Best way to feed Mandarins

A

Amipro

New member
I've been getting a lot of conflicting information as to what and how to feed mandarins. I recently purchased one from a LFS and was told that they will eat blood worms, but everywhere else I research says it's very difficult to get them to eat anything other than copepods.
All help and suggestions are welcome. I want to get a handle on this before my mandarin starves.
 
The best way is to have a tank with a refugium or to have some sort of place where copeds can breed and be protected so predators can not wipe them out immediately. You can train the mandrian on eating frozen foods but it is not a replacement for having a natural coped population in your tank.
 
Get a big enough tank. 75+ gallons.

And stock up on reef pods. There's only a handful of mandarins that will eat prepared food. If it DOES, then I would comfortably say it can be kept in any size tank, since you won't have a problem assuring it has enough food.
 
This is a topic that you will get a wide range of answers on. Some people say they do fine on frozen food others say pods are the way to go. I tried getting my mandarin to eat mysis shrimp for about a month and he just wasnt interested. I spot feed several times a day to with no success. I decided to stop wasting food and let him fend for himself and he is doing fine over a year later.Funny thing is I sometimes see him swim up and grab frozen food out of the water column ....i suspect just to mock me. So I would agree with biodarwin a mixture of the two is the safest way to go.
 
I think natural is best.
Their metabolism is set for constant intake so while frequent spot feeding may keep them alive their bodies really are designed for constant grazing.

I set up my new tank specifically with a Mandarin in mind.
It's a 130g with TONS of super porous life rock, sump and refugium. I bought the best rock I could find and I am so thrilled with it!

I am planning on actively culturing phytoplankton to support a very large population of copepods (Tisbe to be exact).
You can culture phyto and then use the phyto to culture the pods.
You can culture t in soda bottles or small fish tanks, or plankton reactors, etc.
Or feed the phyto to your tank that way other filter feeders will benefit from it too (in addition to the pods)
You can buy the pods and the phyto bottled but that will get expensive.

I haven't tried any of this yet so don't take my word for it.
My pods and phyto starter cultures arrive next week and I'll see how that goes... best case scenario I can keep enough phyto in the tank to have it self-sustaining and no additions are needed.

Otherwise I'm prepared to culture it.
The next few month are just my R&D phase to try things out (without the mandarin fish)

For the time being you might have to buy some Tiger pods to keep your fish alive. Tigers are a coldwater species so they won't multiply for long in a reef aquarium but should work well for spot feeding.

Good Luck!
 
I've seen my mandarin take the odd granule of CycloPeeze. I actually have two of them in my 75 now, made an error too. Thought I had bagged a juvenile female for my large male, turns out I got another male. No conflicts so far, perhaps due to the huge size difference, but I'll keep an eye on them and suspect I may need to remove one in the future. For now, they're both fine in there and no sign of starvation, both finding plenty of pods.

Thanks for the link stugray. I checked the ingredients and right at the bottom in the "ADDED VITAMINS" section it shows 18mg/kg of Copper. I realize that's not much and you seem to be having success with it so far, but still, any amount of copper is detrimental to inverts is it not?? These pellets look similar to the Ocean Nutrition small pellet Formula One Marine pellets I use, I'm about to check the label on that more closely.
 
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My mandarins eat mysis, no issue. I never trained them or went out of the way, and my tank is loaded with pods. They just do it.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=15133685#post15133685 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by euromomtx
I think natural is best.
Their metabolism is set for constant intake so while frequent spot feeding may keep them alive their bodies really are designed for constant grazing.

I set up my new tank specifically with a Mandarin in mind.
It's a 130g with TONS of super porous life rock, sump and refugium. I bought the best rock I could find and I am so thrilled with it!

I am planning on actively culturing phytoplankton to support a very large population of copepods (Tisbe to be exact).
You can culture phyto and then use the phyto to culture the pods.
You can culture t in soda bottles or small fish tanks, or plankton reactors, etc.
Or feed the phyto to your tank that way other filter feeders will benefit from it too (in addition to the pods)
You can buy the pods and the phyto bottled but that will get expensive.

I haven't tried any of this yet so don't take my word for it.
My pods and phyto starter cultures arrive next week and I'll see how that goes... best case scenario I can keep enough phyto in the tank to have it self-sustaining and no additions are needed.

Otherwise I'm prepared to culture it.
The next few month are just my R&D phase to try things out (without the mandarin fish)

For the time being you might have to buy some Tiger pods to keep your fish alive. Tigers are a coldwater species so they won't multiply for long in a reef aquarium but should work well for spot feeding.

Good Luck!
Click to expand...

While it is true Tigriopus californicus come from the west coast of North America, they have a vast reported range from the tip of Baja (Mexico) to Alaska. That is just the reported range on paper. Having spoken with numerous researchers, they've seen them much further down the west coast, IE. Honduras.

They do not live in the ocean: they live in the upper splash zone tide pools. They are not equipped to survive in such a harsh environment as out Pacific coast ocean typically provides. Anyone whom has spent anytime tide pooling in the upper splash zone of the west coast of California can tell you the upper "cesspools" reach the high 90's very often during summer. The myth they produce more males at above 75f was most likely due to where the test culture was collected, IE. Canada. Tiger Pods AKA Tigger-Pods were originally collected in California and have been cultured at near reef temps (mid 70's to 80's during the summer) for numerous years now. If it were true they did in fact produce more males at higher temps its not an event Reed has ever seen. The shear amount Reed has produced over the years is testimony to the fact that not all research is entirely 100% accurate especially when conducted on an animal collected from a much colder zone a thousand miles further north.
 
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<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=15133608#post15133608 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by stugray
Try - Hikari Marine-S pellets.

http://www.hikariusa.com/products/marine-and-reptile/marine-s.php

All of my mandarins have eaten them.
The "S" is for small.

They also sink to the bottom so the other fish dont eat them all before the mandarins get a chance.

Stu
Click to expand...

I use the Ocean Nutrition Formula 1 and 2 small pellets. As they roll around on the bottom of my Barebottom Reef my Mandarin snags them.
 
I feed angel and butterfly food and mine will eat it but only if it settles on the bottom. I have also seen it eat the brine shrimp and squid that I feed right out of the water collum.
 
i have a female ocellated dragonette, i've had for over a year now, started out in my 20H and did quite well, started getting alittle skinny but then i setup my 90g moved her over there and got her a boyfriend. neither will eat prepared foods of any sort.
both are fat and healthy, he follows her around everywhere
 
Wow. Just wow. I have had a reef tank for 10 years and am just now crawling out from under my rock.
Last night while the kids were sleeping I read the posts on the marinebreeder.org forum and most importantly the blog posts and articles by Matt Wittenrich
http://en.microcosmaquariumexplorer.com/wiki/Breeding_the_Green_Mandarin
http://en.microcosmaquariumexplorer.com/wiki/Breeding_the_Spotted_Mandarin
http://www.melevsreef.com/mandarin_diner.html

Holy cow. This is awesome! People have been feeding frozen food and pellets and even breeding them in captivity. What an exciting time to be in this hobby. :)
 
I thought it was interesting what the breeder said about the differences between the Spotteds and the Greens.
Apparently he finds the Spotteds to be more ready to accept prepared/frozen foods although the Greens can be trained as well.
I've always been fond of the Greens but I think I am now leaning more towards the Spotteds...
In a thread on the marinebreeder board MW also said that the next generation of his captive bred dragonets is in the works and he expects captive bred mandarin dragonets to be available commercially 'soon'.
Isn't that exciting?
I wonder what soon means to a fish breeder? Weeks? Months? In our lifetime?
 
The thing I find so funny is how the people that figure this stuff out go against everything people tell them! This doesn't always work but when it does man I bet it feels good. My scooter blennie and my cleaner wrasse also eats frozen food. I beleive after they have acclimated and see the other fish eating it they try it out. Iv have personally seen people put a manadrin in a 5 gallon tank and just feed the crap ot of them with frozen brine and eventually they accept the food. The one thing I'm not for sure about is how it affects them long term not eating only pods.
 
I believe another reason that some fish learn to eat "whatever" is competition.
When you have a LOT of fish & feed, everybody eats EVERYTHING and spits out what it doesn't like.
I think they learn to eat things they otherwise wouldnt try.

That's one theory.
That probably doesn't pertain as mush to my mandarins as they are they only 'foragers' I have had.

As for the blue vs green... All of mine have been the blue ( psychedelic ) rather than the green ( spotted ), and have still all learned to eat pellets ( that's four over a 5 year period ).


And.... to put down some popular beliefs:

My first fish was a psychedelic mandarin ( LFS thought it would make a great first fish in a 1 month old 15 gallon & LR ;-(.

However.... he made it fine through 2 tank moves & was one of my longest lived fish to date.

Once I realized what this fish needed, I upgraded immediately to a 75 then to a 125.

Twice I have had pairs that did the mating dance.
Twice I have lost females to large aggressive fish ( tang & trigger at least that's the only theory I have for their demise - bullying ).

Stu
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=15165288#post15165288 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by stugray
I believe another reason that some fish learn to eat "whatever" is competition.
When you have a LOT of fish & feed, everybody eats EVERYTHING and spits out what it doesn't like.
I think they learn to eat things they otherwise wouldnt try.

Agreed! Thats what I was trying to say I think.
Click to expand...
 
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