Bubble tip dying?!

[misbekka]

Bubble tip, is it dying?? Pink tip Haitian has been doing great for weeks and the bubble is 3 days old, has not chosen a place to play it’s foot been rolling around. Today spilled out some brown stuff the. Closed up and opened a little but mouth is open. All pics from today this morning to now. I don’t want him to kill my tank do I need to remove?? Tried turning off power head to help him stick multiple times over the past 3 days and nothing. Salinity 0.126 Ammonia and nitrite 0 and nitrate about 5 temp 78-79
Hard to get good pics- other Haitian is right after feeding time

 

[Dcloser12]

Looks like it could be lighting related. How old is it and has it been moving? They exposed insides with its mouth open could be dinos or diatoms. Alk to high makes them run and hide like they can't process light. If I had to guess I'd say
1. Parameter swings
2. Lighting
3. Overfeeding.

You can literally cut a bta In half. They are pretty hardy.

 

[ReefLife_Guy]

The brown stuff it is expelling is likely dead zooxanthellae, this is definitely a sick nem. Do you have ciprofloxacin on hand? I would think it is probably time to think about treating it. There is a treatment protocol in the anemone and clownfish forum to help guide that process. While these guys will look pretty ugly sometimes expelling waste, I would say this nem doesn’t look like that it definitely looks sick. Even the first picture with the closed mouth doesn’t look like a thriving BTA.

Some other info that might help:
How long has the tank been setup? What are your other parameters like pH, alkalinity, phosphates?

 

[ReefLife_Guy]

@Lost in the Sauce @Eagle_Steve might have some more thoughts

 

[misbekka]

Looks like it could be lighting related. How old is it and has it been moving? They exposed insides with its mouth open could be dinos or diatoms. Alk to high makes them run and hide like they can't process light. If I had to guess I'd say
1. Parameter swings
2. Lighting
3. Overfeeding.

You can literally cut a bta In half. They are pretty hardy.

The brown stuff it is expelling is likely dead zooxanthellae, this is definitely a sick nem. Do you have ciprofloxacin on hand? I would think it is probably time to think about treating it. There is a treatment protocol in the anemone and clownfish forum to help guide that process. While these guys will look pretty ugly sometimes expelling waste, I would say this nem doesn’t look like that it definitely looks sick. Even the first picture with the closed mouth doesn’t look like a thriving BTA.

Some other info that might help:
How long has the tank been setup? What are your other parameters like pH, alkalinity, phosphates?

I do not have any ciprofloxacin on hand, anything else I can use now or run to store after work? Ph is 8.1 that is all I can test for now, haven’t needed to test passed that.
The light I have Ingot from Amazon:

SMATFARM LED Aquarium Light - Updated Program Coral Reef Light Dimmable 95Watts Full Spectrum Sunrise Sunset for Marine Fish Tanks Fish Tank Light with Timer Function​

Is that light not good enough?

 

[ReefLife_Guy]

I do not have any ciprofloxacin on hand, anything else I can use now or run to store after work? Ph is 8.1 that is all I can test for now, haven’t needed to test passed that.
The light I have Ingot from Amazon:

SMATFARM LED Aquarium Light - Updated Program Coral Reef Light Dimmable 95Watts Full Spectrum Sunrise Sunset for Marine Fish Tanks Fish Tank Light with Timer Function​

Is that light not good enough?

I don't necessarily think the issue is with the lighting. I'm not sure how strong these lights are, I'll let someone else comment on that but generally bubble tip anemones will move and stretch towards the light if they are not getting enough light. If you saw this behavior previously and now it is looking like this, at that point I would say it is possible a lighting issue but if not it is more likely some unstable parameter causing the anemone to be stressed and killing off its zooxanthellae.

Sometimes it is difficult to pinpoint exactly why your anemone is doing this, people suspect there was some stressor event that led to the anemone to become infected but there is not data that I am aware of that proves this. Anecdotally many have treated anemones that exhibit this kind of behavior with ciprofloxacin and seen a full recovery of the anemone. Currently ciprofloxacin is the only recommended antibiotic or in combination with sulfamethoxazole/trimethoprim if the ciprofloxacin isn't working by itself. The link to the protocol is here: https://www.reef2reef.com/forums/anemone-clownfish-discussion.182/ There are two sticky threads one is by OrionN and the other by Amoo, I would recommend reading both. The second was adapted from the original author of the protocol OrionN.

Most pet stores do not carry ciprofloxacin, you can get it online by searching for "fish ciprofloxacin". One brand calls it AquaCipro, in the US this allows you to purchase it without a prescription and usually can get it within a couple of days. In the meantime I would work on planning how to treat the anemone. I believe @Lost in the Sauce has dosed his display tank before, but you will see the protocol has details for setting up a hospital tank. If you don't have the equipment to setup a hospital tank and put the nem in now, I would say do a good 10-20% water change in the current tank your anemone is in and see how it responds to that. If it suddenly perks back up and stays inflated for the next couple of days, then maybe forgo the antibiotic treatment and focus on figuring out the other water parameters I mentioned. If freshly mixed saltwater makes the nem happy again then there is something off with the water and might require addition of activated carbon or more frequent water changes.

Lets see if some others can chime in #fishmedic

 

[misbekka]

I don't necessarily think the issue is with the lighting. I'm not sure how strong these lights are, I'll let someone else comment on that but generally bubble tip anemones will move and stretch towards the light if they are not getting enough light. If you saw this behavior previously and now it is looking like this, at that point I would say it is possible a lighting issue but if not it is more likely some unstable parameter causing the anemone to be stressed and killing off its zooxanthellae.

Sometimes it is difficult to pinpoint exactly why your anemone is doing this, people suspect there was some stressor event that led to the anemone to become infected but there is not data that I am aware of that proves this. Anecdotally many have treated anemones that exhibit this kind of behavior with ciprofloxacin and seen a full recovery of the anemone. Currently ciprofloxacin is the only recommended antibiotic or in combination with sulfamethoxazole/trimethoprim if the ciprofloxacin isn't working by itself. The link to the protocol is here: https://www.reef2reef.com/forums/anemone-clownfish-discussion.182/ There are two sticky threads one is by OrionN and the other by Amoo, I would recommend reading both. The second was adapted from the original author of the protocol OrionN.

Most pet stores do not carry ciprofloxacin, you can get it online by searching for "fish ciprofloxacin". One brand calls it AquaCipro, in the US this allows you to purchase it without a prescription and usually can get it within a couple of days. In the meantime I would work on planning how to treat the anemone. I believe @Lost in the Sauce has dosed his display tank before, but you will see the protocol has details for setting up a hospital tank. If you don't have the equipment to setup a hospital tank and put the nem in now, I would say do a good 10-20% water change in the current tank your anemone is in and see how it responds to that. If it suddenly perks back up and stays inflated for the next couple of days, then maybe forgo the antibiotic treatment and focus on figuring out the other water parameters I mentioned. If freshly mixed saltwater makes the nem happy again then there is something off with the water and might require addition of activated carbon or more frequent water changes.

Lets see if some others can chime in #fishmedic

Thank you, I will look into the meds and order even if I donot end up needing it now at least I will have it on hand. I will do a water change tonight and see if that helps as well as grab a reef test kit. Thanks for the help!

 

[WinterHarkins]

Im guessing Alk swings tbh

 

[Jekyl]

Need to know alkalinity and phosphate. Throw in a non API test of nitrate if possible also.

 

[Dcloser12]

Nitrate and nitrite and ammonia shouldn't even begin to be tested. The bacteria in the tank should be well on its way of handling all this. If it was an issue with that he would have algae blooms galore and a whole different string of issues. The problem isn't the lighting. Smatfarms are good. They bang about 170 par 24 inches down about 8 inches off the water. You can grow anything with them. The issue is temp or parameter shifting. Easy fix. Mix a bowl of water. Float the bowl inside the tank and after it floats and comes up to temp add the nem to it and leave it in its own isolated bowl of new water floating inside the tank. If it looks better the next day, it's your water. Do a 20% change and let nature run its course.