Hi i was wondering if anyone knew of anywhere to get live amphipods from, whether its a website or somewhere local i live in eastbourne

I have never been able to keep mandarins for more than a few weeks, even in a rich live rock setup. They just pined away - refusing to eat anything but live foods.

Hi if i did get them live food would they be ok did you feed yours live food?

its a bit hit or miss wether they will feed,mine do well on the live rock but i have seem them eat mysis lately,if you can get an established one from a reef tank you will do better,otherwise try garlic enriched brineshrimp to trigger the feeding,although garlic is not brilliant long term feeding nether is brineshrimp as its very low on nutrition,but to get the feeding started its ok.hth mikk

if you havent already got the mandarin, insist on seeing it feed in the lfs ie on frozen brine /mysis etc,mandarins are not recommended for tanks that have been set up for less than a year, they seem to do better in refugiums or sumps as there isnt the competition for the pods etc

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WHO'S YA DADDY

Hi my tank has been running for 2yrs and has live rock up to the top its got loads of life and corals it holds 50ltrs its got a pair of true clown fish and a fire shrimp and a few hermit crabs. I have a very good aquatic shop near to me, they have a mandarin there so i will ask if they feed it frozen food it looks healthy and its not skinny so i might give it a go!?

hi sue, any news on the mandarin?

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WHO'S YA DADDY

I use to have a very healthy mandarin until I stupidly added a tang to my set up and got white spot and lost most of my fish not surprisingly I haven't kept a tang since and will not again.

Anyway until then I had a very happy and very fat mandarin I achieved this in the following way:

Tank mates must not compete for food if you have any wrasse in the tank they will out compete the mandarins equally any basslets will do the same.

Ideally the tank will be long standing and be full of copepods and the like.

Food offered should always be small but whole so brine shrimp and mysiid shrimp are a must.

I always fed frozen food never live presentation is the key.

In order to present it properly i placed a cube of frozen bloodworm against the intake for my stream pump this holds the frozen food against the pump whilst it disolves dispersing the frozen food through out the tank making it move as though it is alive. This entices the mandarins into hunting the food when they feed they tend to hover over their target before grabbing it they are very selective they almost stalk their prey like a lion fish.

The other important point is frequency of feeding I would be looking at feeding 2 cubes of mysiid or brine shrimp a day once just after lights on and once just after light off.

Its no guarantee but it worked for me very well until I stupidly introduced a powder blue tang I had the mandarin for about 2 years.

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Alan

Thweeerp!

http://www.reefworks.co.uk/default.a...4&subpage=4158

They sell copeopods and mandarin food packs

Hi no not yet, went to shop and they only had a small spotted mandarin, it had only come in 2 days ago and wasnt feeding very well, so i didnt want to take the chance! They will have some more in 2 weeks.Perhaps they shouldnt sell mandarins untill they are feeding well and have settled in to their surroundings, it must be too tempting to snap it up just becuase of what it is!!