copepod eating fish

[dviper150]

I currently have 1 male green mandarin in my 125. I just have way too many copepods so would like to add 1 or 2 more copepod eating fish. Is it safe to add a female or 2 green mandarins to the tank with the one I have? Any other good copepod eating fish out there that I could add instead?

 

[LobsterOfJustice]

You should be able to add a female no problem.

 

[SweetCoralline1]

I love the Splendid Leopard Wrasse aka The Blue Star Leopard Wrasse or the Vermiculite Leopard Wrasse...anyway you slice it, they are beautiful fish and love pods! You must have a sand bed of at least 3 inches though, as they sleep under the sand at night! 100% reef safe....

 

[dviper150]

I have a potters, yellow corris, and solar wrasse already. Didn't really want to add anymore wrasses at the moment besides a red/yellow tail wrasse which has been on my list for awhile.

 

[SweetCoralline1]

Pipefish are neat too...if you have an abundance of pods, they'll take care of them too!

 

[dviper150]

Pipefish are neat too...if you have an abundance of pods, they'll take care of them too!

I have been looking into them. I have a lot of flow, would they be okay with that?

 

[jahmic]

I have been looking into them. I have a lot of flow, would they be okay with that?

They tend to hug the rocks, sandbed, and corals...you should be fine since they aren't really open swimmers

 

[SweetCoralline1]

I had one in our old tank and it seemed to like to stay right by the rock walls and it didn't seem to be bothered by the flow.

 

[o2manyfish]

I have been keeping pipefish in my reef tank for years. My tank has 25K gph of internal flow plus a 30g second story surge tank which dumps the water at a rate of 22K gph every few minutes.

The pipes do great in the tank. My current pair of dragon faced have been in the tank for over 15 months. I am looking for some banded pipes to add.

Sometimes they will swim into the water column, and wait for the surge to cycle to ride the current across the tank.

In addition I have a red mandarin, green mandarin and target mandarin. I have an outside 250g sump/refugium and the pod population is great. We recently dipped two maricultured colonies that were in the outside tank for 2 weeks and had over 100 pods in the dipping container... Crazy pod population.

Dave B

 

[bobkill]

I am a fan of the red tail and the blue stars said above- mandarins are awesome as well- I don't think u would have a problem at all adding them

 

[Paul B]

Scooter bleenies, blue striped pipefish and another female mandarin will all eat pods.
In this short video they are eating new borm brine shrimp but I also have plenty of pods.