Mandarin goby

[thm1121]

Anyone have any tips to keep a mandarin goby happy and healthy? I love him and want to everything I can to help keep him alive. Tank has been seeded with copepods and I’ve added some pretty regularly but want to give him the best chance of survival. My tank hasn’t been established for long but I’m hoping I have what he needs…

 

[ihavecrabs]

The best thing for a mandarin is an established tank. You need to have a tank that can sustain a copepod population.

 

[AZReef13]

I got a captive breed one over 3 years ago. I have been adding pods monthly, from Algae Barn, plus use their dragon.roe great for finicky fish and inverts too.. Plus I use both PE Mysis and Calanus.... the calamus is used by Biota on all their captive breed mandarins. She has been feed ind on the frozen foods add as well. My female just enjoys her tank. Lots will try a refuge to help grow Pods.

 

[Isopod80]

I hate to give you bad news but your chances of keeping this mandarin are quite low. If you just recently set up and seeded the tank there's no way it will sustain the fish long term. As another stated, mandarins are best kept in large, established tanks with a sustainable pod population and little to no competition for said pods. If this is a wild caught fish it will likely be difficult if not impossible to get it to accept other foods. Trying to buy live pods is impractical as well unless you plan on doing so every other day. These fish appear to eat an average of 1 pod every 3-5 seconds for most of the day. Even captive bred individuals do best in established systems. Mandarins are one fish that's best kept by experienced aquarist with proper, established setups only. If you don't see undeniable evidence that this fish is accepting other foods within the next few days then for the sake of the fish your best bet is to return it if possible. The sad fate of most mandarins is slow starvation. Couple that with the fact that very many are half starved or worse by the time you receive them.

 

[GradientHurdle]

Anyone have any tips to keep a mandarin goby happy and healthy? I love him and want to everything I can to help keep him alive. Tank has been seeded with copepods and I’ve added some pretty regularly but want to give him the best chance of survival. My tank hasn’t been established for long but I’m hoping I have what he needs…

Until I started ordering pods from algae barn, I was unsuccessful. Now my spotted mandarin is fat and happy 4 years on. The ocean magic is great for feeding. I've only added a new group three times and there are all sizes. Refugium is a big plus as well.

 

[DungSl1nger]

Your beat bet is to culture pods on the side while you dump pods in the tank. Mine would eat frozen of from through spot feeding but that was only twice a day. It was also a ORA mandarin. I have since moved cross country so I no longer have him, but he was fat when I gave him a way. you haven’t said what size tank you have or how much rock is in it. If you truly care about the fish I would order pods at least twice a moth while cultivating them and get the fish to eat frozen.

 

[Coralguy777]

The best thing for a mandarin is an established tank. You need to have a tank that can sustain a copepod population.

I feed mine brine srimp i basically put the garlic guard by seachem let the food frozen brine shrimp.sit in it even flake foods he has eaten but mostly frozen brine shrimp i usually feed mysis shrimp but he is a small guy so brine works well for him at this time have you tried feeding frozen to him ?

 

[Neptune 555]

Here is an idea for a mandarin... this will keep him fat and healthy. Paul B has done this for years! I did this in my 180 reef but the mandarin never found the feeder other fish did. This time I will train him in QT and after he has figured it out I will put him in my DT. When I say QT I mean a 10 gallon tank with LR and pods to help him acclimate. https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/which-dragonnet-is-the-easiest-to-keep.215290/