Live pods in cowtown

[digital-audiophile]

Do any of the LFS in town carry those bottles of live pods? I picked up a mandarin and even though I have a decent pod population in my tank.. with a sixline and now a mandarin I am sure it is going to take a hit and I wouldn't mind bolstering the population.

[Pan]

Ocean Aquatics sells them, or direct from reed-mariculture. I've not found a reliable (any) supply in canada yet, aside from oceans, but they run out :) I have not found them in calgary, but i have not looked lately as the big tank is waiting on me building a stand to get it up. I always ordered direct from reed mariculture.

[digital-audiophile]

Colby told me yesterday that he was going to start bringing in live food :)

I'm just not sure if anyone else has started. You would think there is a big enough demand in Calgary for them.

[albert_dao]

No offense, but from what I've read and have been told by people who have used this product (I considered bringing them in), they're the biggest rip-off in the hobby. There's like a handful of pods in a huge bottle.

I'm stating this strictly from an assumed point of view, though, no direct experience with the product. So YMMV.

[michika]

You can culture them, if that interests you.

Have you done anything like creating "pod piles" to help ensure your tank's population doesn't become decimated?

[andresont]

I second that and think that “pod towers/piles” would be way better long term solution compare to live pods fro OA. I tried them two times now in both of my tanks (Nano tank has no fish no predators, just coral) and never seen a single tiger pod again in ether of the tanks..
First time I followed the recommended acclimatization process second time I thought that I need to acclimatize for longer because they store these pods in the fridge so I acclimatized for 3(!) days, and still no pods.
However, having said that; there are people on this forum that had better luck with tiger pods in their refugiums

What I do when I can, I go to the ocean tidal zone and pick 20-30 local pods they only live one day under water, but a real treat for the fish . If there is lots I can gather I freeze them and feed later, anemones love them !

[mark]

Try the pod piles, even in the sump where the pods can be sucked back into the tank. That 6-six is going quite the competition so you'll need a steady supply.

[Delphinus]

I'll echo Mark's concern about housing a 6line and mandarin together, I did the combo in a 75g for nearly a year before the 6line went berserk and attacked the mandarin. I found the poor thing laying on the bottom without any fins left and no means of locomotion. Succumbed that night. :( Stupid 6line. They start off life as nice fish but turn into territorial bullies/jerks once a few years old. I won't get another after this one goes. Any fish that he deems as "competition" had better be able to attack back otherwise he relentlessly bullies them. He attacked my flame hawk at first, until the flame hawk attacked back (and won), same for my potters angel, he relentlessly targetted her until she started fighting back (and winning). Total bully mentality - as long as he thinks he can get away with it, he'll be a jerk.

Sorry for the off topic tangent BTW.

I guess so it's not a completely random musing, I'm currently trying "Artic Pods" (by Reed Mariculture). They're like big honking cyclops-eeze. I bought them in the hopes my CBB would take to them so that his diet isn't completely monotypic on mysis, but so far no go. My tang seems to like them though :neutral: Course he'd probably eat rocks if I offered them to him, so I guess that's not much of an endorsement. :)

[danny zubot]

I got my first pod by trading sand with other reefers. A cup for a cup, or a rock for a rock from various reefers will go along way to diversify your sand bed.

[digital-audiophile]

I have roughly 40lbs of live rock in my sump with Chaeto and the only inhabitant in there is a single ocellaris clown.

If seen pod piles mentioned before. Are they basically just a small pile of rubble in the display tank?

Tony - I hear you about the six line. I loved him when I got him but he has become a realy jerk in the tank. It's funny, he jumped out around 2 months ago but I was there shortly after and got him back in the tank and brought him back to life. I should have left him on the carpet. He is even worse now though as I think he suffered some mental damage whne he was on the carpet.

...allthough politcally incorrect we call him Corky now :p

[michika]

I've never had a sixline go crazy on me *knock on wood*, and mine has lived peacefully with my mandarin for a few years.

As for the pod piles they are just small piles of rubble that a sixline or wrasse can't get into. They can be rubble, they can just be really porous rock, etc.

[mark]

My 6-line not psycho either, actually find rather interesting how he cruises the current and goes throughout the rock. By competition meant that he's a pod eating machine.

At night with a flash light, tank used to crawl with pods, since getting the wrasse, have to look really hard now to find any.

Pod piles just areas of rubble or large pieces of crushed coral.

[Der_Iron_Chef]

Do Centropyge also eat pods? I used to see tons of them at night (with a flashlight, like Mark), but not so much recently, after adding a Rusty Angelfish.

[Delphinus]

Centropyge's likely do reduce a pod population some. Pretty much anything eats pods really, it's just that mandarins are such ponderous eaters ("Hmmm shall I eat this or not? Hmmmm? Hmmmmm?") that usually if you offer them any prepared foods, that the other tankmates eat up all of it before they get enough of it. Thus, the the need for enough of a live population of pods that the mandarin can work on for other the 23 hours, 55 minutes that you're not there trying to directly feed them. Sometimes you get one that "figures it out" and eats food when offered but that's more an exception than the rule.

Catherine, Mark, I'm glad you trust your sixlines but I'm just posting my experience which in hindsight is a fairly well documented trait with these fish. I too thought "No, my mandarin is a nice fish" ... Lived peacefully with a mandarin for at least a full year after I moved the mandarin in from a different tank that I was taking down. There was no warning or any kind of lead-up to the event, otherwise I could have tried something. Anyhow, forewarned is forearmed. Sixlines are OK fish but they are known to become potentially troublesome as they age.

[Der_Iron_Chef]

....they are known to become potentially troublesome as they age.

I'm pretty sure I've heard my mom say the exact same thing...in reference to me.

[michika]

I'm sure you are right. I've heard tons of stories with sixlines becoming mean or agressive as they age. It sounds like its the rule and not the exception that this trait comes out later in their lives.

[digital-audiophile]

I've had my sixline for almost 2 years and I can attest that although he was a model tankmate for most of the time, it has been the past six months that he has turned into a pest. He now spends most of his day rushing up to his reflection at the side of the tank and flaring his fins. The rest of the time he spends picking on my clowns.

He is not a super agressive feeder though, he tends to wait for food to sink to the bottom of the tank before he pops out of the rocks to grab it.

[michika]

Makes me wonder if it has gone into some mating frenzy.

[digital-audiophile]

Perhaps I need to arrange a booty call for him :p

[michika]

:d <-- is supposed to be :D

[mark]

Catherine, Mark, I'm glad you trust your sixlines but I'm just posting my experience which in hindsight is a fairly well documented trait with these fish. I too thought "No, my mandarin is a nice fish" ... Lived peacefully with a mandarin for at least a full year after I moved the mandarin in from a different tank that I was taking down. There was no warning or any kind of lead-up to the event, otherwise I could have tried something. Anyhow, forewarned is forearmed. Sixlines are OK fish but they are known to become potentially troublesome as they age.

Appreciate your comments and cautions re: 6-line, just was going back to the reason of the thread. Guess I'm still on a tangent but needing to add pods in a 90g for a Mandarin is exasperated by having a 6-line.

[digital-audiophile]

I just need to get a stand build for my grow out tank, once this is up and running I will move my sixline into that tank. I would hate to get rid of him, he is my oldest surviving fish and even though he is a maniac I still love him.