First bta

[SALTYwaterDOG]

This story started when I inherited a clown. This would be my first one.this fish so is so fun to watch. But it didn't take long before she started causing trouble. She started loving the corals to death, one torch inparticular. I decided a bubble tip was in order. So I visited my lfs and brought one home.once in the DT it set up and was looking great. Not long after that it was attacked by three peppermints. Those little devils were tearing tentacles off.they were quickly sumped. The BTA survived and the corals are now left alone. The anemone and clown are now best friends. My question is once a day or so the anenome is completely deflated, it looks dead.this condition is short lived and it returns to its previous state.is this normal behavior?

[garygb]

BTAs seem to deflate more than the other host species of anemone. If it generally looks healthy, is stationary, and most of the time is inflated, it very likely is fine. Pics?

[raythepilot]

My question is once a day or so the anenome is completely deflated, it looks dead.this condition is short lived and it returns to its previous state.is this normal behavior?

BTA's will deflate especially after eating but once a day is a lot. Like once a month is more likely.
Is there anything coming from the mouth like brownish slime?
If not feed it less often.

[Mike31154]

How long have you had the BTA? It may still be adjusting to the water parameters. Generally they will shrink down after lights out. Daily drastic deflation is a good reason to check your water chemistry, lights etc. I recall mine deflating much more often when it was new in my tank, but not every day on a regular basis. It has split many times over the years, but these days with the tank very mature, drastic deflation happens rarely & no splits for a few years now.

[SALTYwaterDOG]

First of all thanks guys for the very informative responses.I apologize for not getting back to this sooner,work got in the way hate that lol.the BTA is a new addition probably two weeks now and I havent kept one before. So your input was very helpful. I may have exaggerated the time between the deflation as I was very worried. But I did observe this more than a few times. Sense then it's looked great considering the clown has not come out of it.the BTA isn't that much bigger than the clown. I hope that won't be a problem.sorry no pic's of the deflation guess that's a good thing. But heres one of the new lovers.again thanks for the good info

[Mike31154]

Looks to be in good shape, colour is decent, not whiting out, so should be fine. Give it time. Mine was barely large enough to host my Maroon clown either, when the tank was young.

[raythepilot]

Looks OK to me as well maybe a little pale but that should work out in time.