white carpet anemone

[sufunk]

sorry, forgot to ask this also in my last post. also have a white carpet anemone. when i first got it the color was so bright and vibrant . over time, the last 8 months it has gotten darker and darker until now it is almost a dirty brown color. it seems to be fine other than the color and my clown sure loves it. Is this normal or is something wrong with the anemone or my care of it?

 

[ophiura]

Well, really a "white" anemone is an unhealthy anemone. The coloration is getting to be more normal. But lighting is critical. I am not sure this was covered in another thread but anemones need very good water conditions, very high lighting (more than what is on a standard tank), and a pretty mature tank.

 

[dogstar]

The anemone was bleached ( from stress or collecting and sometimes done on purpose buy dealers ), when it was white, it had lost the endosymbiotic zooxanthellae that lives inside of it. It getting darker because the zooxanthellae ( algea like organisums that live off of good lighting ) is starting to come back.
As ophura said, not healthy when white. There are no natural healthy white carpets. Often the zooxanthellae color is a brownish color and sometimes its green or blue but yours is brown and thats OK with the anemone.

 

[sufunk]

thank you! feel much better. It really is a great anemone and was starting to get a little worried