Path: utzoo!hoptoad!amdcad!amdahl!ihnp4!gargoyle!ddsw1!gryphon!richard
From: richard@gryphon.CTS.COM (Richard Sexton)
Newsgroups: alt.aquaria
Subject: Anemones
Message-ID: <2526@gryphon.CTS.COM>
Date: 9 Dec 87 09:51:35 GMT
Distribution: alt
Organization: Trailing Edge Technology, Redondo Beach, Ca.
Lines: 71


In article <4406@ihlpg.ATT.COM> dalka@ihlpg.ATT.COM (Ken Dalka) writes:

>This is a important question for me. I have not kept anemonies
>but intend to try in the future so I have been trying to ask
>questions. I've been told 2 things:
>
>	1) they are difficult to keep alive for more than 3 or 4 months
>	   in a non-reef tank system where you are using standard filters.

Garbage. I've kept them alive for well over two years with a very 
simple set-up. There was a store near Toronto (I think it was called 
_Anne's_) that had a 150 gal tank with a 10 year growth of brown
transparent anemones. There must have been thousands, in all
sizes. The filter ? Two small inside box filters. Relied on
whatever sunlight filtered through the front window, and that
was the extent of the set-up.

>	2) they are BOTH filter feeders and accept lumps of food and
>	   should be given both.

They will eat both, but dont need both. Lumps of food is easier.

>Anemonies are a broad class of invertebrates so I guess Ill say I'd
                       ^^^^^
Actually phylum Cnidaria, class Anthoza.

>like to keep the kind that clowns love to cuddle up in (carpet anemonies?).

Clowns will get along with most any anemone. They acclimatize themselve
to a "new" anemone by quickly flicking the anemone with their caudal
peduncle (the part of the body just before the tail). After doing this
for a few days, they "get used" to the anemone and can lounge around
in it with impunity.

From _Exotic Marine Fishes_:

"It has been established that the fish develops an immunity from
anemone nematocysts (stinging cells) by altering its protective
mucous coating. The first time the fish comes in fleeting contact
with the tentacles, it is mildly stung and thereafter develops
an immunity."

"Removing the anemonefish from the tentacles is very disconcerting for
the fish. It takes Amphiprion percula (now occelarus or something
like that) fifteen minutes to reorient itself to the tentacles from
a distance of thirty feet." 

CLowns prefer, and look best in the Pacific anemones of the Genus
Stoichactis - the carpet anemones, while the most common anemone
in petshops is usually Condylactis passiflora - a Caribbean
anemone, usually pink or mauve, with fairly long, wide tentacles.
It is one of the easier anemones to maintain.

>Anybody wish to comment?

c
c        Dusty old Nastran Deck
c

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{ Yet another comment }


-- 
Richard J. Sexton
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"It's too dark to put the keys in my ignition..."