Mandarin Goby-Anyone have one?

[Koresample]

I want to put a mandarin in my tank and it will be the first fish in. Anyone have one now that can pass on any tips on their care and unique needs? From what i have read they generally just eat pods, not much prepared food. My tank has a ton of pods and i am putting a 'fuge in now to cultivate more. I have read that they generally don't do well in tanks under 75 gallons and mine is 41. What other fish do they get along with? I was planning on adding one clown and one bi colored blennie with the rest of the other animals just being corals.
thanks!

[Alberta-newb]

Don't have one yet (I actually have a pair on hold right now) but have been doing a fair bit of reading on them. Like you found they do suggest at least 75 gal. or more for a mandarin. It is also recomended to have a tank that has been established at least 6 months to a year to ensure a stable pod population. Pods tend to come and go in the first few months of setup. You also want to avoid other species that will compete for food so wrasses and some of the gobies are out. They certainly aren't recommended for beginners, but are sold all the time by LFS anyway:cry: The latest issue of Freshwater and Marine Aquarium (FAMA) has an excellent article on Mandarins. Also read the "Mandarin Primer" thread on RC in the Reef Fishes forum (it's a "sticky" near the top).

What I am gewtting ready to do is try to train my mandarins on prepared foods based on write-ups from Matt Wittenrich who has succesfully bred them in captivity. He ensures all his stock feed on prepared foods. What he does is keep the fish in a net type breeder trap (found at your LFS) and feeds them live adult brine shrimp enriched with Selcon. Once feeding on those he starts introducing frozen brine. Once they start on those he immediately stops the live and feeds exclusively frozen. He then starts additions of other foods like frozen mysid and pellets as brine shrimp alone are not that great nutritionally. This is the approach I will be trying as although I have lots of pods in my system, I don't want to count on them alone to keep mandarins alive.

Just some thoughts, others that actually have them will certainly chime in.

[Koresample]

I read the exact same articles! My tank is new (2 months) but the rock was from another established tank of 2 years. My pod population is so high i see them out scurrying around the rocks during the day. I dont believe that the clown will compete or the bi-colored blennie, but i could be wrong.

[fishytime]

Don't have one yet (I actually have a pair on hold right now) but have been doing a fair bit of reading on them. Like you found they do suggest at least 75 gal. or more for a mandarin. It is also recomended to have a tank that has been established at least 6 months to a year to ensure a stable pod population. Pods tend to come and go in the first few months of setup. You also want to avoid other species that will compete for food so wrasses and some of the gobies are out. They certainly aren't recommended for beginners, but are sold all the time by LFS anyway:cry: The latest issue of Freshwater and Marine Aquarium (FAMA) has an excellent article on Mandarins. Also read the "Mandarin Primer" thread on RC in the Reef Fishes forum (it's a "sticky" near the top).

What I am gewtting ready to do is try to train my mandarins on prepared foods based on write-ups from Matt Wittenrich who has succesfully bred them in captivity. He ensures all his stock feed on prepared foods. What he does is keep the fish in a net type breeder trap (found at your LFS) and feeds them live adult brine shrimp enriched with Selcon. Once feeding on those he starts introducing frozen brine. Once they start on those he immediately stops the live and feeds exclusively frozen. He then starts additions of other foods like frozen mysid and pellets as brine shrimp alone are not that great nutritionally. This is the approach I will be trying as although I have lots of pods in my system, I don't want to count on them alone to keep mandarins alive.

Just some thoughts, others that actually have them will certainly chime in.

Well said Francis. If not willing to "train" your mandarin, you should make darn sure it is eating prepared foods before you add it to a 40gish tank. If the fish is not eating prepared foods, 40g worth of live rock will simply not support enough pods to feed a mandarin. The fish will likely wither away over a period of a few months.

[UnderTheSea]

I QT'ed a pair in a 20g tank for about 10 days, they were eating my DIY Frozen food and decapsulated brine shrimp eggs before I added them to my DT (180g with 65g sump and 40g frag tank with over 300lbs of LR in total).

[fragNplug]

i have one in a 45 gallon, with 2 clowns and 2 wrasse, bared and canary.

[reeferious]

have a pair of mandarins in tank that eat pods all day and slurp up blood worms but won't touch mysis. not sure why but these fat and sassy fish have been with me for last 2 years. never tried training them to go on frozen diet but these guys just took to bloodworms like natural born worm hunters..

[karazy]

try feeding sushi roe

[TheRealBigAL]

I have a 50 gallon display with a striped male and female dragonet. At one time I had 4 dragonets in the tank. My striped Male&Female and 2 other spotted females that I got from the the LFS because they were so skinny and I couldn't leave them:sad:. Once they had gotten nice and fat I found good homes for them (thanks seahorsefanatic). My secret is my 4.7 gallon hang on back refugium that is filled with cheato. I added about 4 bottles of tigger pods when I first put it on my tank(about 5 months ago). Now it grosses me out how many pods I have :lol:. When I trim the cheato pods are literally running up the scissors and onto my hands. IMO The #1secret to having Dragonets is pods and lots of em!!!!!!! Now my dragonets eat anything Mysis, Brine, even pellets but I have to turn off all of the flow in my tank and allow the food to fall to the sand bed. It took about 6 months for them to adjust to non live food.

[Rbacchiega]

I've got a male in a 90 gallon who chows down on frozen mysis and other prepaired foods. Every month or so I also add some pods to the tank because between the Mandarin and the Copper Banded Butterfly the pod population diminishes quickly

[Alberta-newb]

try feeding sushi roe

I read about that on MOFIB, do you know where to find this in Calgary? Something I would like to try as well.

[Rbacchiega]

I'd imagine you could find it at T&T (on 36th st and 16th Ave NE)

[Argentiner]

where can you get pods in Calgary? I tried at Riverfront but they were sold out and the price was out of my range to consistently buy bottles from them.

[Rbacchiega]

Red Coral has them on a fairly regular basis...

[nanoreefer]

i have used matts method of weaning on several mandarins over the last few years it works well, except you cant get live adult brine shrimp here so i had to grow my own wich is hard work but vary worth it,

i have one male now in an 8g biocube been there for almost nine months and doing well, it was a pair but the female disapeared soon after i added the male, he loves sushi roe, brine, mysis ect but some times gos off food for a week or more for some reason? also he eats bristleworms!

make sure if your feeding frozen to use selcon or some other supplemt on the food, to increase pods you can make some "boxes" out of egg crate and fill them with plastic dish scrubbers and place them behind the LR, or place the LR in mounds with lots of small peices inside so the pods can breed there,
feed the tank with of phyto and crushed up pellets like NLS,
you can set up a 10g and grow them theres its easy, i had them growing with my brine shrimp most of the time, and try and get some isopods as well there larger and mandarins love them

[Koresample]

ok, i am going to check my LFS and see what they are feeding this guy. He is in a FOWLR tank right now and is looking very chubby, so he is quite possibly already eating frozen. My plan to add the refugium seems to make sense as well. I am going to set my 10 gal up as a nano reef and breeding ground, sounds like i am going to need another tank now for my QT/HT. How many tanks is too many?:lol:

[Whatigot]

I have a 50 gallon display with a striped male and female dragonet. At one time I had 4 dragonets in the tank. My striped Male&Female and 2 other spotted females that I got from the the LFS because they were so skinny and I couldn't leave them:sad:. Once they had gotten nice and fat I found good homes for them (thanks seahorsefanatic). My secret is my 4.7 gallon hang on back refugium that is filled with cheato. I added about 4 bottles of tigger pods when I first put it on my tank(about 5 months ago). Now it grosses me out how many pods I have :lol:. When I trim the cheato pods are literally running up the scissors and onto my hands. IMO The #1secret to having Dragonets is pods and lots of em!!!!!!! Now my dragonets eat anything Mysis, Brine, even pellets but I have to turn off all of the flow in my tank and allow the food to fall to the sand bed. It took about 6 months for them to adjust to non live food.



Hey Al, remember when you were putting in like 2 bottles of tigger pods a week before you got your fuge?...

I have seen all of Als mandarins, they are really fat and healthy and I would definitely consider him a good resource for how to keep them successfully.
2 very happy, healthy ones in a 50 gallon tank that is not a species tank is a great accomplishment IMO.

[my2rotties]

I have had my Mandarin since Nov/07. He was one of the first fish I had bought for the 44g that came with my house. I knew nothing of fish and loved this little guy. I was very lucky he ate mysis and such back then since I had no live rock in the tank that was set up in the house. When I learned more about how tanks should be set up I bought some wonderful old live rock from a Canreef person. It was FULL of pods and my little goby is now in the 260g and is fat and healthy to this day. I have billions in my fuge now in the cheato and swap live rock back and forth to my display to keep the pods bountiful.

I was very fortunate that the LFS I bought him from had him of frozen foods since I would have lost him for sure. When you see some good old live rock come up for sale on Canreef buy some, it is so beneficial in the end. When I bring rocks back and forth to my display, the little pail has dozens of pods on the bottom.

[naesco]

There are two requirements.
Like many difficult fish mandarins require a seasoned tank. Has your tank going for at least 6 months?
The reason for the larger tank requirement is that your mandarin will spend the whole day doing nothing but searching for and eating the pods. A smaller tank cannot replenish the pods and the mandarin starves to death.
If you do not meet the above requirements pass on the fish until your tank is large enough and old enough to ensure success please.

[Koresample]

I think i should be good to go as i have almost 50 lbs of well aged LR in my tank, and at night the critters are crawling everywhere. There have been no fish in the tank for the past two weeks and i am now seeing pods etc crawling around even during the day. I am going to add a refugium and swap rock back and forth in my tank. A couple of guys have mentioned buying bottles of pods to stock the fuge with, does anyone in the lower mainland sell this stuff and what exactly is it called? What is chaeto and what does it do? can you get it at J&L?

[naesco]

You can buy the tiny pods, they are expensive and IME don't replicate.
Your mandarin will easily polish off the pods in a 40 than will not have anything to eat.
Wait until you upgrade to a larger tank which you no doubt will in the future.
Don't purchase the mandarin now.

[Lance]

I think i should be good to go as i have almost 50 lbs of well aged LR in my tank, and at night the critters are crawling everywhere. There have been no fish in the tank for the past two weeks and i am now seeing pods etc crawling around even during the day. I am going to add a refugium and swap rock back and forth in my tank. A couple of guys have mentioned buying bottles of pods to stock the fuge with, does anyone in the lower mainland sell this stuff and what exactly is it called? What is chaeto and what does it do? can you get it at J&L?

You can buy Tigger pods at J&L or Ocean Aquatics. They're not cheap though ($20). I"ve had my mandarin for nearly a year now, and he seldom eats anything but pods. Now and then I'll see him take a bloodworm. I buy a bottle of Tigger Pods every other month and dump half into the tank and half into the fuge to replenish the stock.

[Cameron]

I have mine eating pellet and frozen mysis.

[Koresample]

And you have yours in a 45g Cameron? Was it always eating that, or did you have to wean it?

[TheRealBigAL]

you don't need to keep buying bottles of pods and putting them in your tank. You just need a protected area the pods can reproduce (refugium/sump) so that the dragonets don't fully deplete the population. Tiggers pods do reproduce if you give them the right home. Buying bottles of pods and dumping them in your tank gets pricey (trust me:lol:). Its worth it to buy one of these if you want to keep dragonets in a system under 75G http://www.jlaquatics.com/product/AQ-HOR12/CPR+AquaFuge+Hang-On+Refugium+-++Small.html. Sure it seems a bit pricey at first but i have easily spent $200 (:lol:maybe more) on pods. By having a HOB refugium you can be assured your dragonets will eat well and live heathy.

[Cameron]

And you have yours in a 45g Cameron? Was it always eating that, or did you have to wean it?

Not sure what they fed him at the store, was looking a little thin when I got her about 18 months ago. Just turned all the flow off and squirted some mysis in front of her and she ate it. Has only started to eat pellets within the last 6 months.

I will post up a pic, she is FAT.

[Dunweb]

Hi Koresample,

I have kept 2 mandarins in a 46 gallon bowfront for more than 3 yrs. I was running a sump at the time and also fed them tigger pods from reef nutrition. The did eat some black worms as well.

The were healthy and active.

[naesco]

Hi Koresample,

I have kept 2 mandarins in a 46 gallon bowfront for more than 3 yrs. I was running a sump at the time and also fed them tigger pods from reef nutrition. The did eat some black worms as well.
The were healthy and active.

I think that Koresample and the rest of us would like to know whether you are a hobbyist who has experience in keeping mandarins or whether you are a fish store owner who has an interest in selling them.
If you are a LFS owner, IMO you have an obligation to disclose this in your original posting or signature.

[Rbacchiega]

what makes you think that Dunweb is a store owner compared to the rest of us who have said we keep Mandarins and list out setups?

[naesco]

what makes you think that Dunweb is a store owner compared to the rest of us who have said we keep Mandarins and list out setups?

I await Dunweb's reply.
Wayne

[Dunweb]

I have been in the past been BOTH a store owner and a hobbyist. I am currently a hobbyist that now has a 120 gallon drilled tank with sump, uv sterilizer, protein skimmer and MH lighting.

I have more than 20 years as a hobbyist that has imported fish directly from Indonesia, Red sea, Hawaii, Philippines and fiji. I have business contacts and friends that deal with and keep Marine Aquatics at various skill levels.

To make it very clear, my presence here is strictly as a hobbyist and I will not endorse or promote any one supplier but simply share my experience with those who wish advice.


Your direct attack on my position here was unprovoked and I can only anticipate that your aggressive questioning is because you have seen some of my websites that I have designed for various businesses related to the hobby. My business is currently www.dunweb-designs.com, feel free to check it out.

Moderators: Sorry if this post violates any terms and conditions but I felt it necessary to clarify my position and my intention here.


Chris

[Koresample]

now that we have that out of the way....:lol:
I am planning on getting an Aqua Clear AC 50 or 70 from J&L (unless someone has one they want to sell cheap) and making it into a refugium. Once i stock that with some pods/rubble substrate etc, how long until the pods start to reproduce? I gues what i am getting at is; i put the mandarin in my tank where he starts gobbling my pods (that are plentiful at this point), how long until the refugium is producing a sustainable amount of food?

[Rbacchiega]

Personally I'd have your fuge up for about a month. I have no idea how fast/slow pods produce, but with a good number to start and a safe place for them to do their thing (the fuge) you should have a good population going.

[TheRealBigAL]

feed your refuguim a few small drops a day. You will notice a increase in pods in about a month or so http://www.jlaquatics.com/phpstore/store_pages/product-info.php?product_ID=rm-pfl006

[Koresample]

thanks to all for the tips, i will do a mixture of all the suggestions and keep an eye on him after i get him home!