New Horses - Positive ID?

kanicky

kanicky

Member
Hi all-
Imagine my surprise when I came home from work today to find that my wonderful boyfriend had gotten me two new seahorses (male-female) to replace the ones I lost!
They are absolutely gorgeous, and I think the male may even be preggo!
If you don't mind, I'd love to get a positive ID on them:


 
kanicky

kanicky

Member
Yep, from our favorite LFS!
I was amazed when I saw these two, because in the past, all our LFS has been able to get are the plain ol' "black seahorses," which is what we had previously...
Nick knew how much I missed having seahorses, even though I wasn't sure I wanted to try again, so when he saw these, he decided to surprise me... And what a great surprise!

As a quick background on my previous 'horses:
My female h. kuda died about a month ago... she got her head stuck in one of the pre-filter slits (liked hanging out by there for some reason) and we didn't know until we came home, and by then of course, it was too late.
The male h. kuda... not sure why he died, to be honest. He was about two years old (we had him for 6 months) and seemed to be doing well, although I'm sure he was lonely... He passed away about two weeks ago. I was sick to my stomach... cried my eyes out, too...
I'm hoping that I will be able to enjoy these two for a long, long time.
 
koi lady

koi lady

Member
H. comes. Tiger tail. The five knobs on their coronet, slender snout, and the strips on the tail are the characteristics. Beautiful couple. I have one myself. My LFS was told it was a colored Hippocampus. But I grabbed him fast and love to watch him interact with my other seahorses.
 
kanicky

kanicky

Member
Since this will be my second go-round with seahorses, I am hoping that I wil be able to enjoy these two for a long time.
With that said, I would love some advice:
1.) I have a chiller on their tank, but since the weather has been pretty mild lately, without the chiller, the tank stays between 72-75, usually more around 73. Is this a good temperature for h. Comes? Should it be higher or lower?
2.) I have a small garden of caluerpa and a small ball of chaeto in one corner of the tank... should I continue to leave them in, or should I make a refugium in the back compartments of the tank? (It's a tall, 30G Hex that my boyfriend built for the 'horses.)
3.) I currently feed PE Mysis. I notice that a lot of people on SDO prefer the Hikari Mysis. Should I try this as well and see which one the seahorses prefer?
4.) I think I'm ready at trying my hand with hatching live brine shrimp as a weekly treat. What exactly will I need to do this, aside from, of course, the brine shrimp eggs?
5.) I've noticed that some of you like to enrich your seahorse foods. I currently only have Garlic X-treme, which I don't see the 'horses needing. What else, if anything, should I pick up when I'm at the fish store tonight?
6.) Is there anything specific that I should know about this species?
Thank you SO much for all of your replies so far. I'm really excited about my new babies
 
suzy

suzy

Member
I have given up trying to ID species! I posted a wondeful pic on 3 different forums when I first found out about fish forums, a few yars back. I got 3 different answers! Not saying that yours is not what we think, but if it comes down to having a exact species (you want to breed them), check out the species guide on ProjectSeahorse. When you start breeding (notice I said when not if?), you might want to find more broodstock to kick up your DNA base!
1) Temp sound good. I find my herd is more active with cooler tempos. I run 74` in the winter, 76` in the summer. But, if I want a new batch o' fry, I kick up the temp to 78`.
2) I think Caulerpagenus make great hitching posts and funky aquascaping. Has a few issues, though so I wouldn't just have it. I have the Chaetomorphagenus to be lacking for aquascaping and nutrient removal. Grows too slow. There are many other genus spp to evaluate, though. Start looking for others! I found my coolest as hitchhikers on corals. I buy corals just for their algae!
3) PE mysis is a fw mysis, higher in some fats than Hikaris SW mysis. It can and does cause liver failure in adult fish. I use it for fast growing juvies only. (or skinny and new adults)
4) I wrote an article for Advanced Aquarist coming out next month! It's like you read my mind! Are you in a hurry to know details? Really, for adult fish, brine shrimp is not worth the trouble...IMO.
5) I have enriched food forever. But, each fish has different needs depending on age and other issues. Betaglucan, vits, amino and fatty acids are all products we can buy. I use an amino acid supplement made by BrightWell Aquatics at this point, for my adults. I add multivits to the water, though 'cause they hate the taste of it in food! I have atank full of spoiled

[hr]
Hiltons!
6) I think you are supposed to talk to them frequently and tell how cute they are and blow them kisses! Give them lots of virtual hugs!
 
kanicky

kanicky

Member
Haha, thank you so much, Suzy, for your replies!

I went home on my lunch break and they were both doing well. I watched them for about five minutes and they appear to still be hunting pods, snicking at the rock and such, so I believe "all is well."
I'm interested to read your Advanced Aquarist article! Can't wait till next month now
 
suzy

suzy

Member
You are too kind, but don't be too excited. I wrote an article about brine shrimp that explains the life cycle of brine shrimp, their natural habitat and the like. But just between you and I, live brine shrimp is so over rated! If your fish will eat frozen, count your lucky starfish! At this point in our hobby, we are lucky that our fish are already trained (albeit incredibly spoiled) to eat frozen foods. Those of you who have not tried to train a wild caught fish to frozen food will hopefully never know what we went through to get wc fish to eat! I spent hundreds on cases of live shrimps for my first real attempt at breeding.
If a fish will eat frozen (non motile) food, we can add supplements and decrease our time investment. Growing live food is a pain! If you are going to go through all that trouble, you might want to consider breeding, which (thus far) requires culturing live foods...
 
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