Anemone poop color? Or, undigested food?

[diane4]

This is an odd question, but I must ask it. For those of you that currently have or have had anemones, what color is their poop? In other words, if material coming out is white or similar in color to what was fed to the anemone, is that regurgitated food as someone on the forum indicated could happen with an anemone that is overfed - or is the poop brown.
I have 3 different anemones in my tank. My LTA seems to eliminate material that is either brown or light colored close to the color of the food it ate, but in a different texture and shape than when it went in. Denser and square like shape.
My other larger BTA I never see brown coming back out, always white or light colored.
My other sabae is tiny and I don't have it long enough to report on it's elimination details.
If what someone stated on this forum is true that an anemone can consume and eliminate undigested food, then how can one tell if material coming out is undigested food or poop?
The color of ones poop is not a pleasant topic, but it is a question to learn what other folks experience is and opinion.

 

[speg]

Mine poops brown. All my corals poop brown as a matter of fact.
Sometimes I feed my anemone whole fish and it'll end up spitting out anything it cannot handle (bones) which comes out white or whatever color they would normally be.

 

[booduh]

Undigested food will come out almost the same as it went in. Most of the time food is left undigested or partailly digested because of over feeding. The anenome may eat everything, but once it starts the digestion process and rolling pieces of food around and finds it cannot hold all of it, it just spits it out. If you overfeed, you will see the undigested food within an hour or two. If you notice undigested food, cut back on the amount fed per feeding.
Just some info, it sounds like your anenomes are healthy and normal.

 

[popnfrresh]

Def try not to overfeed. IF you feed them it should only be once or twice a week at most. and always use small portions. They should get most of their food from the lightsd..

 

[diane4]

Well, I was in today at Absolutely Fish in Clifton, NJ - one of the NJ states largest fish stores and experts - receiving many awards for excellence.
I asked someone how often is it ok to feed anemones, and they said small portions every other day, minimum twice per week. He said, some of his anemones they feed every day.
He said it doesn't matter, he said as long as the portions arent' huge and you pickup what they spit out, your fine. He said, in fact, heavy feeding encourages splitting to new offspring.
I personally think many lfs underfeed because of money. They don't want the fish to grow. as they claim, "to fast", when in fact, they are stunting the growth. And, it costs the fish store money to feed more. And most people don't want to buy a fish to big.
And, in fact, now that I think of it, one of my anemones has never pooped a brown color, always light color and he is doing well.
I admit, sometimes I do feed to much, but I also think that many people underfeed. All 7 of my fish tanks are doing well and they all are offered food every day.

 

[sweetfish]

I bought this small bubble tip about 2 weeks ago and tried giving it a very small piece of a silverside, boy oh boy did he love it. Closed right up and scarfed it down. I feed him 2x a week, he catches the mysis and brine flowing otherwise. Very healthy and has already double his size. My paired maroons love it to death. They picked the smallest one to host in my tank. Go figure. LOL

 

[diane4]

Originally Posted by SweetFish
I bought this small bubble tip about 2 weeks ago and tried giving it a very small piece of a silverside, boy oh boy did he love it. Closed right up and scarfed it down. I feed him 2x a week, he catches the mysis and brine flowing otherwise. Very healthy and has already double his size. My paired maroons love it to death. They picked the smallest one to host in my tank. Go figure. LOL
So, the gory question remains, what color does he poop?

 

[sweetfish]

Brown

So far that is all I have seen. Does it quite regularly.