Carpet Anemone is Dying

[roguecardinal]

We have had this carpet anemone for a couple weeks and lately, the last two days, it looks really bad. It looks like a wilting flower compared to how it look liked last week. The hole in the center is completely open, about quarter sized, not tight like it was. The good thing is that it hasen't lost any color. The water conditions are all good. I add chemicals: Seachem Reef plus, Reef complete, and Reef Calcium. Wondering if these might affect the carpet. He have healthy mushrooms, brain coral, and other sea anemones. The tomato clown still resides in the carpet. Please Help.

 

[kimf]

I wish I could be more help than what I am going to say.
I have had two that died in the last 4 weeks.
Everyting else is fine, water, fish, corals.
I think these must be very hard to raise.
The first one center became loose. Then got brown around the edges, lost its color and started floating to pieces. Even turned the sand black around it.
Second one ate a piece of shrimp. Looked like its guts came out. Moved under a rock, Lost all its color and I threw it out since I didn't want to risk bad water destroying something else.

 

[ebeckels]

just so you know...anemones open and close frequently...it's surprising how small carpets can get!! My carpet is very large and this morning he was about the size of maybe 2 silver dollars....He looked all shriveled up and pathetic...Now he is his normal enormous self. They expell water that way...anyways...I hope that what's happening to yours.

 

[justinl]

I'm sorry to say but your anemone is more or less dying in front of you. A gaping mouth for an extended period of time is not a good sign. I had one and it did the same thing.

 

[ebeckels]

I'd hold off on disposing of it until it is about to fall apart...You don't want it to fall apart in ur tank...I also don't want you to make the wrong decision and dispose of the anemone if it might recover. Look at the anemone closely...if it's foot begins to lose it's suction it's most likely dead and is beginning to float away and get blown apart by the powerheads.

 

[rhomer]

This is a tough thing, because if you wait too long and the aenonme dies in the tank then it can kill everything in the tank (this has happened to me sand, lr, everything). But if you get rid of it you might never know if it could have lived.

 

[fishforme]

Granted, I've only had my carpet for two weeks, however, I've seen the little guy shrivel up into basically a silver dollar, I've seen him throw up what looked like long stringy red stuff (probably from the shrimp I gave him) and he always seem to return to his original happy self. From all the extensive reading I've done on Anenome's and I hope everyone will agree with me, it seems that the demise of many of the Anenome's is constant overfeeding. Only feed once a week....

 

[marco]

I have two carpet anemones and I feed them Kent micro vert two to three times a week. I also put Sera strontium in once a week. One of them is the size of a voley ball. The other has great form and is very strong. ( it ate one of my starfish )
I would at least try it and see wht happens.
I was told that if you can see the mouth of an anemone it's hungry.
Let us know what happens.

 

[jakob4001]

SIGH...hmmm, don't really think having a anemone die in tank wasting away would cause death of LR,LS, & other fish inhabitants in general;especially if you removed it quickly enough noticing that its tissue was wasting away & not just cycling it's body;of course there might be some kind of chemical spike and if not removed quickly some anemones shrivel up to cycle their bodies, to move, or to expell waste;they only have that 1 orafice in which to eat & expell waste from;open/closed mouth does not necessarily mean anything nor does wether their foot has lost suction; anemones also will tend to eat only what they want when they want depending on species & size & food given;ours regularly sometimes refuses food from it's clown & sometimes regergitates the silversides we feed it being it was not hungary;it's amazing how small they can shrivel up to; anemones are just 1 of the many main debates that will always go on being on lighting,cohabitations w/ various clowns & other fish, age, & on & on;again all depends on who you ask/believe;but for msot part are very interesting additions to a tank;sometimes w/ cautious eye of course

 

[ebeckels]

Originally posted by jakob4001:
<strong>SIGH...hmmm, don't really think having a anemone die in tank wasting away would cause death of LR,LS, & other fish inhabitants in general</strong><hr></blockquote>
I'd have to disagree...An anemone will most likely kill many other things in the tank and possibly stress out the fish enough to give it ich.

 

[jakob4001]

well we did have a fairly large purple based anemone die in the 35 way back before we knew better about lighting at the very least; we didn't remove it until it started to visibly waste away because it can be difficult to tell w/ anemones (which actually most literature states) for at least 1-2 days;like most good sized item in a tank that dies, it may cause some type of chemical spike to occur if not dealt w/ immeditately; have not really heard/seen much about total tank die off from dead anemones; now sea cucumbers or box fish, yes;not saying cannot happen, just not likely or common occurrence

 

[rhomer]

I had an aenenome die, it showed no signs of deteration then the next day our percula clown was tearing it up. There were pieces of it floating throghout the tank.
After that all of our inverts died, all coraline alge died. The percula survived and lived for another year, but anytime any inverts were added the next day they would be dead.
This was really unusual because the water levels were fine... no ammonia, nitrites, or nitrates. We got a scooter blennie to try and clean the bottom. He died with in a couple of days.
It seemed that anything that touched the sand after that died.
The only thing I could come up with is that after the anenome died it released some poison in the tank that I couldn't detect.