Bubble tip anemone question

[ShaneAugust]

Hello, I'm new to the community but have read countless posts on the site. I made an account for this question. I started an anemone only tank 5 months ago. It's a fiji cube 76 gallon shallow, 48x24x16. I purchased a kessil ap9x for lighting, cycled the tank properly, tested the water weekly until it was safe to add two maroon clownfish, diamond goby, starry blenny and some crabs at different times. Started with a large Long Tentacle anemone which is thriving to this day with zero issues/takes food. The problem is I bought many bubble tips. About 12, most were small of the same breed, and 2 large 6 inch A grade bta's Rose/green with yellow tips. Everything started out perfect, they all looked healthy and vibrant. But the smaller ones started to very slowly shrink down, lose color completely and hide away to die. There's 3 small ones left with no color, a quarter of the size and on the verge of dying but they are attached to a rock. Last week the large rose bta kept walking around the tank, tentacles turned to nubs and lost the color into a dark Grey and then died over night within 6 hours. Now today the large green one has detached from the rock and is shrinking down to 3 inches and mouth is gaping. Yesterday it looked better than ever. Yes, I know they shrink to expel but this isn't the usual behavior, it was upside down off a rock like the rose did. It still has color but it's not looking good. What am I doing wrong? Everything I keep is fine but I can't seem to keep BTA's past a few months. Is the lighting insufficient? I lowered the ap9x and have it at 100% intensity. I do 10 gallon weekly waterchanges. I test weekly and dose accordingly. This upsets me because I love bubble tips more than anything else in the hobby. I've done months of daily research, asked my LFS countless questions. I can't figure it out. Right now the large green anemone is in a basket higher toward the light fixture. I have pictures if need. I get if I'm a noob and made stupid mistakes but I could really use the advice. I don't want to lose this one.

 

[tjohnson3]

Watching this thread… same probs

 

[sim2142]

There are a few studies showing that anemones and coral can produce water borne discharges which stunt the growth of other competing anthozoans and bacterial colonies.

Cant find a study specifically on BTAs but there is one showing water borne allelopathy in condy anemones.

Im gonna take a guess and assume that since there is such a high volume of them they are competing chemically and negatively affecting each others growth.

Maybe try running carbon or other filtration?

 

[DKPminus]

Wondering if it’s to much light. I have 3 viperspectra 165 only set 30 blue and 2-4 for white over a 225g. 72-30-24. I have was 2 now 4 watermelon bubble tips, a green, purple and a small white pink tip and all very healthy.

 

[Timfish]

My thought is too bright of lighting is playing a factor but there certainly could be pathogen or disease secondary issues. Once bleaching gets started they may look brighter initially as the process starts and they begin to expell their zooxanthellae but then loose color very quickly when they loose their fluoresing and chromo proteins. For refference if you check your PAR my BTAs do fine with less than ~100 PAR, in some cases just ~30-40 PAR. In this system the larger Rose BTA can get about 120-130 at the surface but most of the BTA is below ~100 PAR and the smaller Rose BTA is getting ~30 - 50 PAR and the other brown and Teal w/ pink tip BTA are ~20 - 50. Also, I don not feed my BTAs

 

[lost66]

Sounds like chemical warfare. I would change some water and run carbon. Change carbon twice a week and wait.