Roe and Cyclo-Peeze

I've begun to worry about the state of the new mandarin.

He decimated my thriving pod population in a week. I can still see amphipods at night, but the preferred little copepods are nearly invisible. The pod pile is still active, which gives me some hope--if I keep at least some pods alive, they will continue to reproduce, though not in great numbers as before. The copepods have always been difficult to see in the pod pile so I can't say if they're in there in abundance or not.

The mandarin is also getting skinny fast. The rate it's happening is so alarming that I may have to give him away at the local reef club meeting next week. However...

I think I may see some light in the tunnel.

I ordered a new batch of copepods from Sharky's Reef, a top notch online retailer. Fast and friendly customer service, great deals, and beautiful corals... I definitely recommend the site.
Anyway, the new copepods product is called Seapods. It is a lot cheaper than the bottles I bought last time, and Sharky's shipping makes it affordable, as opposed to the ridiculous 10 dollar 2 day shipping you are required to do for the other brand.

My last culturing experience was a total waste of time and resources. I'm not doing that again. Instead, I may order a number of these bottles from Sharky's every month, the exact quantity to be determined when I inject the two initial bottles directly into the tank.

Today I went to the LFS and finally bought some Cyclo-peeze. I was expecting frozen blocks, but instead I came home with some freeze-dried. Freeze-dried looks like powdered red chunks, and they break apart when they hit the water to reveal copepod-size "Cyclo."

And for the first time, I honestly believe the mandarin is eating something other than pods.
Though my turkey baster has not been exactly effective, I sprayed enough to settle on the bottom and some of the rocks, and the rest--that wasn't engulfed by the clown and the rampaging brittle star--eventually came to a standstill too. I watched the mandarin for about five minutes and saw it hitting up the area of sand directly blasted with the Cyclo. The mandarin was busy consuming... and he was chewing, which is something different from the other times when I thought he maybe was eating mysis or frozen brine.

I also bought some roe too, the orange fish eggs on sushi. Unfortunately, it has soy and crap on them, but it was all they had... and the clownfish loved it nonetheless. Later today I'm going to inject the tank again with roe to see what happens.

This mandarin was hale and hearty for 2 weeks at the fish store with NO live rock whatsoever. This makes me believe he was accepting some form of prepared foods as his state has diminished in my care when I had loads of pods... (the pic below is for any nay-saying asshole). Unfortunately, all those white dots above have vanished due to the mandarin's appetite. But I am working on bringing them back.

I've learned a lot from my last go-around. I do not intend to lose this mandarin too.

- J
http://joshday.com