[anmacara103]

Hi everyone!

I am new to the whole salwater aquarium hobby, and I have one concern currently. I bought a 29gal Biocube from Oceanic at my LFS. The owner seems very nice and helped us set up the tank by giving us already cured live rock from his tank and water right out of his tanks as well. We also bought live sand. We set the tank up, let it clear up for a few days and then bought a Margarita snail, a Cleaner shrimp, two tiny Hermet crabs and a Damsel to help the tank cycle (the store owner said that this would probably not take as long or be as severe as normal since we basically transported part of a biological system into our new tank). We are still going to wait 3-4 weeks to add the 2 Clowns and an Anemone that we envision completing this tank (other than the soft corals we hope to add piece by piece in the future). Since the live rock came from our LFS's own tanks, we imported some unintentional life. We got a few mushroom corals, maybe a sponge or two and a couple of brittle stars that we have not seen since putting the stuff all in. A couple of days after we set it up, we noticed what appears to be an anemone in the back of the tank, on a rock. It has not moved from that location, which I am not sure is ideal for an anemone (if it is, in fact, an anemone). I was wondering if I could have some help identifying this unintentional part of our aquarium. As it is in the back, it might be difficult to see in the pictures, but it is in the background behind the cleaner shrimp that tried to steal the show! I am worried that it might be a condy and be dangerous to the other stuff that we have.

Thanks for the help!

P.S. Sorry that the pic is so small, it is the max size allowed, and there is a rock partially obscuring the anemone. It is only about an inch tall and is mostly transparent with a little browning towards the end of the tendrils.

[msbdiving]

That looks like an aiptasia anemone. I think you would actually prefer the condy at this point. Try Joe's juice, Aiptasia Control, or Kalkwasser on it.

[anmacara103]

Should I be upset that I paid a lot of money for already cured LR from an LFS and got something like this on it, or is it just the way things are? Would it be better to remove the rock than to try killing the anemone?

[glasta]

well i heard something about using boiling water in a turkey baster and shoot it in there mouth to kill it, or just use a razor and cut him off but make sure to get all of it off.

[msbdiving]

Just the way things are when you try to bring nature into a cube. If you are able to view the rock in an aquarium and can look for things on the surface that would be cool. Often times LR is in a huge tank that you can't see through, and has no light so it would be near impossible to see them. If you try to pull it off, the can multiply. Try one of the above mentioned concoctions. I haven't heard of the hot water/turkey baster before, woulldn't want to get that near anything else.

[anmacara103]

Thanks for the help everyone! I'm looking for some Kalkwasser now

[jipo123]

personally i feel that the best way to do it is put on a couple pairs of latex gloves and rip him off. and trully i dont think they are that much of a bother in just a normal tank.
Things get carried into your tank with rocks all the time, a few weeks ago i found my infestation of fire worms when my lights turned on a little early, it happens. must of the stuff is good though.
my concern is that most bioqubes dont have the right lighting to support an anemone or corals that arnt all the way up at the top of the tank, so it might die anyways. I think you should check and be carful you dont get an anemone that needs extream amount of lights.

[anmacara103]

I do think that it is a possibility that it might die, due to its location (it is all the way at the bottom of the tank). Our LFS owner was prety open with the lighting issue, and said that we could only have soft corals and the anemone would have to be a bubble-tip anemone. I also stacked my rock so that there is some hight to the tank, so a mobile anemone should be able to get to a good spot. Does that sound right?

So far there are no local dealers that have any Kalkwasser or Joe's Juice, and my LFS owner only recommended peppermint shrimp or removal by scraping it off the rock out of the tank. I think I'll keep an eye on if for a week or so, and maybe i can cover it up with a small shelf to block the light and starve it out?

[jipo123]

You should look on a site I use saltwaterfish.com i have not looked but they might have stuff to kill it on there. They have very good prices, have a huge selection and quality fish and inverts.

something else you can try, is get a fish that eats inverts such as a trigger for a couple weeks, then sell it or something of the sort. (just another idea)
I like the idea of blocking it out, does not always work but its worth a try if your willing to wait.
and something else to recomend to you, when you buy your anemone. try to get one with fish already hosted to it, sometimes they dont like the anemones. i have multiple anemones and my fish choose my leather corals instead.(just an idea)

[anmacara103]

I just discovered that there is a second aiptasia on the same rock! I was going to remove the rock, so that I could get them off LFS said you could take the rock off under their base, and you will get the whole thing. I looked, and unfortunately I placed that one rock as the support for almost all my other live rock, so he promised me a bottle of Joe's Juice from his next shipment in a couple of weeks. It seems a little easier to handle than Kalkwasser. Thanks for all the help everyone

[jipo123]

Great, =) good luck with everything.

[anmacara103]

I found a dead snail in my tank today. We had not been able to find it for several days. The last time we saw it, it was crawling on the rock with the Aiptasia, and it was down behind that rock at the back of the tank. Could the aiptasia have killed it? Two of my other snails seem fine, and are dining on an algae smorgasboard, a third that I put in (one of the ones that lives in the sand) has not made an appearance since it went in about 5 days ago. I am a little worried. Any suggestions?

[anmacara103]

CORRECTION!!! Just saw the sand burying snail for the first time since adding him, it was under the moon lights in the dark, but he looks happy! Makes me feel much better

[WILLIAM1]

I just had this same problem looks like a Aiptasia to me. I had 2 on the same live rock and did some research on it and they can multiply very fast. One cure for this is to purchase a small seringe from walgreens fill it up with some lemon juice and inject it directly into the Aiptasia that should do the trick. Aiptasia is a fast growing anemone type coral killer in a sense. They will kill corals by overtaking them until they die. Theres alot of info if you search the web. I might be a little off but this is pretty accurate.

[Fishhead Junkie]

dont do anything with your aptasia. i bought my 29gallon bio cube and pretty much set mine up the way you did...purchased aquacultured live rock from the same store full of lots of goodies, premixed saltwater from them. i think after a week i saw at least 6-10 aptasia's in the tank. they look cool. your clean up crew will take care of them. its been over 6 months now and i only have 1 aptasia left. why kill something that looks very interesting? if you notice the population increasing..then use jo's juice.

steve

[swinginbeef]

I killed the one that I found in my tank by taking the rock out and blasting the spot where the aiptasia was with crazy hot water (nearly boiling). Then I put the rock back in the tank. It didn't seem to affect any of the other life on the rock (several small featherdusters etc).

I noticed one more aiptasia growing on one of the rocks in my refugium. I'm just going to leave it alone. I'll do something about it if it ever becomes a problem.

[WILLIAM1]

heres the website for info...
Aptasia Away aptasia and rock anemone remedy

[rustynloulou]

ive got 4 of them and there no bad little guys the will grow fast but if you take the time and control them you shouldnt have a problem,,,,,look at it this way its kinda an extra perk for as much as we pay for live rock to get a free anemone,,,,,the boiling water on the live rock is probly not a good idea ,,,joes juice is awsome to spot conrol with if they get out of hand,,,,,,

[anmacara103]

Finally got my hands on some Joe's Juice today! It worked like a charm on one of the two, not sure about the other, but it seems to have gone away. Thanks for the help everyone

[WILLIAM1]

They multiplyied so fast I had to remove the small piece of LR for a few days and then returned it to the tank hopefully they all died.

[tychecc]

I have a problem I just bought a handon carpet anemone , this is the seconed day in my tank. First day it was just open and huge now today it was sort of turned inside out and alot smaller. Is this somthing i should worry about or is it just aclimating. Please help