How many pods to keep a Mandarin?

trukgirl · Jan 11, 2012

So I have always been careful when selecting fish....but hubby and I both have always wanted a Mandarin.

I never thought my old 65g would be good enough to maintain a pod population for one. Everything I've ever read has minimum tank size, etc to maintain for a Mandarin, but there is never an actual number or anything on how many pods should be in a tank.

The other night after all the lights were off in the room, with a flashlight I tried looking in my 125g reef tank to see if I could find where my new Wrasse was bedding down. To my suprise, my WHOLE TANK has so many pods, it almost looked like a massive roach infestation!! When I would shine the flashlight on them, they would scurry around like roaches. It was hilarious, but I can't believe how many pods I have!! There are always a bunch in the refugium part of my sump as well!

Please tell me I have enough to maintain just one Mandarin?????

FF337 · Jan 11, 2012

If you can see them in abundance then you have plenty. I have heard people adding a bottle a week for a month straight before adding a mandarin and having great success with them multiplying like rabbits.

My mandarin recently has grown to like pellets. Quite a pellet hog. My favorite fish for sure.

trukgirl · Jan 11, 2012

Sweet!!!! Yeah, they are DEFINITELY in abundance!

Now, I know hubby wants a green or red, but one of my LFS's always has Spotted Mandarins like below. Any difference in behavior or eating habits?

FF337 · Jan 11, 2012

I am not sure the difference in the colors/ eating habits.

I have a green mandarin. More blue and red than green. Beautiful little fish. He is just a mellow little fella. Swims around like a chicken. Swims, stops, swim stops. Steadily eating pods around the rocks and sandbed. Comes out when the actinics are on. Doesn't like the bright light very much. But very very healthy fish. Nothing picks on him. He makes no enemies. I even saw him "hosting" my brittle star once like a clown host an anemone. A steady minute or so, I was waiting for the brittle star to wrap him up and eat him.

Hope it works out and you can enjoy the little guy for a long time.

Good luck.

CJO · Jan 11, 2012

The pods you are seeing are amphipods. Mandarins eat copepods, which are quite a bit smaller. However, your 125 gallon tank should be plenty big to have enough copepods to feed a mandarin. To be safe, I would get a starter culture of tisbe copepods and dump half in the refugium and half in your display tank at night a few weeks before you get a mandarin.

CJ

trukgirl · Jan 11, 2012

They won't eat amphipods at all?
Lots of things I've read said they would?

FishLipz · Jan 11, 2012

Mine green mandarin went into a newly set up 180 using established live rock and he's fat and happy going on two years now. Give time, mine now eats mysis and NLS pellets. You should be fine, I would think.

bct15 · Jan 11, 2012

If you decide to get two make sure you only have one male and one female. They only eat copepods, they will not eat your amphipods. That being said, I have two males that started eating frozen food within a week if having them in the tank. I had to separate them and one is in my 29 gallon with some onyx clowns and is healthy as can be (been in there for several months now), the one in the 150 is doing good to. If you have a substantial amount of liverock you should be fine and it is only a matter of time before they start eating what your other fish eat too. When eating prepared food they still will graze rocks for pods as they need a constant food source due to their high metabolism.

trukgirl · Jan 11, 2012

I'm only planning on one.

Since I can see the amphipods (clearly, almost from across the room lol. Can see teeny tiny ones up close at night with the flashlight), is it possible to see the copepods?

I do feed my reef tank New Life Spectrum pellets in the morning and PE Mysis at night.

I forgot to add, the LR that came with my tank when I bought it was set up for over 5 years, and the LR that came from my old 65g was set up for almost 2, if that counts for anything.

CJO · Jan 12, 2012

trukgirl said:
I'm only planning on one.

Since I can see the amphipods (clearly, almost from across the room lol. Can see teeny tiny ones up close at night with the flashlight), is it possible to see the copepods?

I do feed my reef tank New Life Spectrum pellets in the morning and PE Mysis at night.

I forgot to add, the LR that came with my tank when I bought it was set up for over 5 years, and the LR that came from my old 65g was set up for almost 2, if that counts for anything.

Don't clean your glass for a week or so. See the white specs on the glass? Are they moving? If so, those are copepods! It would be very unlikely that you don't have a good population of them with your age tank.

CJ

rjbesch · Jan 12, 2012

I have one in my 75, when I set up the tank I added two large bags full to get the population going. Then A few weeks before getting him I added 3 more bags over the course of a week or so. No I try to supplement the tank about once every 6 months or so. I have had him for a while now and he seems fat and happy. Goos Luck!

trukgirl · Jan 13, 2012

CJO said:
Don't clean your glass for a week or so. See the white specs on the glass? Are they moving? If so, those are copepods! It would be very unlikely that you don't have a good population of them with your age tank.

CJ

I never clean the back wall.... I'm fairly sure I can see some, on the ends where I can get close!

We transported all the rock from the tank when we transferred it inside Brute cans with the original tank water, and it was still in the 70s out when we did it, so kill-off should have been very minor. (this was back in the last wk of Sept. tank completely set up by Oct 2.) and like I said the previous owners of the tank work with my hubby, it was set up for 5+ years and my old tank was set up for almost 2. I did have to rinse their sand since it was ggrrroosssss but that was it.

Just to be sure I think I will get some Ocean Pods. Hubby wants the Mandarin so much more than I do, I am hoping to suprise him by his birthday with one (jan 21)

Reef Breeders · Jan 13, 2012

trukgirl said:
So I have always been careful when selecting fish....but hubby and I both have always wanted a Mandarin.

I never thought my old 65g would be good enough to maintain a pod population for one. Everything I've ever read has minimum tank size, etc to maintain for a Mandarin, but there is never an actual number or anything on how many pods should be in a tank.

The other night after all the lights were off in the room, with a flashlight I tried looking in my 125g reef tank to see if I could find where my new Wrasse was bedding down. To my suprise, my WHOLE TANK has so many pods, it almost looked like a massive roach infestation!! When I would shine the flashlight on them, they would scurry around like roaches. It was hilarious, but I can't believe how many pods I have!! There are always a bunch in the refugium part of my sump as well!

Please tell me I have enough to maintain just one Mandarin?????

I have been raising and selling copepods for about 9 months now, and in my experience, about 500 copepods should hold up a mandarin for about a week, but I would reccomend addind 1000 initially, then 500 the next week, then another 500 monthly to supplement the population. A 65 gallon should sustain a mandarin for quite some time, but you may need to supplement the population.

clockwurk · Jan 17, 2012

If you really want them with little to no work, get an ORA TR mandarin. They eat frozen mysis

CJO · Jan 18, 2012

clockwurk said:
If you really want them with little to no work, get an ORA TR mandarin. They eat frozen mysis

There have been mixed results with getting these to eat frozen food.

CJ

trukgirl · Jan 28, 2012

CJO said:
There have been mixed results with getting these to eat frozen food.

CJ

I've seen the same.

Anemonekeeper, it is a 125g now that has been set up here since Oct, with old rock from the 65g and all the rock previously set up in this 125 from the previous owner.

So I bought a couple of bottles of Ocean pods to be safe, put one in a few days before, and the day before Hubby's birthday, I surprised him with what I believe is a Female mandarin (green). I have yet to get a good pic of her, she is a TEENY tiny baby one! She is getting along really well, and seems to have gained some weight (she was being kept in a shallow open frag tank at the LFS - I think she might feel safer and more at home with all the LR she has to hunt and explore now)

KJAG · Jan 28, 2012

CJO said:
There have been mixed results with getting these to eat frozen food.

CJ

^ Even if you do get it to accept frozen,its somewhat sporadic and theyre usually too timid to make a real effort to compete with other fish. If you dont have an established Pod supply I wouldnt get one.

lowellb · Feb 4, 2022

Shores805 said:
^ Even if you do get it to accept frozen,its somewhat sporadic and theyre usually too timid to make a real effort to compete with other fish. If you dont have an established Pod supply I wouldnt get one.

You can add a mandarin a half week after throwing in pods, they eat them small or adult size. The pods are 8 oz for every 20 gallons, then put in the mandarin, then get live brine and dump them in two days later. These two different colonies can build in there, while the mandarin eats pods and brine shrimp. One mandarin cannot seek out every pod within one week. By that time, new ones will be hatching and taking the place of the lost pods. Pods do not need much to create mutiple colonies from one pouch.