTA's

steve-s — Fri, 20 Jan 2006 07:47:02 GMT

Anthony,

Are there any species that you would be wary of propogating in this manner or are all equally "safe"? Given they are well established/cared for and the water parameters condusive to recovery after the fact...

The main reason for my question being, I have a H. Magnifica (7+years) that is now approaching 2½ feet and in need of either a new home or a larger tank.

Cheers
Steve

RE: Fragging BTA's

forestal — Thu, 19 Jan 2006 06:58:57 GMT

no doubt, my heart stopped as i picked up the rock and felt the tear...but it worked out...

RE: Fragging BTA's

Anthony Calfo — Wed, 18 Jan 2006 23:42:37 GMT

it's testimony to their great hardiness indeed! But we want to avoid tearing as a method of propagation.

RE: Fragging BTA's

forestal — Wed, 18 Jan 2006 23:36:12 GMT

whilst moving my bta's to a species tank, i while leaning over and picking up a rock it was attached to i discovered too late its foot was equally holding fast to another rock in the tank as well and it tore in half.
much to my pleasure both halves are happy, the smaller one without a mouth is fully expanded and i think developing a mouth, but the pedal disc was sealed completely within 2 days.

RE: Fragging BTA's

Anthony Calfo — Wed, 18 Jan 2006 19:45:09 GMT

I was recently consulting a coral farmer in LA when we got down to the nitty gritty of what species I thought they should abandon and which they should take on when I spied a tank full of Heteractis malu anemones. Mind you, we had just come back from the local hardware store where I talked them into buying an electric wet saw to let me show them just how many species of coral you can slash right through. They had such a good time watching the show up to that point that my request to dive into their anemone tank was not likely to be declined So after chopping a bunch of anemones in half they had my promise that they would not easily be able to tell the split halves form the untouched specimens in an hour. They were having trouble believing at first But after we took a short additional tour of their facility and got some photo ops in (maybe 90 mintues) we all peered into the vat of cut and uncut anemones and... well, no surprise here The cut halves had cinched closed and then fully expanded theyr tentacles again among a "crowd" of other uncut anemones to the extent that we could not ID the fragged ones without waving tentacles down to look for cuts.

In hindsight, we must reckon that pysiologically there is no reason why these such animals should not be as amenable to bilateral division as so many other cnidarians we have been cutting for years. I think many folks are reticent just because anemones generally cost so much more per "polyp."

RE: Fragging BTA's

Amphiprion — Wed, 18 Jan 2006 19:31:13 GMT

Very nice (and speedy) recovery. I love to see pics like this.

RE: Fragging BTA's

Mark — Wed, 18 Jan 2006 17:58:19 GMT

Looks great! (But if that's a green BTA I'm in need of a visit to the optometrist)

I found the healing process fascinating:

Before:

Right after cutting:

One day later:

Pedal disc after two days:

Pedal disk after five days:

Column after seven days:

- Mark

RE: Fragging BTA's

edkruzel — Wed, 18 Jan 2006 15:31:11 GMT

Congrats!!!
I'll slice and dice on softies and SPS, I'll even crack and cut large LPS like bubble and elegance, but I can't bring myself to cut an anemone.
Not sure why, I just can't.

Glad to see your success though...

Ed

RE: Fragging BTA's

Hoopsguru — Wed, 18 Jan 2006 15:08:21 GMT

Absolutely, after observing colonies splitting on their own it really isn't that different of circumstances for them to heal from. Although, admittedly, I have balked at posting this around the net from much of the taboo about the procedure (I still remember folks around the display tank at TFP claiming how they would not survive)....hopefully seeing will be believing for everyone.

I plan on doing more, and will take pictures of the process to add to this thread. I have had the good fortune of harvesting 10 clones from my original "parent" anemone through natural division so I have a good, hardy (relatively speaking) colony to start with manual splitting.

RE: Fragging BTA's

Anthony Calfo — Wed, 18 Jan 2006 14:12:10 GMT

outstanding my friend... thank you so much for sharing! I will note this thread in my fav list of links and we can all work in time to build this up nicely

Indeed, anemone propagation is no different than most other cnidarians. Well fed, well conditioned specimens can usually, simply be cut in half. Sharp blade, good water flow and no stressful light changes insure a fast recovery. Feeding organismally is not so important for weeks afterwards especially when the tank has a typical bioload which affords opportuinities for feeding by absorption.

Fragging BTA's

Hoopsguru — Wed, 18 Jan 2006 13:48:06 GMT

After seeing your presentation with the sebae anemones at That Fish Place a few months ago, I wanted to share that I finally have a BTA frag tank setup and cut my first green E. quadricolor. The picture shows the two halves about a half hour after the procedure. It has now been 4 days and they still look fine. It's hard to believe without seeing it that this is not only possible, but relatively easy!