BTA question

[Tmm87]

Picked up this RBTA from WWC a month ago or so...

Now I know that sometimes they lose their bubbles, they come and go, etc. It doesn't appear to be shrinking, doesn't appear to be growing either though.

It's eating, it gets mysis and chunks of reef frenzy. The spot it's in is one it moved to within a day of going in the tank and it hasn't moved even an inch.

Once a day it closes up (typically late evening) and it opens again in the morning.

Parameters are all stable. Temp consistently sits right around 78, 0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, nitrates sit around 10ppm, 1.025 sg, calc hovers around 450, mag around 1300, alk sits around 9.

All of my coral are doing great and growing like crazy.

Light is a Maxspect razor x 100w. Tank is a 60 cube. Nem is 3-4" off the substrate facing away from the light, it's sitting about 2 ft under the light.

Channel A - Roayl Blue & Cool White

Channel B - Royal Blue & Light Blue

Channel C - Deep Blue & Violet

Channel D - Deep Red, Cyan, & Warm White

Channel A and C ramp up to 100%, Channel B goes up to 75% and Channel D goes up to 20%. Schedule runs at max for about 8 hours, ramp up and down 2hrs on each end.

Could it possibly be not enough light? Maybe need a different lighting schedule?

I've attached some pics...before and a couple afters with different lighting.

 

[sbash]

Sometimes they don't grow very quickly. A month is not a lot of time for it to grow. Give it time, keep feeding it. It looks healthy, there is nothing to worry about...

 

[bekate]

I nearly threw away our ultra-green BTA a few weeks after we got her because she kept closing up, shriveled in a corner and kept spitting out stuff. A few days later she looked perfectly fine again, moved position and then started growing and bubbling. She's getting more beautiful every day. Once a day, she looks horrible when she closes up for a while, then opens back up. So don't give up on your BTA unless it's dead for sure.

 

[rkpetersen]

That BTA looks reasonably happy to me. Staying in the same place and actively eating are great signs. Shrinking up, especially in the evening, doesn't mean much. Bubble tips or not bubble tips probably correlates with something but I don't think anyone's actually figured it out, lol. If you can borrow a PAR meter, you'd like it to measure around 200 at the nem. Increasing the light somewhat beyond that won't hurt either. Keep doing what you're doing and in 6 months or so you'll suddenly notice that it's a lot bigger, and some time after that you might find yourself with two.

 

[Tmm87]

I nearly threw away our ultra-green BTA a few weeks after we got her because she kept closing up, shriveled in a corner and kept spitting out stuff. A few days later she looked perfectly fine again, moved position and then started growing and bubbling. She's getting more beautiful every day. Once a day, she looks horrible when she closes up for a while, then opens back up. So don't give up on your BTA unless it's dead for sure.

Appreciate the encouragement. I wasn't giving up on it, it's still healthy and acting normal. I was just concerned that it's not necessarily thriving.

 

[Tmm87]

That BTA looks reasonably happy to me. Staying in the same place and actively eating are great signs. Shrinking up, especially in the evening, doesn't mean much. Bubble tips or not bubble tips probably correlates with something but I don't think anyone's actually figured it out, lol. If you can borrow a PAR meter, you'd like it to measure around 200 at the nem. Increasing the light somewhat beyond that won't hurt either. Keep doing what you're doing and over the next 6 months or so you'll notice growth and some time after that you might find yourself with two.

Not sure I know anyone with a PAR meter near me. I'll turn the intensity up a bit (slowly) and see if it makes a difference.

 

[Amoo]

If that was my tank I personally would try starting with the following light intensity:


Channel A - Roayl Blue & Cool White

30%

Channel B - Royal Blue & Light Blue

100%

Channel C - Deep Blue & Violet

80%

Channel D - Deep Red, Cyan, & Warm White

15%

That would at least bring you in line with the AB+ spectrum which has shown good results. Not necessarily saying it IS your problem, but personally that is where I would start.

Do note though I'm very good at killing things that you have to glue down. Nems on the other hand are fine for me...go figure....

 

[Tmm87]

If that was my tank I personally would try starting with the following light intensity:


Channel A - Roayl Blue & Cool White

30%

Channel B - Royal Blue & Light Blue

100%

Channel C - Deep Blue & Violet

80%

Channel D - Deep Red, Cyan, & Warm White

15%

That would at least bring you in line with the AB+ spectrum which has shown good results. Not necessarily saying it IS your problem, but personally that is where I would start.

Do note though I'm very good at killing things that you have to glue down. Nems on the other hand are fine for me...go figure....

I'll give that a try and see how it works. Worst case is I revert back to what I'm running now. Thanks!

 

[Amoo]

If you feel that gets you close but not quite there 50% on A and 25ish% on D are about as high as I personally would take them.

 

[Tmm87]

If you feel that gets you close but not quite there 50% on A and 25ish% on D are about as high as I personally would take them.

I'll give it a bit and see how things turn out. The other BTA is coming along nicely. It's sitting higher in the tank though. LFS had it slapped in a tank with all their live rock and standard fluorescent lighting. It's turned from a gross brown to an orange/yellow metallic color.

Hopefully the WWC one will start to bubble up again because it's impossible to remove where it is. The rocks are glued together for stability and it planted the foot right down in a crack in between two of the rocks.

 

[Amoo]

Yeah I noticed from the pictures it seems crammed in there pretty tight, probably why it won't leave that spot, it feels safe. BTA's are such a frustrating species to deal with as I've seen time and time again they'll sacrifice things they need (more or less light...etc) if they can find a spot they feel safe it. Not being able to see their foot 90% of the time makes things much more difficult IMO then some of the more "challenging" species.

 

[Tmm87]

Here's the other one. Can't really get it to show up how my eye sees it with my phone, it's more orange than it appears in the picture.

 

[Tmm87]

Most definitely too soon to make any decisions on the new light settings but both nems look different (better). The smaller one also seems to have some bubbles coming back.

*edit* pictures loaded sideways for some reason, sorry for making you head tilt.

View attachment 20180523_174514.jpg

View attachment 20180523_174450.jpg

 

[Amoo]

Just keep an eye on your other stuff as well. We turned your spectrum on it's head in a way and eliminated a lot of intensity and cleaned up your spectrum some at the same time. Some of your glued down friends may not end up very happy with a change in intensity and may require movement.

You can slowly walk your intensity back up if things continue to go well, but remember that process should take MONTHS not just a few days or weeks.

 

[Tmm87]

Everyone still seems to be doing well. Thankfully I've only got a couple SPS. The tank is primarily LPS and zoas.

 

[Tmm87]

Showing more improvement every day. Both BTAs are looking much better and all the coral are still happy.

Down the road I may slowly increase things a bit but for now I'm going to leave it as is.

Thanks for the suggestion @Amoo it seems to have been just the ticket.