Fattening up a mandarin.

[Paul B]

I realize a lot of people have problems with mandarins and I designed a feeder for them to allow them to eat new born brine shrimp all day and that will certainly keep them alive but if you are stuck with a very skinny mandarin and you want to fatten him up quickly there is something else we can do besides give them the new born shrimp.
I mentioned blackworms in the past (many times) and mandarins will eat these. But the problem with blackworms for a mandarin is that blackworms die almost instantly in salt water and mandarins usually won't eat dead worms, although everything else will.
I recently acquired a very skinny male mandarin and he would feast all day on shrimp but he was gaining weight to slowly so I started giving him live whiteworms. The beauty of whiteworms is that they stay alive all day in fresh or saltwater and don't even seem to notice which is which. At least I can't tell from the expression on their face. Another good thing about whiteworms is that they reproduce very fast and the culture is full of adults and babies. My culture has been going for over a year and I have more worms than I know what to do with and I don't eat them.
My skinny mandarin fattened right up and is spawning.
White worms can be ordered online and they come in a small package of soil. Just put them in a plastic shoebox with potting soil, keep it wet and feed the worms instant mashed potatoes. I pour in maybe a half a teaspoon of potatoes which is a powder and in an hour it is swarming with worms and I just lift them out on the blade of a knife, or Samori Sword.
The whiteworms will not burrow in the substrate of a saltwater tank but they will wiggle around like they are doing the Macarena all day. Mandarins will hunt for them. So will everything else so I feed the other fish first and hopefully they won't notice all the white worms near the mandarin.
I just thought some of you would like to know. If not, go and watch "Dancing with the Stars" I think Pee Wee is on this week. :hmm5:

 

[alukashe]

Thank you Paul. After reading your posts long ago I've had great success with all my fish by feeding them blackworms. Will certainly give this a try as well.

 

[HectorT]

How do you feed the worms to the Mandarin?

I have had one for two weeks and its feeding on pods, frozen brine shrimp and frozen cyclops.

I want to try the worms.

 

[Paul B]

The same way you feed anything else to a mandarin. Shoot some worms in front of it with a baster.

 

[el aguila]

Paul,
Did a quick search and found something called microworms. Is this the same thing?

The only white worms that I saw on Ebay were from Great Britain.

Can you give us a little more info so that we can know where to find them?

 

[Paul B]

No, microworms are tiny, whiteworms get about 3/4" and blackworms get to about an inch.
I just googled whiteworm culture. Here is a site that has information about them. I don't know anything about the site and never ordered anything from them so I can't recommend anything from them but information./
http://www.fishgobble.com/product/white-worm

 

[Duna_]

Whiteworms are also called "Grindal worms", they're widely used in freshwater tanks.

I recommend feeding mandarins Ocean Nutrition Formule 1 (small granulate). I've had 5 mandarins since I started with reef tanks (three died in a power loss, the other two is the pair I have now) and ALL OF THEM, ALL started eating this dry food by themselves, I didn`t even teach them. All mandarins eventually (in some weeks) started eating this granulate, they love it, they search for it.

I do not feed normally any frozen food. They started eating copepods of the live rock and then started eating the Ocean Nutrition formule 1.
If your fish eat everything, it could be a good idea to put the granulate in a glass jar lying on its side, on the substrate, to protect the granulate from the other fishes and the mandarins can get in and eat it.

Mine are i very good shape and do their courtship dance almost every night.

 

[Seababies]

Beside Mandarins, would the Copperband (CBB) also feed on white worms? In terms of nutritious values, are they equivalence to the black worms?

Also, on Moorish Idols, any update on replacement diet for Moorish Idols, beside sponges? (Sorry, out of the topic of discussion.)

Paul, I have learned a great deal on many of your articles written on the reef-keeping. Personally, I want to thank you for helping us out, so enthusiastically, all these years...Thanks!

 

[Paul B]

Seababies. I have spent time with Moorish Idols in the South Pacific and the only thing I ever saw them eat there was a lime green sponge. I found a sponge growing wild here in New York that idols go nuts over and it freezes well. Besides that, a healthy Moorish Idol will eat most foods, but I am not sure food is the only thing that is keeping us from keeping them for 10+ years as a fish of that size should probably live for 20 years or so.

I don't know if white worms are as nutritious or more so than blackworms. I use both of them because whiteworms live for a very long time in salt water so the mandarins can hunt for them and supplement their pod eating. Copperbands love whiteworms but they are smaller than blackworms.
I am glad you find what I write educational. I also learn myself by writing this stuff and the feedback I get from other members like yourself. So far, only one person told me I crashed their tank and killed all their fish. He said, I told him to put Clorox in his tank, and he did. Now if someone told you to put Clorox, gasoline, anthrax, Campbells Chicken Soup, brake fluid or Kibbles and Bits in your tank, would you do it?

I told him that "I" sometimes use bleach in NSW if it looks questionable, then "before" I use it, I add chlorine eliminator and let the water sit for a few days. Then I "test" it on a snail or something "before" I put it in my tank. But he took that to mean to just add Clorox to his tank. I bet his fish had a nice fresh scent.

Here is a video of my fish eating live worms.

 

[Aqualund]

Whiteworms are also called "Grindal worms", they're widely used in freshwater tanks.

I recommend feeding mandarins Ocean Nutrition Formule 1 (small granulate). I've had 5 mandarins since I started with reef tanks (three died in a power loss, the other two is the pair I have now) and ALL OF THEM, ALL started eating this dry food by themselves, I didn`t even teach them. All mandarins eventually (in some weeks) started eating this granulate, they love it, they search for it.

I do not feed normally any frozen food. They started eating copepods of the live rock and then started eating the Ocean Nutrition formule 1.
If your fish eat everything, it could be a good idea to put the granulate in a glass jar lying on its side, on the substrate, to protect the granulate from the other fishes and the mandarins can get in and eat it.

Mine are i very good shape and do their courtship dance almost every night.

On the feed site that OP posted there is an option for a grindal worm and a white worm. Are they the same?

 

[vivicat215]

Hi Paul I was referred to your post when I was asking for food for my dragonets, I saw you live in Long Island, I live in between Queens and Long Island, do you know anywhere locally I can purchase the white worms? Do aquarium village or pets warehouse have them?

 

[Paul B]

Aquarium Village does not even sell black worms and I don't know about Pets Warehouse. But if you want a starter culture of whiteworms I will give them to you. You need a plastic shoebox with some holes in the top and some potting soil preferably without fertilizer. I live in new Hyde Park on exit 34 on the LIE so you are probably 5 minutes from me.
If you want some. PM me and we will set it up.

 

[roberto_lopes]

Mine eats Thera +a 1mm A lot. He is fat....and I'm happy.

 

[supervdl]

Interesting - I have to try this. I fed blackworms before but stopped because they were dying instantly as you said.

 

[herring_fish]

Paul B,
This picture is very interesting! You have a small horde of wiggling animals that a lot of the tank inhabitants would be interested in as you mentioned. Could I get some context for this image please?
Were the worms congregating around the cracker outside the tank before you added them or were they attracted to the food after they were introduce into the tank?
If the worms are not eaten right away, how long can they live in the display tank? Finally, will corals eat them as well?
Thanks in advance.

 

[Paul B]

I feed those white worms crackers or instant mashed potatoes in their worm shoebox. That is also how I collect them, they congregate on the food. They will live for many hours in saltwater unlike blackworms which live about 15 seconds.
I also give them to corals that can eat like hammer corals and bubbles

 

[herring_fish]

Thanks

 

[dkeller_nc]

Thanks for that observation, Paul (that whiteworms will live for a long time in saltwater). I used to have 10 plastic shoeboxes full of these guys when I was breeding killifish; it never occurred to me that they'd be appropriate for saltwater, and they're a heck of a lot easier to grow than the 4 different types of pods that I'm currently culturing.

Might be interesting to try them out on pipefish and/or seahorses.

 

[Paul B]

Pipefish and seahorses ignore them like Supermodels ignore me.

 

[dkeller_nc]

Ha! Still, a fairly revolutionary observation about mandarins. My guess is that 90% of them perish in hobbyist's tanks due to malnutrition. Whiteworms are a heck of a lot easier to deal with than blackworms, particularly for those hobbyists that would have to order a pound or two at a time from California.