De-mystifying the Mandarinfish

[MperRluvR]

How attached to your trigger are you?

 

LOL, let's just say he's got more personality than my brother (smarter too) lol

 

How are you planning on feeding the 12 gallon? Pods will not come out of the live rock, so maybe if you continually replace all the rock in the 12 gallon once or twice a week, but it'll definitely be a lot of work. You will also have to worry about vacations, etc... will somebody be able to give him proper care if you have to leave?

We'll at night they come out to look for food. I think that I'm going to try a DIY pod trap- put a piece of Ulva macroalgae in a mantis shrimp trap type thing. We'll see how it works.

[Withers]

Sounds like a plan to me. Let us know how it works out

[MperRluvR]

I've been around aquariums long enough to spot a starving fish, they're really easy to identify.

I've had my share of tangs/foxfaces and in summary, they eat a lot! i saw a yellow tang at the LFS, which i dont go to anymore, that was paper thin...so i know how much food fish require, and i know how to tell from their pinched stomach if they are starving to death...rest assured if he begins to lose more weight than al roker, i will pull him, fill him up in the refug. and then find a suitable home for him.

[GobyKing]

If you pick up the 2005 annual Marine Fish USA magazine (I think that is the title, its at work right now and I am at home-I got it at petsmart) They have a huge article on how to properly keep them for lengthy periods of time and explain why it is not that hard to keep them in reality. They also go into detail about the different types of mandarinfish too. Jon

[Withers]

they also back the 100 gallon minimum rule of thumb.

[SaltyDawg]

CONCRETE PROOF.

Go to Just About Fish .com Not sure of the correct link so do a search. Email George. He has had one in a 55 gallon for 3 years. It is a green mandarin dragonet and it is 4 1/2 inches long.

I kept one in a 75 gallon three years ago for 2 years up until the day the tank cracked three years later. Had 40 pounds of live rock in it all piled up in the center. They Key is a big tank , but......It is CRUCIAL how you lay out your rock work too. You basicly have to make a small fortress for the pods to hide in and come out of. Ofcourse you want to wait a while and let your pods population get large before you attemp to keep one as well. even in a big tank. They WILL eat baby ghost shrimp too.

[davinaster]

I'm glad that someone has dared to post their mandarin keeping plans. I was going to just do it rather than risk the ire of the mandarin police

 

My 5.5g nano was planned with a mandarin in mind from its inception. There will be nothing in the tank to compete with it for food. It will be a mandarin-centric tank. Please note: there is no mandarin currently in the tank!

 

Plan A:

 

I've got ~10 lbs LR in the main tank. I've got an AC500 HOB, currently running w/o any media, just moving water. My plan is to use it as a refugium to culture pods. I'm going to layer mineral mud, LS and ~1-2 lbs LR rubble in there, along with some chaeto. Then I'm going to wait. The result I'm hoping for is a self-sustaining, very dense population of pods in the refugium, with enough pods flowing into the main tank to feed the fish. If the refugium looks like it's producing enough pods, then I'll buy a fish.

 

Plan B:

 

I'll culture pods in a separate tank.

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/feb...03/breeder2.htm

 

Also, please keep in mind that this is an experiment. I hypothesize that I can culture enough pods to feed a mandarin. I may turn out to be wrong, in which case a fish may die. A fish. Those of you who are vegans, don't use leather or makeup, and refuse medication based on your moral objection to animal testing may flame me now. As for those of you who swung through the MickeyD's drive thru on the way home from the LFS yesterday....

 

:-*

 

Anyhow, I think it would be great for those of us who are attempting to keep mandarins in nanos (who understand what the obstacles are and are addressing them) to share information and ideas.

[cseeton]

Your nuts... but I won't flame you.

 

Try your setup with a scooter blenny first to find out how much a Mandarinfish eats (alot!!!). Also, sooters are much cheaper and easier to find. If you can maintain the scooter on pods then trade it in for a mandarin, if not, the scooters are usually easily switched to frozen brine shrimp.

[Tigahboy]

don't run out and buy a mandarin based on PLANS to keep them. Wait til someone has kept them successfully for more than 6 months and then think about getting one.

 

And a lot of folks read the steps necessary to keep them but simply pick and choose out of the list. That greatly reduces chances of success...most of the literature/articles out there that have stated the relative ease of keeping them have ALSO stated that they need to be kept in a 75g-100g MINIMUM, but many just ignore that.

 

The key is all the steps listed AND the big tank. skip the big tank requirement, and you do it at your own risk w/ no guarantees of similar success.

[davinaster]

Again, please note:

 

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| |

| |

| | <----- my nano - see, no fish!

| |

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I can't decide *what* to put in there, and certainly the difficulty in keeping a mandarin is why I haven't just gone out and bought one. That's why I was asking you about Black Clowns, Tigahboy!

[davinaster]

My ASCII art got messed up. That was supposed to be an empty aquarium

[Tigahboy]

Originally posted by davinaster

Again, please note:

 

-------------------------

|                             |

|                             |

|                             |   <----- my nano - see, no fish!

|                             |

-------------------------

 

I can't decide *what* to put in there, and certainly the difficulty in keeping a mandarin is why I haven't just gone out and bought one.  That's why I was asking you about Black Clowns, Tigahboy!

Hey Dave. It's all good. I was directing my comment more to the general public, not to you specifically. And black clowns are great! =)