Captive-Bred Mandarin in 12 gallon Nano.

[Jimmyneptune]

I have a 12 gallon nano-cube with no lid that I pulled from storage and set up with a colbalt maxi-jet 900, neo-therm heater, par 38 Led, live rock from my sump, a little dry sand to cover the bottom and a bag of matrix from my sump in the back chamber. I have a two small blue leg hermits crabs an astraea snail and a trochus snail. A few weeks ago, I started a white worm culture, thanks Paul B for all the info, to feed the hard to feed fish. The white worm culture is productive.

My LFS has some ORA Mandarins and I am picking up today. I know they will be tiny so I think 2 could work in this system. I was looking for thoughts or input as to the success of this set up. Should I add anything else? Could I add anything else? Another small fish or more inverts or a coral?

 

[NowGlazeIT]

Add a mandarin feeder and you should be good to go. If you wanted other fish maybe a dart fish or something shy like it. Those mandarin come in very small so it will be good to have them in a tank with zero competitors or aggressive fish

 

[92Miata]

We've got 2 in a Nuvo 40 at the moment - been about 3 months - they're fat little things now. Ours are Biota - and they came in tiny - maybe 3/4" ? They're about an inch and a half now.

I'd be concerned about two in a 12 - both from a food perspective, and a territory perspective - ours are a little territorial with each other. I think we ended up with two males - but my understanding is that they're not really fish that 'pair' - but that meet up to breed. So a mixed pair may or may not work better.

Ours get a lot of brine naupali - but will also eat frozen brine, mysis, and a handful of other things.

 

[12gallonsofhex]

The white worms are working for my Mandarin in my 20 long. He was wild caught and wouldnt eat anything prepared but loved the worms. After a while I was able to introduce him to extra small TDO pellets and he eats those daily now.

 

[Elite]

I have had over 20 mandirans I have had ORA and Biota I think you should be good to go what do you plan on feeding them.

 

[Jimmyneptune]

Add a mandarin feeder and you should be good to go. If you wanted other fish maybe a dart fish or something shy like it. Those mandarin come in very small so it will be good to have them in a tank with zero competitors or aggressive fish

What kind of feeder do you suggest?

 

[Jimmyneptune]

We've got 2 in a Nuvo 40 at the moment - been about 3 months - they're fat little things now. Ours are Biota - and they came in tiny - maybe 3/4" ? They're about an inch and a half now.

I'd be concerned about two in a 12 - both from a food perspective, and a territory perspective - ours are a little territorial with each other. I think we ended up with two males - but my understanding is that they're not really fish that 'pair' - but that meet up to breed. So a mixed pair may or may not work better.

Ours get a lot of brine naupali - but will also eat frozen brine, mysis, and a handful of other things.

I may split them up if they have agression or get a larger tank. My hope is to get them to eat the frozen as well.

 

[NowGlazeIT]

What kind of feeder do you suggest?

Paul b makes a good one. I made one using two types of tubing one large one small. It’s basically a place for the food to sit still so the mandarin can graze

 

[Jimmyneptune]

Wow!!! These guys are tiny. They are a little smaller then a frag plug stem. I had put a valve on the mj 900 because the flow was to much. I pulled the hermit crabs, to avoid aggression from the crabs, and added more snails. I put the white worms in the first day but they didn’t seem interested, I’ll try the white worms several more times as they get use to the new environment and feeding. I tried feeding them rods fish eggs, LFS recommendation, the first and second day and they didn’t seem interested. I had a brine shrimp set up previously so I thought about getting that going again when I found this: https://www.bulkreefsupply.com/brine-shrimp-hatchery-dish-brine-shrimp-direct-inc.html
It looks very easy, any one have experience with these and feeding mandarins?

 

[NowGlazeIT]

I have experience feeding them. They live in my reef without pods for 2+ years now. I start them in a small ten gallon tank alone till they use the feeder I built. Then I transport the feeder with the mandarin to the display. The first frozen food my mandarin would eat was Calanus by ocean nutrition. Here is a picture of the feeder I use