A little anemone help please...

[Kane L]

Hello all,
I recently purchased a long tentacle anemone from the lfs and I've had it for 2 days now. Since putting him in my tank, it has his mouth gaped wide open most of the time. It's also excreting a hard, brown, poop-looking something. It's not stringy or slimy but hard and compact. It has stayed in the same sand hole that I dug for him but it doesn't look like it has attached its foot yet. Should I be worried that his mouth is open most of the time or is he just acclimating? Is it normal for them to excrete hard brown stuff? I see on forums they excrete stringy brown liquid but haven't seen anything about a hard brown excretion. Any help will be greatly appreciated and I've posted several photos.
Water params:
Temp: 78.1
pH: 8.2
Nitrates: 0'ish
Phosphates: .03
Calcium: 450
Lights: 2 AI Prime HD
Tank: 40 gallon

 

[sfin52]

@Amoo

 

[sfin52]

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/how-i-cipro.211822/

This may help. Amoo has done great stuff with anemone

 

[Gonebad395]

First off welcome to R2R I’ve never seen hard brown stuff coming out of a nem. The open mouth isn’t a good sign. Have you fed it at all? @Amoo maybe he’s seen something like this

 

[Kane L]

First off welcome to R2R I’ve never seen hard brown stuff coming out of a nem. The open mouth isn’t a good sign. Have you fed it at all? @Amoo maybe he’s seen something like this

I've not fed him at all. I was going to wait until i see some improvement before feeding.

 

[Gonebad395]

No gapeimg mouth when you bought it seems kinda fast

 

[Kane L]

No gapeimg mouth when you bought it seems kinda fast

Is this something that is somewhat "normal" during acclimation?

 

[Gonebad395]

Not really I’ve never seen any of my nems producing a hard brown substance and from your picture it looks like his mouth is inverted not a good sign

 

[reef lover]

If he didnt improve in a cple days i would cipro....do not try to feed at this time. Very pretty nem.

 

[Deiblerj]

Keep an eye on it. Do frequent water changes and give it some time. I had a nem in my my tank a few months ago. Got huge! Then started to die. Shrunk up so small I was about to pull it out cause I thought it had died. Decided to give it some more time and it came back to a nice healthy nem. I swear it just got sick but ended up getting better. I increased water changes and fed the tank a little heavy to allow it to grab food. Did not feed directly and just let it rest wherever it wanted

 

[Captain Quint]

Is this something that is somewhat "normal" during acclimation?

Only a small degree would be considered during acclimation. To me, in the pic, it appears as if the LTA is expelling a rather large chunk of food it had been fed. Perhaps at the LFS.

It has such a nice color and I certainly would not give up hope at this point but I'd watch it carefully as it is a bit more than just usual expelling but could be due to the large chunk.

I have seen this on a couple of my LTA's and they ended up doing fine.

Do you hate a hospital/QT if it became necessary?

Welcome to R2R and thank you for bringing this to the attention of the forum so quickly with a hopeful good outcome. Please keep us updated.

 

[Kane L]

Only a small degree would be considered during acclimation. To me, in the pic, it appears as if the LTA is expelling a rather large chunk of food it had been fed. Perhaps at the LFS.

It has such a nice color and I certainly would not give up hope at this point but I'd watch it carefully as it is a bit more than just usual expelling but could be due to the large chunk.

I have seen this on a couple of my LTA's and they ended up doing fine.

Do you hate a hospital/QT if it became necessary?

Welcome to R2R and thank you for bringing this to the attention of the forum so quickly with a hopeful good outcome. Please keep us updated.

Thanks for the advice everyone. Currently i don't have a quarantine but maybe I'll take a swing through the local thrift stores and see if fate has put a nice little affordable setup in there for me. Still looks very similar today, hasn't gotten any better or any worse. Although it has dug it's foot into a crevice between the rock and sand and seems to be very stationary. Hopefully he makes it through the acclimation.

 

[sfin52]

Attaching foot is a good thing