6 gallon eclips with anemone...

[ampeg21]

Hi,

 

I am relativly new to this hobby. A friend gave me his 6 gallon eclips tank about 6 months ago. He left the live sand in it and I accuired some live rock to fill it with. I then went ahead and bought some snails, a hermit crab, 4-5 mushrooms, a small plant, and a yellow striped maroon clown fish. I had this set up for about 4-5 months with no problem. I did a water change about every 3 weeks. Added calcium drops 2 times a week for the mushrooms. The only thing i checked was the specific gravity. (

 

Well anyway, about 3 weeks ago not knowing much about all of this i decided to by an anemone. I was told that the bubble tip was the best choice for a maroon and that they were pretty hardy. I took my bubble tip home with the live rock it was attached to and put it in my tank. The next day it was opened up, had moved to a new spot where its base was shaded from the light and my clown fish was loving it. (very cool to watch). A couple days later i fed it some formula one.

 

Anyway, after getting the anemone i started doing a lot of reaserch and realized that i needed much better lighting than the 8 watt bulb in my tank, so i ordered a 27 watt 6700k pc retrofit assembely off of marine depot.

 

so far the anemone seems to be doing fine. The new bulb kit arrived today and i already installed it. The tank is much brighter and the anemone is fully opened up. I was getting worried because he had been looking kind of poor the last couple of days, sometimes fully closed up in a little ball like i found him this morning. I hope that with the new light he will start to flourish. I dont think that he has lost any color since i bought it. but it did go for 3 weeks with only 8 watts of crappy light.

 

Other things i have done since the anemone has been put in the tank:

I change the water every week now instead of every 3 weeks.

I added a "Bio Chem Zorb" pouch placeing it on top of my filter so that more waste will be taken out of the system.

I also bought a ph tester, its been at about 8.1.

 

Right now the anemone looks very good. I feed it a little piece of formula one about once a week. The clownfish occupies most of its time in it and will spit food into it as well.

 

Do any experts out there have any advice for me to ensure the success of my anemone in my 6 gallon tank? do you think that i have enought light now? Am i changing the water often enough, and am i feeding it the right amount of food at the right times?

 

Any feedback would be great. I really dont want this thing to die on me!!!

 

 

Thankyou,

 

David

[ninhsavestheday]

your maroon clown is going to out grow your tank. you dont have enough lighting in your tank to raise a happy anemone. you might get flamed because of this post. good luck. my advice get MORE LIGHT!

[ampeg21]

i dont think there is any more room under the good of the tank for more light. this was the most light i could find (27 watts) that would fit in this tank. i posted this same thing over at reefcentral and the people there didnt think that i had a problem and offered some advice that i will take regarding the sg levels.

 

i will probably get a new tank in about 6 months or so however.

 

flame away....

[aqua_aaron]

I don't think that you'll have too much of a problem with the 27 watt PC's. However, I would also feed it abt. 1 to 2 times a week to keep it healthy. If you are getting a larger tank for you BTA and maroonclown, might I suggest a 20 long because the tank doesn't have much height so it's easy to get decent light w/ one or two larger bulbs.

(2 x 65 watt PC's or even if your buget allows, 3x65 or maybe 4x65 watt PC's...sweet )

[ampeg21]

thanx for the reply. In the future i would like to get a larger tank but cant right now for various reasons.

im going to feed it twice a week i think. when opened up it is about 5 inches in diameter. i feed it half of one of those formula one chunks. when i do feed it. do you think that is enough?

 

my maroon clown is only about 2.5 in long. ive had it for about 5 months and it hasnt grown at all. i dont feed it too much though. the LFS said that it was probably a year or two old when i bought it. hopefully it wont get too big.

 

any adviece is great.

[Smokin-Reefer]

you really DON'T want to feed it peices to big for the anemone to digest easily. I say, if you can cut it up into even say, 2 more peices, and just feed it 2 times on feeding day, say morning and night, or however your schedule allows, would be better than one large meal. Also, Since you're lighting isn't very intense, I'd feed it around 4 or 5 times a week, maybe even everyday, hell I'd feed it everyday since you're not giving it NEAR enough light. I don't know, thats just my opinion though, and how I'd do things. Hopefully you will have success.

 

good luck.

[Tempest]

I think people overestimate the amount of light needed to keep corals and anenomes alive. 27 watts on a eclipse 6 is ok, though I'd try to get better bulbs (10K or 50/50 10K/.03). Feed the anenome at lest every other day - this will help make up for any inefficiencies in the lighting. I used to feed mine Hikari frozen mysis shrimp with great success. That fish will eventually outgrow the tank. I'd also invest in some test kits to monitor ammonia, nitrite, clacium, magnesium and alkalinity. A pH of 8.1 is ok, but a little low.