Dragon goby

I'm concerned with my dragon goby. He seems to be getting skinny. I bought him about a week ago. I'm jot sure if he will be able to support himself just by sifting through my sand or if I need to do something else. Please advice

 

Do you have a steady supply of pods? U can start one in your sump/refugium. They eat a ton of them. Probably not possible to keep unless you have pods in a safe place

 

Well that's going to be a huge no. My tank is only two months old and i don't have a fuge set up. I'll have to get rid of the guy sigh I really liked him

 

Well I do have a ton of rock in my setup here is a fts.

I'm not sure if the pods would be able to survive or if i should just make a fuge. Or the third option is to see if anyone local wants to buy/trade for him

 

I would go with selling/trading or you could try making one of those pod condos do a quick google search

 

What a lot of people don't realize is that sand sifters are actively preying on the live sand infauna. Most will usually deplete a well-established sandbed in smaller tanks in only a couple of months and then starve. Even the gobies that may chase food don't compete well with other fish. I'd suggest you return him or sell/trade him to someone with a larger tank while he's still healthy.

 

Thank you Mr Bill

 

Or you could go with finding a small inaccessible cave and put pods in there and slip a net over it but that method is a bit risky. Try and look at your tank w a flashlight tonight in the dark and if you see little bug type things you have pods

 

I've been meaning to ask, how does a sand bed create infauna? Is there a way to increase the amount infauna?

 

FYI, dragon gobies are sand-sifters and do not chase free-swimming pods. Perhaps you've confused it with the mandarin dragonette (often incorrectly referred to as a goby)?