How long till mandarin?

I know to get a mandarin the tank has to be pretty well established with lots of growth to keep the mandarin happy. I am just curious as to how long this usaully takes. I have had my tank up and running for about 6 months now. I have about 80 pounds of live rock- I know that can make a difference. They eat copepods, I haven't noticed any in my tank, but I havent looked hard and there is soo much rock to look at. Is there a way to get copepod population up. Sorry long post!


Thanks guys!!

 

Im also curious to see what peoples opinions are on this...

 

I know let's hear it from the Guru's.... yea I just called ya out- lol!

 

for mandrines or other pod exclusive eating fish need at least a year before you can add these fish unless you get extreemly lucky and get one that actualy eats brine or other prepared foods

 

6 months to a year is what I would wait, however, without a refugium or other type of safe haven for copepods to reproduce, a dragonette will quickly wipe out a pod population in less than a year. If you don't think you have pods, take a good look at your tank glass after the lights have been out for a few hours

 

My tank was flooded with Copopods and I decided to get a Mandarin simply because they are one of the coolest looking marine fish, It lived 6 months totally ran out of food.

It just kept getting littler and littler until it died.

I tried all types of frozen preps to keep him going.

Hard to keep lil fellow...

Never thought of the refugium to create a safehaven for the pods.

 

you can always buy copepods to keep replenishing

 

the problem with this is the amount you buy about 500 at a time can be wiped out in a day and at about 10 bucks or more for this makes a very expensive way to keep a fish better off doing a fuge of some sort to grow the pods and waiting for the population to grow to and adiquet size before trying to add one of these fish

 

many mandarins can be tempted with frozen food - as long as the competition for it isnt to stiff. Thats what i found with mine anyway!

 

I waited a whole year before I added my mandarin when I was sure that I had a good copepod, amphipod population. You can see my tank specs below. I seeded my fuge twice with tigger pods in the few months previous to adding the mandarin I have had him for 3 months now and it is great to see him growing up I bought a small one .