Mandarin Goby info needed

[EricandBrandi]

Well the Mandarin has caught my eye and I am trying to find out all I can about them. Everything I am reading has said how hard they are to keep. Is this because they dont have a long life expectancy or is that just not being informed and the fish dies of starvation. I saw where they need pods to eat. Are these naturally in the tank or do I need to buy these. My tank is 115 gal. and I have about 100lbs of live rock. Any help would be appreciated, past threads, books I can read or experiences.

 

[MCCOOL]

Here you go,

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1492650

 

[EricandBrandi]

thanks that is a great link

 

[snorvich]

How old is your tank? Refugium?

 

[alton]

I have kept and currently have one in my 29 and my 300. The one in my 29 is just as fat as the one in my 300. The trick is to have rubble in the tank for pods to breed and tank mates who are not aggressive eaters. I have heard horror stories of people who are buying the ora ones which are fed on frozen and then placing them in an aggressive feeding tank. Mandarins love to just bounce around on the bottom and feed off of the rocks wether it is pods or frozen PE Mysis. You did not list your existing fish so if you do not mind buying bottles of pods and creating an area for pods to grow, go for it.
Mandarins could be in a credit card commercial;
Mandarin $10
Cost to keep one $100

 

[d0ughb0y]

keeping the mandarin alive aside, what you need to consider is do you really want a really small fish in your large tank? chances are, once it is in your tank, you will not see it very often. for sure it will not be a showcase fish.

 

[Angel*Fish]

My tank is smaller, only a 100g but I saw mine a lot. And since I had a pair they would do their mating dance as dusk. Bad pic, but here they are front and center. Maybe because they were picking pods off the bottom of the glass where I needed to scrape --lol.

 

[bigdoug]

I have one in a 125g, I have heard the horror stories and how hard they are to keep, wait till about 2hrs after lights out and take a flashlight and observe your pod population, if you have them crawling all over, I say go for it. Mine is going on 3months and is FAT. But as stated I don't see it much as it is eating and pods like dark areas.

 

[pinnatus]

I have mine in a 240. I did not see it much for the 1st 4 months, then it disappeared entirely. 2 months later I saw it living in my sump. I caught it and put it back in the display. Now I see it all the time as it hops around the rockwork looking for food. Very cool fish. It shares the pod population with a scooter blenny. Of course neither of them are blennies, they are dragonets.