New Mandarin ?

well i love mandarins and know alot about them i have my 55 set up for 2 years but i have a bad GHA problem. Technically speaking i should be able to support the mandarin easily but im still hesitante because i dont see all that many at night. but i dont know if therer just getting lost in the GHA or if the mandarin will be able to pick copepods out of the GHA. ive also added close to 15000 copepods over the 2 years. based on this do you think i could get one know?

 

It would likely be able to find more pods than you can. It would probably be ok to put in the tank....

The problem here would be that if you ever lose that hair algae, your system would likely not be able to support a mandarin anymore. Hair algae was one of the things constantly recommended to have a lot of when dealing with mandarin, because pods live in hair algae (and other algae), and it's also a food source for them.

Do you have a refugium? Any other equipment, like a sump? Any other fish in the tank?

 

all in my signature

 

Since you have a fuge, it should be cool to do a mandarin. It's really that the pods need a safe haven from the mandarin, which a refugium provides wonderfully. What size is the fuge, part of a sump or one of the AquaClear ones?

 

its an intake fuge. i used a clear plastic tube about 8 inches in diameter with holes in it. i used some diatomic mud(aka cat liter) and macro algae

 

I'm not exactly sure what you mean, but it's probably cool. Chaeto or another edible algae is neccesary (can't be 100% caulerpa), but that's usually not a problem. Just has to be decently sized to produce enough pods.

 

JUST BOUGHT MY FIRST MANDARIN!!!!!! very excited just put her in the tank and shes not moving much just hiding behind the rocks. ill get some pics up soon as she comes out and the lights are on

 

It has nothing to do with mandarins directly eating the macroalgae. It ha to do with pods finding the macroalgae a suitable home where they can multiply and have an abundant food source.

 

i think hes saying that the pods eat the hair algae and live in it.