OK, I know, don’t put an Anemone in a new tank ! Problem is, the guy at the LFS convinced me it was ok to put an Anemone in my new tank and I only read about how wrong he can be after I brought a bubble tip anemone home. After reading about all the Anemone warnings, I am wondering what I should do to improve my bubble anemone's chances of survival.

My tank is 220 gallons and has had it's Nitrite, Nitrate and Ammonia level at zero for about 2 months now. It has pretty good water movement coming from my pumps at 8200 G/P/H. i have 6 T-5 lights and a large protein skimmer, plus 150lbs of live rock helping with the filter system. would this be enough to help the chances of its survival? or what else would i need to improve its chances?

It has been feeding and moving about the tank and seems to have settled in one area. My two clowns fish are now hosting with it as well so hopefully they will help to feed it and give it plenty of circulation.

It has been in there for about 2 weeks now and seems to be doing ok, the changes that i have noticed are that it retracts for about 30 minutes and then comes back out, it also has changed slight colour in the foot looking a bit darker. Is it more likely to die or has anyone has a simular confusion with the fish store and had their anemone survive in a new tank?

Please help me cause im concerned of it dieing and wouldnt want it to polute my water

Thank you for taking the time to read this

honestly bad idea to get a nem this soon but if the foot is getting darker then thats a good sign. Also if it has found its spot and its getting good enough lighting then you should be ok. Like with any nem though they can be picky on where they want to be but the clown I believe ( no fact behind this) will help them settle in. Does your lighting fixture have individual reflectors or one big one also I know it has only been a couple weeks but have you noticed the nem getting smaller (thats a bad sign). What color is he nem does it have any signs of damage on the foot?

Thats what i thought by putting him in so soon, it has settled into a spot and seems to happy there for the time being and his foot is darker with no damage on it. Last night tho he had shrunk up, and his tenticles were limp, he didnt look to healthy at that point, but come this morning and he was flowing in the current with the clowns happily in. Is this normal for the anemone to do this?

He is supposed to a green bubbletip anemone, but when he is inflated he is more pink with a little bit of green, the foot has become darker and seems to be well attached to the rock.

my lights have one big large reflector covering the back of the lights, are these good enough for the reef aquarium? (6 T-5s).

Thanks again

Not to sure if your lights are strong enough but I guess time will tell. I am more of an mh guy than t5 but t5 will do the trick with good reflectors. It is normal for a nem to shrivel up when something either bugs him or scares him. Just as long as he dont do it to much as that is a sign of stress. From what I have seen bubble tips are a hardier type of nem than most. As far as putting him in your tank to early all you can really do at this point is try to keep the water as prestien as possible. I do say that with a word of caution though as I have seen many reef keepers crash there tanks by trying to hard and doing something stupid to correct a problem that most liklely would have corrected itself. That the main reason I think people say not to get a new so early.

the reflectors are pretty good and it does seem a good light system so it should be alright, my waters are pretty good near excellent, im due a water change at this weekend which will keep it at its best.

I do remember last night that my spiny sea urchin was right up in front of the anemone and did get to close for comfort, that was probably the main reason why he shrunk up.

at the moment im finding it easy to keep the water in good quality with my bi weekly water changes and having 220 gallon tank which i have read that the bigger the better.

hopefully the nem will be ok, and thank you again for the tips and help

Off the subject tho, what kind of setup to u have?