Adding mandarin to nano...

[emmysnewtank]

So against my instinct we added a mandarin to our 16g nano from a LFS that we bought a bunch of coral from on sale.

He is pretty dope, and we have been culturing copepods (and Phyto) for about a month now with two jars and a small tub growing. We feel pretty good that he will have plenty to eat, as we harvested and added a "cloud" of them before putting him in.

He was acclimated and added last night and already claimed a little spot in the tank and feeding pretty easily.

Any advice or thoughts? and yes I know tank might be a bit small, but its established, full of pods (with the ability to keep adding daily if we want).

 

[Fish Think Pink]

So against my instinct we added a mandarin to our 16g nano from a LFS that we bought a bunch of coral from on sale.

He is pretty dope, and we have been culturing copepods (and Phyto) for about a month now with two jars and a small tub growing. We feel pretty good that he will have plenty to eat, as we harvested and added a "cloud" of them before putting him in.

He was acclimated and added last night and already claimed a little spot in the tank and feeding pretty easily.

Any advice or thoughts? and yes I know tank might be a bit small, but its established, full of pods (with the ability to keep adding daily if we want).

My advice is having a backup and backup backup culture of pods, just in case. An ATO of any sort (even gravity fed) is helpful to maintain salinity both in your nano as well as those cultures, since pods reproduce better at lower salinity than you'll keep your nano with corals and mandarin.

This lazy, easy spirulina and banana skin/peel method is what I do for pods:

raising tig pods - tiny 2.5g tank experimental culture #2

2nd attempt at raising tig pods is officially underway. Original attempt was outdoor lazy banana leaf method I found online - that is still underway but seems to be failing. Suspect Texas temperature and full day direct sunshine is too much, but that pod culture experiment still underway. 2nd...

forum.dfwmas.org

 

[DaJMasta]

I would still train them onto prepared foods, or at least offer them daily in a way they can eat them.

16 gallons of a normal tank worth of pods is a day or two of a mandarin's diet, so it's not going to allow for a buffer if you miss supplemental feedings or your culture crashes. It's all dependent on density, but you probably need a decent amount of culture volume and daily harvest to keep up with consumption (I'd probably aim for about 4 gallons of benthic pod culture, harvested 10-15% daily as a baseline, but I'll admit this is a guess).

Also make sure your tank has a lid. They don't seem like it, but they are jumpers.

 

[emmysnewtank]

Thanks. We have two half gallon glass jars and a 2 gallon tub culturing...so have back-ups. Each is actually a different pod mix, so hopefully some diverse diet. I am copying a youtube video setup from Blue Reef Tank. The tubs are all covered and aerated, so very little evap.

Good call on scooping and feeding some pods daily, shouldn't be too hard to do.

...and yes, lid on tank!