Dying Anemone What now?

[frany123]

I am new here so forgive me if I did something wrong.

My sabae anemone looks like it has colapsed and it happened from one day to the other. I've had it for about a month now and it used to be white and I was proud that it's color started to darken and it seemed to be happy and eating well (every other day with direct feeding). My tank is a few months old, yes I know that is bad, I have 55 gallon tank with a skimmer, sump and I have the Aquatic Life T5 lights. I screened the water and there wasn't anything spiked or wrong day before yesterday and this morning the anemone looked horrible. (see link)

Not sure if you can tell from the picture but it's front tenticles are shrunk and odd colored and the body seems to have fallen onto itself and it seems to be coming out of it's mouth. I am not hopeful but if there is any way to save it please let me know.
What I am most worried about are my fish in the aquarium so what I really want is to comfirm the dying so that I can remove it before it starts to release the toxic and begin killing my fish.

Thank you for your time and I feel like a complete failure for letting this anemone die. I will not attempt it again till next year.

 

[Rscomia]

Will it still eat?

 

[frany123]

No, I just tried it and nothing really happened besides stirring up the tenticles and now you can see the center better and the fact that there is something coming out of the mouth.

 

[Rscomia]

I may be wrong but with my anemones they will do stuff like this from time to time I would give it a few days and see what it does

 

[the_fish_man]

+1 It might be pooping yes it sounds weird but anemones sulk when they poop out the food you feed them. Is white goo coming out of the mouth?

 

[Fishbone13]

I advise wait'n it out a few days and i strongly advise not to feed it so much. They get all they need food wise from the water column and photosynthesis. I do feed mine but only once a week and only a little bit. The more they have to digest and whatnot makes it tough on them and they expend alot of energy and it could kill them. If all you're water partameters are good to go just wait it out and keep test'n you're water and don't feed it for a while, try feed'n once a week start'n sometime next week. I would start to worry if it looked slimey other than that just keep an eye on him. Good luck

 

[Purevil21]

When you say T5 lighting, do you have T5 HE or HO lights? HE bulbs will not support the anemone. As the others have mentioned, he could be expelling waste, best to wait it out if water and lighting is sufficient.

 

[frany123]

Pureevil21 I got T5 florescent bulbs 216 watz and it seems very bright in the aquarium... not sure what HO and HE is though sorry lol
The fish man not it's not gooey it really looks like the texture of the insides of the anemone.
Mike73 ok I will. The reason I was feeding it so much was because I read that I had to feed it 4-5 times a week when they are so badly bleached like mine was until it started getting darker then reduce feeding.
Thank you guys for all the help it hasnt improved much but at least it pulled whatever was hanging out back inside but the bad part is that the mouth is now partially open. I will wait it out and keep you guys posted in any improvements.

 

[thominil]

HE is high efficiency if I remember correctly. HO is high output. As you can probably guess, HE is geared towards energy consumption savings wise, whereas, HO is geared towards high intensity, PAR, and lumen ouput. Basically, HO gives you the most light possible while not caring for energy consumption. I'm just going to guess that you have HO, since most T5 fixtures that I have come by are HO in aquaria. Sabae are higher light requiring anemones, so I am not sure if you have adequate lights.

 

[frany123]

Thanks for the explanation. I went and looked at the bulb itself on the fixture and it says HO on it. Also I told you the wrong watts it's 324 not 216.

 

[frany123]

This is a picture of her this morning. Mouth is open and most of the tenticles are completely deflated and some are actully coming off. No sings of any slime that I can tell.....

http://i1204.photobucket.com/albums/bb409/FrannyKimonoShop/DSC_0401.jpg

 

[Fishbone13]

Have you fed it all or are you wait'n it out like we said? Have you tested for Amonia? and what are the rest of youre parameters like? And also what is you're Sg and the temp in the tank? Do you have good water flow? My Anemone looks funky in the morn'n sometimes too. Maybe take a sample of you're water to the LFS and have em do the test for you just to be sure if you do have any doubts or dont have the complete test kits. The smallest change in the tanks water will mess these guys up.

 

[Purevil21]

It appears to be heading south quickly. I have never kept one, but I know they require high lighting, and I'm not sure you have enough. I may be wrong on that, but if all your water parameters are in line, that would be my suspicion.

 

[rancidpetals]

get that thing out of your tank immediately if you think it was dying, because your whole tank could possibly suffer. When they do die, they kinda turn inside out and form a ball of black gross stuff. I had one die about 2 years ago and haven't had one since.

 

[Krypt]

If tentacles are actually coming off, get it out of there ASAP. It is a potential disaster at that stage.

 

[frany123]

Yeah sorry I didn't update I took it out the next day after posting. It took my tang before I could do anything. Thanks for all the help !