Mandarin spawning

[Raynn]

Hi all,


Yesterday, just after 10pm I had a pleasure watching my Mandarins’ mating dance.
After about 40 mins, my mandarins swam together to the top of my tank and spawned. I wasn’t prepared for this occasion, unfortunately my wave makers have broken all the eggs to single pieces, which firstly have been sticked together.
I spent about an hour collecting every single one I could see, and placing them in another container.

Have any of you had success with breeding mandarins? How long does it take for eggs to transform into larva stage? What should I use as a food for larva?



Any advices will be much appreciated.

 

[ISpeakForTheSeas]

Yes, people have had success with these (see the threads linked in the post of thread below - the post below also has some general aquaculture advice).

I've heard it takes ~13 hours after spawning for the eggs to hatch.

For food, you want Parvo pods (Parvocalanus crassirostris) - though I've heard that Ape pods [Apocyclops panamensis] work too - for the first foods (which they should start eating after ~48 hours). Then around day 7-14 (when the fish start to settle at the bottom of the tank), introduce Tisbe pods (Tisbe biminiensis). You can start training them onto prepared feeds (like tiny pellets) at the same time as you introduce the Tisbe. Around day 25 or so, they'll be able to start taking Baby Brine Shrimp (Artemia spp. - typically Artemia salina - nauplii), and they'll be ready to transfer from the rearing tank into a grow-out tank until they're large enough for a normal tank.

Blenny mating?

So these scooters and about 2 weeks in my tank. Definitely male and female (deliberately). Didn’t think this would happen so soon. Been seeing the male getting a little aggressive, chasing the female and showing his fins. Anyone with experience know if this actually is mating and what happens...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[SaltBabies]

I've haven't gotten them to settlement but I've gotten them to 14 days.
They spawn at night. I used to turn the pumps off around 30 minutes before lights out and I'd could see and collect eggs with a flashlight in about an hour or so. They were very consistent on timing so once you know about when they are going to go you can time it.

For me they hatched about 24 -26 hours. Then you have about 4-5 days before they form a mouth.
Literature says parvocalanus. I've hear people trying apex copepods. I got to about 14 days, I used a mix of everything I could find but I think I just didn't have enough really small food.

Here's a 18 hour picture. Note these things are also temperature dependent warmer hatches faster. and a day 6 picture.

 

[SaltBabies]

Oh and don't worry about these eggs once they are happy and start spawning they'll do it pretty much every night.

 

[Raynn]

Hi both, thank u for your advices.
I tried to build some kind of containers, which could be kept in the tank to keep the same water temperature as in my display tank. I couldn’t find any online, which will be suitable. I also put some air in there.
Today, I couldn’t notice any eggs left in the water. Some of them just dropped on the bottom, and change a colour to white, I just assume they are dead. Also, yesterday I noticed some larvae swimming around, but I can’t see them today. I put really small amount of frozen rotifiers and naupili baby shrimp into container. As I can’t find any live food suitable for larvae in uk. What else can I use to feed larvae?

Does it mean none of them survived?

 

[SaltBabies]

Ok so raising mandarins is expert level stuff. It is hard. frozen rotifers is not going to do it. Also they can't eat for like 4 days so no sense feeding them you'll just foul your water. generally rotifers and baby brine is too big.

I will bet there is someplace that has copepods. You'll need to look around. We also have guys on ebay selling copepods. most will be tisbe. Which from my experience didn't really work mainly because I think the tisbe actually attacked the larva as food.

The white ones that fell to the bottom either were not fertilized or got a bacterial infiltration. Yes they are dead. If you've seen larva then any eggs left are probably dead. they will hatch all within a few hours of each other generally. The larva can be super hard to see when young because they are clear. A strong flashlight can help.

I love trying new things and I do with all my breeding. So I hesitate to say something won't work. But in general you need very small copepod naupulii from parvocanlanus or maybe apopocyclops.

You might also check with any universities. My local university let me have some Isochrysis (algae) in a pinch.

Parvo's are hard to get a hold of and even harder for me to keep alive so I wish you luck.

 

[ISpeakForTheSeas]

I put really small amount of frozen rotifiers and naupili baby shrimp into container. As I can’t find any live food suitable for larvae in uk. What else can I use to feed larvae?

Ah, yeah rotifers won't work nutritionally and brine shrimp nauplii are going to be too big at first. It's always tough finding feeders in the UK.

You can culture and feed ciliates - depending on the strain of ciliates you end up with, they may or may not be nutritious enough to carry some larvae through the first few days (I've seen it work with spotted mandarins before, but I don't know the survival rate).

Yes - for how, this link has info (it's a bit wordy, but it's good):

The Breeder’s Net: The Culture Of Ciliates

Hopefully from this article, you will see the value of ciliate culture for the home fish breeder and understand why we dedicated this month's column to them.

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