Mandarin Eating Frozen!

[maxfrenkel19]

Hey Y'all

After weeks of my mandarin only eating live food, and another week of me THINKING he was starting to eat frozen but not being sure, he now definitively does eat frozen! I have seen him take multiple big pieces of frozen mysis into his mouth and NOT spit it out.

Anyway no real point to this thread other than to share a small victory with people who care about fish. Saying "I got my fish to eat food!" to a non-fish person doesn't get much of a response

So to anyone considering trying to get a mandarin on frozen, it can be done!

Max

 

[LiquidDecent]

Nice


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Balz3352]

Nice! Wish I had the know how and diligence to do this... I guess I'll just wait to get a big tank that can support a big enough pod population

 

[sethsolomon]

Congrats! now you have a buddy for life

 

[maxfrenkel19]

Nice! Wish I had the know how and diligence to do this... I guess I'll just wait to get a big tank that can support a big enough pod population

It did require some diligence but overall wasn't as bad as I thought, if you do decide to try give me a shout, happy to throw in my $.02

Congrats! now you have a buddy for life

That's the plan! Visited MBC over the weekend and saw their 6 year old mandarin, biggest I've ever seen...inspired to fatten mine up.

 

[CRW Reef]

Congrats on that, I need to get my 3yr old mandarin to do that still what was your trick?

 

[FinsUp]

Yeah, I can only imagine the response if I said to a non-fish buddy, "HEY!!! I got my mandarin to eat frozen!"

 

[Balz3352]

Interested in selling a mandarin that eats frozen

 

[Balz3352]

But on a more serious note I'm sure I'm not the only one that would be interested in a good write up on this process,

 

[Jeremiah]

I recently posted the following

Ding ding ding...read some stuff about feeding mandarin mysis.
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1492650


totally worked...my mandarin is eating frozen mysis.




if anyone is interested...probably won't work in large tank, but for those of you with a smaller tank.
Turn off all flow...everything so that the water is calm. Everyone who posted said their mandarin would go to a spot when that happened and sure enough mine does also...must be a spot he feels safe in.


Then just direct mysis shrimp shower over him. He didn't grab any as it fell but as soon as it stopped moving he would peck at it like they do. He ate like 4-5 of them before losing interest.


I also read people doing the same thing with tiny pellets. I will try them tomorrow and if he doesn't eat them then do mysis again

So far he doesn't go after pellets.

He is now eating out of the water column(doesn't wait till they hit the bottom) but I still turn off my flow because he is slow and can't catch the food.

 

[maxfrenkel19]

Congrats on that, I need to get my 3yr old mandarin to do that still what was your trick?

But on a more serious note I'm sure I'm not the only one that would be interested in a good write up on this process,

I'll do a quick write up on my process when I get a couple minutes... Seems Jeremiah posted a good thread on it already but I'll add what worked for me. +1 on the no flow. These fish will not chase down food like many others, if it doesn't land and STAY PUT directly under their mouths, they probably won't eat it. SO frustrating watching pieces of food bounce off his fins, body, and even eyeballs without him registering it.

Interested in selling a mandarin that eats frozen

Of course! Current bidding price is $700 PM me