Live pods in cowtown

Delphinus · #1 10-23-2007, 05:49 AM

I'll echo Mark's concern about housing a 6line and mandarin together, I did the combo in a 75g for nearly a year before the 6line went berserk and attacked the mandarin. I found the poor thing laying on the bottom without any fins left and no means of locomotion. Succumbed that night.

Stupid 6line. They start off life as nice fish but turn into territorial bullies/jerks once a few years old. I won't get another after this one goes. Any fish that he deems as "competition" had better be able to attack back otherwise he relentlessly bullies them. He attacked my flame hawk at first, until the flame hawk attacked back (and won), same for my potters angel, he relentlessly targetted her until she started fighting back (and winning). Total bully mentality - as long as he thinks he can get away with it, he'll be a jerk.

Sorry for the off topic tangent BTW.

I guess so it's not a completely random musing, I'm currently trying "Artic Pods" (by Reed Mariculture). They're like big honking cyclops-eeze. I bought them in the hopes my CBB would take to them so that his diet isn't completely monotypic on mysis, but so far no go. My tang seems to like them though

Course he'd probably eat rocks if I offered them to him, so I guess that's not much of an endorsement.

danny zubot · #2 10-24-2007, 04:33 AM

I got my first pod by trading sand with other reefers. A cup for a cup, or a rock for a rock from various reefers will go along way to diversify your sand bed.

digital-audiophile · #3 10-24-2007, 01:45 PM

I have roughly 40lbs of live rock in my sump with Chaeto and the only inhabitant in there is a single ocellaris clown.

If seen pod piles mentioned before. Are they basically just a small pile of rubble in the display tank?

Tony - I hear you about the six line. I loved him when I got him but he has become a realy jerk in the tank. It's funny, he jumped out around 2 months ago but I was there shortly after and got him back in the tank and brought him back to life. I should have left him on the carpet. He is even worse now though as I think he suffered some mental damage whne he was on the carpet.

...allthough politcally incorrect we call him Corky now

michika · #4 10-24-2007, 02:45 PM

I've never had a sixline go crazy on me *knock on wood*, and mine has lived peacefully with my mandarin for a few years.

As for the pod piles they are just small piles of rubble that a sixline or wrasse can't get into. They can be rubble, they can just be really porous rock, etc.

mark · #5 10-24-2007, 03:09 PM

My 6-line not psycho either, actually find rather interesting how he cruises the current and goes throughout the rock. By competition meant that he's a pod eating machine.

At night with a flash light, tank used to crawl with pods, since getting the wrasse, have to look really hard now to find any.

Pod piles just areas of rubble or large pieces of crushed coral.

Der_Iron_Chef · #6 10-24-2007, 03:24 PM

Do Centropyge also eat pods? I used to see tons of them at night (with a flashlight, like Mark), but not so much recently, after adding a Rusty Angelfish.

Delphinus · #7 10-24-2007, 03:42 PM

Centropyge's likely do reduce a pod population some. Pretty much anything eats pods really, it's just that mandarins are such ponderous eaters ("Hmmm shall I eat this or not? Hmmmm? Hmmmmm?") that usually if you offer them any prepared foods, that the other tankmates eat up all of it before they get enough of it. Thus, the the need for enough of a live population of pods that the mandarin can work on for other the 23 hours, 55 minutes that you're not there trying to directly feed them. Sometimes you get one that "figures it out" and eats food when offered but that's more an exception than the rule.

Catherine, Mark, I'm glad you trust your sixlines but I'm just posting my experience which in hindsight is a fairly well documented trait with these fish. I too thought "No, my mandarin is a nice fish" ... Lived peacefully with a mandarin for at least a full year after I moved the mandarin in from a different tank that I was taking down. There was no warning or any kind of lead-up to the event, otherwise I could have tried something. Anyhow, forewarned is forearmed. Sixlines are OK fish but they are known to become potentially troublesome as they age.