Green Mandarin
Common Names: Green Mandarin, Mandarinfish, Mandarin Dragonet, Psychedelic fish
Scientific Name: Synchiropus splendidus
Family: Callionymidae
Maximum Size: 4 inches
Life expectancy: years
Minimum Tank Size: 30 gallons
Temperature Range: 72 - 78 °F
pH Range: 8.1 - 8.4
Sg: 1.020 - 1.025
Water hardness: dkH 8 - 12
Temperament: Peaceful
Origin: Indonesia, Australia, Philippines and New Guinea
Aquarium Setup:
The suggested large size tank isn’t for the Green Mandarin’s size, it’s for their feeding habits. They feed off of the bottom on the live rocks and sand and need a large feeding area to assure they can find enough pods. Although, smaller tanks can be used if the pod population is sufficient.
Mandarin’s can be kept in reef aquariums without any problems. They like live sand, live rocks and love lots of places to hide. They’re almost always scouring the bottom for food.
Diet:
Diet is about the only problem with these fish, they will often refuse to eat. Another problem is that they’re slow and other fish will take the food before they can even get to it.
Adding brine shrimp and worms to the aquarium will help in providing them with a steady diet. Many Mandarin’s will only eat live foods, rotifers can also be added to the diet. Fresh chopped shrimp and other seafoods can be added as well.
Tank Mates/Community:
These are very peaceful fish that seem to ignore and be ignored by other fish. They can be introduced into any community of peaceful fish and even large fish as long as their not overly aggressive.
If two Mandarin males are kept together it is likely that they will fight. They should either be kept as a single species in the tank or kept as a pair. Some suitable tank mates are Firefish, Cardinalfish and Clownfish.
They should not be kept with Triggerfish, Sharks, Rays or Groupers. Angelfish in the same tank may also pose a problem. Since the pod population in the tank is their main source of diet, they shouldn’t be kept with other fish or invertebrates that eat pods.
Behavior:
Green Mandarins are very docile, slow moving fish. They use their pectoral fins to sort of hop or walk across the bottom of the tank and across rocks and corals.
Color:
The Green Mandarin is a very exotic, detailed fish, almost looking as if it’s been carefully painted by hand! The body is covered in a maze like design that feature colors of blue, green and orange.
There’s some white accents and a series of small yellow spots at the sides of it’s head. Some may have browns, black and instead of orange, the color may be more reddish.
Breeding:
Though difficult, spawning Mandarins has been successful. When the females stomach becomes swollen, keep an eye on the pair. They will make some practice runs, aligning their bodies and swimming into the water column.
Eventually on one of these practice runs, the female will release the eggs. Once the eggs are released, the pair will quickly descend to the tank bottom and the eggs will rise to the top of the water.
Eggs will need to be removed to keep them from being ate. You can carefully scoop them up off of the waters surface with a cup or small bottle.
The eggs will hatch in just hours, but the Mandarins begin life as prolarvae that have no eyes, mouth or fins. Although, they will have large yolk sacs to feed on.
The fry will go through several transformations and should be ready to eat by the time they’re four days old. They can be fed a diet of rotifers and zooplankton.
The fry will go through various color changes and body changes for almost two months. By the time they are around 50 days old, they will start to show their intricate designs and some colors.
Interesting Notes:
Green Mandarins have a built in protection mechanism that deters predators. They can secrete a poisonous, toxic mucus through their scaleless skin!
Due to their preference for foraging for live food on the tank bottom, the mortality rate in Mandarin’s is high. Many are only able to survive for a few months.
You can train your Mandarin to eat other foods. Keep your Mandarin in a breeder basket and start feeding them live brine shrimp. Then slowly introduce frozen foods to the basket. Once they’ve started eating the frozen foods release them into the tank!
