Pest Anemone

When it retracts, does it leave a little tiny tube behind? I have a few that look like mini feather dusters. When they are out, they are perfectly circular, and the "feathers" are opaque/white'ish in color. I thought they were mini aiptasia when I first saw them, but then I saw the little tube. It's not much bigger than a needle. If it draws back into the tube, then my guess is that it's not an aiptasia. It's what I have that I haven't ID'd yet. If you look closely at this picture, you can see one. It's in the lower left side of the frag between the large polyp facing "west" and the little polyp east of it. It almost looks like a polyp, but the color is off.

 

Hard to say for sure but it kind of looks like that

 

I'd look for the small, needle sized tube (maybe 1/4" long) sticking out of the rock when it retracts. If it has one, I don't know what it is, but I don't think it's an aiptasia.

 

Its hard because I have the rock in the back of the bowfront tank so my view is very distorted, the one thing I hate about the bows lol) My wife is always making fun of me because I have my glasses off for forehead pressed against the glass trying to get a good luck studing every inch of the tank

 

OK not the greatest pictures but I cant do any better without taking the rock out of the tank





The thing circled in white kind of tucked underneath the yellow is what I am trying to ID. I am thinking that yellow is some sort of sponge been in the tank with no changes in size for over a month now so Im thinking it made it. If you notice anything else on the rock let me know though

 

Some more this time a little closer up. I am pretty sure there is a colony of ball anemones next to this unidentified guy





Also what is this whit tube like thing above the featherfuster

 

The more I look at it the more I think it is an aiptasia. It does not look like any of the ones I see in stores and I know there are different species of aiptasia some are not as bad as others. I hate to lose everything else that is on the rock but should I remove it from the aquarium to prevent any spreading?

 

I've used kalk paste pretty successfully. Here's what I did recently to get an aiptasia about that size off a frag plug and it never came back. Got this tip from Coralline and it seems to have worked great. Frag has been aiptasia free for 4 weeks.

Mix up a pretty thick kalk paste (think a very heavy pancake batter)
Have a bowl/tub with tank water in it on the side
Apply the kalk paste to the area where the aiptasia is with a Q-tip. (Not real heavy but make sure it's "coated")
Let sit out of the water for about 5 mins
Rinse the area by "sloshing" the rock in your tub of water.

I could see the aip after I rinsed and hit it a second time with the paste, but only for a minute or two the second time. After the second rinse, I was able to slide the anemone off the frag with the tip of a razor blade (foot and all) and it ended up in my rinse water. I'd be very cautious with that though. If you have to scrape it off, any little piece that is left could come back if the kalk paste doesn't destroy it. But, it worked for me.

 

So is it for sure an aiptasia? It doesnt look exactly like the glass aiptasias I see online and all over the petstores. Maybe I would be better off jsut taking the whole rock out if it is?

 

Is it taking over your tank?? Glass anemones will but if it's not doing much maybe it's not invasive