The Horror.

I looked in my tank and what did I see?







A $35 lunch for my Anemone.




Was perfectly healthy yesterday. Who thinks it died and the anemone ate it? Who thinks the anemone killed it first?


Edited by Jared

I really think that the fish died and the anemone lucked out. Sorry that sucks

It was a purple tang, I didn't see the anemone ketch it. I think that's actually while the anemone is spitting the tang back out. The tang is a little (ok a LOT) larger than the food I usually feed the anemone.

I have a massive brittle star that usually devours anything that dies in my tank so that has me a little suspisoues of the anemone, though I have had that anemone for years and it's never eaten a fish.

I agree with the sick fish conclusion. Fish can seem healthy, yet be sick for weeks or have some kind of heart condition and then die within hours. I have seen healthy fish get nabed by one or two anemone tentacles but flip it off as through it were nothing. When a fish is sickly, it lays around being blown by the water current then momentarily "kicks", which gets it blowing around somewhere else in the tank. I hate watching it.

Brittle Stars, on the other hand, can catch healthy, but unwary fish. I've heard of a Brittle Star that slowly formed a cage around a small Regal Tang. The Regal was too dumb or frightened (you know how they hide in a tight place) to notice till it was too late to escape the bars of it's death trap.

Edited by Mark Peterson

Adam Blundell wrote: I'm going to say it was a healthy fish that just swam into the anemone.

I do remember you had a carpet anemone that was eating your fish. What did you ever do with it.  I've had this anemone for about 3 years now and it's never eaten a fish before, but it's also getting rather massive. It'll open up to around 9". It just needs to hurry up and split.

Adam, I know the person that saw it happen and now you can say that you have "heard of it happening".

Of course, the Carpet Anemone is the exception. But shoot, the fish is just asking to be eaten when it snuggles up to a carpet.

That's not too difficult. To get an anemone off of the glass, use a single edged razor blade or a nice new, straight algae scraper blade.

My tube anemone eat two purple fire fish in one day... $$$$ That was about three years ago. I watched him catch them. Got one back out but it died from the sting.  None since........ go figure