What foods have you seen your Mandarin/Dragonet eat? (besides pods)

[sjj80]

I'm strongly considering adding this fish one day once my pod population greatly increases in my tank & fuge. I've also been studying up on how to culture copepods and will do that too, so I can make sure the mandarin doesn't run out of his natural food source. I also do not have any fish that eat mostly pods.

With that said, Who's fed their mandarin things like cyclopeeze, rod's food, nutramar ova prawn, or anyother aquarium food with success???

[snorvich]

I can get some of my mandarins to eat nutramar or mysis but could not begin to sustain them totally on that since I only feed 3 times per day and they are: grazers and poor hunters. They rarely get much if any frozen food as there are other fish in the tank.

[block head]

just got my mandarin to eat live brine,he didn't seem to eat frozen brine,mysis,or blood worms, he ate a little flying fish roe,bought from supermarket/sushi section. trying live baby brine shrimp today. the size looks like it should work well.

[DNickell]

I have a mandorin that has been in my tank for well over six years now. I have never seen it show any interest at all in anything other than the little specks crawling around the tank walls, sand and liverock. I have a refugium in my sump that is producing a sustainable population of pods. I've also carefully avoided getting any other fish that might compete with my mandarin for food. I could probably sustain another pod eater in my 120 gallon tank with sump, but why chance it?

Mine is fat and sassy. I would suggest that you start out with the assumption that a mandarin will be completely dependent on the copepod population in your tank. If you can get it to occassionally nibble at something else, that is a bonus, but don't in anyway depend on it for the fish's health.

[Lockhartia]

I consider myself quite lucky, my mandarin eats just about anything. She'll eat frozen mysis, cyclopeeze and even these little sinking pellets I throw in from time to time for my gobies!

I still have a fuge hooked up to the tank so there are plenty of pods as well. She's just a little glutton that will eat anything that fits in her mouth! DNickell is right though, that's more of an exception to the rule than a consistency. Assume your mandarin will never even look at foods other than pods. If they do accept frozen, then great! If not, then you're prepared.

[cl2ysta1]

mine only eat off the rocks.

[sjj80]

Thanks everyone!!!

Something I've been wondering is where did everyone get their mandarin from?

The reason I ask is because I know liveaquaria QTs all their fish and I would assume that they at least attempt to feed their mandarins. I wonder if I'd have a better shot at getting a mandarin that would eat prepared foods by ordering from liveaquaria vs. LFS. Of course I would be able to actually witness the mandarin eating @ the LFS but then again it will be hit or miss.

[block head]

mandarin ate the bbs shrimp today. i got mine from a lfs who kept him in a seahorse tank. mandarins can be selective on what they eat, most will eat pods (harps) finding one that eats other food is a huge advantage.

[sjj80]

Good to Hear your mandarin ate the bbs!!! I hope mine will eat other foods, I'd feel better about it's health that way. I'm planning on buying pods within the next day or two and adding them to my DT and fuge. I have some DT's phytoplankton to feed them so they will hopefully reproduce quickly. Once I see pods like crazy then I'll add the mandarin.

[block head]

god i miss colorado weather, try to get harpcscoid ? pods if you can, they are the tiny pods that cling to the glass, the bbs are very close in size , the live food really seems to trigger feeding ,the only drawback i see is that the bbs swim in the water colum a little more,

[Dante_JoseCuerv]

Well, all of my dragonets are pretty much the least picky fish you can find. I've mostly fed them frozen food but they go after mysis, brine, bloodworms, tubifex, rotifers, one of them actually went after some algae today and ate some. I guess I just got really lucky but I'm kinda confused as to why mine ate some algae.

[cudaruner]

copapods and brian, not much else I've seen them eat. In most tanks they don't do well unless the tank is well established.

[sjj80]

blockhead, are you culturing your bbs?

Also, can anyone tell me where they got their mandarin that eats aquarium foods from?

I know it's hit or miss but I wonder if certain online suppliers and LFS are able to get their mandarins to eat. Surely liveaquaria and others go through several mandarins and I'd imagine they would have to get them eating since the pod population in their holding tanks can't keep up with the amount of mandarins that have gone through them.

[block head]

yeah i cultured the bbs,not that hard just takes a little time,i'm able to buy live adults for less. most lfs's aren't going to put alot of effort into feeding. mandarins are one of the only fish that bother to eat harpscord? pods

[Chibils]

Keep in mind that they have very fast metabolisms and very tiny mouths. So their body structure doesn't lend itself well to eating half a cube of mysis at once and going another 6-12 hours without eating again. The reason they scavenge all day is because they can't truly be sustained on anything other than zooplankton. That said, it would be interesting to see the results of a mandarin population fed exclusively on pe bbs or rotifers.

[Setec]

I know none of you will believe me on this post, but I can hand feed mine Marine A pellets.

I don’t know how it happened, but I do know how it started.

I had 3 of these in a 180 (I didn’t put them there, I inherited them) + 2 wrasses, so pods were in short supply. 1 day, I noticed that my spotted mandarin was picking at the pellets that were sinking to the sand.

After some time went by, 2 of them passed on even with me dumping pods into the water on a weekly basis + having a fully running refuge, but the spotted was still fat and happy.

So I started following him around the tank and placing pellets on the sand near him and he would sit there and pick at them until he seemed full and move on.

This went on for a while until one day I went to put the pellets on the sand near him and he did not flee. Now I can put them on the sand and actually touch him and he does not move.

Anyway, to answer the question, I feed mine Marine A soaked on Sel-Con.

[HoopsGuru]

Buy a breeders net, it attaches inside the tank. This way, you will have adequate filtration yet can wean the mandarin over to whatever foods you want. You can start with live brine and slowly introduce other foods (i.e live brine, then frozen brine, then frozen mysis, etc.). These guys don't need to swim much, so you really can't beat it and it only takes a few weeks. Breeders at MOFIB use this regularly.

Mine eat Hikari enriched mysis from a Melev style "diner" (baby food jar) and I also have live cultures of T. californicus copepods for this and other purposes. I started mine from a live bottle of "Tiggerpods".

[Freed]

How does everyone get the pods from their refugium to the main tank?

[Waxxiemann]

I've had a manderin for a few years now and he eats spectrum pellets (as do all my fish). A fat and happy fish.