How do pods get from fuge to display

[mhe]

So I'm thinking of getting a Mandarin for my healthy 2+ year old 90 gallon tank. I have a lot of live rock and a 30 gallon fuge that's full of pods.

I really never see pods in the display tank - but I assume they're there - and I keep reading that if you have a healthy pod popultation in the fuge that "feeds" the main tank.

How's that work? Is the assumption that pods get sucked up in the sump/fuge and blasted into the main in sufficient quantity to keep a Mandarin alive?

Another question is about the size of the pods - does a Mandarin live on tiny pods that are hard to see, or the "normal" sized ones that I see all over the sides of my fuge?

Thanks!

- Michael

 

[Sk8r]

They're small enough to get through the impeller of your return pump alive. Heck, I once saw the nozzle shoot out a very bewildered amphipod, which scuttled off very fast before it became lunch. That whirling impeller looks like a buzz saw to us, but it's got a lot of gaps in it.

With what you've got, you'll have no trouble keeping a mandy. I have a very small one in a rocky 54.

They eat pods from new-hatched to what you see on your glass. You may never see pods up there: when they're being predated, they hide during the day.

 

[Radicaljbr]

I agree....the only problem I have had is with my six line wrass. It ate them so fast that the Mandarin had trouble i think so I had to get rid of him. Now my wrass is gone so I am thinking of getting a Mandarin again. I have had two in the past and they are so beautiful.

 

[mhe]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9389485#post9389485 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Radicaljbr
I agree....the only problem I have had is with my six line wrass. It ate them so fast that the Mandarin had trouble i think so I had to get rid of him. Now my wrass is gone so I am thinking of getting a Mandarin again. I have had two in the past and they are so beautiful.

I have a Red Sea Eight Line Flasher Wrasse - I've never seen him poke/nip at anything other then the food I put in - does anyone know if they eat Pods and would compete with a Mandarin?

- Michael

 

[c-horseman]

i've had baby sea horses go through the impeller alive and (apparently) fine in the display --> refug --> display journey

 

[surfjeepzx]

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