Do not get a mandarin if...

Status
Not open for further replies.
SeeCrabRun said:
Someone shared these with me recently citing these recommendations of 50+ is a thing of the past.......

http://coralmagazine.coverleaf.com/coral/20111112/MobilePagedReplica.action?pg=47#pg47

http://en.microcosmaquariumexplorer.com/wiki/Breeding_the_Green_Mandarin
Click to expand...
One weak anecdotal report does not prove anything. Additionally if you read the article he is stating that he is feeding his at least 3 times a day. Something most keepers are not inclined to do.

I'm also going to question feeding adult brine shrimp as the staple.

Then he goes on to expound about how wonderful ORA captive bred Mandy's are. Something that I have seen mixed reports of, at best.

My takeaway from it: it is one persons opinion, and has some serious incongruities with what I have personally observed, and what I have seen others report.

So, as with anything else, proceed with caution. The article smacks of yellow journalism and offers no novel insights.

This is in reference to the piece by Matt Pedersen, I haven't yet read the others entirely.
 
That's what I was thinking as well. You can successfully keep one in a small tank if you are handfeeding it like an infant.
 
Yeah I find it disingenuous to say the least that he scoffs at the "reef will provide" attitude and then proceeds to blather on about how can keep them in a 10 gallon, with the caveat that you feed them constantly around the clock.

Because that's what I want to do.

I love my reef, and I love my fish, but I occasionally enjoy doing other things besides painstakingly feeding them foods, many of which can be difficult to source, or maintain long term stable cultures of.
 
I have yet to see a reliable report of a long-lived ora mandarin who is NOT in a tank large enough to provide sufficient pods on its own.
 
Yes Mongobongo I Agree with you that the article is not the end all to be all. And his feeding regiment is well beyond the avg hobbyist ability. Still it does show some promise. Was not to long ago when many corals and anemones were beyond the avg hobbyist. I Did take interest in the brood numbers(more then i thought) There are no bad questions, only bad answers...hehe:beer:
 
Proffugazi said:
Yes Mongobongo I Agree with you that the article is not the end all to be all. And his feeding regiment is well beyond the avg hobbyist ability. Still it does show some promise. Was not to long ago when many corals and anemones were beyond the avg hobbyist. I Did take interest in the brood numbers(more then i thought) There are no bad questions, only bad answers...hehe:beer:
Click to expand...

again, in Pedersen's article he offers no novel insights in to the husbandry or care of these animals. the advances you cite in the keeping of corals and associated species have all been to specific changes in the understanding of water chemistry, newer equipment, better equipment design, or some other previously unknown or unrealized techniques.

his section on breeding is just regurgitated paraphrasing of work of others have done, leaving out quite a few important details.

the key point is that they spawn at dusk? no. in fact, that is barely a footnote. a key point would be some important observations about larval settlement, or obtaining high survival rates. he even admits he has no success with breeding mandarins, so i'm not even sure why he attempting to appear as an expert on the topic?

pedersen's whole article is just tired rehash in my opinion.
 
If I may.....

If I may.....

Proffugazi said:
Yes Mongobongo I Agree with you that the article is not the end all to be all. And his feeding regiment is well beyond the avg hobbyist ability. Still it does show some promise. Was not to long ago when many corals and anemones were beyond the avg hobbyist. I Did take interest in the brood numbers(more then i thought) There are no bad questions, only bad answers...hehe:beer:
Click to expand...

Actually I've owned a male green Mandarin for almost a year in a nano (before it went carpet surfing), and did exactly what was prescribed in microcosmaquariumexplore write up:

The best method in my opinion was developed by Matt Pedersen of MOFIB (see the links below). The idea is quite simple. Isolate new mandarins in suspended breeder baskets (or small quarantine tanks) and get them feeding on enriched live brine shrimp. Then, introduce frozen brine shrimp and mysis shrimp. After the fish begin sampling the frozen fare the live diet is slowly replaced. Once they are eating frozen fare with vigor they are released into the display tank where their "training" pays off.

In my case though I did the following:

1. Put the Mandarin in a breeder net

2. Put in live brine shrimp. Watch it peck and eat. If it doesn't do so within a day or two, I'd trade it back to your LFS. (NOTE: females are suppose to be easier to train than males, and psychedelic mandarins easier than greens)

3. Once it's eating live brine, put in a little bit of frozen brine along with the live brine. Aim a tiny powerhead at the breeder net, angled slightly upward so as to stir the frozen brine around, but not so that it ****ing off the mandy. In my case, I had a power head attached on the other side of the tank so that the flow was really gentle but swirled the brine around just enough.

4. Once it's eating some frozen, increase the ratio of frozen to live. Your goal is to eventually put in all frozen brine.

5. Once it's eating frozen brine, start substituing in Nutramar Ova. (That's what I used at least). It should readily start eating that. NOTE: Good luck finding any more of this stuff though.

6. At this point you can start weaning of the frozen brine and only feed Nutramar Ova.

7. Once eating, make sure to leave the mandy in the breeder net for at least a few weeks, and get him big and fat; sausage-like. It's best if there's even some back fat forming.

Only when the mandy is eating well, would I release it into the tank.

I fed twice daily, and even made an eating container for it to go into. But if you're not DIY, you can get one of these instead:

http://www.dragonetsden.co.uk/

I'm in no way a pioneer. I'm that guy that reads on the internet and copies what other's have done. All of this is not new, and has been done numerous times over. The real issue is to be patient and persistent.

And most of all, start with a mandy that doesn' t have a sunken belly. Because once they get skinny, it's game over. So as soon as I see a new mandy come into my LFS, I'd buy it that same day and put it/feed it in a quarentine tank. Because chances are, that mandy would most likely starve at the LFS. Remember, a mandy can't get too fat.

No one said any of this would be easy, I'm just saying it's possible because I've done it. Flame suit on :smokin:
 
again, "feed a lot" isn't a revolutionary strategy or innovative approach to the husbandry of these animals.

pedersen's article, which is the exact one we have been talking about here, is misleading in several ways.

first, i want to extremely clear, i've never said, nor have i seen anyone say, that it's not POSSIBLE to keep a dragonet in a smaller tank. my stance has always been that it is not advisable, nor PROBABLE, that you can have long term success that way. there will be, and in fact are, outliers. however these deviations are like statistical noise in relation to the far larger group of people who try, and fail, to keep a mandarin in a smaller tank.

and to echo sk8r's post above, i still have yet to see anyone, but certainly not a sizable subset, of people keeping dragonets in smaller tanks having long term success. it seems that they die of "unrelated causes" after not too long a time. i suppose we'll just have to take your word for it that food supply had no bearing on their demise.

now i'd like to talk through why i "tow the line" about tank size with dragonets.

most of the questions about keeping dragonets that i see and answer on this board follow this general pattern:

"i just set up my tank (1/2/3/etc... days/weeks/months) ago, and i want a mandarin! i have (little/no) experience keeping (marine/freshwater) fish, but i love this fish and that's why i got in to this hobby. i have a (29 bio cube/20 gallon long/10 gallon/similarly inappropriately sized tank) that i feed (pellets/flake/frozen) once a day to. give me the answer i want to hear about how i'm a special little snow flake whose mandarin will thrive."

sometimes followed up a short time later by:

"HELP!!!! my mandarin isn't moving! what can i do?!?!?! oh now he's dead."

i have yet to see someone start this thread:

"i have (reasonable and credible) experience keeping obligate feeders, and have an established NPS tank that has been thriving for (a reasonable and credible) amount of time. it know it's on the small side, but since it is NPS i would like to think about getting a dragonet, as i believe the food supply and attention i provide the tank will be sufficient"

those two scenarios would produce vastly different answers about the suitability of the tank for a dagonet.

so yes, obviously it CAN be done, but it is not something that the average, or even slightly above average keeper should generally attempt. again, i am still waiting to see LONG TERM success with a dragonet in a small tank that is credible and documented.

even if you do provide doting love and attention, you should also expect to have a certain margin of error. what if you need to go away on vacation or for work? will the person watching your tank have the knowledge and skill to diligently complete your exact regimen? what if there is a supply chain disruption? perhaps your pod cultures crash, or you can't get food (nutramar ova and frozen cyclop-eeze are the perfect example of this). then what do you do?

and not to put too fine a point on it, but what about the shortcomings of keepers? how many people who start in this hobby are gone after a year? how many people will have the DAILY dedication and ability to hand feed these creatures for YEARS AT A TIME to keep them healthy. in the summer i sometimes find it difficult to stick to my normal water change schedule with everything else i have going on.

so i think it's daft almost to the point of being irresponsible to lampoon and debase, like Pedersen does in his article, the established protocol for successful care of these animals, and i find his flippant treatment of the feeding requirements as being "hippie-ish" just down irritating and ridiculous.
 
I wish I could "like" your post LOL.

These articles I provided were given to a young man in high school who already made the mistake of buying a dragonet for a newly upgraded nano tank. He didn't want to hear the truth, just wanted to be told it's possible.
 
MondoBongo said:
again, "feed a lot" isn't a revolutionary strategy or innovative approach to the husbandry of these animals.

pedersen's article, which is the exact one we have been talking about here, is misleading in several ways.

first, i want to extremely clear, i've never said, nor have i seen anyone say, that it's not POSSIBLE to keep a dragonet in a smaller tank. my stance has always been that it is not advisable, nor PROBABLE, that you can have long term success that way. there will be, and in fact are, outliers. however these deviations are like statistical noise in relation to the far larger group of people who try, and fail, to keep a mandarin in a smaller tank.

and to echo sk8r's post above, i still have yet to see anyone, but certainly not a sizable subset, of people keeping dragonets in smaller tanks having long term success. it seems that they die of "unrelated causes" after not too long a time. i suppose we'll just have to take your word for it that food supply had no bearing on their demise.

now i'd like to talk through why i "tow the line" about tank size with dragonets.

most of the questions about keeping dragonets that i see and answer on this board follow this general pattern:

"i just set up my tank (1/2/3/etc... days/weeks/months) ago, and i want a mandarin! i have (little/no) experience keeping (marine/freshwater) fish, but i love this fish and that's why i got in to this hobby. i have a (29 bio cube/20 gallon long/10 gallon/similarly inappropriately sized tank) that i feed (pellets/flake/frozen) once a day to. give me the answer i want to hear about how i'm a special little snow flake whose mandarin will thrive."

sometimes followed up a short time later by:

"HELP!!!! my mandarin isn't moving! what can i do?!?!?! oh now he's dead."

i have yet to see someone start this thread:

"i have (reasonable and credible) experience keeping obligate feeders, and have an established NPS tank that has been thriving for (a reasonable and credible) amount of time. it know it's on the small side, but since it is NPS i would like to think about getting a dragonet, as i believe the food supply and attention i provide the tank will be sufficient"

those two scenarios would produce vastly different answers about the suitability of the tank for a dagonet.

so yes, obviously it CAN be done, but it is not something that the average, or even slightly above average keeper should generally attempt. again, i am still waiting to see LONG TERM success with a dragonet in a small tank that is credible and documented.

even if you do provide doting love and attention, you should also expect to have a certain margin of error. what if you need to go away on vacation or for work? will the person watching your tank have the knowledge and skill to diligently complete your exact regimen? what if there is a supply chain disruption? perhaps your pod cultures crash, or you can't get food (nutramar ova and frozen cyclop-eeze are the perfect example of this). then what do you do?

and not to put too fine a point on it, but what about the shortcomings of keepers? how many people who start in this hobby are gone after a year? how many people will have the DAILY dedication and ability to hand feed these creatures for YEARS AT A TIME to keep them healthy. in the summer i sometimes find it difficult to stick to my normal water change schedule with everything else i have going on.

so i think it's daft almost to the point of being irresponsible to lampoon and debase, like Pedersen does in his article, the established protocol for successful care of these animals, and i find his flippant treatment of the feeding requirements as being "hippie-ish" just down irritating and ridiculous.
Click to expand...

An excellent post. Over the many years I have been doing this, I have kept mandarins and mandarin pairs. For me, the most enjoyable circumstance is a sufficiently large tank (I have a 350 gallon and 240 gallon) with a producing refugium (40 gallons) on each tank. So the mandarins act as they would in the wild. As a fish behaviorist, for me that is the most enjoyable.
 
I just read through this thread and really found it beneficial. My first marine tank was built when I was a teenager back in the mid 80's (75 gallon) and I did have a Mandarin. It did live a while but not longer than a year. The tank was well established but the Mandarin never took to the given food. The local store wasn't much help.

I have no plans for a Mandarin in my 55G tank - maybe one day in a tank described earlier - but even then probably not. I think I'd rather let them stay wild.

Thanks for this great thread.

Ed
 
I keep checking back on this thread to find out if the rules have changed and I can get a Mandy! lol


That being said, the fish is definitely on my wish list. That is being taken into consideration through the build of my new 56g tank. A healthy, thriving pod population is a priority so I can support a Mandarin. My current tank has some rock that looks very similar in porosity to Marco Rock, and it's absolutely stuffed with pods. So, the new tank gets 60# of Marco Rocks as it's base.

I've seeded those rocks with some from my current tank, and will be adding pods to the tank before any fish or coral even find their way in. Planning LR rubble and suitable macro in the sump to help in the long run.

I know it'll take some time for the population to grow and stabilize, so I don't plan to rush in, but I'll be excited when the time comes!
 
It's my experience that if you have a very good rock/sand/cheato fuge, 20 gallons, for that size tank, stable parameters, with plenty of rock in the main tank, you can support one healthy small size mandy in a 50 gallon with a lot of rock...females tend to be a shade smaller than the males.
 
Last edited:
I have a 75g with a megaflow#4 sump that the big sections in it is a large with live rock deep sand bed and macro algae, full of pods, I have pair of mandarins, when I got my 1st one the female she was small and very skinny I put her in my refuge for like 2 months and after she got bigger and fat I put her in the tank itself and then got a male mandarin my tank has a lot for live rock and deep sand bed, I am always monitoring them making sure that they are ok, because I know they are hard to keep, and to keep healthy they have been in my tank for more than a year, in the past month I have seen that they are grabbing food that get to the bottom or on the rocks, from the food mixture that I give my fish.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Similar threads

G
Back after 20 years - cycling advice
Replies
4
Views
155
Guygettnby
Guygettnby
S
Why do oversized protein skimmers not adequately remove protein from a tank?
Replies
17
Views
3K
Guygettnby
Guygettnby
K
Mandarin acting strange
Replies
4
Views
1K
OrionN
OrionN
E
What's Old is New Again
Replies
2
Views
484
Uncle99
Uncle99
R
LFS can order "red" or "blue" peacock mantis?
Replies
2
Views
151
game misconduct
G
Back
Top