Anemone question

I have a bubble tip anemone that has sucked all it tentacles in for two weeks now. It will still eat but no tentacles just a pink blob. My tomato clown doesn't know what to do , just keeps circling around it. Is it dying? It was good size with long pink tentacles with white tips, very nice looking. Not sure what I can do. Any advice would be great. Thanks

 

What are the tank params? How is your lighting? Current? Have you fed the anemone lately?
We can get a better picture with more info!!

Happy anemone saving!

 

Yeah what Doc said. I have seen my anemone react harshest to any level of nitrates, even 5ppm. Make sure the tank is getting enough dissolved oxygen, as anemones use up A LOT of O2. But make sure you check your tank parameters. How old is your tank?

 

My ph is at 8.2 , nitrates are at 30- but have been as high as 70 with no problems with it, my sal. is at 1.025. The tank has been up for 5 years. Anemone is about 6 months old. I'm due for a water change, but like I said I've ran as high as 70 with the anemone looking good. I have two 4' current usa orbits totaling 520 watts. My corals look good. Fed it last two days ago. My tank is a 90 Gallon with five fish and around 75 lbs live rock. Wet/dry filter, skimmer.

 

Even if the anemone does look good, those nitrates are through the roof. What type of lights are those? PC, t5, or halide? If they are t5 or halide, you could get a clam. They are beautiful and would help with your nitrate problem. If they're PCs, you probably shouldn't have an anemone anyway.

 

I do water changes regularly but can't seem to get nitrates below 20. I don't over feed if anything I could feed more but with the nitrates I don't want to over do it. My lights are compact fluorescent. Each light has two 65 watt dual actinic bulbs and two 65 watt dual daylight bulbs. Thats a total of 260 watts per unit and I have two for a total of 520 watts. Thats not too much is it? I have a plate coral and a open brain that seem to be doing very well. They are both new, around two weeks. The Anemone is looking worse, not sure it will bounce back.

 

Well, remember that PC's are really only good down to about 10-12" of water; after that they lose power considerably. Those nitrates could be doing a lot of harm too. Whats the temp, ammonia, nitrite, mg, dkh, and po4 readings? Just because the anemone looked good a while ago doesnt mean they didnt harm it. Anemone's can take a very long time to die. If you really don't think it will make it, get it out of the tank and see if the LFS will take it back. It's not worth losing everything else in the tank along with it.
As for lowering your nitrates, more rock would be where I would start first. General rule of thumb for a reef tank is 1 1/2 to 2 pounds per gallon.

 

look into a denitrifier

 

I didn't realize you need that much live rock. Thats something I'll address. I'm going to retest the water here today to give you an accurate reading to date. Yesterday I purchased some new filter medium. It's called Chemi-pure Elite. It says it is Ammonia and Nitrate scavenging. Although Ammonia has never been a problem for me I'm hoping it will help with the Nitrates. I added it last night, its been in for 13 hours now. I don't know if it is just a coincidence but the anemone has perked up a little, still far from 100% but better then last night. The Chemi-pure claims to do a lot of other stuff to, way to much to list. I've been thinking about building a coil denitrator. Has anyone tried this? Do they work? I will post water parameters a little later today, have daughters basketball game to go to. Thanks for your advice so far.