BTAs with and without Bubbles in their Tips - why

[JonF]

Some BTAs have uniform, perfectly round bubble tips and some are long and spindly. My long spindly bta moved from the bottom of the tank to the middle of the tank. For a day or two in its new home its tentacles showed bubbles here and there and it has since gone back to a more consistent long, thin tentacle.

My question is why my LFSs show tank has a bta with crazy perfect bubble tips and mine does not. Is it lighting adequacy? Is it trace elements (I dose B-Ionic 1,2; Iodine and Strontium).

Or is it simply that there are different morphs?

Thanks.

[Typhon]

With my experience, I have noticed that lighting makes a big different in the way a BTA displays there tentacles. Currently I have a Rose BTA and when I first placed it in to the tank it had nicely rounded BTs ,but over a 2 day period they disappeared. Then recently I add 2 X 250w metal halides to my 90g that had only VHOs. The next day the BTs were back and very large as a matter of fact. So it might be that you don't have enough light for your BTA. What type of lighting are you using?? Size your tank?? Amount wattage over you tank now??

[JonF]

Its a 150g tank (72x18x28 high). 3x 150w MHs and 2x 160 VHOs. Anemone is probably midway up in the tank now. Yes, I'm starting to suspect it prob is light related.

[Typhon]

I see that you have a very high tank 28". Normally most experts recommend that tanks with less than 16" use 175w MH and tanks great that 16" should look into 250w or 400w depending on depth. For a tank that is 28" deep, I think your 150w MH are not getting enough pentration in to the water. You may want to think about 250w or even 400w for your 150g. Are you MH about 9-12 above the tank??

[JonF]

Hey Typhoon - yes my MHs are about 9-12 inches above the tank. I've thought about getting 250w - I think the 400w would be too much power draw for my breakers and would produced too much heat.

I try to compensate by putting low light creatures on the bottom - eg mushrooms and putting more light loving creatures - clams, acro etc up at the top.

[Jamesurq]

I read that the BTA extends his tenticles when he's hungry. How often do you feed him?

[Jimbo]

It's not a hunger issue. It seems to be either current or lighting related, or both.
Jim

[PaintGuru]

Mine does that too and they seem to change by the day. Actually looking at him, he is half and half. The more "bubble" shaped ones are closer to my 400W MH in the middle and the non-bubble ones are probably in lower light.

[JonF]

I almost never feed my bta. i'll do so for a few weeks and will follow up if it makes any differnce or not.

[helenjc]

Well my BTA always looks so so almost all day, but when, for the night, only the actinics are on for an hour, the tentacles get the bubble shape.

[slojmn]

According to Joyce Wilkerson in Clownfishes : A Guide to Their Captive Care, Breeding and Natural History There are a few theories out there regarding the bubble tip versus long and stringy. Some noted it was a response to a clownfish symbiot, Sprung and Delbeek refute this theory and lean more towards the lighting issue. Less light means more stringy and long, more light means more bubble tips. In my 120g reef under 1240w of MH/VHO light my Rose BTA has some phenominal bubble tips, usually at least 50%-75% of the tips are bubbled. In my 40g reef I have a green BTA that has never shown buble tips and it hosts a clownfish. This tank is lit by 175w of MH. Lighting could certainly be playing a large part in my opbservations between two tanks and two BTA's

Now to throw a wrench in my unscientific observations, my Rose BTA split last year and I moved the clone into the 40g reef while it healed. It kept the bubble tips through the healing process and the entire two weeks in the 40g under the 175w of light. Then I sold it. Who knows...either way both of my BTA's are healthy and thriving despite bubble tips or lack of :)

[jms]

I have the same 150 with 250 halides and my bubble tip (have had for 6 months without dividing) is about 2/3 way down the tank and has not had bubble tips since I first got him. About 12 inches in diameter now and eacts like a pig. Truly huge but still hasn't divided which puzzles me.

From everything I've read, I don't think its the light thats necessarily the issue.

[schanz]

I bought a large piece of live rock from another guy that had a small, bleached white BTA on it. He was using worn-out pc's. The anemone was hosting two percs. The anemone had nice little bubble tips when I bought it. I put in my 125 with 175W MH and NO fluorescent. I got a maroon for it after I put it in that took to it immediately. It slowly grew and gained all it's symbiotic algae back.

The anemone is now huge, has a very long base that it uses to reach around and has tentacles 6" long with no bt's. I feed it krill/selco about once a week.

[liusteven]

I have 4 rbta... 3 of them are stringy and only inflates their tentacles when they are hungry or just before my daylight switches on... My 4 rbta has bubble tips all the time? I hope we can get a better (scientific) explanation!

[manderx]

the bubbliest bubbletip i've ever seen was in a very low lit tank. it was pretty big for a BTA and had perfectly round tips. it was in the little display tank by the register at Fish Safari for you tidewater peeps.

[robthorn]

Doesn't it take your anemones a while before they lose the bubbles? explaining why your fish store has bubbles and you don't it seems to take a little time to lose them not normally over night. ( at least it seems so to me) . I was using tropic marin salt and my green bta was stringy. my Rose bta was semi stringy. I just switched to crystal sea's bio assay salt and the rose is all bubble tips again and the green one is about 50% bubbles again and the bubbles are huge. Can't say why this happened but it did and I am happy about it. Neither anemone has moved since way before I started changing salts. I have 250w iwasaki mh bulbs on ice caps. the bulbs are 6 inches off the water which I have seen specs showing that the 250 bulb at 6 inches is actually brighter than the 400 watt same bulb between 9-12 inches

[JonF]

just swapped my bta into a 200g tank from my 150. after 1 day he's much stouter and bubblier than he's been. the main difference is the level of current. the new tank has much less current than the old. wondering if that's the ticket? i'm going to ensure he remains in a low current area and see whether i can keep his tips bubbly.

[robthorn]

good luck keeping your bta where you want it because when mine decides to move it just does it and I have no control . the funny thing is it always ends up where it started. normally within a day or two

[captainsafari]

Hello
robthorn
the bubble in question at fish safari has been in that tank for about 5 years now. the lighting started with a twin tube 2 x 20 watt, then to a 2 x 36 watt pc then to a 2 x 55 watt pc and now has a new 2 x 65 watt esu pc. the state of the bubbles changes day by day. there is times it is half and half, There are now 5 clones in the tank all starting from a small GBT about 4 " accross. now the biggest is at least 12" accross. so i dont think there is an explanation of why there are the form they are, it depends on which side of the tank they got up on that day just like we feel jreat one day and regular the next. anyway my 2 cw later leroy