My 75g DT with 20g sump/ fuge was also at about 14 months when I added my mandarin. 8 months later she is doing well and reasonably plump. I hedged my bet a few ways.
- I had her eating frozen in a QT. she was not enthusiastic anout it and was not putting on any weight, which is why she got a shorter QT than most of my fish (I think she was only in there about 3weeks - I don't have my record book with me). Once in the DT with pods, she has not shown any interest in frozen. She probably accidentally eats an occasional cyclops or mysis, but not much.
- i started and maintain a small pod culture (2 pretzel jars with airstones) and harvest from these to the tank to keep the population up. This has really shown me how much the population fluctuates.
- I also made a Paul B style feeder to occassionally give her some newly hatched brine and give the pod population a break for a few hours. Hatching brine every day is too much of a nuisance, but it is a nice way to give her some extra food. She learned that I usually feed the rest of the tank before I fill her feeder, so sometimes when I feeed the other guys, she will go check to see if there is anything in her feeder. I like to give her brine for a week or 2 before I go on vacation as an insurance policy.
Suggest having one or more of these backups just in case.
Btw, I have no where near the number of fish you do. I have 6 in my system and wouldn't add more than one more.
