Lighting Question for Rose BTA

[Rig]

My current lighting setup has 2x65 pc (Dual Daylight (10,000K & 6,700K), Dual Actinic (460nm & 420nm). Would a rose bta be happier if I replaced the Actinic with another dual daylight? Would it matter much, i.e. is it worth the aesthetic sacrifice? Thanks.

[zhenya]

Hi Rig,

Your best bet would be to replace your lights with the metal halides, for your anemone's sake.
On a more specific base, how large is your tank and most of all, how long it's been set up? Most of the Entacmaea quadricolor anemones come from relatively shallow waters and require pretty intense light.
In my experience, they can survive under VHO lighting but for a long term success metal halides bulbs would be the best.

[Rig]

Its 26 G, its pretty much going to be specifically for the BTA. I'm building up the sand bed about 5-6", so it should be pretty shallow. I'll build up the rockwork in such a way too, that if the anenome so chooses it can climb. I've done a fair amount of looking around on the subject, and it seems that a good number of btas tend to "hide" from metal halides and actually prefer lesser lighting. I was more concerned about actual wavelength preferences. Also, since the tank is on the small side, I've no interest in the anenome growing at top speed. If need be, for health reasons, I'll feed it a little more often than I would with stronger lights. This site is one of the ones that seems to support anenomes and pc lighting. http://www.freewebs.com/karenssaltwater/lighting.htm

Todd

[Poseidon]

LOL!!! So Anemones hide from Metal Halides?



That is a picture of Genes E. Quad, I guess maybe someone should tell the anemone!

Zhenya may not be a marine biologist, but I challenge you to find someone else that has had his success with anemones! Not trying to be a dink here, but just cause it is printed doesn't mean it is true! I think those who keep anemones without the proper INTENSE lighting and manage to keep them alive are more LUCKY then good!

This is a SUCCESS?

Where's the ANEMONE???

[Ninong]

This site is one of the ones that seems to support anenomes and pc lighting. http://www.freewebs.com/karenssaltwater/lighting.htm

Todd,

This is what Karen had to say about her BTAs:

They do not REQUIRE metal halide lighting, in fact they hide from such bright light UNTIL FULLY ADJUSTED TO WHICH COULD TAKE WEEKS OF ACCLIMIZATION. They will thrive under PC lighting very well IF YOU HAVE ROCKWORK THAT THEY CAN CLIMB UP ON TO REACH MORE LIGHT IF THEY FEEL THE NEED TO.


Quite true. However, in most tanks, metal halide lighting is the best option. Her tank is rather shallow and now she has it lit with SIX T5's. That's strong lighting.

It's perfectly normal for newly introduced bubble tip anemones to hide out while they adjust to their new environment.

[Ninong]

LOL!!! So Anemones hide from Metal Halides?



That is a picture of Genes E. Quad, I guess maybe someone should tell the anemone!

Zhenya may not be a marine biologist, but I challenge you to find someone else that has had his success with anemones! Not trying to be a dink here, but just cause it is printed doesn't mean it is true! I think those who keep anemones without the proper INTENSE lighting and manage to keep them alive are more LUCKY then good!

This is a SUCCESS?

Where's the ANEMONE???

What do you mean "where's the anemone?" They're all over the place. That's a 65-gal tank and she has SEVERAL small rose BTAs in there scattered all over.

[Rig]

Ok, first I did not say "all". Second I have a feeling that picture was a random pics of lights, since it was from a lighting section of the page. If you browse around the site you'll see anenomes, that to me look healthy, but, im no marine biologist either. http://www.freewebs.com/karenssaltwa...rentcolors.htmI simply said a good number of btas shy away from mh light, which by no means means the majority, but depending on where the anenome came from, they could prefer lesser light. Also, If you read my post entirely, you'd see that I'm not entirely interested in providing the "best" possible enviornment for the anenome bc that equates to excessive growth. While I want the anenome to be healthy, I do not want it to be getting so much light that it grows into an 18" monster in a year or two. No need for a smart a** reply.

[Rig]

Todd,

This is what Karen had to say about her BTAs:

They do not REQUIRE metal halide lighting, in fact they hide from such bright light UNTIL FULLY ADJUSTED TO WHICH COULD TAKE WEEKS OF ACCLIMIZATION. They will thrive under PC lighting very well IF YOU HAVE ROCKWORK THAT THEY CAN CLIMB UP ON TO REACH MORE LIGHT IF THEY FEEL THE NEED TO.


Quite true. However, in most tanks, metal halide lighting is the best option. Her tank is rather shallow and now she has it lit with SIX T5's. That's strong lighting.

It's perfectly normal for newly introduced bubble tip anemones to hide out while they adjust to their new environment.

Ninong,

I was going more off what she said here. "They will thrive under PC lighting very well if you have rockwork that they can climb up on to reach more light if they feel the need to."

I had read somewhere, and I've forgtten where, about a discussion on wavelenght preferences for anenomes. I don't mean to be stuborn or anything, but I was just trying to make the best of what I'm working with.

[Poseidon]

What do you mean "where's the anemone?" They're all over the place. That's a 65-gal tank and she has SEVERAL small rose BTAs in there scattered all over.

I was being a smart AR$$, just in comparison to Zhenya's the tank lit by t5's is well no comparison.

Rig, please don't take my comment personal, I just think if you can't keep the best possible environment for an animal you should not keep it. I may just be a little more blunt then polite. I'll make the comparison to a dog, if you have a 40lb dog and it requires 32 ounces of food a day to be healthy and playful, I'm sure it would survive on less. Lets say you give it 16 ounces, then you have a lethargic animal that may be prone to illness and a shorter life span. Just cause the anemone is NOT a DOG doesn't mean it should be treated any differently as far as its care is concerned.

[Ninong]

Ninong,

I was going more off what she said here. "They will thrive under PC lighting very well if you have rockwork that they can climb up on to reach more light if they feel the need to."

I had read somewhere, and I've forgtten where, about a discussion on wavelenght preferences for anenomes. I don't mean to be stuborn or anything, but I was just trying to make the best of what I'm working with.

No one's trying to give you a bad time. Some people just thought that her comment that her rose BTAs would "hide from metal halide lighting" was funny. Actually, her complete explanation is quite true.

The six-tube T5 fixture that she is using over her 65-gallon tank seems like sufficient lighting to me for bubble tip anemones. I'm not sure exactly how much PC lighting you can fit over your tank??? You may not be able to get sufficient intensity over your size tank without going to a 150w metal halide lamp???

You can compensate to a certain extent by feeding the anemone three times a week. They eat like pigs and need to be fed at least twice a week to stay healthy.

[Rig]

Ok, then why is there a tang in your tank, or a trigger that gets to be 12" long? Is that the "best possible environment" for that animal? A dog is a domestic animal, for the most part. Fish/Anenomes are not, so a comparison there does not really work. In just about any situation, a dog is better off under the care of a human. This is a discussion you can have on just about an aquarium inhabitant. I don't mean to be a smart ass either.

[Ninong]

Perhaps zhenya will be kind enough to tell you what size his BTA (singular) was when he started out and how fast it grew (AND MULTIPLIED) and how many he gave away. I have to ask him to post it because I lost track of exactly how many he has now.

[Rig]

The tanks a bowfront, so I really have only about 11" in depth to work with in terms of mounting things. I'm living in an apartment, with an already skeptic landlord about my flooding his place. He is also very set against my drilling into his ceiling to install a light for some fish. If there was a 150W mh unit, that sat un legs over the tank, and was no wider than 11", I'd go with it, but I looked and came up empty. I've read that actinics do nothing for anenomes, and I was thinking about doubleing up the daylight bulbs, In which case my 130W would be more likeable to anothers 260 which I think oughta be enough. Maybe I'm way off, I was just tossing this idea around. Any splits, I'll be giving away at local meetings or to the lfs.

[Poseidon]

Ok, then why is there a tang in your tank, or a trigger that gets to be 12" long? Is that the "best possible environment" for that animal? A dog is a domestic animal, for the most part. Fish/Anenomes are not, so a comparison there does not really work. In just about any situation, a dog is better off under the care of a human. This is a discussion you can have on just about an aquarium inhabitant. I don't mean to be a smart ass either.

Well the tangs and trigger are not full size yet, so YES, I am providing them with the best possible environment. I do have plans to relocate them to larger systems when the time arises. Their new homes will be 600 gallons or more, in volume. Right now they are all relatively small, less then 6" in length. I guess I look at it differently then others, if I know for SURE that an animal, fish, coral, or invertabrate will not have the right conditions in my tank, I will pass. Okay I know my trigger WILL EAT ASTREA snails and I keep buying them, but at least the trigger is directly benefiting from the snails consumption. Another point is I was given my Naso Literatus as a birthday gift, I would not have chosen that particular species myself, but it is doing very well for me. Ignorance is not an excuse, but it may end up being a reason that we keep things in our tanks that maybe we should not.

Ultimately the decision is yours, you may do very well and keep the anemone alive for a long time under PC, but I think you will find more success if you choose to keep it under MH. If MH was not better then PC why on earth would ANYBODY use it? THey cost more at start up, more on the monthly bill, and produce TONS of heat! BUT they WORK! I kept lots of softies under PC, even had a SPS under it, POcilliopora, it stayed the same size and didn't appear to GROW AT ALL, until I added the MH, then POW! It was almost instant growth and LOTS of babies!

You are correct in my example using a domestic dog, versus a wild caught creature, don't you think the fact that it is WILD (for the most part) makes us the ultimately responsible for it care? Just like the dog?

I'm sorry if you felt my comments were an attack. They were not intended that way, it just seemed funny to me that someone would suggest PC over MH. Especially when I am so familiar with the success Zhenya has had with his system!

[Rig]

I think the problem is we're viewing "success" differently here. While zhenya's btas look fantastic and are "successful", in a 26 gallon tank, they would probably be dead, or very unhealthy. Im guessing anyways. I'd think the nitrates would get quite high.

My idea of "success" Is keeping a bta healthy, while not having it grow at an alarming rate. I realize that my environment will not be the best possible, but I think it is one where it is possible to keep the anenome alive and well, for some time anyway. Sure, left unchecked, some day it would consume the tank, but I am anticipating having a bigger tank at some point, and have full faith in my ability to find it a home if need be.

I have no problem with your inhabitants, I think your tank is great. I merely brought it up as a quick response to "I just think if you can't keep the best possible environment for an animal you should not keep it." Our tanks will never be that, in my opinion, even for a 2" fish.

The dog thing is different because we bred the dogs, basically as human servants. They're different the sense that they technically arent wild, and are meant to be under our care. Obviously this isn't the case with fish.

P.S. When I brought up the astrea thing on the other thread, I was not being a snail activist or anything, I was just curious.

[Rig]

Hmm.. I really have got to stop with the choppy sentences

[Reefland]

Rig,

If you search around a bit, you should be able to find a suitable 150w halide that you can "sit" on your tank. I understand your concern about hanging the fixture from the ceiling so I mention this as you should be able to come up with another way. For 2 years I used small square stand that sat on top of our tank with the pendents for our halides sitting on top of them; it wasn't elegant but it worked. In my opinion, this option would be much better for the anemone than the PC's. Whether you use all daylight or a mix of daylight and actinic, it's not going to be no where near the intensity as the single 150w mh.

[zhenya]

OK, this thread seems to start getting off track and I will try post something that will be as helpful as I can possibly make it,my writing skills suck. So, be warned!

As Ninong pointed out, the anemone could and probably will survive under the PC or VHO lighting, providing that tou can fit enough bulbs in the canopy. And, ultimately, here's where your plan seem to work in a totally opposite direction from what it were ,originally.

My idea of "success" Is keeping a bta healthy, while not having it grow at an alarming rate. I realize that my environment will not be the best possible, but I think it is one where it is possible to keep the anenome alive and well, for some time anyway. Sure, left unchecked, some day it would consume the tank, but I am anticipating having a bigger tank at some point, and have full faith in my ability to find it a home if need be.

Your idea of "success" may be worked out as planned, providing that you can keep it healthy enough to survive untill that time when you can get a larger tank. My question would be, how would you keep it "healthy" and small enough to not overtake your 26 gallons aquarium? Will you not feed it enough to stay small? With PC lighting you'll probably need to feed it more often than I'd have to keeping mine under matal halides, which in itself will require more maintenance in terms of water changes and filtration would have to be designed to keep up with the waste. Now, having said that, a single DE 150W bulb over your tank would probably be enough to allow you to feed your anemone once a week. It would probably have enough energy to survive but not grow( I cannot support this with any references), I am only guessing.

My idea of healthy anemone is a little different from yours, I think. I think of it in terms of growth and ability to reproduce. Doesn't necessarily makes it a right idea for everyone but it does for me. I also think that keeping aquarium does come with responsibilities but this is another story.
What Mike was trying to say( I am only guessing here) is that why get an animal if you intend on "keeping it in check" and don't allow it to grow to its full potential and reproduce... A fair question I would think...but anyway, I hope you didn't take it as a personal attack on you. We are all pasionate about our hobby

Perhaps zhenya will be kind enough to tell you what size his BTA (singular) was when he started out and how fast it grew (AND MULTIPLIED) and how many he gave away. I have to ask him to post it because I lost track of exactly how many he has now.

Well, here's a gist of it. I bought my rose E.quadricolor in August 2002, IIRC, for my 110g tank lit by two 175w and two 5' VHO bulbs. The size of the animal coming out of the bag were roughly 4" and settled in quite nicely in a few days and did not move after that for at least 4 month. I fed it about three times per week and it was not really growing much.Shortly there after it divided into two and both animals begun to seek more light and started to move up on the rocks, stinging and killing many corals on the way... In a few month( I believe it was 9 month or so) one of the animals split again, this time into three and I had 5 animals to content with... and feed. I bought larger skimmer and upgraded lighting to two 250W metal halides thinking that perhaps my enemones will stay put and won't seek higher grounds.Well, I was wrong, they did what they like to do in nature, hide their foot in the crevice of the rock and than expand their oral disks over and out towards sunlight. In my aquarium it equals to taking oproximately over the entire tank if you consider that I had 5 anemones in there. I removed as much corals as I could and transfered them in newly seet up 75g tank that I planned to have as a softies tank at the time.
I started to feed less( one or two times a week) but anemones continued to grow in size and reproduce. I had given two clones to a friend here locally and send one clone to Dr.Shimek as a present( which he luckily for me accepted).
My life started to look brighter at that point but that wasn't a lasting moment becouse anemones started to split even faster and now I am proud owner of 9 animals in a 110g tank that I decided to give to them. They all hosted by a single Amphiprion clarkii which is the meanest fish that i ever had a "pleasure" to keep( and I have scars to prove it ).

OK, I think I better stop right here.

Tod, the thing about this particular anemones is that I don't believe they need to get to a certain size to divide, they can do it being quite small.If you can find a home for new clones that it is not a problem but more and more people realize now that keeping one in a reef aquarium is not that simple unless it is a huge tank.They ultimately take over by splitting and producing clones- that is how they are found in nature, in the clumps of many animals that make it appear as one huge anemone. In the Ocean it take about 50cm or little more and is nothing but a speck on the big map of things, in our tanks it is quite different.
Anemones have no brain, as you hopefully know, so if environment is correct they will do what they are genetically predisposed to do. ;)

Anyway, where was I? Oh, yes, if you have more questions or feel that i can help you with anything, just ask and I'll try to do my best to answer or help.
Now, about that "lights" statement by Karen, it was her observation and should be treated as such. I wouldn't think of doubting that that is what she saw in her tank, however, I would have to disagree that anemone were hiding from the lighting to seek less of it. I agree with Ninong that it was probably an initial response upon introduction to an aquarium and should be expected.

Sorry for such long post... Whew!

[Rig]

Thanks for the reply gene, that was very helpful.

Right now I have this as my lighting,
http://www.premiumaquatics.com/Merch...ode=currentusa

Maybe theres someway I could take out the the pcs and lunar lights, and put in an 150 10k blueline or something. The metal halide would melt through the acryllic splash cover though im guessing? And would i need to use a different reflector? It seems like it would be pretty easy to do if that were the case. What do you think about that?

[zhenya]

Thanks for the reply gene, that was very helpful.

Right now I have this as my lighting,
http://www.premiumaquatics.com/Merch...ode=currentusa

Maybe theres someway I could take out the the pcs and lunar lights, and put in an 150 10k blueline or something. The metal halide would melt through the acryllic splash cover though im guessing? And would i need to use a different reflector? It seems like it would be pretty easy to do if that were the case. What do you think about that?

Todd,

I persoanlly wouldn't attemp to retrofit that fixture with any metal halide bulbs, it's just not design for it and quite narrow and short to house any of those intensly hot bulbs and yes, the 150W DE bulb will melt any plastic that is close enough to it. If you would like to have a single metal halide bulb over a 25g tank then using small fixture designed for it is the way to go, like the pendants made by either Blueline or some other manufacturer. There are tons of them out there and some are very reasonable and quite elegant looking.

I forgot to mention in my post the real answer to your question,ie. if you need to change one of the bulbs becouse of the spectrum of the bulb. In my experience, the spectrum of the bulb didn't matter much as I had bulbs from 10K to 20K and everything in between over my anemone tank. The only difference I noticed was how the color of anemone appeared under certain spectrum bulbs to my eye.
Intensity is what I think is important thing to consider when we talking about the lighting for anemones and I found that on a 24" tall tank( or even on 18" tall tank) nothing works better than the metal halide bulbs. And even with the two 250W halide bulbs my anemones eventually migrated to the top of the reef structure to get the most of it. None would ever shy away from it.

Do you already have the anemone or you still researching it?