Training The Trickiest fish on Earth to Eat Prepared Foods....

[Suzanne Lynn]

So today I decided I'm going to attempt training my dwarves and mandarin to eat dead foods. I have too many now to feed them live constantly. Not to mention that only feeding them brine shrimp (even if they are enriched/fed with spirulina powder) I'm going to track my progress here and post lots of pictures. I hope that if anyone else has trained a difficult fish like a mandarin or pipefish to eat they would like to share pictures and progress here! For now I'll just post pics of my seahorse setup because I know how much you guys love pics! lol

Here's my plan step by step

Seahorses

1. spray paint the bottom and three sides of a breeder box black so that the fish inside doesn't spend all of its time trying to get out and can spot food easier
2. buying and painting the outside of a few small petri dish like dishes bright orange so that the horses associate the dish with food.
3. I've noticed one or two females snicking up dead shrimp so I'm going to put them in the box with another horse so that they can "show" him/her how its done
4. if my petri dish does help the fish make a connection, then I will slowly change the foods from brine shrimp to more nutritious meals.

Mandarin

1. noticed my female mandarin eating live adult brine so I will apply the same idea as with the seahorses but need to find a small jar to put the food in so that when introduced to the larger tank, the mandarin wont be out competed for food.

 

[ReefCheif]

I started my female mandarin on live brine while still in QT. I gradually began to mix in small amounts of frozen brine with each feeding, gradually increasing the amount of frozen and reducing the live. After the mix was about 50/50 i began to drastically reduce the amount of live brine and started adding other frozens suxh as mysis. She now eats frozens just like everybody else, she is still a rock grazer and loves her pods.

I recently aquired a small male from Drew, put him in QT, caught the female, put her in with him in hioes they would pair off before getting lost in the 180. Its working great, not only are they bonding, he is already beginning to show interest in frozen blood worms due to the example of the female!

I used this same method to get a clown tang eating frozens

 

[Suzanne Lynn]

good to hear that the monkey see monkey do works!!!

 

[ReefCheif]

It seems to be, I fed tonight more frozen than live and the little male ate just fine, hes actually nice and fat. Ive removed most of the live rock from the QT to try and limit the amount of available pods in hopes he would eat more of what Im putting in and it seemed to work, Im thinking one more week and the pair should be good to go in the DT, although Im also thinking it might be cool to try and breed them, but I dont know the first thing about breeding mandarins, nor do I think I have the time. Bred alot of cichlids in my day, but no mandarins. LOL

I really cant believe how easy it was to pair these guys up though, once the male quits being shy Ill try to snap a few photos.

 

[Suzanne Lynn]

well if they lay eggs give them to me and I'll try, you'll be able to tell because the female gets really fat before she's about to release eggs.

 

[Suzanne Lynn]

Here's my breeder box newly painted with Krylon Fusion black, which I heard would be safe for aquarium use. The side that typically faces out of the tank has no paint. now I just have to let it cure for a few days (7 to be exact)

 

[Suzanne Lynn]

So I couldn't wait for the paint to cure the seven days (meaning it might flake off someday) and I spotted a female combing the base of the tank for morsels and plopped her in the breeder along with a few other random horses. I'm going to put in some dead food and observe.

 

[LittleCrabby101]

Love the pictures Suzanne! I'm very interested to see how this little experiment works. With my mandarin (he just recently passed) he would eat prepared foods but since he was slower then the rest of his tank mates I would target feed him. He would pick the shrimp out of the macroalge. If he didn't do that I would put food in a little jelly jar and set it on the bottom and he would go in and eat. Why he died is a mystery, but he was quite large.

 

[Suzanne Lynn]

He might have just died of old age I hope it works! on the plus side I have more seahorse babies!

 

[LittleCrabby101]

He might have just died of old age I hope it works! on the plus side I have more seahorse babies!

I was thinking he may have died from old age cause he was quite large and who knows how old he was. But in three weeks I've lost three fish! How often do your seahorses have babies?

 

[Suzanne Lynn]

I think it was every six weeks

 

[Suzanne Lynn]

New update, my female mandarin is now eating frozen brine shrimp, I will move onto mysis as soon as I can get a new breeder box to put her in (stole one for my seahorse fry and the other for training the adult dwarves) or as soon as the adult dwarves learn to accept frozen shrimp. I saw a few scooping up dead shrimp so it's either a fluke or progress. I released the female mandarin into my big tank a day ago and noticed that when the food (frozen brine shrimp) was dropped in the tank she sought it out and pecked at a few, I hope to put her back in the breeder box and offer more and more mysis and less brine shrimp, then I will do the same with pellets. I hope to get both the seahorses and dragonet eating pellets by the time I'm done....If I'm REALLY lucky.

 

[andrew]

My green mandarine attacks mysis now. he seems to love mysis. he even goes after it will it's floating in the tank. He doesnt eat big ones but the small ones do good. good luck

 

[Suzanne Lynn]

My female mandarin is officially chowing down on pellets now!!!! The box was a complete success for her and an utter failure for the seahorses.... Only a few have occasionally pecked at dead brine shrimp and haven't seemed to make a habit out of it. I'm going to draw the conclusion here that like many smaller breeds of dog these horses may just be too.... simple-minded to learn to eat frozen and that's why Oceanrider and breeders all over the world have had no success in switching to 100% frozen.. Just a guess though and I applaud anyone who is willing to try!

up next?.... Dragon faced pipefish, a male dragonet and a larger breeds of seahorse!

 

[SquidBreath]

Great thread...tagging along

 

[Suzanne Lynn]

I got a male mandarin today (hes on the right 3X bigger than the female) courtesy of Nick Ambrosio of Ambrosio's Aquatics, Biggest, fattest and healthiest male mandarin I've ever seen. Its love at first sight and she's showing him how to eat frozen brine which he's now picking at.

 

[joeMASC]

Training The Trickiest fish on Earth to Eat Prepared Foods....

I have a pregnant mandarin that looks like she may lay the eggs any day now. I'm hoping to be ready to catch the eggs if I'm around when it happens. I thought It happened tonight but I had a mysid shrimp explosion instead. I caught about 100 of the mysid and haven in a 20l with air stones and a heater.

Any advice on keeping the mysid alive or catching the mandarins eggs?

 

[Suzanne Lynn]

I have no experience with mysid so that's hard... as far as I know with those you just keep them well fed (phytoplankton) and or far away from their parents. but as for mandarin eggs.... they will be released at night or at dusk under moonlight. When this happens you should suck up the eggs up in a turkey baster or water bottle. After that, I believe the fry hatch rather quickly like within 24 hours or something crazy like that. They are pelagic and will need a kreisel or similar current to grow. I have a kreisel but unfortunately its not up and cycled yet. The newborn fry should develop mouths and eat phytoplankton or VERY small rotifers within three days. Let me know how that goes! Ive been trying to breed mandarins for a while now but its been difficult to get a decent pair of mandarins.

 

[Suzanne Lynn]

UPDATE:

I put the new male in a breeder box with my female. I added some frozen brine and a few pellets so that she could maybe show him the ropes and it worked great! She has him chowing down on pellets like a champ after only one night of being introduced! I'm going to keep them in there for a few more days just to ensure that they are both feeding well. Hopefully by then my new heater will be in and I will be able to introduce them to their breeding tank.

 

[andyrm66]

I just picked up 2 ORA Greens. Getting along nicely. Just picked at some R.O.E. I tried giving them. Paid almost 90 for both of them at Petco. Sitting in my frag tank as QT isn't ready, nor do I really want to setup the 40B for 2.5" worth of fish. Worried about getting them to eat, but they are plump right now. Have some small pellets. Blood works and ROE. Going to try the ROE and blood worms then pellets if we get that far. Any tips? Almost think I should put them in better hands, slighty worried.