Amphipods and Rainbow BTA

[Lambs-_-13read]

Hello all , I am a little curious , from what I’ve learned over the years; amphipods are great for being scavengers of detritus. Recently, I’ve added a Rainbow BTA to my system and have noticed around feeding time or lights out they(amphipods) tend to irritate it rubbing/crawling over it. I figured the amphipods are not necessarily eating it as I don’t see bite marks/tares. There is no foul smells or odors, my tank parameters are as spot on for an sps tank as can be. Here’s where the curiosity comes in, Have amphipods been known to irritate a BTA to the point of melting away/dying? Have amphipods ever been seen/recorded eating a BTA? In these photos below, I had just fed the BTA Reef Frenzy by LRS which is why it’s closed up. As you can see by the size of the amphipods, why I would be curious .
Thank you ahead of time for any responses.
60 gallon cube
Alkalinity 8.3
Calcium 440
Magnesium 1340
Ph Day 8.15 Night 8.02
Nitrate 10
Phosphate 0.07

 

[Spare time]

I am quite certain the amphipods will not cause an issue.

 

[R33fDaddy]

Amphipods are currently eating my Zoas.

Here is my emergency thread if you want to check it out:

EMERGENCY - Amphipods Eating My Zoas Help!

A couple weeks ago I had 10 Polyps of Illuminati Zoas. I few days after that I took "inventory" and noticed I only had 8. A few days after that, I noticed a bunch of shrimp looking creatures in my tank, that everyone here identified as Amphipods. This past Monday when I checked my Tank I...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[ClownWrangler]

I was about to post a thread about this and stumbled across this one. I cant tell if they are harming it. Maybe they are scavenging leftover food/waste. They don't go near the one with a porcelain crab.

 

[ClownWrangler]

They are definitely irritating it. Maybe I need to get some more anemone crabs to keep them away.

 

[Dolphins18]

Are you directly feeding this anemone?
If so I recommend stopping that, it is generally not good for them as they will pick up all the food they need thru the water column.

 

[ClownWrangler]

Suck up the amphipods with a turkey baster, chop them up and feed them to the anemone. Maybe the others will back off when they see what happened to their friends.

 

[Jekyl]

I have a TON of amphipods in my tank as well as 4 BTA. They have never caused issues with my nems.

 

[R33fDaddy]

I broke my Quarantine process by 30 days because these things ate $1,100 worth of Zoas. It may be rare but from this point on I'm playing it safe and just assume they eat coral or irritate them to death.

 

[Spare time]

For whatever it is worth, I have amphipods and over 30 bubble tips with no issues.

They are not coral eaters. If they ate coral, lfs and coral vendors would be in chaos. They are so widespread, and thinking that one has some ultra rare coral eating one that is different from 99.999999999% of amphipods in everyone's tank vs literally anything else possible going on (anything, I mean anything), seems implausible. I am not saying its impossible, but I'd say its as possible as a squirrel stalking, killing, and then eating my dog.

 

[R33fDaddy]

For whatever it is worth, I have amphipods and over 30 bubble tips with no issues.

They are not coral eaters. If they ate coral, lfs and coral vendors would be in chaos. They are so widespread, and thinking that one has some ultra rare coral eating one that is different from 99.999999999% of amphipods in everyone's tank vs literally anything else possible going on (anything, I mean anything), seems implausible. I am not saying its impossible, but I'd say its as possible as a squirrel stalking, killing, and then eating my dog.

Well the coral in is my display tank now which has zero amphipods and they are all doing really well. Same parameters, same lights, same type of sand, same equipment only difference is no pods.