did this mandarin starve?

[mikedmiked]

it looked healthy and was picking at my rocks (assume eating pods); until last night and it was just hanging out looking fine and I woke up and found it dead. Was it starving?

 

[snorvich]

Short answer. Yes.

 

[mikedmiked]

is it a sunken belly that had you make the determination?

 

[snorvich]

is it a sunken belly that had you make the determination?

First of all, the proper forum would be reef fish; more answers will be available there. This forum is for questions about Reef Central itself. You put the fish in a nano tank that was not mature, so there were few if any copepods. The picture shows a horribly emaciated fish. Sorry.

 

[Wolverine]

I agree with Steve on both points, it will be better in this forum, and it looks like that fish starved.

 

[mikedmiked]

First of all, the proper forum would be reef fish; more answers will be available there. This forum is for questions about Reef Central itself. You put the fish in a nano tank that was not mature, so there were few if any copepods. The picture shows a horribly emaciated fish. Sorry.

I had been adding pods from a guy that is culturing them and trying to use the 'diner' method to convert him to prepared foods. I understand your comment about the nano and not a lot of time for pods and factored that into my decision. I know it was not the best idea but have seen many of these guys perish at the lfs anyway and figured I would give him a better shot in my tank where I spent time trying to make it work. Thank you for your response. I would move the post if I knew how.

 

[Wolverine]

I had been adding pods from a guy that is culturing them and trying to use the 'diner' method to convert him to prepared foods. I understand your comment about the nano and not a lot of time for pods and factored that into my decision. I know it was not the best idea but have seen many of these guys perish at the lfs anyway and figured I would give him a better shot in my tank where I spent time trying to make it work. Thank you for your response. I would move the post if I knew how.

Your post is already moved. You can't do it on your own.

As for the "saving" the fish from the LFS, my advice is, don't try it. You will often end up with a sick fish, and you've often just rewarded the store for either getting in inappropriate animals or not taking proper care of them (I know this isn't always the case). They're going to turn around and buy another one. You've shown that there's a market.