Hippocampus zosterae

Have there been any more problems since the three deaths? I am really considering getting these little guys again but will use copepods to feed them. Maybe I will try to dig up my old pics of them and post them.

Nope, no problems. I've got thousands and thousands of copepods. They must have been being sucked into the filter or something, because as soon as the flow decreased their population just exploded. The seahorses also react to the presence of microworms, although again I can't confirm they're eating them as I haven't sat down and watched the tank after feeding them yet. But I'll likely have time this weekend. New pictures to come soon.

After reading this article I'm thinking of getting some nerite snails. http://www.fishchann...-seahorses.aspx Apparently the young of the snails are good food for hippocampus zosterae. I like new food sources for the fish that take zero effort to maintain on my part

After reading this article I'm thinking of getting some nerite snails. http://www.fishchann...-seahorses.aspx Apparently the young of the snails are good food for hippocampus zosterae. I like new food sources for the fish that take zero effort to maintain on my part

I read more and another source confirmed that the young of nerite snails spend about a month free swimming (and are very readily eaten during that time). Also, they don't eat fry and no one seems to be of the impression that they eat copepods. And there is all that purple slime algae covering the caulerpa, so I could probably use some snails even if they don't breed. I found this rare color form / species of nerite on ebay that no else seems to be offering (good, because if the babies don't get eaten, I can sell the excess young without competing with a lot of other sellers), so I bid on it.
Picture: http://img.photobuck...zps1ab37aa0.jpg
I like them. Hopefully the seahorses and mandarinfish will like them, too It is possible that hippocampus zosterae eats nerite young in the wild, as the ranges of the two animals overlap. This particular nerite is from the Pacific Ocean, though.

Edit: I did some more research and this species, Nerita versicolor, is from the Caribbean (Florida to Brazil), the home range of Hippocampus zostereae. Image: http://3.bp.blogspot...+versicolor.jpg Info: http://www.sms.si.ed...rita_versic.htm

Edited by EricaWieser, 10 February 2013 - 05:35 PM.

Oh great. You know what is curiously omitted from most descriptions of nerita versicolor? Apparently they refuse to stay underwater, and will crawl out of the tank.

The Bleeding Tooth nerite gets its name from a strange formation at the aperture of the snail that looks just like a set of teeth surrounded by a blood red stain. The "blood" is really just iron deposited in the shell, and the function of the teeth is not known, but it seems that the bleeding teeth are intended as a display that makes the snail shell appear to be a mouth. Presumably this would startle potential small predators. The bleeding tooth nerite reaches up to 3 cm in length. Its shell is yellowish with red and dark purple zigzag marks. It is a pretty snail, but unfortunately not suitable for home aquariums. It lives just above the tide line and migrates with the change in the water level. This results in it escaping from the aquarium and ending up somewhere else in your home, attached to a wall, a bedpost, the ceiling. The surprising thing about them is that they can remain out of water for extended periods of time, days at least, possibly weeks. I know this because I at one time attempted to keep a few of them. After a few had become missing in action, when I discovered them more than a week later somewhere in the house, they miraculously came back to life when placed in a cup of saltwater. It might be possible to maintain this snail in a large rocky tidepool exhibit, but the tidal variance should be at least one meter.

The four tooth nerite, Nerita versicolor, is very similar to the bleeding tooth nerite viewed from above, but lacks the "blood" stain on the underside of the aperture. It only reaches 2.5 cm in length. The four tooth nerite has 4 prominent teeth, compared to two or three for the bleeding tooth nerite. It occurs in the same habitat as the Bleeding tooth, but spends more time in the water, and stays lower down on the rocks even when it crawls out. Like the Bleeding tooth it always crawls out of the water, so it is not suitable for most aquariums.

Source: http://www.advanceda.../2003/9/inverts

This is what I get for bidding first and doing the extensive research only later. Now I have to figure out how to put a lid on the seahorse tank. I guess it needed one anyway; I've been having to top it off every few days from evaporation. *sighs* Oh well. I hope you all are reading this and learning from my mistakes. Or at least getting a good laugh.

Edited by EricaWieser, 11 February 2013 - 10:10 PM.

I was outbid! yay!

If anybody knows any animals, such as snails, that release planktonic larvae that would be good for seahorses to eat, please let me know. I will thoroughly research them.

Cleaner Shrimp Lysmata amboinensis, Peppermint Shrimp, Lysmata wurdemanni. Wurdemanni are from the same region as your Dwarves.

Edited by Subrosa, 12 February 2013 - 07:49 AM.

Cleaner Shrimp Lysmata amboinensis, Peppermint Shrimp, Lysmata wurdemanni. Wurdemanni are from the same region as your Dwarves.

I have heard that shrimp are slightly carnivorous? They might eat copepods or fry?

Fry, perhaps, I doubt they'd dent a copepod poulation. You'd want to maintain the adults in an upstream refugium which allows larvae to overflow into the main tank, or perhaps in an in tank refugium.

I'm not so sure about those shrimp. I would try some smaller species just in case the dwarves get picked on. What about some sexy shrimp? They stay small and breed readily.

Irate's sparkle shrimp might just fit the bill!

Sexy shrimp aren't very prolific compared to Cleaners and Peppermints, and adults are almost food sized themselves, which could make sustaining a population difficult. They would pose a negligible threat, but neither would the other species if kept in a discrete refugium.

so, if planktanic larvae are a seahorse food, and seahorses coexist with scallops in our marine grass, could they be munching on scallop larvae?

so, if planktanic larvae are a seahorse food, and seahorses coexist with scallops in our marine grass, could they be munching on scallop larvae?

Gut content analysis of two species of seahorses in Turkey:
Pakistan J. Zool., vol. 43 (6), pp. 1197-1201, 2011. Gut Contents of Two European Seahorses Hippocampus hippocampus and Hippocampus guttulatus in the Aegean Sea, Coasts of Turkey. Sule Gurkan,* Ertan Taskavak, Tuncay Murat Sever and Sencer Akalin. Department of Hydrobiology, Faculty of Fisheries, Ege University, 35100 Bornova-Izmir, Turkey http://zsp.com.pk/pd...653-11FINAL.pdf

They list everything in the seahorses' stomachs if you follow the link and look at Table 2 on page 1199.

Edited by EricaWieser, 13 February 2013 - 06:53 PM.

Current whole tank photo:

http://gallery.nanfa... photo.JPG.html

Anyone who read my Elassoma gilberti post will be familiar with my usual excuse as to why you can't see any fish in there; it's a four foot long tank and the fish are one inch maximum.

Edited by EricaWieser, 13 February 2013 - 07:03 PM.

Gut content analysis of two species of seahorses in Turkey:
Pakistan J. Zool., vol. 43 (6), pp. 1197-1201, 2011. Gut Contents of Two European Seahorses Hippocampus hippocampus and Hippocampus guttulatus in the Aegean Sea, Coasts of Turkey. Sule Gurkan,* Ertan Taskavak, Tuncay Murat Sever and Sencer Akalin. Department of Hydrobiology, Faculty of Fisheries, Ege University, 35100 Bornova-Izmir, Turkey http://zsp.com.pk/pd...653-11FINAL.pdf

They list everything in the seahorses' stomachs if you follow the link and look at Table 2 on page 1199.

Gut content analysis of two species of seahorses in Turkey:
Pakistan J. Zool., vol. 43 (6), pp. 1197-1201, 2011. Gut Contents of Two European Seahorses Hippocampus hippocampus and Hippocampus guttulatus in the Aegean Sea, Coasts of Turkey. Sule Gurkan,* Ertan Taskavak, Tuncay Murat Sever and Sencer Akalin. Department of Hydrobiology, Faculty of Fisheries, Ege University, 35100 Bornova-Izmir, Turkey http://zsp.com.pk/pd...653-11FINAL.pdf

They list everything in the seahorses' stomachs if you follow the link and look at Table 2 on page 1199.

it seems bivalve and gastropods were not very significant, by the way have you heard that if you bring a seahorse to the surface it in someway injures their swim bladder, making it impossible to survive, that is what they are saying on the gulf here to keep people from observing them on the surface, sounds bogus to me, i think they should be alright if handled gently, ie left in hand net then put back in grass

have you heard that if you bring a seahorse to the surface it in someway injures their swim bladder, making it impossible to survive, that is what they are saying on the gulf here to keep people from observing them on the surface, sounds bogus to me, i think they should be alright if handled gently, ie left in hand net then put back in grass

Mine were all wild caught and arrived alive after shipping. That's all I know.

Two more deaths. I covered the filter intake with a nylon just in case that had anything to do with it, but I doubt it did.

Having cared for a number of sygnathid species in a former life as an aquarist at a tiny, second-rate public aquarium, I can tell you that it's absolutely possible that those guys were slipping through the cage on your intake. I pulled a number of unharmed seahorses out of sumps and tossed them back in the main tank before we put finer meshed screens on our overflows. Even our adult lined seahorses would slip through.
Having a huge quantity of live food just free in the tank was, we discovered, the best way to keep any of these guys, as well as the dragonettes. On the other hand, most of our seahorse species learned to take frozen brine or mysis shrimp provided that the current was strong enough to keep the food suspended in the water column long enough for them to chase it down or snag it as it passed by. Not everyone adapted to frozen food, but most did. Pipefish were a different story, but the seahorses were less picky. Can't recall if our zosterae were able to take adult brine, but I know they ate Cyclop-eeze. They'll still really benefit from the constant live food since they tend to just nibble constantly all day as opposed to eating a couple of big meals, but variety is always good too. And of course they should like newly hatched brine shrimp as well.

Sounds cool, good luck!

Hi, I'm just curious to hear how the little ones are doing. I hope everyone is ok!

Hi, I'm just curious to hear how the little ones are doing. I hope everyone is ok!

I honestly have no idea how many sea horses are in the tank. I mean, I see them probably five at any given time, but not more than that. There is so much caulerpa prolifera for them to hide in, and they do.
I have taken to feeding them twice a day with microworms. They are more active when microworms are added, so I drop them in during my twice-daily check on them.