Livestock Dream Sheet

JLandes

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Hey guys, I am starting up a RSM E260 (69gal) and put together a livestock list that I would like to have. Please let me know your thoughts and experiences about any and all of this list as well as any suggestions not on the list. Thank you!


Pair of Clownfish
Coral Beauty Angel
Royal Gramma
Six Line Wrasse
Small School of Chromis
Squaretail Bristletooth Tang
Yellow Eye Kole Tang
One Spot Foxface
Mandarin Dragonet
Yellow Watchman Goby
Starry Blenny
Bubble Tip Anemone
Frogspawn Coral
Green Star Polyps
Green Polyp Leather Coral
Devil's Hand Leather Coral
Kenya Tree Coral
Birdsnest Coral
Red and Green War Coral
Various Mushroom Corals
Various Zoanthid Corals
Shortspine or Tuxedo Urchin
Sand Sifting Starfish
Emerald Crab
Blue Leg and Scarlet Hermit Crabs
Turbo Snails
Nassarius Snails
Cerith Snails
Fighting Conch
Cleaner Shrimp
 

reefer333_

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In my opinion, 69gal is probably too small for mandarin to just hunt for pods, it will eventually starve unless you keep putting pods in every month. I would suggest you check out paulB's mandarin feeding device thread on here if you want to keep dragonet. It really works, my mandarin and ruby reds are happy and fat since I put in baby brine shrimp everyday into it. And in my experience, six line can get too mean after they have been in the tank a while., I recommend other types of wrasse.
 
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JLandes

JLandes

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In my opinion, 69gal is probably too small for mandarin to just hunt for pods, it will eventually starve unless you keep putting pods in every month. I would suggest you check out paulB's mandarin feeding device thread on here if you want to keep dragonet. It really works, my mandarin and ruby reds are happy and fat since I put in baby brine shrimp everyday into it. And in my experience, six line can get too mean after they have been in the tank a while., I recommend other types of wrasse.
Yeah, that was probably one of my biggest question marks. I really like them, but definitely would need to figure out the best way to keep one.
 

reefer333_

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Me too, I like all types of dragonets, so I keep ruby red pair and mandarin.

Here is one of the threads that talks about the feeder.

And here is my ruby red pair eating on the feeder in quantine.
 
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tehmadreefer

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Fox face gets too big. Mandarin is fine... more you feed the more pods will come, plus they typically learn to eat frozen after a while regardless.
 

James M

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IMO the tank is also too small for
Squaretail Bristletooth Tang
Yellow Eye Kole Tang
One Spot Foxface
They all need a tank that’s bigger than 100 gallons
 
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JLandes

JLandes

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IMO the tank is also too small for
Squaretail Bristletooth Tang
Yellow Eye Kole Tang
One Spot Foxface
They all need a tank that’s bigger than 100 gallons
I am on the fence about those as they would like outgrow the tank eventually. I would not do all of them at once through, maybe just one tang and the one spot foxface.
 

reefer333_

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Fox face gets too big. Mandarin is fine... more you feed the more pods will come, plus they typically learn to eat frozen after a while regardless.
NO disrespect, but In my experience, a single mandarin can wipe out pods population in a small tank very quickly and pods population in the tank will not recover enough for mandarin to survive, unless u have whole tank full of rocks for pods to hide and repopulate and unless you patiently spot feed them, they are too slow to eat any frozen food you put in the reef tank with moderate flow before other fishes get to it. Even when I spot feed them, they would get one or two mysis shrimps on a lucky day.
 

tehmadreefer

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NO disrespect, but In my experience, a single mandarin can wipe out pods population in a small tank very quickly and pods population in the tank will not recover enough for mandarin to survive, unless u have whole tank full of rocks for pods to hide and repopulate and unless you patiently spot feed them, they are too slow to eat any frozen food you put in the reef tank with moderate flow before other fishes get to it. Even when I spot feed them, they would get one or two mysis shrimps on a lucky day.
Nope, pods reproduce quite rapidly. In my 180 I have 3 of the biggest pod eaters know and none aren’t starving to death...Filefish, copperband and a mandarin. Mandarins get the frozen foods that fall to the bottom and underneath the rock work.

obviously they are not swimming in the water climb chasing down the food. My tank is crazy at feeding time with a fox face, niger trigger, powder blue, then the anthias, clowns, etc and the mandarin still gets food and isn’t starving.

Noobs that have killed mandarins just blamed it on not enough pods without knowing jack, and just blown up the pod issue as being the problem.
 

reefer333_

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Notice his tank is 69g newly set up tank and yours is 180g? And OP is obviously a noob asking for advice. You may have successfully kept one in a large tank where u have luxury to feed heavily doesn't mean it is the norm. Check out other dragonet threads in reef2reef where ppl with much longer experience than you or me shared their failure to keep mandarin in smaller tanks. And just because I don't post doesn't mean I am noobs, been reefing for 15+ years.

I don't want to argue back and forward, so I would just say to OP, do your research and do not take one poster's word (including me) as the truth. I just want to make sure new reefer coming in doesn't think that they can keep mandarin dragonet in their newly set up small tank and realize that it is not a good idea after they kill a few fish from starvation. And it can take a while for mandarin to slowly starve to death, so one may think it is alright for a few months and then realize the fish is getting thinner and thinner as time passes.

Nope, pods reproduce quite rapidly. In my 180 I have 3 of the biggest pod eaters know and none aren’t starving to death...Filefish, copperband and a mandarin. Mandarins get the frozen foods that fall to the bottom and underneath the rock work.

obviously they are not swimming in the water climb chasing down the food. My tank is crazy at feeding time with a fox face, niger trigger, powder blue, then the anthias, clowns, etc and the mandarin still gets food and isn’t starving.

Noobs that have killed mandarins just blamed it on not enough pods without knowing jack, and just blown up the pod issue as being the problem.
 
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I am not a complete noob either, having had several different setups over the last nine years. Most of my experience is with smaller tanks however, mostly the Biocubes. I would also like to know what kinds of livestock people have successfully kept in this size tank.
 

reefer333_

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Sorry to assume you are a noob. my bad :)

My advice would be to keep the bio-load down in the beginning and add more after your tank is stable for a while. May be only one bristle tooth tang and smaller fishes. IMO, it is also important to not keep mean fish like six line, or you won't be able to add smaller new fish later. At least that was my experience.

I am not a complete noob either, having had several different setups over the last nine years. Most of my experience is with smaller tanks however, mostly the Biocubes. I would also like to know what kinds of livestock people have successfully kept in this size tank.
 
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James M

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I am on the fence about those as they would like outgrow the tank eventually. I would not do all of them at once through, maybe just one tang and the one spot foxface.
I would go with the Squaretail Bristletooth Tang if you plan on rehoming it after it’s grown.
 
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JLandes

JLandes

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I would go with the Squaretail Bristletooth Tang if you plan on rehoming it after it’s grown.
I am in the military and am subject to move often, so one thought is to rehome when I move and start fresh with new livestock after each move.
 

Ike

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Hey guys, I am starting up a RSM E260 (69gal) and put together a livestock list that I would like to have. Please let me know your thoughts and experiences about any and all of this list as well as any suggestions not on the list. Thank you!


Pair of Clownfish
Coral Beauty Angel
Royal Gramma
Six Line Wrasse
Small School of Chromis
Squaretail Bristletooth Tang
Yellow Eye Kole Tang
One Spot Foxface
Mandarin Dragonet
Yellow Watchman Goby
Starry Blenny
Bubble Tip Anemone
Frogspawn Coral
Green Star Polyps
Green Polyp Leather Coral
Devil's Hand Leather Coral
Kenya Tree Coral
Birdsnest Coral
Red and Green War Coral
Various Mushroom Corals
Various Zoanthid Corals
Shortspine or Tuxedo Urchin
Sand Sifting Starfish
Emerald Crab
Blue Leg and Scarlet Hermit Crabs
Turbo Snails
Nassarius Snails
Cerith Snails
Fighting Conch
Cleaner Shrimp


Just a warning on most of the corals on your list, many of those grow like weeds and can take over that size tank is fairly short order and you won't like many of them enough to be ok with that once you've been in the hobby a while. No go on the mandarin and tangs IMO.

The clowns will likely try to dominate a decent chunk of the tank. The fighting conch won't live long.

I'd also suggest red leg cortez hermits over blue legs as they seem to be a little less boisterous.
 

Ike

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One more, the chromis won't "school" and they will most likely kill one another until you have one left. Best to skip those as well IMO.
 

OrionN

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[QUOTEJ....

Pair of Clownfish
Coral Beauty Angel
Royal Gramma
Six Line Wrasse
Small School of Chromis
Squaretail Bristletooth Tang
Yellow Eye Kole Tang
One Spot Foxface
Mandarin Dragonet
Yellow Watchman Goby
Starry Blenny
....
[/QUOTE]
IMO only, if you want all the fishes to thrive and not out grow this tank I would suggest the following:
1. That is a lot of fish for a 69 gal tank. I think this two tangs and Foxface should not go into this tank. Possibly a Tomini tang. Any other tang will outgrow this tank. Foxface get uge very quickly. I would strongly recommend NO Foxface in this tank.
2. If you want ONE Mandarin in this size tank, you must have to set it up just right, pod friendly, and have no food competitors namely the very mean Six Line Wrasse and no dwarf angel, the Coral Beauty. If you want a lot of grief, then keep the Sixline. If you don't want a Mandarin, then keep a dwarf angel.
3. Chromis will not school in this tank, and they can get pretty big if they don't kill each other. IMO only, damsels and Chromis are waste of bio-load in a tank this small. If you really like Chromis, then you must cut out bio-load elsewhere.
4. Consider a Watchman or Blenny, maybe not both to save bio-load.

So 6 fish in a 69 gal tank with just one large fish which is a much more manageable bio-load.
 
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OrionN

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Also, in place of the Blenny and Watchman, may I recommend two or three Flasher Wrasses.
CarpenterFlasher2020040902.jpg
McCoskeri2018051801resized.jpg
P attenuatus2020050904L.jpg
YellowfinFlasher2018071602.jpg
 
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