Mandarin

chueu

New member
I gave my scooter blenny away today.. i bought is as the lfs told me it was a goby...

So, went down to the one and only LFS to pickup a clown.. had a mandarin in a bare tank with one rock.. feeding it flakes... dying a slow death...

I decided to bring it home.. with the premise that my friend would take it if it wouldnt eat after a day or two...

So within the first half hr, it ate frozen brine with a drop of kent marine garlic....

I know i will cop some flak for bringing the mandarin home...

Also setting up refugium now...

Here is a video of the training http://youtu.be/m_7a5tScPJo

Am pretty stoked..

Can someone who has experience tell me, how long should i continue training it. And what next steps to take please..
 
I'm glad that it is eating frozen, but you should try to see if it will eat something a bit more nutritious, perhaps mysis or tiny krill. Ideally, a large refugium to grow pods is what will make or break him.
 
Yup.. i will get the refugium up asap. I have no mysis or krill.. as im using the garlic.. i begun giving him one or two pellets.. he ate one.. would pellets be good?
 
A 30 gallon is on the small side, in my experience Mandarins are much healthier and have a better chance of surviving in a larger more established aquarium (many books/literature support this). The fact that hes eating anything, makes me optimistic you will be successful.

You may also realize you have to feed more often to ensure he gets enough food. If you find yourself feeding more than normal, watch your amonia, nitrates, etc......
 
He wont be in a 30 for long.. moving to a new place in abt a 5~6 weeks.. renovations.. he`ll be in a 90
 
Ill try my best to keep him superfed for now.. also found someone selling pods locally.. so hopefully i can bring the refugium up to speed quickly
 
As much cheato moss as you can cram into a fuge: it often comes loaded with pods: don't let him in with it---the pods get through the pump ok, and will reach him. Think of them as little super-vitamin-food pills: if he will eat pellet or mysis, and you can supplement with his real food, the pods, he may make it. If they get too far down they won't eat at all, but sounds as if he has a chance.
 
The fuge will be hob, so no pump, theyll flow out wihout going thru a pump...

Honestly, i shudnt have started this tank.. after starting, i found the perfect place after a long search. Now i have space for a new tank lol..

Yes, i will cram as much cheato, and supplement with pods i Buy... thanks for the support..
 
In you initial post, you mentioned a friend who would take him. Does that friend have a well established tank with a refugium? If yes, have you considered harvesting some critters from your friend's setup to add to your display tank as a food source? It looks like you have the long-term plan in place, this will cover the short-term nutrition requirements of the mandarin goby. (Which isn't a goby either, it is a dragonet.)
 
I'm jealous! :wildone:

Mandarin is high on my list of fish I want for the new tank, and the new system was build around that - size of tank, fuge, etc. - to support one.

My long term plan is to get the system established for over a year so that there's a sufficient pod population to support one, before introducing to my system.

I'm really hoping I can find one that will eat flake, pellet & frozen, as well as pods, when I get to that point!

I'll be following along on this one. Please keep posting updates!!
 
My favorite fish, hands down. I have a green spotted (you can barely see him in my avatar pic) and I wish he'd eat frozen! Best of luck and could we see a pic? :)

I can never keep chaeto alive, but there's still pods everywhere in the sump. Some people just can't keep chaeto :/

PS: I wanted the user name mandarin_dragonet, but it was taken.
 
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I'm jealous! :wildone:

Mandarin is high on my list of fish I want for the new tank, and the new system was build around that - size of tank, fuge, etc. - to support one.

My long term plan is to get the system established for over a year so that there's a sufficient pod population to support one, before introducing to my system.

In order to shorten the one year wait, have you considered obtaining a starter culture of pods? There are online resources where you could obtain a sufficient number of pods to reduce the wait by months. You may even have a local source with an overpopulation that would be willing to share.

Part of the reason I ask is because that is exactly the stage I am at now. I have the tank and the live rock. I'm planning on jump starting the pod population soon and want to make sure I'm not overlooking something critical.
 
In order to shorten the one year wait, have you considered obtaining a starter culture of pods? There are online resources where you could obtain a sufficient number of pods to reduce the wait by months. You may even have a local source with an overpopulation that would be willing to share.

Part of the reason I ask is because that is exactly the stage I am at now. I have the tank and the live rock. I'm planning on jump starting the pod population soon and want to make sure I'm not overlooking something critical.

LFS has cheato that is loaded with pods - you can see them literally crawling all over the stuff in their tank. Once I'm done cycling, and start stocking, I plan to add some of their cheato to the fuge - that should start the pod population growing. Once that gets going, then I'll dose with some Tisbe or other packaged pod populations to boost it.

Everything I've read about Mandarins emphasizes "mature" and "established" tanks for success with them. They really emphasis that thriving pod populations are a must. That the only real way to know when you're ready for a Mandarin, is to check your tank late at night with a small flashlight - if you see pods scurrying along the sand line at the glass, then you're ready for a Mandarin.

I'm willing to take the time and wait it out, to make sure my tank and pod population is stable enough for a Mandarin, and to make sure the other livestock aren't also going to deplete the pod population to the point of starving the Mandarin. That's why I'm planning to make my Mandarin my last fish purchase, and not one of the first. I can wait, to make sure I can enjoy him for a lot of years.
 
You can buy a starter culture of pods and then breed them, or just dump them in the sump like mentioned above. That starter culture is probably not going to be good enough to help in out very long, so I would either keep buying the cultures on a bi weekly basis, or just get a couple cultures and start breeding them in a 20 gallon. There are lots of articles on how to that online.
 
I'm from Brunei. Not much stuff here, I'm trying to get someone who has done it before to restart their culture...

I need to train him to eat some pellets.. He's eaten one before..

Does anyone use a dragonet den?
 
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