Rescued this little guy today

ktnjer

New member
As I was looking along the empty tanks in Pet City today, I stumbled upon this skinny guy that seems to be under fed.

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After doing some extensive reading about them and their diets, I decided to bring him to a better home. Once he stayed in the bag for about an hour, I released him to the tank. He stayed at the bottom around the seashell for about an hour or so, then began fluttering around and eating some. So I threw in some frozen cyclops that I had, and he immediately began to picking the sand like a hog!

Also I heard they are good at eating worms and pods, so thanks to Mike, I have a tank full of pods and worms that came from the live rock that he gave me this weekend! Not to mention, he also gave me some prilifera to try and reduce some of the nitrates as well. We built a temp stand for the tank as of now, and I have a 30Gal fuge I am going to be building to add some chaeto and live rock to also reduce some nitrates and build up my pods for future anoroxic captures.

I've still got a long way to go before corals, so I believe my next purchase will be some better lighting than these 50/50 fluorescents I am running now. The rock looks like a pile of rubble for now, but it does the job until I can get bigger pieces to build a nice looking reef. Here's a shot of the tank now:

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My PH is looking good and so is the nitrite. I am going to get a Phosphate test kit next to see how that is doing.
 
Yeh its the clearest its been in weeks! Thanks to you for the sand that the mandarin spits out every mouthful! haha

I'm contemplating this rock pile as I sit here...something that maybe looks a bit more refined than last nights "hurry up" fiasco at 11pm...
 
good luck with him.

i trained my mandarin to eat blood worms. and even after feeding him virtually every day, and having almost 100lbs of live rock he still looks skinny and underfed.

honestly, i can't believe he is still alive after a year and a half.
 
A 'fuge with a healthy breeding population of pods would go a long way with that little one. Hope it continues to eat prepared foods. Good luck!
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=12899649#post12899649 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by lilalove
A 'fuge with a healthy breeding population of pods would go a long way with that little one. Hope it continues to eat prepared foods. Good luck!

Thats what I am working on now is a fuge....for one to get this stuff hanging on my tank off, and two to build up a good pod collection to feed these guys more :D
 
Not to be a playa' hata', because I did the same thing when I first setup my tank and bought a mandarin as my first fish (it lasted <6 months). But I think you jumped the gun on that one.

Mandarins are difficult to keep fed, and starting out with one thats already been starving is making things even more difficult for you . . . and putting it into a new tank that virtually barren.

For future purchases, I'd suggest buying fish that are healthy. Personally, I've had about 50/50 success with saltwater fish. Thats enough wasted money already without buying dying or diseased fish.

Again, I'm just trying to share my experiences so you don't have to go through the same frustrations. I (and probably many others on here) have been there and done that.
 
Just ordered some pods today to help feed this new guy, and we got the rocks re-situated for the time being!

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<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=12900171#post12900171 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by J. Montgomery
Not to be a playa' hata', because I did the same thing when I first setup my tank and bought a mandarin as my first fish (it lasted <6 months). But I think you jumped the gun on that one.

Mandarins are difficult to keep fed, and starting out with one thats already been starving is making things even more difficult for you . . . and putting it into a new tank that virtually barren.

For future purchases, I'd suggest buying fish that are healthy. Personally, I've had about 50/50 success with saltwater fish. Thats enough wasted money already without buying dying or diseased fish.

Again, I'm just trying to share my experiences so you don't have to go through the same frustrations. I (and probably many others on here) have been there and done that.

Its all good....sometimes we gotta try it on our own to see if we can conquer fate and keep things alive!

If we get really costly fish, they will be of good health though. This little guy was $25, so in a way its much, but I'd like to see him get treated right even if he does die. He was in that tank with 1 chunk of live rock and I doubt anything to eat. So basically he was sitting there starving! I couldn't see that happening...

Today he is really lively and looks MUCH happier!
 
Mandarin's are beautiful fish. I have always wanted one, but the difficulty of keeping them alive is a challenge.

Keep an eye on him, if he starts losing weight or looking unhealthy you may want to ask around and see if anyone with an established tank wants to adopt.

Good Luck
 
nice save. Tigger pods are a nice buy if someone around you sells them. ZQ in C'Burg usually has them
 
zooquatics. they are difficult to find because they don't have the best shelf life.. even with feeding phyto they don't last long in the fridge. I don't know of ua has them in stock or not, sometimes they do. call sam.. 5807755
 
the only thing about rescuing live stock from a dump of a petstore is it encourages them to replace that fish you just bought. i'm definetly not giving you a hard time about it because i have done it many times myself. i've just learned not to go in these stores and refuse to spend any money there.

i honesty don't see how some of these petstrore owners can sleep at night.... one store here localy has had a yellow tang in a "display" tank for at least 2 years and the thing is so skinny you can almost see through it. i was in there about a month ago and that poor fish is still alive, it just breaks my heart to see that. and how those people can walk by and see that and not do something is beyond me.
 
You and me both...thats the only money I spent in there and I feel good that I got him because if not, he would have probably been in the toilet by today!
 
Yep make sure you buy some trigger pods to feed that mandarin. Since your system is new you definitely don't have enough pods to feed it in the long run. They don't eat amphipods, only copepods. The fuge will get your pod population going so get that setup asap.
 
The fuge is the priority this weekend. Not sure what pods came from Mike when he gave me the LR and Prolifera, but the rock definitely has worms throughout it everywhere, and I got all these white bugs all over my glass of the aquarium. Is that the pods we refer to? Oh yeh, he gave me this stuff out of his huge fuge that goes to his 72Gal.
 
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