novahobbies
Well-Known Member
This has been coming up a little bit, so I thought I'd post it here. I was looking for info about using koralia p-heads in seahorse tanks, but I couldn't find anybody who had done this and posted about it. I even asked Pete Giwojna, one of the true seahorse Gurus on the web, (OK, so that's just my opinion, but he's NEVER steered me wrong!) and he'd never heard of any experiences with them either.
So, I had to experiment.
Put the p-head in early saturday morning. I posted the current results so far on another site, but here's the cut'n'paste:
Progress so far:
Saturday morning I pulled a spare Koralia-one and placed it in the seahorse tank. Before I turned it on I let them examine the head first. The yellow H. reidis went up to the p-head, "sniffed" it, then ignored it. The black H. erectus recognized a kindred color, hitched with the power cord leading to it, and said "mine?"
Turned it on. First impressions: a single Koralia-one is not necessary for a 37 gallon cube. VERY strong flow...until I took the director nozzle off, then it settled down. The directional nozzle is good for other things though...see below. But I would still recommend two Koralia nanos over the K-1's for this sized tank (20"x20"x24")
The horses took a little time adapting to the flow, but adapt they have. The black erectus has hitched to the power cord and the back mount of the egg, and she has never looked like she was even slightly phased by the suction back there...it's just too dispersed to cause any problems! My yellow reidis aren't the most pelagic of horses, so they rarely swim up high enough for me to get a good analysis of their reactions. After that initial sniffing period, they've ignored it completely.
I'm going to let it run another day or two to see if there are any behavioral changes. I'll probably turn it off tonight to make sure there aren't any midnight accidents, though! In the meantime, the initial results look promising!
One final note for today: Koralias have a sort of "flow focuser" that you can snap on the front of the egg to help direct the flow. I would recommend keeping this collar ON. It als acts as an additional barrier if a seahorse was to try and hitch to the very front of the egg. It seems improbable given the strength of the flow, but I'd rather be safe than sorry!
So, I had to experiment.
Put the p-head in early saturday morning. I posted the current results so far on another site, but here's the cut'n'paste:
Progress so far:
Saturday morning I pulled a spare Koralia-one and placed it in the seahorse tank. Before I turned it on I let them examine the head first. The yellow H. reidis went up to the p-head, "sniffed" it, then ignored it. The black H. erectus recognized a kindred color, hitched with the power cord leading to it, and said "mine?"
Turned it on. First impressions: a single Koralia-one is not necessary for a 37 gallon cube. VERY strong flow...until I took the director nozzle off, then it settled down. The directional nozzle is good for other things though...see below. But I would still recommend two Koralia nanos over the K-1's for this sized tank (20"x20"x24")
The horses took a little time adapting to the flow, but adapt they have. The black erectus has hitched to the power cord and the back mount of the egg, and she has never looked like she was even slightly phased by the suction back there...it's just too dispersed to cause any problems! My yellow reidis aren't the most pelagic of horses, so they rarely swim up high enough for me to get a good analysis of their reactions. After that initial sniffing period, they've ignored it completely.
I'm going to let it run another day or two to see if there are any behavioral changes. I'll probably turn it off tonight to make sure there aren't any midnight accidents, though! In the meantime, the initial results look promising!
One final note for today: Koralias have a sort of "flow focuser" that you can snap on the front of the egg to help direct the flow. I would recommend keeping this collar ON. It als acts as an additional barrier if a seahorse was to try and hitch to the very front of the egg. It seems improbable given the strength of the flow, but I'd rather be safe than sorry!
