Yet another Madarin Question

cmattdvc · Oct 10, 2015

Ok guys, I've picked up a Madarin, he was a rescue from a tank that was getting shut down quickly. I've had no contact with the owner of the tank, I got him from a friend of a friend.

I know that they eat pods and I put an entire bottle into my tank (29 biocube) last night after lights out. I used a turkey baster and "seeded" the rock all through the tank. I will move him into a 60 gallon shallow mixed reef tank in the next two weeks.

My question is this, how often do I need to add pods, or how many bottles do I need to add to get ahead of his eating?

My new tank will have a 'fuge and I will attempt to grow them there so they can get into the dt from there. But I want to keep him alive and healthy until I can get him into the new tank.

Thanks
Matt

melypr1985 · Oct 10, 2015

It wouldn't hurt to add pods once a week or more depending on how many are in each bottle. Think about this..... Mandarins have such a short digestive tract that they have to eat constantly to maintain their health. So maybe he eats a pod per minute.... I suck at math so I'll leave that to you. I was hatching baby brine shrimp to help supplement my mandarin's diet and using a mandarin feeder that I built following Paulb's model. It worked until ick broke out badly in my tank. Good luck!

Breakthecycle2 · Oct 10, 2015

Well, my first question is, which pods are adding? Some of them do no breed. Which bottle?

cmattdvc · Oct 10, 2015

Well it was a foil pack with a clear back and a little pour spout. I can't remember the type and I'm at work right now.

It had some cheito (did I spell that right?) in it also.

It can from a lfs.

Breakthecycle2 · Oct 10, 2015

cmattdvc said:
Well it was a foil pack with a clear back and a little pour spout. I can't remember the type and I'm at work right now.

It had some cheito (did I spell that right?) in it also.

It can from a lfs.

Actually, if it's the ones I'm thinking of, they are the right ones. Was there a little bot of cheato mixed in?

cmattdvc · Oct 10, 2015

There was some mixed in.

seth999 · Oct 10, 2015

I seeded my tank once with pods as well as a rubble pile in my sump. They will go around about constantly picking pods and thing off the rocks. I only feed live or frozen foods to the fish, I noticed that mine would start searching for brine shrimp when I would feed. It would go around picking up all the little pieces of shrimp in the frozen stuff but wouldn't eat the whole shrimp until the pieces were gone. I never saw it eat a live one. I made sure there was baby brine or some broken up pieces when I fed and haven't had to reseed pods yet and it's been about 1.5 years.