Sea horse from indian ocean

P

peterlin

[Well, I ordered two seahorse from salwaterfish.com - and I did it because I was intrigued by the MACNA photos of seahorse taken by Marc.

I'm hatching brine shrimp from egg - so I'm going to use it to feed these seahorse. Plus they will be housed in the refugium by themselves..so they will not be harassed by other fish.

Anyone else in the club has experience with seahorse? Chris - I think you bought seahorse recently..how did that work out for you?

I used to have live rotifers..but I did not keep up with them. Anyone has live rotifers that I can have some to get started again?]
 
[Hi Peter,

Seahorses have no stomach so they need a constant supply of food to do well. A refugium will be a good place to house them as they will be free from compitition for food as you mentioned. I kept a banded red tailed pipefish for a few years in a 120 until I added a couple of wrasses. Bad move on my part.

Sorry, I don't have any rotifers, but you should be able to score some online. But enriched brine should work better actually if they will eat it.

Good luck!]
 
[Peter,
I am not a seahorse expert but I don't think you need to go as small as rotifers unless the seahorses are babies. Their mouths are very deceiving they look tiny but even a small seahorse can eat a full grown brine shrimp.

Good Luck!]
 
[I'm starting a seahorse nanoreef myself. Mysis shrimp is the only way to go. Seahorse can starve on brine shrimp but if you want to go cheap enriched brine is the way to go. Also might want to take a look at oceanrider.com. They sell capitive breed with the mated pair. Very import buy a mated pair and the larger the better they mate for life and without a suitable mate will not live long in capitivity. Lastly, shifting, weak currents is very important. A sump might have too much current depending on your pull(return pump). Seahorses kind of drift in the water and depend on the current to move back into feeding areas.]
 
[So my seahorses arrived today. They are much bigger than I expected. Each is about 3 inch, yellow. If they don't die in a day or two, I'll get around to take pictures.

I totally forgot that they arrive today..so I used up all of my baby brine shrimp. It'll be another 2 days before the new batch is ready. I'll have to find food source soon.

BrianC - RE mysis, are you referring to frozen food?

I think my refugium may have to strong of water current. The frag prop. area is probably better.]
 
[I wasn't very clear. I was not suggesting feeding brine shrimp. I was only using it for a size reference. I thought anyone around here would know what size a grown brine shrimp is. Sorry for any confusion.]
 
[Hi Peter
Yes you can start trying frozen mysis shrimp. Let it thaw and only drop in a couple pieces at a time. If they were eating live food before it may take some effort to get them to eat frozen.

The slower the flow, the better and they have no need for strong light. Make sure your heater is in a seperate compartment from the horses. If they latch on to it while it is on they could burn themselves.

I have a list of corals they should be kept away from, if you need it let me know.

If you get some time drop in at seahorse.org and do some reading there.

Good Luck! :D]
 
[Thanks Terry and Amanda.

I'll keep you posted on my effort to keep sea horse in my refugium. I wish I had known to get a mated pair. I could have purchased just one..but I thought it might get bored all by itself in a 30 g refugium.

Wish me luck that they'll eat frozen food. It's not easy to get adult live brine shrimp. LFS has them on certain day of the week. And in the long run - I would prefer that they feed on baby brine shrimp and supplement on other frozen food like mysis..or enriched brine shrimp]
 
[I've seen Fish Paradise selling live brine shrimp on several occasions. You might call them.

Are they latching onto your macro algae for something to hold onto? I don't believe you'll have too much flow in there, except when feeding. That is a good time to stop the current, if possible. Did you put a ball valve on that line?]
 
[Here is a picture of my seahorse

seahorse.jpg
alt="">

Marc - I was going to put seahorse in the refugium - but the current is too strong. So at the moment I put them in the frag area. The seahorse grab on the egg crate. The two seahorse came with Deep Sea Yellow Gorgonian.

I'm going to try to put some live rock where the 2nd drain pipe leads to the refugium..maybe cut down on the flow? I did not install a ball value because I did not think that I would want to restrict the water return to sump.]
 
[You might consider putting them in the refugium anyway to see how they do. After all, the refugium is supposed to be their food source. Of the food they eat, only 25% is digested and the rest is pooped back out. They need to eat all the time, so the fuge is the place to go.

Try observing them and see how they handle the current.

Btw, don't use a net to catch them, use a clear container like a specimen box so you can catch them and the water they are in, and transfer them gently.

They look beautiful!]
 
[I just p.m you sorry I didn't refrence sooner but not all require mates unfortunately most do I will do some research for you if you would like what kind of sea horsees are they common or scientic name???]
 
[Thanks Brian.

I got a reply from Reef Central that these are Hippocampus barbouri.

Yesterday one of the seahorse ate the frozen brine shrimp/mysis. It does not go after food very quickly.]
 
[Maybe I have a pair, but they dont' care for each other yet. One of them holds on to the rock, while the other one likes to float around by the water current. Very weird creature...I spent alot of time observing them..]
 
[that might be a sign that they do care one maybe looking for food while the other is waiting? I think there is some role reversal particularly in that the male carries the baby to term???]
 
[Here is an update to my seahorses. One is really eating, even float to eat frozen brine shrimp or mysis. By the way, where can I find PE mysis ?

seahorse_1.jpg
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seahorse_2.jpg
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[Peter:
Try Dallas North I have purchased it there in the past couple of months. They have a good frozen selection.

Steve]
 
@Amanda wrote:
[I have a list of corals they should be kept away from said:
[Amanda I just e-mailed and p.m you to make sure you got my request could you send me a copy of that list or include it in this thread thanks]
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