Mandarin goby

[Frickmiester]

Tell me all you thoughts on mandarin goby's I have Ben doing a lot of reading on them but I would like your inputs.

 

[dragonfisher33]

the most outrageous fish in terms of color. i would def keep one if i can train it to eat pellets/frozen. it will live for years if you have an established tank with proper refugium setup. in essence, it's one of the fish that requires the least maintenance or the most, depending on your setup

 

[MJSerik]

You need tons of pods. Been working on starting a colony, and they're getting eaten quick.

 

[bribo12]

the most outrageous fish in terms of color. i would def keep one if i can train it to eat pellets/frozen. it will live for years if you have an established tank with proper refugium setup. in essence, it's one of the fish that requires the least maintenance or the most, depending on your setup

They are much more difficult than havin a refugium and saying that will suffice. I know people who have established tanks with refugiums that can't keep them. If you get them eating frozen that's your best chance at survival. They are gorgeous but I would never call them low maintenance.

 

[woody390]

What size tank do you have refugium etc? They are very difficult to keep as said above best if they are taking frozen for extra nutrients but they can go off frozen food once they have started taking it

 

[Frickmiester]

I have a 90 gallon it's not set up yet I still need a protean skimmer and a pump for the sump the sump is between 25 and 35 gallons I was reading you can have a colony in your sump an some of the pods will make it to the tank I know I have to take about so months after getting my tank goin before considering them but there so rad do you think the will do ok with a small group of clowns

 

[Frickmiester]

I get back to you on the exact size of the sump . My tank is pre drilled for a sump but the stand it came with wasn't so I hve to cut a whole for the pipes

 

[Frickmiester]

Tank and sump

 

[TommyP]

He would do fine with clowns, just make sure your tank is well established. Wait at least 6 months to a year before introducing a mandarin. You want it to last, not to just buy a fish for it to starve because it looks cool ya know. An excellent pod population like everyone else said is needed.

 

[Frickmiester]

How can I help with increasing the pod pop. And will having some in my ref. help an would any of them lie to make it into the tank becouse pods are little shrimp like critters in algae right like super small critters that make up a part of the plankton

 

[Frickmiester]

What about a flame angel and royal gramma's

 

[woody390]

You can buy pods to add to your tank. May be worth buying some to build population and if you get a mandarin can never hurt to buy some every few weeks to throw in to keep population up if you are concerned all those fish should be fine although flame is not 100 percent reef safe if you are planning a reef

 

[carey]

Also keep in mind that some other fish will also eat the pods. My mandarin ate the entire population of pods i had in my tank in less than a month. If you MUST buy one I would strongly suggest paying the xtra money and getting an ORA one. They cost about $50 but supposedly they eat pellets. Mine didnt but did learn to eat frozen food after a month and now even eats pellets. BUT if it hadnt switched to frozen food mine would have starved without any doubt in my mind. I put ALOT and I mean alot of effort getting her to eat frozen, I had over 12 different kinds of frozen food and fed several times a day with a turkey baster and the flow turned off. They are extremely delicate eaters and can easily have their food eaten by other fish cause they are so slow to eat.

If I had it to do again i might not have tried the mandarin. Too much of a risk in my opinion.

Here is my fat "mandy" the mandarin

 

[Frickmiester]

Beautiful fish! How hard is it to train then to eat other food sources? An I know That the flame isn't 100 percent reef safe. But some places I read that some are bad on the reef and some arnt so bad how much damage could he inflict are the brutal on the reef or just from time to time pick at it?

 

[bribo12]

Beautiful fish! How hard is it to train then to eat other food sources? An I know That the flame isn't 100 percent reef safe. But some places I read that some are bad on the reef and some arnt so bad how much damage could he inflict are the brutal on the reef or just from time to time pick at it?

It depends on the fish. Some flames are model citizens, some aren't. They like large polyp stony corals to munch on.

 

[Frickmiester]

Are those the corals that look like a bush almost?

 

[Mebbid]

You can buy pods to add to your tank. May be worth buying some to build population and if you get a mandarin can never hurt to buy some every few weeks to throw in to keep population up if you are concerned all those fish should be fine although flame is not 100 percent reef safe if you are planning a reef

If you're willing to put in the effort to grow a phytoplankton and a pod culture then it's much easier to keep them. I wouldn't even think about relying on buying pods to add to the tank in order to keep them well fed.

 

[bribo12]

Are those the corals that look like a bush almost?

They come in all different forms like hammer corals, acans, Duncan's, trumpet coral, brain corals, etc

 

[Frickmiester]

So soft corals should be ok

 

[alco1]

ive had a mandarin for about 2 years now..... if your getting one small, from my experience im afraid the only thing you could really get them to eat are pods which you can grow yourself.... really easy to do by the way.

if your getting a larger one, you may be lucky enough (like me) that will eat other food sources.

I've pretty much got no pods left, the mandarin destroys them in a matter of days when I add them in. all I do is just feed it brine with vitamin solution and all is well.

never really had any trouble with it at the moment