BTA not opening

[zenn]

My BTA has not been opening much the last 3 weeks. This is a huge suprise to me as I've had it for almost 2 years. It's always done so well.

It all started when a PC bulb went bad ahead of schedule, and I didn't catch it right away. So the BTA moved. Since then, it's hardly opened at all. It stays under a rock in the position it normally only stays in to exit wastes. The color remains the same though; yet it continues to stay in a tight balled-up position with all it's tentacles pulled inside.

I thought the culprit was the new location it moved to. There's a bit more water movement. So I switched the powerheads around to ease up on the water flow around it. That didn't help. It hasn't moved since the PC bulb went out. So I don't even know if it's unappy really. Is it just going through some development or is something wrong?

PS. A pair of clownfish have been hosting in it forever. I feed the bta every week or two. It gets mysis shrimp. Water parameters are very stable and my sps, lps and zoos are all doing excellent.

 

[returnofsid]

It could be that it's getting ready to split. Sometimes, certain things that cause stress with BTAs also induces splitting. Normally, before splitting, they go through a period where they look sickly. Keep an eye on it and watch for powerheads since it's moving around. It'll move around until it finds a "happy spot" and then settle in again.

 

[zenn]

it hasn't moved since it originally moved about 4-5 weeks ago. But the last 3 weeks it hasn't been opening during the day. So I'm not to worried abou tit getting sucked into a powerhead because it seems to be staying put. I'm more concerned with it not extending it's tentacles for the last 3 weeks. It seems like I've only heard of BTA's splitting very quickly and suddenly. I haven't heard of them being all balled up for weeks on end. So you're saying that my bta is not opening because it could be preparing to split? That's cool with me. I just haven't heard that before.

 

[zenn]

bump for someone that knows if this is typical behavior for splitting or if it's not good....????

 

[zenn]

I think it's just dying. It's looking progressively smaller and smaller. I have no clue what's wrong with it.