growing copepods for mandarin

[monsterm]

Hi,
I am interested in purchasing a green manderin for my 75 gal fowlr, but I feel that 50lbs of live rock isn't going to cut it. I am slowly adding live rock due to funds. I have been reading the other threads about copepods for madarins, and some people say even with a 100lbs of live rock the mandarin can still starve by depleating the food supply. I was wondering if I can set up a small fuge and buy copepods and place them in the fuge and the tank itself will that be enough food untill I can buy some more live rock?

 

[nycbob]

its better to over more copepods than hv the madarin die later on. i'd get another 25lbs of lr and invest in a hob fuge made by cpr.

 

[afboundguy]

I would def get more rock and a fuge. I have a mandarin in my 55 gal that has about 70 lbs or rock and an in tank fuge. It also helps a ton that mine eats frozen food like a pig

When you goto your LFS ask them to try feeding the mandarin frozen food. If they eat it scoop them up. The day I bought mine it was the second or third one he sold from his weekly order that was eating frozen foods...

 

[xcrvin70098]

i have tons of lr too, mine has been fine since september, I never knew about the pods, i am going to get some live ones. I bought today at store a bottle of orange pods, i forgot the name, but all fish took after them.

 

[perks98]

if i have a fuge/sump with the pods in it, do i scoop them out of it to get them to the dt?

 

[puffer32]

You don't want to toss the pods into your DT. All your fish will eat them right away. They make their way into your tank from fuge. Some times i help things along by shaking some chaeto from fuge into my DT when the lights are out.

 

[monsterm]

Thanks for the advice guys. When I had my 55 gal I used a hang on trickle filter and I would always find pods in the carbon sponge and in the filter itself. so I was thinking of buying a small trickle filter put some chaeto and live rock rubble in there with some store bought copepods so they can grow.
Do you think that would work?

 

[puffer32]

You would have to put a light on the filter. The reason you saw pods on you filter before was probably they got sucked up into it.

 

[perks98]

Originally Posted by puffer32
http:///forum/post/2564801
You don't want to toss the pods into your DT. All your fish will eat them right away. They make their way into your tank from fuge. Some times i help things along by shaking some chaeto from fuge into my DT when the lights are out.
when you say that they make their way to the dt from the sump, are you saying that they go in the return pump and up the return line? how would they live through that?

 

[nycbob]

i think he has the hob fuge. even if u hv sump setup, most pods will survive going up thr the return line, since they r very small.