Anyone feed mandarin w/ TOM Hatch N' Feeder Brine Shrimp Hatchery

[duganderson]

The TOM Aquarium Hatch N' Feeder Brine Shrimp Hatchery constantly releases recently hatched eggs a couple inches from the waterline.

1. Would this be a good option to keep a mandarin well fed in a small tank (34 g) that likely does not have enough pods?

2. Would the uneaten baby brines foul the water?

3. Would the Mandarin likely learn to go to the hatchery near the surface to eat?

4. I read a poster online say..."I would recommend you NEVER let hatching water come in contact with your tank water. Brine shrimp cysts CAN and sometimes DO harbour harmful bacteria that can damage or decimate your investment in your tanks." Does anyone know the validity of this statement?

My tank has a clown, African flameback and a mix of softies, LPS and RBTA. May try to add some easy SPS. May also add Shrimp Goby & Pistol Shrim and Midas Blenny.

Appreciate any thoughts, opinions, suggestions, etc. about this?

--Doug

 

[hkgar]

Brine shrimp are not very high in nutritional value. See post #6 in this thread.

 

[duganderson]

Brine shrimp are not very high in nutritional value. See post #6 in this thread.

I've read multiple good sources that say that freshly hatched brine shrimp have high nutional value for the 1st 12-24 hours.

 

[duganderson]

Anyone have other thoughts! Thanks

 

[Joe0813]

I would bet that your other fish will get to the food first and the Mandarin would starve

 

[WVfishguy]

You'll have to have the shrimp shot down to the bottom. At the surface, the others will gobble them up.

I've used newly hatched shrimp for fish food for 50 years. I don't know why people insist it has no food value. I suspect it's a way to sell stuff to feed shrimp. Its food value was never an issue until the internet came about.

Keep in mind I'm talking NEWLY HATCHED SHRIMP.

I'm currently using it to grow out Bangaii cardinals, and I've used it for God only knows how many freshwater fish - as have countless others hobbyists.

I seldom use frozen adult brine, but I DO NOT believe is has no nutritional value. I prefer mysis and blood worms (I actually prefer live mosquito larva over ALL OTHER FOOD).

 

[sfdan]

I had 2 very healthy scooter dragonets in my old 120 gallon tank, but there were dark times when very evil dinoflagellates took over the tank. One of the consequences of this was the microfauna population was decimated and my scooter dragonets started to get very skinny as their primary food source went away.

My first attempt to fix this problem was to try feeding frozen food, targeted towards them, multiple times per day. Though they had always been voracious eaters of frozen food, it just wasn't enough and they were still very skinny.

So then I decided to build a brine shrimp feeder like this one, and feed them newborn brine shrimp daily and see if that helped. It took them a few days to get used to the feeder, but soon after I could load in a batch of newly born shrimp and both of them would be snacking on them for basically the next hour or so. Within a few weeks of feeding them newborn brine multiple times per week they were gaining weight and started breeding again. So I can pretty conclusively say that baby brine shrimp offer nutrition, at least as part of a balanced diet that also included nutritious frozen foods (like PE mysis). If BBS were purely empty calories I don't think my dragonets would have fattened up and resumed breeding.

And now to answer questions specifically about your case:

If you put the brine shrimp into the water towards the top of the tank, there is 0% chance a dragonet will ever get to them. Brine shrimp swim towards the light and dragonets are not going to be searching for food in the water column. The feeder I linked above works because it is on the ground and it very slowly releases the brine shrimp into the water so the mandarin can slowly snack on them. Dragonets also eat very slowly so if you release a bunch of brine shrimp into your tank they will all dissipate before your dragonet can fill up. A dragonet's natural way of eating is lots of tiny snacks all day long, so that is what you have to recreate.

I never washed my BBS, but given what people have said in this thread maybe I'd start doing it if I fed BBS again. I never had any issues with fouling the water but then again I had a 120 gallon tank so there was a lot more margin when it came to nutrients.

Is it a good option to keep a mandarin? I'd say no. Hatching BBS a few times a week isn't an inordinate amount of work, but is a ton more work than feeding frozen food once or twice a day. You need to hatch the BBS, strain them, put them into the feeder, clean out the hatchery and then repeat the process again. And if you get behind there is nothing fun about a fish withering away in your care.

But I admit I'm a lazier reefer than most, and would never keep a fish that required this kind of regular effort. Fortunately in my case I both upgraded tanks and defeated the dinos, so my dragonets are plump and breeding without any supplemental feedings. My dry food and frozen food turns into pods which turns into their food source, which is the way I like to enjoy a fish like this.

In your case with a smaller tank you'll have much less margin for error since the natural food source for your potential mandarin would be less, and your chance of dumping in too many nutrients via BBS is higher. So if it were me I'd stick with fish like the Midas Blenny or Watchman Goby which are really cool fish with a lot of personality that are much easier to keep in a tank of that size. And enjoy all the free time you have not having to deal with maintaining a constant BBS hatchery.

 

[Uncle99]

I hatch them out separately, once a month, I strain them into a small water bottle using water from the DT, I put in 10mls of phyto, 3 drops Selcon, and let them feed for 4 hours.

Then, at night, lights out, zero flow for 1 hour, I drop them all in, and in an hour, turn flow back on.

This way they hide in and around the rocks where my Mandarin picks them off. I keep some phyto in the water at all times to sustain the brine.

This is only for supplementle feeding....