Is this BTA sick?

[ThRoewer]

I got this BTA from Diver's Den and it had been acted strangely since day one.

This was the picture of it posted on DD:



It arrived in a dirty soup of excrement and slime (not really unusual for shipped anemones).

Second day:



Third day:



Spitting out something (food or rather zooxanthellae?)

Fourth day:



Again expelling or secreting something...

[ThRoewer]

Day 5:



Expelling more "stuff" and additionally to that it developed cracks out which mesenterial filaments came out:





Day 6:

Looking a bit "better" but still having mesenterial filaments hanging out:

[ThRoewer]

Day 6 (cont.)



Day 7:



Day 8:



Day 10 (morning):

[ThRoewer]

Day 10 evening:



Day 11, morning:



For the first time hinting its actual size.

Later in the afternoon:



and then in the evening:

[ThRoewer]

Day 12, early morning before lights on:



late afternoon:



night, shortly before lights out:



At first, I thought it may just need some time to adjust but now I think it might be sick. Especially since the other BTAs there now start acting up as well (they were certainly healthy before.)

My suspicion is that it may have been treated at the Diver's Den facility, but not all the way for a full week. Looking back now it looked kind of unwell in the picture they posted. But it just didn't act exactly the way I am used to from sick BTAs.

I contacted Live Aquaria's customer service early on to find out if it had been treated, but the rep just gave me the runaround and played 20 questions.
This is basically a refugium tank, well established and smack full with caulerpa. I don't need to do water test to know that there is no ammonia, nitrite, nor nitrate and phosphate...
Also the other anemones that were put into that tank only a day earlier certainly had no more time to get used to the water in the tank than this one.

[Small Heavens]

Hey, I am sorry to hear about your loss but this Nem is not gonna make it.

I never had bubble tip anemones, but your Nem is dead and you can remove it for burial unfortunately.

[Small Heavens]

When Nems die, it is like cutting off the head of a snake, the body keeps fighting and fighting but the animal is no longer there.

[Small Heavens]

Your Nem must have died in the bag.

The holes showing and releasing tissue, is similar to if a dead human body still looks "kinda" fresh but green patches of rot begins to show clearly on the skin.

You could do nothing, the tank you had it in, was clearly good for it.

[Small Heavens]

They can to try to isolate healthy tissue and they can try to split to get rid of dead tissue - I have read one person say an entire Nem rotted and fell off of its foot but the bottom foot tissue stuck on the rock and a Nem grew back from that.

With a dying Nem, one have to consider the chances to save it, against the risk for other livestock to get stinging cells (or ammonia release ofc.), in your case, other Nems are sharing the water and do not need the exposure to the rotting tissue of their kin.

Anyway, you all tried your best to save it, but it died before reaching the safety of your human settlement, there was nothing more you could do.

The tissue might well bring both stinging cells and rotting material into the water column, keep up water changes, I don't think it has any more contagious risk to your other Nems, than if a human dies and is left rotting near other humans - which means super-duper bad and contagious but mostly just because it is rotting material of the same species.

Your other Nems should do fine if the water remains clean enough but they will try to prevent the water from entering their own tissue since the water is now filling with the decomposition of the dead Nem - antibiotics are not to be used as prevention just because of a risk of infection but only when there is a verified known need for it preferably.

[Small Heavens]

When the Nem turns upside down from gas, it means it is really rotten.

There is simply so much decomposition gas inside the carcass at that point, that even if there is still just enough energy left to move tentacles, it cannot keep buoyant the right way up naturally.

But Nems still move, after they have died, it just does not want to give up fighting, so it keeps urging you on, to keep fighting for it.

If a Nem turns over because of inner gasses, if it deflates completely but have gasses holding up single tentacles straight vertically upwards, and if the skin starts to break, it is dead.

- all this clearly indicates that there is no longer hope for it to be saved, it still have areas of "living" tissue and ...nobody want to take an animal that is actually moving, to its burial.

Its tissues have begun rotting, save the other livestock you have, and take this animal to its "burial".

I am sorry for your loss.

It seem your water was excellent condition because it has been slowing the rotting down considerably by allowing the Nem to fight for the last healthy cells it did have.

[Small Heavens]

I am really sorry about your anemone though

[wow0_0kcb]

same thing happened to my uncles tank, the nem eventually started expelling like a milky white acid and killed literally everything in a 150 gallon tank. get it out and isolate it while you still can!

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[slief]

Originally Posted by ThRoewer

I don't need to do water test to know that there is no ammonia, nitrite, nor nitrate and phosphate...

I’ve been keeping BTA’s for close to 20 years now. That could be part of the issue if in fact you truly don’t have nitrates or phoshates. BTA’s are photosynthetic filter feeders and don’t usually do well in the absence of sufficient nutrients like nitrates and po4. Depending on the water this BTA came out of, a lack of suffient nutrients could be part of the issue. I’ve got one BTA that I’ve had for well over 12 years and I maintain pretty high nutrient levels in my tank at 25 ppm nitrate and .25 Po4. My BTA’s thrive and I never feed them. I also have them under really strong light. Not saying that’s your issue but if the BTA was “sick” from the supplier, I would have expected it be long since dead after the stress of transport and acclimation.

[ThRoewer]

Originally Posted by slief

... but if the BTA was “sick” from the supplier, I would have expected it be long since dead after the stress of transport and acclimation.

My suspicion is that DD did treat this anemone with antibiotics but didn't do the full 6 to 7 days that would be necessary to be sure the pathogen is eradicated.

I found that different anemones behave somewhat differently when they are sick. S. gigantea and H. magnifica are the ones where it is probably the easiest to tell when they are sick due to their rather strong and quite distinct reaction. But I found that H. crispa, S. haddoni, and BTAs can be sick but contain it for quite some time and not clearly show it.

From its appearance, this BTA should actually be far larger than DD indicated. It just seems it never fully inflated.
If too low nutrients would be an issue I would expect it to inflate as much as possible to catch prey or collect more light.

I think I just gonna start treatment as soon as I have a treatment tank free (I got 1 gig under observation in one tank, treat a 2nd gig in another tank, and treat 2 haddoni in a bucket.)

[Small Heavens]

If they treated it partly with antibiotics, they should at least have asked you to finish the treatment. If you can carry through a full treatment cycle of it, that would be really great, good luck.

What do they do, if you don't mind me asking? I never kept any but Macrodactyla but learning about marine life seem to be just as addictive regardless if it is about a favorite species or something completely different.

Ah lovely, I wish I had that many tanks too. But then again, then I would probably crash the floor out of my apartment�� The LFS I can get to, are just not awesome, so I hope you can make it pull through this - it was probably stuck with rotting Anemones through half of its travels and time at the LFS. Keep updating, it's always wonderful to learn about the experiences of others and it seem the Nems got a good shot at making it with you.

[Krush]

How is the nem doing ThRoewer?

[ThRoewer]

Originally Posted by Krush

How is the nem doing ThRoewer?

Still the same. It seems that it so far manages to keep the infection under control but is not strong enough to beat it on its own.

Depending on the status of my latest gig from LA I may put it together with the new purple gig. The purple isn't sick but maybe I just treat it anyway just to be on the safe side. Most of the "healthy" gigs I lost were untreated.
And the new one doesn't seem to be severely sick. After being a deflated blob of slime for the first day it's been okay so far. So maybe it was just upset about being shipped.

Anyway, this way I could free up a QT/HT and get the BTAs treated.

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[Krush]

Man you have tons of nems. Good for you. One day my wife will come around but for now i'll have to keep living vicariously.

I hope the nem pulls through. I don't know if it's just the photos, but it looks to be a really decent size, even deflated.

What is your treatment like for nems? Do you treat the same for all species, or species specific? I want to get a nem for my clowns once they're healthy and safely out of QT. Not sure what would be best in a 25g IM Fusion...I was thinking a BTA or RBTA because of the size constraints but I'm worries about it getting sucked into my vortech. I would love to get a blue haddoni if it wont quickly outgrow the tank and if I can find one. I had one 15+ years ago and it was by far my favorite specimen I've ever kept, fish and corals included.

[gmneil]

me personally I would put that nem in a basket all of its own, if it is sick or stressed having it that close to another nem is going to make things worse. you will have a better chance if its all by itself in its own basket.

[Small Heavens]

Is it showing any sign of closing up the open flesh wounds?

I always read that too much chemical warfare in one tank is a sure catastrophe waiting to happen, but I haven't tried it so I have no idea of how much it actually does (expect making people buy good quality skimmers obviously).

What I understand of Nem acclimatisation, is more or less that it would need to remain in one location. If it moves it is not happy. If it stays still and starts a pattern of inflating and deflating, it is just adjusting the actual net of "muscles" that it use to position optimally for the "sun". Since the sun would be moving, the Nem deflates to allow the reaction of photosynthesis to tell it where to "stretch" at such times as right after noon or when the blue night periods click in at whatever time the tank is set at. That behaviour is temporary until it adjusted all its tissue- so moving the Nem again, force the Nem to start the process over again, so rest vs. move is an important consideration with Nems.

Does healthy BTA actually do that thing on the picture with their foot? I have never seen any Macrodactyla stretch the foot tissues like that, it looks completely melting, is it because they climb rocksurfaces?