green mandrins

The friendliest place on the web for anyone with an interest in aquariums or fish keeping!
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.

tmkx3

Aquarium Advice Freak
Joined
Oct 24, 2005
Messages
238
Location
houston,texas
I recently purchased a green mandrin ( He is being held for 2weeks at the lfs) and I read some where that mandrins don't get ick. The article said something about because of what they eat that they are immune. The reason I ask is because I don't have my qt set up right now. The lfs will hold him for a while. I was thinking about drip acclimating him and just adding him to the main after the 2 weeks at the lfs. What do you think????
 
I don't recall hearing that they can't get ich, any chance you can post the article you read, I am really interested in checking it out.
As for QT, it is best to QT, period, otherwise you risk your main tank's health. You can get a QT pretty quickly if you seed it correctly.
 
Actually Mandarin dragonets are more ich resistant then most fish. I wouldn't go as far to say that they cannot get ich, though their highly toxic, thick slime coat prevents parasite intrusion from nearly all external parasites. Again they are not parasite-proof but just more resistant then most fish.

As for qt'ing Mandarinfish I would highly recommend against it. Mandarins do not take prepared foods and get their meals almost solely off of live rock. Copepods, Amphipods, and other natural crustaceans that live on live rock are there main food sources and without a well established tank, lots of live rock, and a good refugium a mandarin will likely slowly starve in captivity.

I would get the fish home from the LFS and into a well established reef tank as quickly as possible if you hope to keep it fed and healthy.
 
Thanks for the info. I was concerned about him eating also. I have waited 2 years for my tank to mature before I attempted a mandrin. I don't have a refuge but I do have alot of live rock. The mandrin only arrived at the lfs 2 days ago. I thought I would let him settle in to reduce stress before moving him again
 
I kind of agree with macman on this that the mandarin will most likely just feed off pods unless you or your LFS can get him to eat prepared foods. Most do not but there are always some that do. I have one question in that what will he be eating while he`s at the LFS for the next two weeks? You need to make sure he is eating while he is there and you dont get a fish that has not eaten in two weeks.
 
tm,

The only frozen food, (well any food other then natural foodstuffs) I have gotten a mandarin to eat is Cylopeeze. I have noticed, since I turn off all my water pumps and filters when I feed the corals, that my mandarin actively picks at the little red crustaceans.
 
Just keep in mind that although mandarins don't usually get or carry ich, the water from the lfs might. You could buy pods to feed it in QT for a few weeks.
 
You can buy pods? I thought for some reason that pods and fauna were the same thing. For some reason I assumed that they were something that just produced itself with aging. Kinda like a biological filter. You can't see it but it's there and it only happens in nature.
 
There are many kinds of copepods, mysid shrimp is another food for the fish. They do sell them so shop the net and see what you can find. Its not a bad idea to get some and seed the tank with them to help the population. If you don't have a fuge or some othere safe haven for them to reproduce the Mandarin will eat them fast..
Check your tank after lights out with a red flashlight and you should hopefully see little critters moving around. If you don't see them you should get some pods to seed the tank.
 
In addition to what was already said, you want to make sure you don't have any other animals that will compete with/eat the same things as the mandarin such as wrasses, pseudochromis, etc.
This link has some general info, feeding tips/tricks, and a link to a video at the bottom showing a jar being use to target feed a mandarin.
http://www.melevsreef.com/mandarin_care.html
tmkx3 said:
I thought for some reason that pods and fauna were the same thing. For some reason I assumed that they were something that just produced itself with aging
As long as you started w/ decent LR, or a LR/baserock mix, then yes fauna such as amphipods, copepods, etc. should develop on their own. You can buy kits online to boost/re-seed some of these things, if you feel it necessary(ex. ipsf.com). Feeding LIVE phytoplankton such as DT's phyto should help increase their numbers(IME it helped pretty much as claimed). Should you decide to start feeding micro-foods such as phytoplankton, be very deliberate and cautious w/ the amounts used.
 
There's a great detrivore kit on eBay. I picked one up from Bob about 2 years ago. This is a great kit for seeding a fuge/tank.

Then there are places like Reed Mariculture where you can buy pods to seed or feed while in QT.
 
okay, I got the mandrin home, acclimated him, put him in the main and after the blue tang finished harrasing him to death, he finally came out from hiding for me to discover he has some type of parasite on his fins. I had to set-up my qt anyway. He is now in a 10g with 2 pieces of lr. I used some filter media from my main to seed it. I bought some frozen myis shrimp and I can't tell if he is eating it or not but he is picking at something on the bottom of the tank :roll: LESSON LEARNED :cry:
 
Tm,

when you say the mandarin has some kind of parasite in his fins, what do you mean? Can you visibly see an external parasite, such as an ich cyst? what does it look like and what makes you think that the fish is carrying a parasite?
 
Back
Top Bottom