mandarin dragonet tank
 

Hello,

I'm hoping to base my new 100G tank around the mandarin dragonet. I would like something of everything. I will have live rock, 5" sand bed in tank, 8" dsb in refugium. For lighting I will eventually have 4 PC's half 10K and half actinic. The display tank is 72" x 18" x 18".

I would like some recommendations of fish, corals, and invertebrates that would behave together.

Regards,
Tahir

not alot of light, stick with softies. I have 6x55w PC's on my 58 gal & it's enough light for my LPS to live but their growth is sluggish while the softies are huge. 2xMH 250 10000K w/VHO antinics would offer alot more versatility in your coral selection & growth.

lighting wattage
 

I didn't provide proper information for the lighting. I'm hoping to have 4 PC hoods providing 110 Watts each. So that would be 4 x 55 Watt 10K and 4x 55 Watt Actinic. Should increase my seleciton a bit. Any more thoughts?

MH hood + bulbs are too expensive right off. Perhaps in a year or so I can upgrade to MH.

Yeah thats alot better. I'm very dissapointed with my PC antinics, you don't see that "glow"that you see under VHO. I think if I were to start again I would DIY VHO. I'm with you on the $$$$ of a full MH system, which was a major reason why I went PC. If you can hang in there & save the allowence so to speak, it might really be worth it though.
Luck :cool:

Here are some of my suggestions if you wish to base the tank on mandarins.

1. Your on the right track with lots of live rock,{dont skimp} and the dsb.
It will take awile for the sand & rock to be able to support mandarins.

2. The refugium sounds good. You could also grow different calerpa algaes or seagrass in the main tank instead, if you wished. Perfect home for mandarins and the food they eat.

3. Your lighting will be fine for the above algae and most soft corals. In a tank thats set up as described, corals like leathers would be nice. Also several polyps type corals.
I would stay away from anemones or any lps corals that eat larger things.

4. Non aggressive fish would be best tankmates. Although I have tangs and a large pair of clowns with my mandarin, I would avoide those if one one was setting the tank up with them in mind, esp for breeding purpose.
Also watch for other fish like wrasse,s that compete for food with the mandarins.

That's exactly right. Basically I'm on half allowance for the rest of the year to pay for the initial setup.

specific fish & corals
 

Doug,

I would really appreciate it if you could give me specific species of fish and invertebrates to investigate. I'll be posting my livestock list before I make my purchases, that should bring additional comments from people such as yourself.

I will try to think of more fish and corals that would be good. Julian Sprung once wrote on a 75 gal tank for mandarins, but that was several years ago. I dont have the article anymore.

For other corals, perhaps some types of mushrooms. I once had a huge colony of green star polyps that grew up both overflows. It had layers of mat on it, which housed a bazzillion bugs.

Fish like, some of the goby fish, like yellow watchman. Jawfish would be good tankmates. For upper water, perhaps green chromis, although they require several feeding per day. Perhaps a smaller species of tank raised clowns, like percs. They could live in a large umbrella type leather coral. Problem is they are still clowns and can get agressive, not to mention clowns and damsels,{ esp. the larger ones}, have a tendacy to fan the crap out of your sandbed, making a mess.

I will think of more once my brain gets working again. :biggrin:

I went looking for this article but didn't find it online. I did find a lot of related information though. So far this is what I'm thinking:

3 to 6 Chromis - viridis ( blue green )
pair of Perculas ( clowns )
Mandarin - splendidus ( green )

Now I'm looking for a host for the clowns and other corals what would get along all together. Plus shrimp, hermit crabs, and snails.

It was in one of his old reef notes. I have the published books of reef notes, buy have to find them.

Julian does write for www.advancedaquarist.com and does sometimes respond to questions in the forums.

The percs should host in any coral that provides protection. Once your tank is mature and can support mandarins, perhaps you could add a pair. Its important to make sure you have a female & male, as two males will kill each other.

Try find healthy mandarins, if possible like mine, some that are eating frozen brine. They can also be fed live brine shrimp.

I must add, I dont advocate mandarins being kept by inexperienced aquarists. They are hard fish to keep, but if a tank is set up proper and large enough, {as you are interested in}, they can be kept. Its unfortunate, but to many are sold to new aquarists, as cute little fish that are easy to keep in a small tank.

I plan to wait for 18 - 24 months before even thinking about adding the Mandarin. By then I should have 150 - 200 lbs of mature live rock plus a stable refugium. I have used J & L's online information plus other sources to come up with a list of my livestock. Luckily for me J & L has a lot of their stock from the Indo-Pacific region, same as the Mandarin - Splendidus. After a bit more thinking I will post the most likely candidates and see what people say about putting those fish and corals together in a tank along with Mandarins.

Thanks for the help.

I must commend you on your excellent planning. :biggrin:

I forgot to mention before about shrimp. They are voracious pigs. All from coral banded, peppermints or the common kept cleaners. They love to eat things in the sandbed and from the rock.

Most of us keep them in some form, and my cleaners worked over my sailfin daily. But I have seen many of the experienced reefers on the boards, moving away from cleaners, {unless they have large fish}.

Peppermints are mostly used for apitasia. Kinda stupid shrimp,IMO. :biggrin: Coral Banded have large claws for grabbing food and are fine if well fed. If not they will find food one way or the other.

Thank you. Long ago my first tank was a 20 Gl, in Winnipeg. Even knowing that the LFS happily sold me the Mandarin. We were very sad to have to take Kermit back when he started to starve. Even after trying brine shrimp and frozen shrimp. Now, I am older, wiser, and can afford the expensive books to do more research.

Does that mean I should stay away from the cleaner shrimp so the Mandarin does not have competition for it's food supply? Or will the cleaners eat frozen food before they go after the local critters?

No, you may keep cleaners if you wish. I just wanted to mention they are not the saints many believe them to be. In your set-up, there should be enough food for all. They will eat all frozen foods, like their kin folk, mysis & brine. :lol: They also eat flakes, pelletts or anything else I feed my tank and climb everywhere or on anything to get it. I have seen them in tug of war fights, with serpent stars over a piece of food.

I totaly agree, feed my tank the other night and watched my cleaner jump off a rock and tried to pull a piece of food out of the mouth of my yellow tang