mandarin question

[aminyassien]

hi everybody

i bought last week a green mandarin like this

most of the time it is hiding

it doesnit eat ocean neutrition food but i see it eating from the rocks and from the glass

is it a good sign eating from rocks and glass?

in the meanwile the other drgonet is eating like a monester (scooter blenny )

this fish

is that normal please advise

Amin

 

[GrendelPrime]

most mandarins will only eat live foods like copods, thats why he will only eat off of the rocks, alot of people will only put them in an established aquarium with large pod populations and alot of live rock so they dont starve, this is 1 of the fish that seems to be very popular but people dont take the time to do research and the fish usualy ends up starving when the pod population is wiped out

 

[BobBursek]

iN a established tank they will only live about 6-9 months depending on what else in the tank eats pods and hve to compete for them, then they starve to death, been there 3 times!!!!!

 

[jski711]

Search this site for "how to train your mandarins onto prepared foods. I wrote a small write up on this and wish they made it a sticky but it wasn't. If u have trouble finding it shoot me a pm and I'll find the page for ya. I had a spawning pair in a 15g tank so needless to say I was doing something right.

 

[JulesVane]

I had an "infestation" of pods all over my tank. Added a Manderin. All pods were soon gone and shortly after, so was the Manderin.

 

[bennyd]

It's not hard to keep a mandarin fed if you've got a fuge setup with a good source of pods, you can also buy pods every so often to keep it fed. It's not hard to keep a fish fed. It's harder to get the owner to feed the fish.

 

[erawling]

I have managed to keep a mandarin for two years now.He is in a 55 gal fuge with a lot of live rock and algae growth for a good population of pods.

 

[Seastar501]

We had a Mandarin who was with us for 8 years - until an accidental contamination wiped the tank. He was in a well-fed, well-established reef tank and learned to eat the frozen mysis / plankton that I fed every other day or so.

They're beautiful fish, but like so many of the fish we love, takes consistent attention from the aquarist so that his specific needs are met.

The scooter blenny and others are a little easier to encourage to eat frozen foods. I've not tried to keep any exclusively on flake type foods. All will pick the rocks for pods as they are grazers. Be sure to research the specific fish you are keeping - each variety is unique.

 

[BigAl07]

Excellent information everyone

Seastar we'd LOVE to see some of your tanks

 

[mitch]

I've had mine for ~ 2 months.
He has 2 seahorses for companions.
He definitely loves live Brine Shrimp, which I feed every morning.
He is active during the daily feeding of frozen mysis, but I've never seen him eat any. Its possible that he eats them later or that they cause other small and edible critters to emerge.
He does seem to be losing weight, so I've started a small pod tank in the basement, though it isn't producing much yet.

 

[BLAKEJOHN]

I've had mine for ~ 2 months.
He has 2 seahorses for companions.
He definitely loves live Brine Shrimp, which I feed every morning.
He is active during the daily feeding of frozen mysis, but I've never seen him eat any. Its possible that he eats them later or that they cause other small and edible critters to emerge.
He does seem to be losing weight, so I've started a small pod tank in the basement, though it isn't producing much yet.

It is good that yours is eating brine shrimp. You can slowly introduce frozen brine shrimp and the he should move onto the mysis.

I will say that brine shrimp should not be used as a staple food for any fish as brine shrimp has no nutritional value unless "gut loaded" or with in 24hrs of hatching.

Copods take about 20days to reproduce. Feed the copod tank with a little flake food and little to no light. Water changes are not needed as much as our dt's but just enough to keep the water from getting green or yellow.

 

[mitch]

Thanks for the reply.
I pour a bit of Phytoplex into the brine shrimp about 5-10 min before I feed them to the fish.
Any other suggestions for gut-loading?

I'll get some frozen brine and see if he eats that also.

Thanks.

 

[Snappy]

If you truly have a well established tank they will be fine. Many people incorrectly think they have an established tank however if a mandarin kills a pod population within a few months or even a year the tank is either not that well established or more likely there is not enough rock for the pods to sufficiently increase the population. I have a reasonably large system and my pod population keeps growing larger even with 3 mandarins, 9 wrasses and a couple of pipefish that all hunt pods. For pod populations to explode you need a lot of areas that the fish can't get at them. Creating a rubble pile in the sump or even in the display works well and the live rock should be pourous so they can lay eggs inside the holes fish can't easily get to. One reason this is important is that mandarins like to eat the pod larvae so they need to have some protection. If you do things right your mandarins can live for many years. Not sure of your tank size but I personally wouldn't recommend mandarins being kept in small tanks under 50 gallon.

 

[rgfast]

+1 snappy

 

[Rhodes19]

I made several pod farms out of 1/2" pvc pipe. I perforated the pipe with multiple holes and then friction fit end caps on both ends and tossed them into the DT behind my diy rock. Its a new tank so the pod population is not quite there yet. Once they are we will be getting some mandarins.