Ritteri Anemone help

90reefernyc · Sep 27, 2021

Hello everyone,
Recently purchased a ritteri anemone. My current tank 150 gallon has 2 carpets and a couple small bubble tips. I acclimated the anemone turned off all pumps and let him settle. After about 5 minutes in the tank my clarkii clowns have been using him as a soccer ball. This has been going on for about 5 days now. It had settled over the weekend into a hole but today clowns want to play soccer again. I recently put him in a separate basket so they would leave him alone. What do you recommend I do next?
thank you

Jekyl · Sep 27, 2021

Maybe remove the clowns until the anemone gets situated

D-Nak · Sep 27, 2021

The best course of action is to separate the clowns and allow the ritteri to acclimate. They like to perch on the top of a flat rock, unlike other anemones that either bury their foot in sand or attach in a crevice in the rockwork.

If the anemone is disproportionately smaller than the clownfish, even if it does find a suitable spot, they may "over love" it to death, so keep any eye on them.

Clarkii are especially rough on their anemone hosts, so you've got that working against you as well.

All that said, it could definitely work, and if well fed the ritteri can quickly grow to become a great host anemone.

90reefernyc · Sep 27, 2021

D-Nak said:
The best course of action is to separate the clowns and allow the ritteri to acclimate. They like to perch on the top of a flat rock, unlike other anemones that either bury their foot in sand or attach in a crevice in the rockwork.

If the anemone is disproportionately smaller than the clownfish, even if it does find a suitable spot, they may "over love" it to death, so keep any eye on them.

Clarkii are especially rough on their anemone hosts, so you've got that working against you as well.

All that said, it could definitely work, and if well fed the ritteri can quickly grow to become a great host anemone.

@D-Nak thank you for the quick response. Would you think one of those mushroom / anemone acclimation boxes would work? Getting the clowns out will be a big PITA