Mandarin dragonet Eating habits

[squash110]

I have a mandarin dragonete who does not seem to be eating copopods. but he does eat allot of pellet food. He is eating Ocean Nutrition formula one marine pellets. I was wondering if he will soon suffer from mal nutrition from not eating copopods. Thanks
Josh

 

[Curtswearing]

If you have a mandarin eating fish food and are feeding a balanced food mixture, be thankful. Many people would pay you twice what you paid for that fish because they want one and their tank cannot support a mandarin that only eats pods (which most do).

However, they have choices too. One of RF's sponsors sells pods for those mandarins. http://www.oceanpods.com/

PS.....I guarantee your mandarin is eating plenty of pods when you aren't looking.

 

[Reefbound]

I have a mandarin dragonete who does not seem to be eating copopods. but he does eat allot of pellet food. He is eating Ocean Nutrition formula one marine pellets. I was wondering if he will soon suffer from mal nutrition from not eating copopods. Thanks
Josh

Im in the same boat... My Mandarin eats both types of the pellet the red and green... and inbetween feedings if you watch carefully,you will see him hunting for pods.

If you have a mandarin eating fish food and are feeding a balanced food mixture, be thankful. Many people would pay you twice what you paid for that fish because they want one and their tank cannot support a mandarin that only eats pods (which most do).

If this were true I would try another to see if mine would teach the other to eat pellet food.

 

[Curtswearing]

LOL

Think about it though. If you analyzed a copepod, what do you really have? You have a hard exoskeleton covering the entire animal that has no nutritive value whatsoever......it's 100% waste. Once this exoskeleton has been broken down, there's very little protein inside the copepod. That's why they have to eat so many daily to live.

EDIT: You can also culture pods. http://www.oceanpods.com/faq.html#culture

 

[Elmo18]

IMO, it's not really the copepod that has nutritional value, it's what they eat.

This is why after some time, wild caught clowns can become drab coloured, especially if they were eating a lot of wild copepods. If you look at all of the wild Chrysopterus clowns, and then look at them about 3-6 months after being in our tanks, they have lost some major color, especially brightness.

I attribute this to either astanxanthin, or other pigments that the copepod provided the clownfish.

Best,
Ilham

 

[Curtswearing]

I attribute this to either astanxanthin, or other pigments that the copepod provided the clownfish.

Best,
Ilham

I think you're right. I remember when cyclopeeze first came out, many people were reporting that their fish were brightening up in color.

 

[morgan]

ive just started a prop tank for brine but am now thinking pods would be molre benifical questions if u dont mind curt
can i use red sea green water or another product that contains rotifers and nannochloropsis but they are not living would this matter? and where can u obtain pods from noramally or would i have to setup a fuge to produce pods from live rock if i cant purchase pods?

 

[Curtswearing]

ive just started a prop tank for brine but am now thinking pods would be molre benifical questions if u dont mind curt
can i use red sea green water or another product that contains rotifers and nannochloropsis but they are not living would this matter? and where can u obtain pods from noramally or would i have to setup a fuge to produce pods from live rock if i cant purchase pods?

Morgan,

Here's the thing with brine shrimp. The babies (called Nauplii) are highly nutritious for only a short period of time. Once they start their main growing period, they start becoming more and more like candy. Sure, there's still some nutrition there but the effectiveness drops with each passing day. There's nothing wrong with eating a little candy everyday, however, that better not be your only source of nutrition or you're going to have some health problems. Same thing goes for our tanks. With all of that said, you CAN improve the nutrition of adult brine shrimp by doing something called gut-loading. Since you're from Australia, I'm giving you an Australian link that will explain the process. http://ozreef.org/library/articles/artemia.html

Unfortunately, I think it would be very expensive to obtain a live culture of pods and have it shipped to Australia. You might send a question to DBW of Ozreef. He might know of some local sources.

If you are wanting pods for your mandarin fish, they are easy to cultivate. Get some copepods from your main tank. How do you do that? (This is described in detail on the link I provided earlier but I'll summarize). After the tank lights have been off for some time, turn on a flashlight and set it on the stand next to the tank. The copepods will collect there. GENTLY use a sponge and sweep them off of the glass where the flashlight is shining in. Drop the sponge into your cultivation tank and feed that tank phytoplankton or small amounts of flake food. Dr. Rhodes does have a sponsors forum here if there's additional questions related to this. http://www.reeffrontiers.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=84

There's also a little trick that many people have used for some time called "pod piles". Basically, somewhere not visible from the main viewing area, you make a small pile of dead snail shells where the pods can reproduce and hide from the fish that want to eat them.

 

[morgan]

cheers curt i will have to try that please do cheack out this link that i will post as i would be planning to use this for feeding and am quiet positive that it would be a good food http://www.nutrakol.com/
in the pod tank is live rock a good idea? and is subtrate good for pods ?

 

[Curtswearing]

Morgan, that looks like a very good food for your purposes.

Additionally, both live rock and a substrate are good for pop propagation because pods also eat bacterial biofilms that form on both of these.