Help my manderins...

[raw04f]

Today I went to the LFS and bought 4 manderins because the were in poor shape. The pet store where I bought them knows nothing about pets much less the eating habbits of manderins. I understand they need copapods and I am trying to give them what I have in my tank which seems to be a significant amout, however I didnt know anyone who has supplemented with other foods such as bine shrimp. If anyone has done this please let me know how and what food manderins will readily eat and how to go about getting them to eat something besides just copapods.

[Zaita]

No.1 Rule for Mandarins. "Don't buy them to save them".

Once a mandarin starts to show the signs of starvation (sunken belly, line down body) it is usually too late and they will die in a matter of weeks/short-months.

If you have purchased 4, they are going to decimate a HUGE amount of pods. Supplimenting them with enriched BBS (live) would help but it's not usually enough to sustain them.

If they are going to survive, you might want to order some Copepod cultures and start culturing these to keep your populations high enough.

You can search for "mandarin diner", but this depends on if they will readily take prepared food, most mandarins will not (esp Blue)

Soz to be the bringer of bad news, but I wouldn't rate their survival chances very high at all. Good luck thou!

[Sk8r]

If you want them to have a chance, go get a 30 gallon tank, connect it to your system---closed loop pump is ok: will not kill the pods---and float the biggest ball of cheato you can buy, under a mini H0 light on a 20/4 cycle, with timer. Pods will come in on the cheato and solve the immediate problem.
Add washed sand, over time, bit at a time, add a big rubble pile of live rock, and feed DT's daily. You will then have enough pods to support these guys. It costs far less than buying pods in a bottle.
Generally mandys will not accept other than pods when starving. They get desperate and dim, and do not recognize other food. They may also turn on each other. Well-fed, paradoxically, they may get greedy and start experimenting with frozen mysis or micropellet.