[Mitsunei Ray]

Hey guys, i just got a Mandarin Dragonet today from my uncle. I was freaking out with i saw that my whole tank was covered in pods. Which i shouldn't have, but it was bothering me. -.- After i got the fish, i realized that i'm going to have problems taking care of it.

I have a 28gal nano cube HQI

Pods are everywhere now.
But i know that i will have problems feeding it. 30 mins after i put it in today it started eating the pods.

Theres live rock in there but not 50lbs. of it.

Guys help, i have no idea what to do now. XD

[Jeremy0322]

You could actually buy pods and feed it to him, or start a fuge, but i still dont know if a fuge alone will do it, i think you are going to have to feed pods.

[Mitsunei Ray]

OHHH like stuff from Reef Nutrition?
Does that stuff work well?

So far, since i've put him in the tank, he likes to hang out in a certain spot, and hes picking at sand and rock..... i hope hes eating somethin. But i saw him go after some frozen brine shrimp! =D

[Jeremy0322]

If he is going for frozen food that would be amazing. I thought that was just an urban legend.

[mtfabel]

I have 2 Mandarins and they both eat frozen brine. I have had them for over a year. This is the exception not the norm.

[Jeremy0322]

Yea, i did not think they did that very often. How did you get them to start, they are so pretty i would not mind keeping one once my fuge gets going, but I would not know how to get them to start eating frozen food. Is it just a crap shoot?

[gimmito]

I fed mine live brine shrimp first...then slowly weened it off to frozen brine and mysis.

It also loved cyclopeeze.

[migget]

Hey man, i had a pair in my 30 gal tank 30x12x18 and had them in there for 3 months b4 upgrading and putting htem in a 65gal. They did wonderful, when i bought them they were pretty ragged and i thought they were gunna die but slowly rthey came back and look great. I had about 50-60 lbs of LR in my 30gal which helped out and i supplemented pods about every 2weeks. One thing i also did is cultured my own pods. 10gal tank, light and about 2 gals of water to start. I added to bottles of tiger pods and in 1 week had 3 times as many. I am feeding the pods phyoto feast and there thriving which helps b/c its $15 a bottle the pods in the lfs were i live. Jeremy had a convo with me about the dragnets too, just read alot about them and se what other ppl had said and have had success with, there are a beautiful lil fish for it to waste away b/c of not having enough food.


john

[sgarron]

Mine actually eats formula 1 pellets that land on the rocks. I don't konow if he thinks they are pods or just isn't picky. Either way, hes fat and happy.

[elkinsda957]

Mine eats the Formula 2 pellets along with frozen brine, mysis and i've even seen him eat a few flakes once in awhile.

He'll hang out in the front of the tank when its feeding time waiting for those formula pellets.