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A question for the nem experts out there

Roc

Guest
Earlier today I saw that my nems (which had moved off my perfect rock for them becuase I am a dumb ass and I made a bridge outta rock by accident) were stinging the hell out of my best SPS pieces, I knew at some point I was gonna need to get them outta there and back on to an isolated rock (this time with no bridge), the issue was the rockwork they were attached to was extremely hard to remove.

In the process of trying to get them off both nems were damaged, one much more then the other, I tried and tried to just pry the foot off but the rockwork was very poruious and one of them was halfwaly in a cave. I have them in a soap dish with holes cut for flow, and have them laying on some rock pieces, here are my questions

1. What chance to nems which have some damage, have of recovering (I figured it would be high as they can be fragged in half)

2. Is the soap dish a good idea or not, should I have rock at the bottom or not?
 
What kind are they? BTA's seem to have an excellent recovery mechanism.

I think the soap dish is fine, although the holes will make it hard to get out. In commercial collection holding tanks they use marine carpet to make it easier to remove the anem. I have great success getting them off glass & Acrylic.

Can you snap a pic?
 
Echoing what Gresham said, BTAs are pretty durable, the most important thing right now is to give them enough flow to keep the damaged areas free of debris and allow the nem to slime a little and have that slough off due to the current, yet not have them blow around like crazy getting beat to hell.

The soap dish should be OK.
 
Sounds like a plan.

Now if it were a carpet I would have something else to say :)
 
Ok, so my question to add to this is:
If he had time, what is the best way to detach that nem from the rock it is in if he couldn't move the rock?
I have a nem that I bought a couple months back which was a quarter size and it is now 3 to 4" in size and I only have a nano.... So, I was gonna try to do the same as Jason and just cut them in half, but can't move the rock either.
I wasn't expecting it to grow so big so fast.
Last time I tried, I ended up damaging so much that I ended up killing it. :( Sorry :((
Prying it off of the rock is really difficult and don't want to move it.
What should I do?
 
Roberto, I was in the same place and what I had to do is REMOVE the rock from the tank and deal with removal (not that I did a good job or they wouldn't have been hurt) but it's very hard to get them off rockwork IN THE TANK
 
i had success in removing the rock/nem from the water and immediately turning the rock upside down over a bucket. The nem was about 14" and it has not retracted when I pulled him out. Dunno if small ones would be different.

PS - my nem is RBTA.
 
One trick to try is to point a poser head directly at it for a little while and it usually gets pissed off enough it moves itself. Watch it to see if it does and then just pull it out of the tank. There are drawbacks to this method. You need to keep an eye on it to make suer it doesn't just release from the rock and float up into a power head or on to some other coral.
 
tuberider said:
A technique that I've heard about yet never tried is to use an ice cube.

Anyone ever try it, or heard of it being used?
Never tried but I will have to removed my RBTA from some rock soon and I might give that a try.
 
Last time I tried to get GBTA off the rock was a big challenge. I tried to get the rock out and turn it upside down with anemone's head suspended in water and it didn't move a bit.

I ended up using an exacto knife and carving/cutting a rock under its foot. Most coral rocks are soft enough for this.

I also removed several had RBTA's before and it seemed easier. Especially if you see the foot all puffy and moving.
 
tuberider said:
A technique that I've heard about yet never tried is to use an ice cube.

Anyone ever try it, or heard of it being used?
What do you mean?
Place a cube close to it to irritate the nem in hopes it will move?
 
tuberider said:
A technique that I've heard about yet never tried is to use an ice cube.

Anyone ever try it, or heard of it being used?



I've tried it without success.. Ice kept melting faster than the nem would detach. They would completely contract but still held on in the crevices of the rock.
 
tuberider said:
A technique that I've heard about yet never tried is to use an ice cube.

Anyone ever try it, or heard of it being used?


I used it once on a smaller rock, it worked pretty well but you need to be able to get the ice cube under the foot, I would have tried it this time but the rock didn't allow for that much ease of access to the foot.
 
Many are collected in the wild be the over turned over a bucket method.

The ice trick has worked for me. You can't just use an ice cube, I used an otter pop that was sealed :lol:
 
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