Feeding A Mandarin
- Thread starter sjgsm
- Start date
promisetbg
Active Member
Tiggerpods are carnivorous, they will eat each other. Their type{tigriopus californicus} also gets hung up in pumps. You want harpacticoid copepods. Even if mandarins take to prepared foods, it is not enough to sustain them. Watch a mandarin, see those little butterfly like fins? See them searching all day? They need more food than you could give them, as they expel lots of energy. Brine shrimp is ok if it's newly hatched BS. After 12 hours the BBS must be gutloaded to have any nutrition whatsoever.
promisetbg
Active Member
Originally Posted by nYgel
here's how I've got 3 dragonets on mysis..... i put it in my tank.... the ate it when it touched the bottom.
What happened to them, why 3?
here's how I've got 3 dragonets on mysis..... i put it in my tank.... the ate it when it touched the bottom.
What happened to them, why 3?
flpriest
Member
Originally Posted by nYgel
here's how I've got 3 dragonets on mysis..... i put it in my tank.... the ate it when it touched the bottom.
I have 2 Mandarins, one green and one spotted, both male. This is the method I used to get mine to eat mysis.
BTW, I have the green Mandarin in my 90 gal. tank with approx. 90 lbs. of LR, and the spotted in a 35 gal. with about 55 lbs LR. The 55 is over a yr. old and the 35 is a little over 8 months old. I agree with promistbg, even if your Mandarin will eat frozen or prepared foods, they still need a healthy pod population to live a long, happy, and nutrisious (sp) life.
Good luck!! :happyfish
here's how I've got 3 dragonets on mysis..... i put it in my tank.... the ate it when it touched the bottom.
I have 2 Mandarins, one green and one spotted, both male. This is the method I used to get mine to eat mysis.
BTW, I have the green Mandarin in my 90 gal. tank with approx. 90 lbs. of LR, and the spotted in a 35 gal. with about 55 lbs LR. The 55 is over a yr. old and the 35 is a little over 8 months old. I agree with promistbg, even if your Mandarin will eat frozen or prepared foods, they still need a healthy pod population to live a long, happy, and nutrisious (sp) life.
Good luck!! :happyfish
nygel
Active Member
Originally Posted by promisetbg
What happened to them, why 3?
I had 2 scooters (one i just got that was less than an inch long, he died, I think the larger scooter i've had for a year killed it.... or maybe hes just so friggin small and fragile he couldn't handle acclimation well... oh well.)
and one mandarin that I gave to a relative. But I've had all three eating. and no, the smaller scooter didnt die of starvation, it was only with me for a week. But the larger scooter is great and grown considerably and is the best fish I've ever had.
What happened to them, why 3?
I had 2 scooters (one i just got that was less than an inch long, he died, I think the larger scooter i've had for a year killed it.... or maybe hes just so friggin small and fragile he couldn't handle acclimation well... oh well.)
and one mandarin that I gave to a relative. But I've had all three eating. and no, the smaller scooter didnt die of starvation, it was only with me for a week. But the larger scooter is great and grown considerably and is the best fish I've ever had.
sjgsm
Member
lol you seem to have misunderstood me.... I bought the mandarin somewhat skinny in an attempt to fatten her up... I have enough copepods in my tank.... I bought 3 bags of copepods which is a 200 count each about a month ago and have not much in my tank that would eat them except probably baby serpent stars and possibly hermit crabs.... I'm sure my pod population is fine considering that my tank is also over a year and a half old..... I'm just wondering if there are some other pods I could feed them or how I could also get them on prepared foods
sjgsm
Member
Originally Posted by nYgel
I had 2 scooters (one i just got that was less than an inch long, he died, I think the larger scooter i've had for a year killed it.... or maybe hes just so friggin small and fragile he couldn't handle acclimation well... oh well.)
and one mandarin that I gave to a relative. But I've had all three eating. and no, the smaller scooter didnt die of starvation, it was only with me for a week. But the larger scooter is great and grown considerably and is the best fish I've ever had.
Scooter's don't quite eat the same... they are not quite as finicky... I've had 2 scooters in which I had for alittle more than a year....they ate everything... just so you know they didn't die I traded them into my LFS for credit when I moved
I had 2 scooters (one i just got that was less than an inch long, he died, I think the larger scooter i've had for a year killed it.... or maybe hes just so friggin small and fragile he couldn't handle acclimation well... oh well.)
and one mandarin that I gave to a relative. But I've had all three eating. and no, the smaller scooter didnt die of starvation, it was only with me for a week. But the larger scooter is great and grown considerably and is the best fish I've ever had.
Scooter's don't quite eat the same... they are not quite as finicky... I've had 2 scooters in which I had for alittle more than a year....they ate everything... just so you know they didn't die I traded them into my LFS for credit when I moved
sjgsm
Member
Originally Posted by promisetbg
Tiggerpods are carnivorous, they will eat each other. Their type{tigriopus californicus} also gets hung up in pumps. You want harpacticoid copepods. Even if mandarins take to prepared foods, it is not enough to sustain them. Watch a mandarin, see those little butterfly like fins? See them searching all day? They need more food than you could give them, as they expel lots of energy. Brine shrimp is ok if it's newly hatched BS. After 12 hours the BBS must be gutloaded to have any nutrition whatsoever.
you have me confused... I went to look up the harpacticoid californicus and found this.... "Tigriopus californicus is a very large (250-2500 micron) harpacticoid copepod that ranges from Alaska to Baja California. T. californicus is a very hearty copepod that can tolerate wide ranges in temperature (10-35°C) and salinity (10-100 ppt). T. californicus eats microscopic algae, protists, bacteria, diatoms, algae and microbes (McGroarty 1958)"
Also copepods have a 44-52% protein content, my main fish food MarineGro (small pellets) contains 53.1% protein content... with this in mind it should be able to sustain them but if it doesn't it would keep them fed while allowing the pod population to continue to grow right?