Mandarin Fish and Amphipods

[Sushi Roll]

Hi everyone.

I plan to start a 100-120 gallon reef tank with one green mandarin and one spotted mandarin. I've heard in a tank that big one of each species should not fight with each other.

Now I've done enough research to see from multiple sources that mandarins don't like to eat most types of food and will generally only eat live amphipods that develop on my live rock. I've also read that it will take six months to a year to establish a large enough amphipod population that will not be wiped out by the mandarins right away.

However that 6 months to a year statement appears to mean it will be that long for the amphipod population to grow large enough naturally.

My basic question is this: If I "seed" the aquarium enough with store bought amphipod supplies when I start up the aquarium, do I really need to wait very long before adding a mandarin fish or two?

My main question is this: How many store bought amphipods would I need to seed the tank initially to speed up the process? Hypothetically if I bought enough amphipods to seed the aquarium tomorrow could I buy the mandarin fish the very next week? If not, how long do I need to wait?

Finally, can it be dangerous to add too many amphipods to a tank? Are they dangerous to any types of fish, coral or invertebrates?

Any other suggestions for someone who is in love with green and spotted mandarinfish? Thanks in advance!

 

[T Man]

Hello Sushi, I have a pair in my tank,a male and a female. I have a 125G w/ 225 LR, 225 LS, the system is six years old.
In your case, I would suggest feeding brine shrimp to the fish, they do scavenge for the pods, but only as a suppliment to daily feedings of the brine shrimp.
If you want to add more pods to your tank,I would recommend that you put them in your sump first, they will stand to live a little longer and may multiply. TinMan

 

[Sushi Roll]

Thanks for the info. Any idea how many pods I need to buy initially? And how long they can be in the tank before I can add the first mandarin fish?

 

[flameangel88]

I can't give you a direct answer but when I'd the Mandarin I put in 4 bottles of those TigerPods over 3 weeks and I still don't see any pods in the tank now. I put them in the tank and also a converted AC 110 and this led me to believe that it will take a long time for them to grow. Do what TinMan suggested by putting them in the sump first and let them multiply. Buy the Mandarins fro your lfs and made sure they eat frozen food before you buy them and this way it will solve a big part of your food source problem. Good luck!

 

[Sk8r]

It's the copepods they eat. I have a mandarin in a 52g with ancient rock and a lot of it. I still supplement with bought 'pods from time to time, and feed phytoplankton to my tank---which has brought new specimens of sponge to life, among other benefits.

Angelfish, when they're being hunted, they stop coming to the glass. Easiest to count the 'hits' per minute of a feeding mandarin to know how your pod count is running. When she slows down I send in an order.

 

[seaduck]

how can u tell the difference between a copepod and amphipods??? i have some sort of small shirmp looking things living on/in the live rock..they look like minature table shrimp without the horn in front. the adult pods are bet 1/4 n 1/2" long and they r fast as lightning. They never get on the glass but stay on the rock and sand. I have about 100 or so in my 10 gal and im looking towards a mandarin.

 

[flameangel88]

Sk8r: it was one of your reply a while back on this subject that got me to buy pods to supplement the tank. It sure gets expensive...buy the pods then your have to buy the phytoplankton (lucky that I got this bottle for free) to feed the pods. I like your way of knowing when to add more.

How often do you have to restock?

 

[garvin90]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8031084#post8031084 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by seaduck
how can u tell the difference between a copepod and amphipods??? i have some sort of small shirmp looking things living on/in the live rock..they look like minature table shrimp without the horn in front. the adult pods are bet 1/4 n 1/2" long and they r fast as lightning. They never get on the glass but stay on the rock and sand. I have about 100 or so in my 10 gal and im looking towards a mandarin.

Those large "shrimp things" are amphipods, copepods are very VERY small. Usually if you can find them they will appear as moving white dots on your glass.

Seaduck even if you purchased a mandarin large enough to eat those hundred you claim in your 10gal, they would be gone within the day. Watch a mandarin for a bit, all they do is move and eat. Thats why they seem to be all over the tank, they constantly graze all the time.

Ive tried it before with my system and I always came up with the same end result, not enough established suplimental food source. Sushi, your going to have to hear this sooner or later but with saltwater you have to be patient. There is no quick fix to just jump into the systems like with freshwater. Most systems need a good couple months just to establish their waste bateria to hand the bioload for fish, inverts and whatever else.

This bears mentioning as well, the other reason its recommended as a big tank for these guys is what we see in lfs is not even half grown. They(either species) can attain a pretty good size, Id say atleast 3-4in. That probably doesnt sound like alot however measure it and then take a body width of atleast 3/4"-1" and that is a pod killin machine. If anyone doesnt believe me I have a reference picture of size with a overflow box its under for comparision. They are neat fish but IMO best left for mature systems that also contain a well stocked refuge.

 

[Angel*Fish]

Sushi Roll,

<img src="/images/welcome.gif" width="500" height="62"><br><b><i><big><big>To Reef Central</b></i></big></big>

My main question is this: How many store bought amphipods would I need to seed the tank initially to speed up the process? Hypothetically if I bought enough amphipods to seed the aquarium tomorrow could I buy the mandarin fish the very next week? If not, how long do I need to wait?

Actually there is a typical stage within the first few weeks of setting up your tank in which you will likely have a huge copepod bloom. But this stage subsides and should never be used as evidence that the tank is "pod ready". What you are looking for is a stable pod population which can only occur after things have had time to "settle" in your tank. You have an amazing number of animals that live in your tank - all competing for food and niche. You need to have your pods successfully established - an equilibrium must be reached and this takes time. I don't know if any research has been done to discover a typical length of time - which is probably why you get responses like 6-12 mo. - I don't think anybody really knows how long it normally takes and even if they did, it would be impossible to state specifically for your tank - not knowing the exact make-up of animals on your rock. They'd also need to know what other fish you keep. And I assume you won't be having pod eaters like 6-line wrasses, for example.

HTH

Anyway - in case I wasn't clear, it's not how long it takes for your pod population to grow to a certain size -- it's how long it takes to stabalize. And as Sk8r pointed out, it is wise to reseed occasionally.

 

[Angel*Fish]

Finally, can it be dangerous to add too many amphipods to a tank? Are they dangerous to any types of fish, coral or invertebrates?

That depends on how rich you are - most of us couldn't afford to add that many . But seriously - no.

What you want to do is seed your tank for variety of life as opposed to quantity.

This can be done by buying a cup full of LS from a fellow reefer. Especially one who knows what he's got in his sand/tank. I got a nice mysis population going this way. Check your local reef club, there may be someone obsessed with growing this important life as we are lucky to have here. Other ways of obtaining good pods can be ordering macros or LS from companies that grow macroalgae & other inverts like tiny brittle stars.

one green mandarin and one spotted mandarin. I've heard in a tank that big one of each species should not fight with each other.

A male spotted mandarin will not tolerate other males...and I believe this includes males of other species - probably best to get a male green and a female spotted, Although a male /female spotted pair can be very nice.

 

[EvilMel]

To be honest with you, if it were me, I'd stick with one mandarin and I'd wait more than a year to get it. Too often in this hobby people with new tanks jump the gun and end up with dead fish (wasted lives and money). The people who have long term success are the ones who don't act quickly...who take their time and let things stabilize before jumping into buying fish.

My question to you is this: why not wait it out? I'd seed the tank with copepods (those tiggerpods are awesome IMO) and then sit back and wait it out. You will be so happpily surprised when your fish (hoping you pick a single mandarin) thrives...when it not only *survives* but it thrives. Isn't that the type of environment we all hope to provide for our little fish?

Seaduck: anyone who puts a Mandarin in a 10g, no matter how initially stocked with copepods, is asking to have a dead mandarin on their hands.

 

[Angel*Fish]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8031084#post8031084 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by seaduck
how can u tell the difference between a copepod and amphipods??? i have some sort of small shirmp looking things living on/in the live rock..they look like minature table shrimp without the horn in front. the adult pods are bet 1/4 n 1/2" long and they r fast as lightning. They never get on the glass but stay on the rock and sand. I have about 100 or so in my 10 gal and im looking towards a mandarin.

If they are fast as lightning, they sound like mysis & though nutritious, are probably are too fast to be a main staple of a mandarin's diet

Seaduck: anyone who puts a Mandarin in a 10g, no matter how initially stocked with copepods, is asking to have a dead mandarin on their hands

Even if you are planning the mandarin for your 30g and using the 10g as a pod breeding area & religiously feeding them, you are in for a pain-in-the-neck uphill battle (or a starved mandarin)

Also even if your mandarin accepts live brine, this should only be a small/occasional/stopgap portion of your fish's diet because brine lacks vital nutrition provided by copepods and your fish will decline

 

[EvilMel]

Yeah...what she said.

That's what I meant to say.

 

[dc]

My mandarins will eat anything. I started out feeding brine with frozen with the hopes of them starting to eat frozen. Seemed to work. My female always ate pellets, but my male took a little time to adapt to them. Pod piles also aid in your different types of pods multiplying, which are a bunch of small rocks piled up for them to hide in from fish. Melev's diner is also another great thing.

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-02/nftt/index.php

 

[seaduck]

OK, so garvin90 says these things are amphipods and angelish says they r probably mysis. I thought mysis shrimp, which i buy frozen from lfs are fresh water shrimp???? I just wanna know what the heck they are. They dont bother me but if i can find something that eats them and will survive in my 10 gal or that i can switch back and forth from 10 to 30 then i would like to give it a try. I have 0 fish in the 10 gal and would like to put 1 or 2 small fish that can eat these things because it's my office tank and im not here to feed them on the weekends. I dont have fish because i cant feed them on weekends. I don't want to kill the fish so i will go without them.

 

[dc]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8035725#post8035725 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by seaduck
OK, so garvin90 says these things are amphipods and angelish says they r probably mysis. I thought mysis shrimp, which i buy frozen from lfs are fresh water shrimp???? I just wanna know what the heck they are. They dont bother me but if i can find something that eats them and will survive in my 10 gal or that i can switch back and forth from 10 to 30 then i would like to give it a try. I have 0 fish in the 10 gal and would like to put 1 or 2 small fish that can eat these things because it's my office tank and im not here to feed them on the weekends. I dont have fish because i cant feed them on weekends. I don't want to kill the fish so i will go without them.

Mysis swim around fairly flat and very fast. don't have a picture, amphipods are curled.

Then there are isopods. That's what I see on my glass the most.

copepods are like a little teardrop, smaller than a pinhead. (on left, very close up)

If they are out, generally most fish will pick at them, then there are the hundreds of 'bugs' that I have no idea of.

 

[Angel*Fish]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8035725#post8035725 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by seaduck
OK, so garvin90 says these things are amphipods and angelish says they r probably mysis. I thought mysis shrimp, which i buy frozen from lfs are fresh water shrimp???? I just wanna know what the heck they are. They dont bother me but if i can find something that eats them and will survive in my 10 gal or that i can switch back and forth from 10 to 30 then i would like to give it a try. I have 0 fish in the 10 gal and would like to put 1 or 2 small fish that can eat these things because it's my office tank and im not here to feed them on the weekends. I dont have fish because i cant feed them on weekends. I don't want to kill the fish so i will go without them.

Many fish can go the weekend with no food- but it would be better to have an automatic feeder... Most fish that eat these guys will deplete the population in 10g, so that would only get you thru a couple of weekends. Someone will post a link to pictures... but if they move as far as 2 inches in the time it takes to say "banana", they are mysis -- the saltwater kind. Most of those sold as food are freshwater mysis, though I think H2O brand has some marine ones. Copepods, BTW, which is the favorite food of your mandarins are really tiny - like even < 1 mm as adults. Very hard to see except on the tank glass.

Personally the only pod eating fish I keep are mandarins. No worm eating fish either in my tank. The worms and pods are so beneficial to a healthy system that I don't want anyone in there who will deplete them. Just my $.02

 

[Angel*Fish]

Debi types faster than I ... anyway here's a list of links to info on most small crustaceans and tons of other inverts
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-02/subject/invertebrates.php

 

[dc]

that's a great link, and Melev's in the beginners has a lot of good stuff too.

http://melevsreef.com/id/

 

[seaduck]

dc your 1st pic is exactly what i have all over my lr, Amphipods. I have several large ones and a zillion small ones. I also see a few copepods on the glass. I'm gonna give up on the mandarin as they eat too much and r picky eaters. I might try a catalina goby as the one in my 30 gal tank attacks live brine shrimp and eats everything i put in there. He is very quck and can prob. catch the pods....don't think mandy is fast enough.......thx all for the info....