mandarin research

[rayn]

I am currently reading the mandaring primer in the reef fish section, but I have a couple noobish questions I would like to ask.

Copepods or pods. I think I know what they are, the little bug looking guys roaming around in the fuge. Am I right? And do they really end up in the DT in enough quantities to supply with enough food?

Tank size. Looking to put one in a 120 with ~150 LR. Big enough?

Fish compatability. Currently has two clowns, angel, rabbitfish, chromis, blue tang to be added latter after QT over. One other fish I would like, but not sure if the two would be compatable with food is a copperband butterfly. Would the two work or would there be food issues, as in enough, in the 120.

The one I am currently looking into is or has eaten fish roa (fish eggs). Is this a doable way to feed, and would blood worms be beneficial as well.

Any help here would be appreciated as I would rather not condem one to starvation.

[streak]

I think you might want to read up on the copperband butterfly from the brief stuff i read about them there more intremediate fish to expert fish to take care of. So i would hold off on them.. but that is my opinion.. Mandrins are all about pod populations.. if you have them growing and such good for you but you cant have fish in there competing for there food as there slow movers and constant prediters that eat all day long.. unless your lucky and can get them to eat prepaird foods..

As beautiful as they are and as much as i would like to have a pair i would only consider them if a i had a massive culture pod population and b they took prepaired foods..

[gewehermeister]

By no means am I an expert on them but I have been keeping a pair af red madarines for 2+ years in my 40 breeder. I keep my pod population thriving by feeding the tank with phyto daily. I also feed cyclopeeze and they go crazy over them. I am also lucky that mine eat mysis as well.

[m-rass]

This was one of my first noob mistakes. Was the 2nd fish i purchased, then researched. I did manage to get him to eat live brine. A LFS turned me on to Selcon, and i fed the brine that, and he fattened right up. He is now 3, and a fatty at that. If you have a pod population in your fuge now, you will probably be fine, you have plenty of live rock which is needed, so the pods have somewhere to hide and repopulate everywhere in your system. Good luck with the copperband, few survive. I think they are feather duster eaters and supposedly aiptasia.. Phyto will certainly help keep pop populations up.

[bur01014]

To ensure adequate pods getting to your DT, shake out your chaeto you discard every couple weeks in the main tank....I do this with the lights off and seen tons of little pods dropping out....with lights off, gives the pods a chance to hide a little, which then helps them reproduce successfully more in the DT....this should also help the mandarin if he isn't seeing many pods that should be getting sucked up by your return pump.

[rayn]

Thanks. I'm looking into the pods you can buy just to help my population along. We'll see what happens.

[Palting]

You should be fine, Rayn. I starved my green mandarin for almost 5 weeks in hyposalinity. The DT ran for 8 weeks with no fish and had a critter population explosion, same as your 120. I did dose with packaged pods twice. The mandarin is now fat in the 150, almost pregnant looking, same as the 6 line. LOL!!

Also, your 120 gal with the live rock and substrate should be able to grow enough of the pods for one dragonete. The refugium is just an added insurance.

My LFS has fine looking butterfly specimens. I purposely stay away from them because of their poor reef tank reputation. OTOH, I took a risk with my coral beauty, another fish with a poor reef tank rep, but so far so good. Your call if you want to try out the copperband.

[rayn]

Yeah, but is the 120 big enough and able to produce enough pods to sustain both? Even if I were to dose occasionaly with pods to help the population.

[davocean]

You should be fine w/ one mandy, but I do recommend having a fuge.
I did have one mady wipe out pods in a 90g that had alot of rock and pretty established, but w/out fuge.
The pods really should have a breeding area w/out predation.
Having one that eats other prep'd foods does help, but pods are needed for constant intake.
CBB's can be tough, but if you do get one that will eat prep'd food should be fine, but expect any type of feather duster, even coco worms to be wiped out.

[rayn]

I have a fuge that is loaded with pods now. You can't hardly look anywhere and not see them. Some are even about a 1/4"long.
The CBB I looked at ate bloodworms, so that would help too.
Mandarin ate fish eggs, not sure about anything else.
Like I said, I could buy some cultured ones and dose with them, I could even set up a ten gallon and culture my own, but that is a whole other subject and thought process.

[davocean]

Buying them can get pricey after a while.
I'm sure there is no need to do that w/ your size system and a fuge though, at least for one.
The bigger pods are most likely amphipods, my mandarin's did eat those too, and it was neat to watch them wrestle those.
CBB's are just hit or miss, I finally got one that eats pretty much everything.

[rayn]

Amphipods. That makes more sense as I've been looking up different pod types. Now to figure out what to do. If I supplement, maybe I'll just do it monthly or something like that to help the pod population.

[davocean]

I think it's good to prepare for what may be needed, and careful thinking on your part, but again, probably not even needed.
A good clump of chaeto will probably have as many or more pods than what you will pay for through online pod supplier.
I do however think it's a good idea to boost and intro pods of different types, there are different kinds, some grow bigger, better, faster, or produce/live in our warmer reef temps better than others.
But I don't think it would be something I would plan out to do monthly, as long as you have a fuge and macro, the ones that do well in our system should multiply quickly.
1 mandarin in a 120g,w/ a fuge, I would not hesitate or be too concerned, unless you had wrasses or other competition.

[rayn]

Only other competition might be a CBB. Looking into one of those for the 120 as well. I've read they eat pods too, but I have one that eats mysis and bloodworms.