so my research tells me BTA like strong lights and decent flow. i have a 10inch tall tank with 4x24w t5ho with 2 clams thats happily living in my tank. i recently added a BTA to the tank this weekend. its a really small piece. around 1inch diameter. ive never owned one before and through my readings, you just drop the anemone in the tank and let it find its happy place.

so here i am. temp matched the bag, and drip acclimated the anemone and put it in the tank. i placed it in some rock and just let it be. it found a place under some rock away from direct light. i thought nothing of it and just left it. i was more concerned about my clown finding the anemone and hosting it.

the next day comes and i see it on the sand bed in the back of my tank which gets little light and low flow. it kinda spew its guts out too. thinking it wasnt able to find a happy place itself, i moved it to a place which i THOUGHT would be good for it. it has good lights and plenty flow. left it to attach itself to rocks and move to a comfortable place. come back a few hours later to find it wedge itself in this hole in the ground, out of the light again.

what the hell is going on with it?

If your water params are good and the nem is alive I would just leave it alone for a while. It will eventually settle in a spot where it wants to be. Check your water and make sure everything is ok and just wait it out. Of course this is all based on my limited experience with BTAs and is basically just my opinion.

thanks nanoty,

my parms should be up to par:
0 trates
0 phos
420-450ppm calcium
9-11dkh
8.2ph
stable 25-26c temp
1.025-1.026sg

well i guess it really is just trying to adjust to my tank. i THINK i found a place it lights. my clownfish found my anemone and started hosting it so its fun to watch...from a distance. i cant get any closer or it will see me and think theres food magically appear in the water again

another question, now my BTA have moved itself ontop of my zoa frag overnight. im assuming the stinging part is in their tips and not the base correct? should i be worried?

Yes the "foot" will not sting, just the tenticles. I would think it would eventually move away from the zoas but they may need to be repositioned if it likes that spot.

thank nanoty, this BTA is weird...it wont stop moving. i guess it doesnt like my tank.

thought ill dig this from the dead to ask a new question

so its been 9 months since i bought the nem and so far its doing good. it found a piece of rock is likes to attach to and never moved after that. i had one clown who tried to host it but the fish died. added 2 black clowns and they never look interest in it which sucks. i really want them to swim around in it...

ANYWAYS, i dont think ive really seen it bubble up. right now it just looks like long sweeping tentacles in my tank. ive always fed it from time to time with frozen mysis and krill. i thought i didnt feed it enough so now everytime i feed it i take half of the block of frozen food and feed it all to the nem while the others for my acan and sun coral. and yet i never seen it bubble up anymore. what gives?

It may take time for you clowns to host in it but, from what I have observed some BTA's just don't bubble up. I have three and out of the three only on bubbles up. Its fine if it doesn't. You should feed it silversides. Here is a page with good info for future reference:

Karen's Anemones

thanks for the site. pretty helpful information. gotta hunt for some silverside now.

Oh god, the ubiquitus Karen's anemone link...

FWIW, I've only seen them stay bubbled under halides IME.

All of mine are fully bubbled under T5-HO

I do hate that website by the way. It does have some good information but people label it as the be all end all information for BTA. I just cant stand the terrible formatting and layout of text.

you hate it because the information is misleading or false? or the design sucks?

Most of the info is actually good, it just seems that all people use it for it to start threads about the bubbly-tips, or lack thereof. o.O

I just hate it because its an eyesore to me. Lines of text ending abruptly and continuing two lines down. The information is valid on it though.

Just a quote to show you, the spacing between lines and cut-off sentences kills me.

Maybe im just mean, i dont know, but i cant stand reading the information there without my head wanting to explode. I'm not the best when it comes to typing or grammar myself, but that site just needs to be cleaned up a bit to make it easier to read. Especially considering the kind of traffic it has to get from people in this hobby.

Maybe you should offer to clean it up. I suspect Karen hasn't ever been told about how to create a more effective site.

I doubt she would give me access to her site, but i guess i can download the whole thing to my computer and see if i can tidy it up a bit. Then email her the new files, she should have her contact info somewhere on there.

Did just ONE of the many pages on her site, check it out, let me know if you guys think its an improvement.

Her original tank size page
My cleaned up version of her page

so i cant find any silverside in hong kong. can i feed other fish meat to the nem?

That looks much better than the original. As for not finding silversides in hong kong, you can feed mysis or raw shrimp that is cut to appropriate size or maybe even clams.

ive been feeding it mysis and krill, but it doesnt want to bubble up.

ill try shrimps and clam

yeah try the fresh shrimp. And it may never bubble up, some are just goofy like that. Mine stay bubbled 95% of the time. They sure do have a "mind" of their own.

I have my BTA in a stock 14g biocube (PC lighting) and he has never moved and has always been bubbled since I got him from my friends nem split. He claimed these guys are bulletproof and I am now a believer. He gave his nem away awhile back and found a split piece in his fuge area months later, still alive the size of a quarter. Since it has split in 3rds and I got one of the babies. I was very concerned at the begining placing him in this tank but he has done amazing, and he came from a biocube (more established then mine though). Had him since June or early July. He has more then doubled in size (Silversides, mysis, Krill, Artic pods) are the main foods I use.

I stopped using silversides lately cause he is already starting to ourgrow the tank with the current coral in it. Working on a new larger tank to move him too or to remove the other corals and just let him own the Biocube by him self. Here is a pic of the nem. All the corals have been moved further away as he grows or placed in a different tank.

http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/vv17/wipndry/DSC06968.jpg