What’s my Black Widow RBTA doing?

Nowell · Feb 18, 2018

Splitting? Acclimating? Dying? It came from a well stocked tank with LEDs about 10 days ago. The mother colony had split off 30 babies. My tank is lightly stocked with T5 and appears brighter. My crocea, gorgonian, Fiji yellow leather, Sinularia, and SPS are growing quickly. T 77.5, Salinity 35, NO3 undetectable (Salifert), KH 8.15, Mg 1455, Ca 425.

From this:

To this:

Lance M. · Feb 18, 2018

Probably still acclimating to your tank. It will most likely look normal again in a couple hours as long as your water parameters are stable.

One of my rbta's came from led to my tank (T5's) and it went through some changes for a couple weeks. All good now, 9 months later with that one becoming two that are both ~3x the size of the original.

It is healthy, barring any drastic water parameter swings, it should be fine.

I have the same fuge light as you. Great light, only thing I don't like is how big the bulb is.

Zack K · Feb 18, 2018

I agree with the above statement. Just acclimating. Give it another day and if it still looks worse or declines more than it should be time to worry

Nowell · Feb 21, 2018

The anemone did not split. It was inflated more though no where near its initial size. Looks to be healthy though. This morning I noted that it had one side of its base moving down off of its rock and onto the lower rock where I originally wanted it to settle. I added foam covers to my MP40s since he's on the move as a precaution.

Nowell · Mar 16, 2018

It’s alive! I feed it a 1/4 of a silverside every couple days.

brawthy · Mar 17, 2018

I would not feed silversides-bony fish can hurt RBTAS (they don't eat them in the wild)

Other meaty supplements like squid and mysis are cool.

Nowell · Mar 17, 2018

brawthy said:
I would not feed silversides-bony fish can hurt RBTAS (they don't eat them in the wild)

Other meaty supplements like squid and mysis are cool.

Thanks for the tip--I noticed the anemone was regurgitating a piece last night.