Mandy's & Pods

[darkdancer333]

As I said in another post I have a 35 gal reef tank. I have been told by numerous people that this tank is to small to support a Mandy on pods alone.

I was thinking of going to Petco and spend about 30 dollars on those plastic beta tanks with filtration. I wanted to use this as a refugium to breed pods. I was going to purchase 2 packs of live pods, Cheato algae, and reef phyto plankton.

But my question is how long for pods to breed and will 1.5 gal be enough to breed them in. I was curious if i should dump the filtration beta tanks and just use a pump instead just to circulate the water..??

[sheen]

Keeping a dragonet can be done in that size display but just a few observations. One, it might be easier in the long run to train the fish to take prepared foods. Just think how many copepods would be required to equal the biomass of a small mysis shrimp.

Two, if you want to breed copepods, learn how to grow phytoplankton first- diatom or brown algae preferably. Or, you can buy algae paste but you must change the water often.

Three, any aquarium is a poor way to grow copepods. They are hard to move around, get into, pour out, etc. The best thing? 5 gallon buckets. Get yourself two 5 gallon buckets, an air pump, and have fun culturing. Skip the chaetomorpha- too much chance of culture contamination from ciliates and hydrozoans. If you want more surface area, get some shower poufs (the plastic kind in all the rad colors). No, 1.5 gallons of culture is not enough for an adult mandarin unless you can ensure that they multiply heavily in the display (which precludes them being eaten then, right?)

 

Just train the dragonet to eat prepared foods. Whatever you do, I cannot stress this enough- only buy specimens that are healthy, full bodied, and looking for food and better yet eating. Feel free to reach out with any additional questions.

[metrokat]

Keeping a dragonet can be done in that size display but just a few observations. One, it might be easier in the long run to train the fish to take prepared foods. Just think how many copepods would be required to equal the biomass of a small mysis shrimp.

Two, if you want to breed copepods, learn how to grow phytoplankton first- diatom or brown algae preferably. Or, you can buy algae paste but you must change the water often.

Three, any aquarium is a poor way to grow copepods. They are hard to move around, get into, pour out, etc. The best thing? 5 gallon buckets. Get yourself two 5 gallon buckets, an air pump, and have fun culturing. Skip the chaetomorpha- too much chance of culture contamination from ciliates and hydrozoans. If you want more surface area, get some shower poufs (the plastic kind in all the rad colors). No, 1.5 gallons of culture is not enough for an adult mandarin unless you can ensure that they multiply heavily in the display (which precludes them being eaten then, right?)

 

Just train the dragonet to eat prepared foods. Whatever you do, I cannot stress this enough- only buy specimens that are healthy, full bodied, and looking for food and better yet eating. Feel free to reach out with any additional questions.

^^ this

[darkdancer333]

Keeping a dragonet can be done in that size display but just a few observations. One, it might be easier in the long run to train the fish to take prepared foods. Just think how many copepods would be required to equal the biomass of a small mysis shrimp.

Two, if you want to breed copepods, learn how to grow phytoplankton first- diatom or brown algae preferably. Or, you can buy algae paste but you must change the water often.

Three, any aquarium is a poor way to grow copepods. They are hard to move around, get into, pour out, etc. The best thing? 5 gallon buckets. Get yourself two 5 gallon buckets, an air pump, and have fun culturing. Skip the chaetomorpha- too much chance of culture contamination from ciliates and hydrozoans. If you want more surface area, get some shower poufs (the plastic kind in all the rad colors). No, 1.5 gallons of culture is not enough for an adult mandarin unless you can ensure that they multiply heavily in the display (which precludes them being eaten then, right?)

 

Just train the dragonet to eat prepared foods. Whatever you do, I cannot stress this enough- only buy specimens that are healthy, full bodied, and looking for food and better yet eating. Feel free to reach out with any additional questions.

He is small but is full bodied I don't see any indentations on the body but ive only had for 2 weeks.

The 1.5 gal has light and filter so air is getting there. I added 1 lb live rock and several bushes cheato. I am not sure how much I should add from the packets of 6k or dump all 6k in the 35 gal tank. I did add 1200 pods several days ago to the 1.5 gal

 

He dragonet eats the Mysis. He goes after a piece eats it, spits it out, eats it same piece sometimes he doesn't spit out. I tried blood worms its the same process. I have been mixing the Mysis with frozen rotifers and daphoids. I just ordered online 6000pods I hope I can dump all them in my 35 gal tank

[sheen]

Sounds like you are on the right track. Try to feed a few times a day especially while getting it established and give the food a good soak in some type of HUFA enhancement (ie Selcon). Observe if a starvation line/ridge starts appearing along the side, then you know something is not right.

 

As for the copepods, sounds like you may have gotten a mix of different types? What kind did you get?

 

Dumping all of it in will be a good afternoon treat for the fish, which is a waste. Every tank has a different maximum carrying capacity for microfauna, so anything in excess of that will just die off if not first eaten (lack of food, hiding space, living space). The purpose of your culture would just be to maintain them at a high volume as the fish grazes constantly. You are better off holding the bulk of those and letting them multiply in culture, and add the copepods to the tank regularly when you split your culture.

The other thing is, it will be harder to wean your fish onto prepared foods if it stuffs itself silly right away with its preferred food. Good luck! You are taking the right steps to ensure the well being of the animal in your care.

[metrokat]

Live black worms are good too, nutritious. My mandarins used to chomp them down.

[darkdancer333]

Sounds like you are on the right track. Try to feed a few times a day especially while getting it established and give the food a good soak in some type of HUFA enhancement (ie Selcon). Observe if a starvation line/ridge starts appearing along the side, then you know something is not right.

 

As for the copepods, sounds like you may have gotten a mix of different types? What kind did you get?

 

Dumping all of it in will be a good afternoon treat for the fish, which is a waste. Every tank has a different maximum carrying capacity for microfauna, so anything in excess of that will just die off if not first eaten (lack of food, hiding space, living space). The purpose of your culture would just be to maintain them at a high volume as the fish grazes constantly. You are better off holding the bulk of those and letting them multiply in culture, and add the copepods to the tank regularly when you split your culture.

The other thing is, it will be harder to wean your fish onto prepared foods if it stuffs itself silly right away with its preferred food. Good luck! You are taking the right steps to ensure the well being of the animal in your care.

Tisbe are the pods I use. I was told rock dwellers.

I just ordered 6k Tisbe and Tigriopus

I just hope the 1.5 gal is adequate enough to raise the pods.

The mandy is funny he eats some mysis and spits out other mysis not sure why lol

Sometime he spits the same piece out several times.

If i ever see the ridge line, he immediately goes to my local fish store and he gets tossed in the 125 gal display tank..

Live black worms are good too, nutritious. My mandarins used to chomp them down.

I tried blood worms he tasted spit out and now ignores them lol

[metrokat]

Black worms.

[darkdancer333]

Black worms.

whats odd the 4 or 5 lfs in my area 2 only carry live food and thats the pods

[darkdancer333]

its only 2 weeks but he seems to look healthy

[sheen]

Looks OK, no immediate cause for concern. Keep up the feeding and you can get that fish more plump. You have a female there.

 

As for the mysis eating and spitting, dragonets chew with their pharyngeal jaws (in the throat) and if they cannot swallow the food they want they will often spit it out and try to eat again to grind it up. The telling sign if your mandarin is interested in the food is if it keeps trying to eat the same thing repeatedly.

Something that it tastes and hates, it spits right out and does not chase after it again.

 

Lastly, with the Tigriopus, if you can, that is definitely something you want to culture separately as they do not reproduce readily in reef tanks. Otherwise, you throw them in and that's it. A meal for a day or two. The Tisbe you can add some and set some aside for culture. Keep the two species of copepods separate. They will not culture well together. Again, I don't think 1.5 gallons offers enough capacity or redundancy if you want to rely predominantly on pods to feed. Typical sustainable Tisbe culture densities are at 1/ml, and daily population growth factors in the absence of phytoplankton use are about 10%. In your cause you would have 5,670 copepods in culture, producing 567 copepods per day under good conditions. That is about the number of copepods a mandarin can eat in an hour or two. You can get faster reproduction if you feed heavier in culture or use phytoplankton, but that would be more work from keeping the small amount of water clean and keeping the culture from crashing. Basically, you should step up to multiple, larger containers or just use the copepods as an occasional treat.

[darkdancer333]

Looks OK, no immediate cause for concern. Keep up the feeding and you can get that fish more plump. You have a female there.

 

As for the mysis eating and spitting, dragonets chew with their pharyngeal jaws (in the throat) and if they cannot swallow the food they want they will often spit it out and try to eat again to grind it up. The telling sign if your mandarin is interested in the food is if it keeps trying to eat the same thing repeatedly.

Something that it tastes and hates, it spits right out and does not chase after it again.

 

Lastly, with the Tigriopus, if you can, that is definitely something you want to culture separately as they do not reproduce readily in reef tanks. Otherwise, you throw them in and that's it. A meal for a day or two. The Tisbe you can add some and set some aside for culture. Keep the two species of copepods separate. They will not culture well together. Again, I don't think 1.5 gallons offers enough capacity or redundancy if you want to rely predominantly on pods to feed. Typical sustainable Tisbe culture densities are at 1/ml, and daily population growth factors in the absence of phytoplankton use are about 10%. In your cause you would have 5,670 copepods in culture, producing 567 copepods per day under good conditions. That is about the number of copepods a mandarin can eat in an hour or two. You can get faster reproduction if you feed heavier in culture or use phytoplankton, but that would be more work from keeping the small amount of water clean and keeping the culture from crashing. Basically, you should step up to multiple, larger containers or just use the copepods as an occasional treat.

I want to get him to eat mysis twice a day and he can pick the pods off in the tank as he wants. I feed him 10am and 11pm when i get home. the other time he is picking in the sand or live rock. The probelm with the pods i purchased i think they are mixed together.. no way to separate.. I hate dumping 6k in the tank. I put in the tank at night with the lights off.I actually pour them into the sand

I am using phyoplankton in both the reef tank and the small one.

1.5 gal i give 1 small squit twice daily and i was told in the reef tank to give half a cap weekly