Just how big can an RBTA get?

[nsamouroux]

Most of the rose bubble tip anemones I've seen are about 6" diameter, but I've had one that has grown from that size to almost 16" diameter in the last two years... The thing has always been pretty quiescent and never moves from it's spot directly under a 400w XM 20k halide, and has been hosting two occelaris clowns for a a bit less than 2 years. Recently, this RBTA consumed a 6" blonde naso tang (probably got too close while chasing a chunk of nori), and the anemone seems to be RAPIDLY growing. As nearly as I can tell, this thing has grown almost 2" in the last week and is now spreading out / extending it's tentacles more than ever before. I always fed it weekly (a couple 1/2" cubes of home-made meaty food that I feed my fish), but I'm wondering if I might not have been stunting it's growth potential by not feeding it more. I've heard from people who have had RBTAs split dozens of times in the same amount of time that I've had this beast, but it has never once split. It's large size, bright colors, and it's stationary disposition have always made me consider it to be healthy and happy.

This is what it looked like a couple weeks after I bought it from Barrier Reef when I finally got the clowns to host in it:

And this is what it looks like today:

My sebae anemone that I purchased from a person who had it under power compact lights mad: it was bleached completely white!) is now a dark chocolate brown with bright purple tips and has more than quadrupled in size in the year I've had it. I seem to have very good luck with anemones of various types, and want to get a nice carpet anemone once my larger display is set up because I find the various anemones so fascinating (moreso than my corals in most cases ).

I guess my question is: Just how big do these things get? I haven't really been able to find any solid examples online of anemones larger than this one in a reef tank, so I don't really know where it's going to stop :lol:. It already basically owns 1/4 of my 100 gallon reef tank... Thankfully I'll be moving everything over to a 360 gallon display within the week. Anyone have any first-hand experience with large bubble tip anemones? I'd appreciate some feedback!

 

[nsamouroux]

For those of you who remember the posts from when I first discovered the activity... Those two occelaris in the pics include the infamous Wormsnuggler clownfish. I managed to find a few pics of his antics and had a good chuckle at remembering just how strange this fish was . It took a solid week of "training" to get these two clownfish to get into the mood to try hosting with the anemone, but Wormsnuggler seemed to prefer my koko worms and feather dusters. I think the guys at Barrier dropped him on his head when he came out of the shipping box...

And a pic of Wormsnuggler next to the sane clownfish of the pair who was perfectly happy in the above RBTA...

 

[Myteemouse]

I know of two people here who have HUGE RTBA's
Herefishyfishy
and FINN

 

[wjguy]

I know how ya feel

 

[jill]

I bought 2 and one of them split into 3 about 3 months ago. 4 of them was too much so I was finally able to get one of them out of the tank and took it to my LFS so I still have 3 and they are HUGE. I would like to get rid of another one but my tank is way too deep (31") so I keep waiting for my chance.
Now I read your post and am alarmed to think that one of these monsters ATE your tang. Did you see it happen? That's pretty creepy - I didn't think that could happen.

 

[nsamouroux]

Weird, the site didn't subscribe me to my own post... I just noticed there was updates, thanks everyone! Nice pics WJguy! My RBTA rarely gets the "bubbles", but I'm surprised yours has them at such a size.

Jill: Yes, when I got home from work I sat down at the computer and looked over to check out the tank inhabitants. I noticed a spot of grey inside the anemone and paniced a bit thinking it was injured. I went to look, and saw the nose of the blonde naso sliding down into oblivion. I'm sure it had gotten too close or tried to pick some nori off a tentacle or something. If you look at the pics, I have always had a powerhead pointing in the general direction of the bubble tip (it seems to prefer high / direct flow). I am guessing that the fish was picking at something on the rock around the 'nem (or off it's tentacles) and got blown into direct contact. I was pretty beat up about it at first, but weird things happen so I find the humor in it now. I'm certainly not going to be feeding this damned thing an $80 fish every couple weeks! It'll have to be happy with an increased amount of the usual home-made cubes :badgrin:

 

[Maxx]

I've seen photo's of BTA's in excess of 22 inches in diameter. I've read that there are believed to be two morphs of BTA's:

1...Small morph that clones frequently
and
2...large morph that rarely if ever clones

Mike O'Brian, (MojoReef here) told me about a LTA (M.doreensis) a friend of his had that was fed one cocktail shrimp nightly and grew large enough to require its own 90 gallon tank. Mike said it took up about half the tank.

I've personally seen an H.magnifica anemone that was over 24 inches in diameter, (been in captivity for over 10 years, fed cocktail shrimp also in a 150 gallon tank), and two H.crispa anemones 30+ inches in diameter, (in a 750 gallon tank).

I've found I can control how large my H.magnifica gets by how much food I give it. If I feed it regularly, it explands significantly. Its in a 120 so I dont feed it often since I dont want it getting large. It stays steady at about 10 inches in diameter, and I've had it for 3.5 years.

Anemones seem to pretty much grow as much as you feed them....If you're really concerned about the anemone getting too big, stop feeding it.

Nick

 

[alki]

If you take away the clownfish most likely it will split.
One of mine grew to about 12" across with 2 clowns. It got so big I had to get rid of it. I first sold the clowns and within 4 days it was splitting. It had never split before only grew. It split into 4. On the plus side selling 4 for the price of 1 is good!

I would suggest if you have 2 tanks and they are getting too big for you to move the clowns to another tank for a couple weeks. Then if it splits move them back and sell the clones.

Ohh yeah I had also tried pouring colder water change water on it during changes, feeding it alot then stopping and vice versa, all these things I heard from people saying it would make them split. After trying all that I never fed it, but the clowns did. But removing the clownfish did it for me.

 

[nsamouroux]

I don't really mind that it's getting insanely huge, since I'm a couple of days away from moving the contents of my 100 gallon tank into the new 360 gallon tank Good to know though about the clownfish / splitting connection, I'll have to look into that just in case! That might explain why the green BTA I had split off two tiny clones when I sold the clarkii pair that was in that tank... Interesting!

 

[mfinn]

The ones I have frequently grow to 18" to 20" and split on a regular basis.

 

[luke33]

Jnarrow had some 26" rbt's. I had one get to around 18" but had to remove it because it started to sting my sps. If its growing that much i would assume it will keep growing if you keep feeding it. Maxx seems pretty dead on with his answer.

 

[nsamouroux]

Excellent info, thanks everyone! I'll be transferring everything over from my 100 gallon "nano" tank into the new 360 gallon display in the next day or three (as soon as I get rid of the sediment cloud from the new sand) so this anemone will have PLENTY of room to expand as much as it wants. I plan on having a couple small "islands" for my two 'nems (the big RBTA and a 10" diameter Sebae) along with the carpet anemone I eventually plan on getting. I'll just continue feeding these critters as I've been doing and hope that the naso tang it ate was a random event

 

[luke33]

If you get a carpet your naso incident may be a regular occurance.......be careful with the carpets as they have a hell of a sting.

 

[1fishkeeper]

I lost my powder blue tang to my old carpet. Get nem but it packs one hell of a sting. It got me one day when i was cleaning my tank. The next think I knew it was wrapped around my arm zapping me