Is my Anemone Eating My Fish?

[civitan.erichanson]

I have a pretty large spaghetti anemone (or GBTA) tentacles are over 8 inches long and the "body" is probably over 6" in width. I lost another small fish last night - hippo tang about two inches. he is not in the sump, not in the overflow, not on the floor. He was there last night. I noticed him missing when I fed the tank at 5 tonight.

 

SO - the only think I can think at this point and I have lost other fish is the anem is eating them.

 

A) is that possible, his mouth definitely could consume a sleeping 2" fish

B) If I decide to boot him, any suggestions on how to get him out? He is attached to base rock right now.

 

Thanks.

[DDiver]

a)you'd be surprised

B)run a credit card under the foot and slowly peel him off or direct a powerhead on him and see if he gets irritated and start moving

[Rascal]

A large anemone like that is certainly capable of killing a 2 inch fish, but I am very doubtful that an otherwise healthy and non-stressed tang would find itself swimming into an anemone. They seem to have a pretty good instinct about avoiding them.

 

How long did you have the fish before it went missing?

[civitan.erichanson]

I would say a month. But this is not the first small fish to go missing, over the Summer three disappeared. The Tang could of jumped, but I do not think so. He was healthy, good eater.

 

A large anemone like that is certainly capable of killing a 2 inch fish, but I am very doubtful that an otherwise healthy and non-stressed tang would find itself swimming into an anemone. They seem to have a pretty good instinct about avoiding them.

 

How long did you have the fish before it went missing?

[treesprite]

I would frag it up so I could still have it but at a safer size, then trade out or sell the rest.

[traveller7]

Make sure you have a proper ID of the anemone prior to making a decision. BTAs are not efficient fish eaters, although they do survive manual division.

 

There are a few long tentacled fish eating anemones, but they are not common in our tanks.

 

Post a picture.

 

Most likely you are dealing with fish that are weakened and fallen prey to one of many potential predators or opportunistic feeders.

[trble81]

Are you feeding you anemone enough? A well fed one shouldn't go hunting and eating your healthy fish...

[civitan.erichanson]

Honestly I do not directly feed it. I feed the tank every other day and simply rely on the food to find its way to the anem. It has a live in clown, but he spends less time in the tentacles than he once did and I rarely see it bring food to the anemone. The anemone "birthed" two babies over the Summer. One is wandering in the sump and the other is now in the tank.

 

I have mia - very sad to say a large yellow Tang (3-4"), dragon wrasse, yellow tail damsel, and now the hippo Tang. I need to figure this out since I want to keep fish in the tank.

 

I had egg crate over the tank in the past, recently I acquired a refugium and have not recut the egg crate to fit the tank.

 

I could divide it, but I am not sure I want 4 of these things terrorizing my corals.

 

Not sure I can ask this here, but would anyone be interested in coming all the way up here (10 miles from Mr. Coral) to buy or trade?? Sorry no visitors b4 midnight madness my kids are young. I may be there tonight though.

 

Pic:

 

 

Are you feeding you anemone enough? A well fed one shouldn't go hunting and eating your healthy fish...

[traveller7]

From the single picture it appears to be a green BTA, E. quadricolor. I don't recall ever having a healthy fish getting caught in any of mine, and to say I have/had a few BTAs would be an understatement. If you had alot of BTAs, some fish do be come stressed when many divide at once, such an event is quick and quickly passes.

 

It is more likely the fish become ill, have dietary issues, suffer physical injury, or there is another predator in the tank.

 

Best of luck in the hunt and you might want to avoid adding new fish until the culprit is identified or 6 weeks passes without losses.

[civitan.erichanson]

Thanks any thoughts on other predators?

 

I feed about a dime-sized portion of frozen food every other day. There are now a total of 6 fish in the tank. Two percs., a bi-color, two yellow tailed damsels and a bi-color.

 

Am I under feeding?

 

Thanks,

 

Eric.

 

From the single picture it appears to be a green BTA, E. quadricolor. I don't recall ever having a healthy fish getting caught in any of mine, and to say I have/had a few BTAs would be an understatement. If you had alot of BTAs, some fish do be come stressed when many divide at once, such an event is quick and quickly passes.

 

It is more likely the fish become ill, have dietary issues, suffer physical injury, or there is another predator in the tank.

 

Best of luck in the hunt and you might want to avoid adding new fish until the culprit is identified or 6 weeks passes without losses.

[traveller7]

Am I under feeding?

In my opinion, yes.

 

Full disclosure: I over feed my fish greatly. A single pair of my clowns will get that much twice a day.

 

 

Thanks any thoughts on other predators?

Classics: spearer mantis shrimp, some snails, some crabs, large serpent stars...

 

Many folks miss disease diagnosis as well, unless they have seen the symptoms before, tough to explain such without photos unfortunately.

 

Best of luck.

[dzekunoi]

I want to jump on this as well. I still have a mistery to solve.

 

Never would blame my BTA before but recently it did try to eat my Hippo. Hippo was healthy and happy the night before. Next day I found it in the BTA's tenticles :( Dead.

 

Now, I do not believe the tang died of natural causes. BTA stung me a couple times badly when I was cleaning my tank. Now I wonder - maybe female clown beated it and anemone got it?

 

No other predators in the tank.

[Smoothtriqueter]

Am I under feeding?

 

From my understanding that is slightly underfeeding. People always say feed sparingly, but that's just don't put all in at once. I have found that fish do best with one or two smaller feedings throughout the day, they are swimming almost all the time!

[civitan.erichanson]

Thanks everyone for the advice/ I am going to start to feed more and target feed the anem weekly. I am convinced his mouth is big enough to chow a 2" fish so if I can figure out how to get him out I may split him.

 

Then I will post a few for sale.

 

Eric

 

 

From my understanding that is slightly underfeeding. People always say feed sparingly, but that's just don't put all in at once. I have found that fish do best with one or two smaller feedings throughout the day, they are swimming almost all the time!

[trble81]

Just to give you an idea, I've got a purple condi anemone and I directly feed it a silverside twice a week and I broadcast feed my tank some frozen cyclop twice a week...

 

Fish are happy (2 false percs, 2 azure damsels) and inverts (anemone, mushrooms, polyps) are happy.

 

 

Best of luck!