Feeding captive bred mandarins

Reafer · Feb 12, 2019

jtl said:
I have never had a lot of success with keeping a Mandarin but I will likely try again. The last one was picking and eating and looking healthy then one day it up and died. I had a good pod population and the mandy was the only pod eater in the tank. This time I may just start a culture to be safe.

Certainty wouldn't hurt. Depending on the size, you would think dying of starvation wouldn't be so abrupt.

DSC reef · Feb 12, 2019

Reafer said:
Certainty wouldn't hurt. Depending on the size, you would think dying of starvation wouldn't be so abrupt.

Depends on the condition the mandarin to begin with. Many I've seen in the trade have been starving for some time before it makes it to the hobbyist.

Reafer · Feb 12, 2019

DSC reef said:
Depends on the condition the mandarin to begin with. Many I've seen in the trade have been starving for some time before it makes it to the hobbyist.

Yeah, you for sure want to start out with a healthy one, or at least a trusted source. It would be difficult to see that it's not healthy if you don't have a good baseline in which to judge from.

jtl · Feb 13, 2019

After many years in this hobby I have learned that sometimes we just don't know what caused a problem be it death of an animal or a tank crash. However being the responsible people that we are we are always looking for the reason in an attempt to prevent it from happening again or for peace of mind. It is always more satisfying to me if I can convince myself that it was fate and not my fault.

davocean · Feb 13, 2019

DSC reef said:
Depends on the condition the mandarin to begin with. Many I've seen in the trade have been starving for some time before it makes it to the hobbyist.

And some fish are still collected in some area w/ cyanide, and those animals never seem to eat.

One thing about mandarins, wild caught, or captive bred, it's their metabolism that is the issue, that will not change, and meeting that requirement of constant food supply is key for long term success.

Honestly, if you have a fuge and enough LR surface area, they are one of the easiest fish to keep, you should never need to feed them ever if you have pods.