Seahorse in Nano tank

Check this one out:

Seahorses - Hippocampus erectus

That is by every opinion I've heard the best source for horses. They guarantee them to be eating frozen food and I believe have some type of life time guarantee as well. There are a lot of good facts on that site as well.

 

Yes, Seahorsesource is held in high esteem by the members of the "org".

 

We had 5 Lined Seahorses in our aquarium for a good 8 months. They where caught by a local waterman in his crab pots and he knew we had a saltwater tank so he asked if we wanted to take a couple. He got a few more and we took those in. The first pair we drip acclimated them for a good 2 hours. Then we just let them go free into the tank. They hid for a few hours then came out, and swam like crazy. We had some sea whips that they loved to hang off of and we would feed them frozen mysis shrimp as well as some live brine shrimp we grew in a setup i got offline. We also got about 1000 pods for them to forage for during the time in between feeding periods.

For them we did spot feeding with a sea squirt and they did very well for the time we did have them. We even had them mate 2 times, set up a 10 gallon to keep the offspring but unfortunately no survivors. The last seahorse passed about 4 days ago and while i will miss the little guys as they where majestic and had amazing personality. I will never buy some from a store if i can come across some more caught ones i will make a species only tank, this time.

 

I'm wondering why you would get more wild caught when they only lasted 8 months for you.
Properly kept seahorse lifespan in an aquarium would be in the 5 to 8 year range.
Unfortunately, wild caught seahorses have problems other than training to eat frozen food.
In tanks, the pathogens they carry will usually become infestations that can kill them off. Usually, these infestations are internal parasites that you don't see and in time, kill the seahorse. The treatment protocol for these wild caught, as well as captive bred/tank raised seahorses from places like asia and south america (raised in ocean water) can be found at the "org".
WILD CAUGHT DEWORMING PROCEEDURE
If you buy TRUE captive bred that haven't seen ocean water, you have much better chances of success, although even that is no guarantee.
Places like seahorsesource.com provide excellent stock with MUCH fewer problems than wild caught or asian and south american imports.

 

I loved the little guys, to be honest the tank they where in was not setup for seahorses when we received them. I made some changes based on what research i did to accommodate them the best we could.

As far as the other problems i did not know about these, makes me reconsider this now. They where caught in the Patuxent River, right near the bottom which feeds into the Chesapeake bay.

 

If you get some more, you can check out the forums and library and articles on the "org" to help you.
If you decide to go with true captive bred that haven't seen the ocean water, then the "org" can again help to increase the odds of success.
As seahorses populations are quickly declining due to overfishing for aisian med purposes as well as the aquarium trade, any lives saved are bonuses.

 

Thanks for all the info....I know I would get a captive bred if & when I decide to get one but I'm still very unsure about one at the moment. I know that if I am gonna spend the money I want to make sure I am prepared to take care of it and give it the proper environment to live in. I would really like to have one but at the moment it seems like the disadvantages are greater than the advantages right now. I will check out the links as posted on here and while I have some input from some of you can anyone recommend an upgrade as far as a better filter and skimmer for my nano tank?

 

hitching in

I am in the middle of starting a seahorse tank almost here figure one more month before adding the horses. From what I have seen I can get away with two Giant seahorses, both male or both female (so they will not breed something I am not able to keep up with) My tank temp is about 76 should be able to go up to 78 max 74 ideal. I have been watching a couple of Seahorse Colts at the lfs and they eat saltwater feeder shrimp about 1 inch long. He has been raising this kind of seahorse for years and he said to feed them just through in about 2 dozen (12 per horse) per a week and they do fine.

 

Aquarium bred sea horses often readily accept non-living foods and are pretty easy to keep.

 

Odd that he wouldn't give you the proper name, but what size tank is yours?

Are you prepared to always be paying for live foods for these seahorses?
Usually when seahorses are eating live foods only, they are wild caught.

The odds of him actually doing this, especially for H. ingens, is very slim.
The only breeder I know of at the moment for H. ingens is in Mexico but they can be purchased from seahorsesource.com.
Ask him to show you his nurseries and rearing set up with the ongrowing fry.
He would be the FIRST one that I know of, if true, that isn't training the seahorses to eat frozen mysis.