My LTA is affraid of the dark!

[dulgee]

I got my Purple LTA about a week ago after doing much research and reading everything i could on the subject. I know my tank is not the most mature, but my cycle went well, and all my nutrients are spot on, so i figured what the heck, why not?

Right away, it was a challenge to get him to stick anywhere, i'd dig a hole and put him in it, and put some small rubble burried next to him to help him feel secure, and to help with the current, but invariably, the next morning i'd find him either floating around in circles, or wedged in some cave in my live rock away from direct light. after a few days of this he started retracting completely and looked like an orange ping pong ball floating around in the morning... i'd plant him back under the lights, and he'd open up again... i did target feed him some rehydrated mysis shrimp early on, but then he just stopped eating after being so stressed out. every morning i'd find him wedged in some crevase seemingly unable to find an adequate spot. i tried slowing my flow significantly and stopping my ph completely, but i was worried about my bio-filter holding up, so i restarted it and brought it to a moderate/lowish flow.

Tonight, i stayed up late to observe, and like clockwork when the lights went out, he retracted his tentacles and started to come out of his deep sandy spot. before he was completely free and floating i put on all the lights to full, and low and behold, he opened back up and sank back down!

to see if I was going nuts, i again put the lights on nighttime cycle (which was 3% blue and 0% white) and bam, he'd close up again! so I tweaked, and found a sweet spot that he stays open for the night cycle with 25% blue and 0% white, which my Chromis dont seem to mind, because they are asleep, but my clowns never settled down. i am going to try to slowly over the next several days decrease the lux for the night cycle and see if i can find a sweeter spot to let my clowns rest, but still have a night light for my chicken ish Anemone.

Anyone else observe this?

 

[CodyRVA]

Welcome to reef2reef!

This is not uncommon at all. Nems typically shrink down in size when the lighting goes down; this is a natural process. I would not adjust your lighting to keep the nem of adequate size 24/7. Time your lights to simulate natural day light and let the nem do it's thing. In regards to it "floating," i'm assuming you mean actually floating around not attached to anything... this is not good.

You don't need to "dig a hole" or anything like that for the nem. A nem will move around the tank until it is happy, regardless of how ideal you think the placement is. This is a catch 22. On one side it's going to find a happy place by itself which takes the guess work out of it, on the other hand, if you have any other corals they will likely be stung by the nem and the nem also faces the odds of being sucked into a power head, over flow, etc.

How old is your tank? Assuming it recently cycled, your system is not stable enough to house this critter. The biggest issues i've encountered with nems in tanks of this maturity level is ALK swings, which you are almost guaranteed to have at this point. Keep a close eye on it's health; it's likely moving around like it is because your water chemistry is not up to par. Ultimately, if your parameters do not stabilize or improve the nem will die and potentially pollute your water. If this does happen, you'll want to remove the nem ASAP.

How long have you had the nem, any pics?

 

[dulgee]

Thanks for the welcome!

update, and the reason i haven't gotten back to the thread since i started it...

so, my aquarium was going great, pH was at 8.3 and very stable, Ammonia 0, Nitrite 0 and Nitrate around 5ppm, phosphate was also very low. the only issues I had was the quirky behavior of the anemone.

The day after posting the thread, i did a standard 30% water change (using reef crystals which seems to help stabilize pH). the only part nonstandard was that after I was done, my return pump did not start back up, it was dead! and of course i did not have a backup. It was 12 hours before i was able to get a new pump in there working, in the mean time i put an airstone in the fuge hoping to quell a dye off in my rock/sandbed.

At this point I probably SHOULD have tested the water in the sump before starting up the new pump, but alas, i did not. I still had the powerhead running in my DT so I was hoping there would be no die off there either. after a few hours of starting everything back up again to tested my parameters, and i was completely shocked!

salinity 1.025
pH- 7.8
Ammonia - 6ppm
Nitrite - 5ppm
Nitrate near 0.

SO, it looks like my nitrogen cycle has restarted! great! problem is, i have 3 chromis, 2 clowns, an LTA, a mini-maxi, and assorted invert CUC! i rushed out to petco and bought a bottle of Ammo-lock and Bio-Spira to jump start things again, and neutralize the ammonia in the water. also dosed with some sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) for the pH, and some vodka, to help the bacteria growth. before dumping all this mitigation into the water i performed a 50% water change to no effect on the levels. i also stopped my skimmer to not take the bacteria before they got to colonize. now 2 days into this cycle, and my parameters have not improved at all. and both nems look like they are about to die. i don't have a quarantine i can move them to in the mean time i put them in separate specimen containers hanging inside the DT with an airstone in each. the water is brand new mixed salt water, and I added a piece of live rock with each.

i am not sure what else to do. the maxi is shriveled up with a big ol' gaping mouth and the LTA is open with shriveled up tentacles, and had some brown stringy stuff coming out of its mouth. but it is completely unresponsive to any external stimuli the purple color is still very good though.

not sure what else i can do... ideas?

 

[CodyRVA]

How old is your system exactly? Did you have the power head in your display aiming towards the surface? What other equipment is in your sump area? There could be other factors you're not considering.

Did you confirm your test results with different kits/multiple tests?

Ultimately, I would remove the livestock until your system balances itself.

 

[dulgee]

System is about 4 months old, and was perfectly stable until this mishap!

PH was pointing at surface churning the water nicely. and had cover off to allow max gas exchange. Also put my spare heater in the DT.

In my sump I only have skimmer in drain area, a sock, a refugium section with deep sand and about 10 lbs of rock with some cheato in the middle. This is also where my heater is. Hen return pump is right after bubble trap. I shut the skimmer off and diverted the airflow to an air stone in the fuge.

I only have one test kit, it is the API reef kit, and a stand alone phosphate kit. I did run each test twice, just for sanity's sake.

Unfortunately, I don't have a place like a hospital tank to move my stock... and no small time lfs I've made friends with to babysit for me. Just a big petco that I wouldn't trust to feed my 6 year old's beta fish. Hoping the ammo lock keeps them healthy till it stabilized. Any experience with ammolock? It says to dose every 48 hrs till ammonia is gone. Can I overdose the tank?

 

[CodyRVA]

Seems odd that the power head didn't prevent this issue from happening. I've never used ammolock, not sure what the adverse affects could be to your system cycling properly.

 

[dylana407]

There have been many reports that API test kit is unreliable. My recommendation is to have the lfs test your water. I have 2 happy BTA, but no luck with LTA.

 

[Amoo]

If you had 6ppm ammonia and did a 50% water change, it's not physically possible to have 6ppm ammonia afterwards without having ammonia in the water you mixed up and added.

I would immediately suspect the test kit, which I believe one of the ammo lock products throws way off, but I don't remember specifically if it's ammolock or another brand.

Your tank obviously has a problem because everything is mad, but your numbers aren't passing the common sense check.

 

[Amoo]

worth mentioning, worrying about pH at this point in your tank's age is a complete exercise in frustration and unnecessary. I wouldn't honestly even test it until you start dealing with corals.