Copepods-where to start?

Discussion in 'Fish Food' started by devo1108, May 8, 2011.

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  1. devo1108

    devo1108 Plankton

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    Hello all.

    I am going to purchase a mandarin soon, and i know these arent the easiest fish to keep. I have about 45 lbs of live rock in my 37 gallon tank. when i started my tank, i scorched the live rock during the curing process due to a faulty heater. the water was too hot to touch :(. I assume this pretty well killed off anychance of having copepods, or anything substantial living in the rock. Ive had my tank up for about 8 months now. My question is, what is the best way to inhabit my tank with copepods? Any tips/comments about copepods will be greatly appreciated :).
     
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  3. Corailline

    Corailline Super Moderator

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    It is a dry heat, yeah right !
  4. Greg9MM

    Greg9MM Skunk Shrimp

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    If u want to buy some pods Reefs2go.com has good prices and they are running buy 1 get 1 free on pods. Shipping sucks but u could add some other things and make it worth it.

    I am actually going to order some myself and anyone that reads this, can u put to many in ur tank? I was thinking about getting 1000 or 2.
     
  5. telstar

    telstar Fire Worm

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    first, your tank is not big enough to maintain the number of copepods a mandarin will require. You will need a fuge to grow and maintain copepods, even then you may have to periodically purchase more copepods to maintain a healthy mandarin.

    This is just my opinion, others may think differently.
     
  6. epsilon

    epsilon Feather Star

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    Do you have a sump/refugium? If you have a refugium, some chaeto and a few pods in there either from your tank or from a bottle from your LFS and they should thrive in there. From what i'm told anyway. I just started them in mine a few days ago so can't really say how effective it was yet... Another option would be to start a pod farm. There was a good post started on this the other day. May want to look into that, that's what i'll be doing if this fails.
     
  7. epsilon

    epsilon Feather Star

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    agree if he doesn't have a fuge up and going...
     
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  9. benbabcock

    benbabcock Bubble Tip Anemone

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    i will agree that you really need a fuge or a larger aquarium unless you plan on purchasing pods bi-weekly. mandarins are a commitment for sure.
     
  10. devo1108

    devo1108 Plankton

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    No fuge. just the tank. does anyone have any opinions on the bottled copepods from fosters and smith?
     
  11. devo1108

    devo1108 Plankton

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    and also, i plan on just purchasing copepods for the time being. Is there any care involved with them? or do i just add them to the tank and let em go?
     
  12. ComputerJohn

    ComputerJohn Panda Puffer

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    I agree, you'll need a fuge or a larger tank. I have a mandarin in my 90gal and she goes everywhere looking for pods. I do have a fuge to supply my main tank.

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