Dragonet feeding discussion

[carsonbigelow]

I recently got a nice looking manderin and I have learned from past expirence that these guys are hard to feed. I just want to hear from you guys out there on how do you keep yours healthy?

 

[Joeganja]

Copepods, they love live food.

 

[clownfish chris]

Lots and lots of live rock. I have mine in a 210. He is fat and happy!

 

[Wolff92]

Have a large tank with a lot of rock. The only way I've seen these guys do well in smaller tanks is in a tank covered in macro algae where the copepods and reproduce. Normally these fish are found in shallow water with lots of algae and macro algae not on reefs.

 

[Dastins]

He's in a 10 gallon but I have a lot of copepods..

 

[Wolff92]

Unfortunately a ten gallon won't cut it. I've tried to many of them over the years in much larger tanks without any success. That fish can wipe out your tank of cooepods in a few days. And even if they eat frozen you are unable to keep them fat and healthy because they eat constantly. My personal opinion is that these fish should just be left in the wild. I wish you the best of luck with your fish and hope you are able to keep him. The only alternative is to feed your tank with pods once every two weeks. Which will become expensive.

 

[cmcoker]

How long has your tank been set up?

 

[clownfish chris]

I have to say I agree with this. Mandys will eat over 1000 pods a day. They can not reproduce in a 10 gallon fast enough. Beautiful fish though.

 

[Dastins]

This particular tank has been set up for about 8 months. It is just a holding tank until I can get enough pods in the 100 gallon and transfer him over

 

[cmcoker]

If you have a 100g that will be ready soon, definitely take a look at Melev's Mandarin diner and Paulb's baby brine shrimp feeder. You are going to need supplemental food, it will depleted that ten gallon in a hurry. Also look into using rubble piles, they provide safe areas for pods to grow away from predators. I would personally have a pod culture going to supplement as well. If the 100g is not even running yet, I would return/rehome the fish.
Just my 2¢

 

[Humblefish]

Most mandys I've kept would eat Nutramar ova (as a supplemental food), but it is no longer available. I would love to know if anyone has had success feeding them Roe.

 

[Wh00pS32]

I keep a mandarin in a 14g and have done so for the last 9 months, when i got him he was skinny and not eating now he's fat and very happy.
I dose a full bag of pods daily (sometimes 2 bags)

which is expensive but they are my favorite fish and i knew full well what i was getting into before i bought the him. The pic is from about 5 months ago, he's a lot fatter now.

 

[linus.chan]

do you mean bags of pods that they sell at LFS? the ones that cost $8 a bag? whoa!!

 

[carsonbigelow]

Do you guys know of any supplemental foods that are still available today?

 

[Wh00pS32]

do you mean bags of pods that they sell at LFS? the ones that cost $8 a bag? whoa!!

Here in the UK a bag of pods is roughly £1.00 which translates to around $1.43.

 

[Paul B]

Build a feeder such as this. This pair constantly spawns as do those pipefish and ruby red dragonettes. Pregnant female


Video

 

[Christopher123]

F

 

[Naiad]

I use a feeder for bb. Wean them on to pick at frozen and just have a big tank.

 

[R_C]

Mandarins are my favorite fish and I could not wait til I was able to have one. When I first started in the hobby I had one in a 45 gallon and did well. I used add copepods at least once a month. Now I have one in my 125 and I seeded my tank for about a month adding copepods weekly and he is very happy. I would like to get a red one next.

 

[jd371]

I have a 9 month old 95 gal total with a Royal Gramma, Melanarus Wrasse, Midas Blenny, 2 T/P Clowns, Fire Fish, cleaner shrimp, fire shrimp and some snails. I added a Mandarin last week and I do see him peck at the rocks, but not as much as he should, so I built him a BBS feeder. I put in the tank 2 days ago but he hasn't eaten from it yet. I also have a 20 gal that has some rock and natural sea sponges that I started about 2 weeks ago to culture pods. Last night I took a look at the culture and it is starting to explode, there are a lot more pods on the glass since when I started. In a few days I will take some of the sponges and shake them out over the tank and fuge to seed more pods into the tank. I'm hoping he starts to put on weight soon he's still skinny as he was when I brought him home from the lfs.