Time to pony up: What is your experience with seahorses?

[Peace River]

Time to pony up: What is your experience with seahorses?

Seahorses are fascinating and seem almost surreal. They have a strong allure to some reef keepers, but the special requirements can be daunting. Their uniqueness demands a level of respect and providing a tank to meet their food, flow, and aquascaping requirements are key to success. What is your experience with seahorses? Have you ever kept them? Do you keep them now? Please tell us about your experience and share any tips or recommendations in the following thread.

Photo by @robert_au

For more information please check out these R2R Seahorse articles by @vlangel:

• Keeping seahorses in aquaria 1: Introduction and setting up your seahorse tank
• Keeping seahorses in aquaria 2: Aquascaping and providing excellent water quality
• Keeping seahorses in aquaria 3: Stocking your seahorse tank/what to add other than the ponies
• Keeping seahorses in aquaria 4: Selecting your ponies
• Keeping seahorses in aquaria 5: Feeding your ponies
• Keeping seahorses in aquaria 6: Dealing with travel and sickness

 

[Borat]

Horse is the best friend of Kazakistani man.. especially a hungry one !!!

 

[Paul B]

I used to collect them all the time here in New York where they are rare but you can find them. I kept them for many years, spawned them and raised a few generations.

Here is my female transferring the eggs to the male in my reef.

 

[robreefer91]

I used to collect them all the time here in New York where they are rare but you can find them. I kept them for many years, spawned them and raised a few generations.

Here is my female transferring the eggs to the male in my reef.

Are they expensive I’m in ny too.

 

[Renaissance corals]

Had a pair seahorses throughout high school. Every time they spawned I was at school and caused a massive downshift in water quality. When the filter inevitably got clogged. Beautiful creatures but I would not keep them again.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Had a pair of erectus and one developed tail infection which is common. I got it to heal and they bred twice. because at the time I had 2 damsels, fry did not survive. Shortly after , I was offered a tank for them and of course I took the offer.
While they are neat, they are best by themselves, in low flow and with pristine water quality.

 

[Jacked Reefer]

One day I was at the beach after a large storm and while looking through the sea grass mats that were looser and floating out into the ocean I found a large male H. zosterae. Decided to take him home, kept him alive for 5 months on BBS and adult brine. I want to say he loved out his full lifespan as he was already very large for a dwarf seahorse.

want to try them again in the future. Really cool little guys

 

[revhtree]

I have never kept one personally.

 

[snorklr]

about 40 yrs ago kept one in a 20 long with an undergravel...it was caught in the canal behind my shop (like PaulB on Long Island NY)...fed it nothing but live brine shrimp from the LFS...guess it lasted about a year or 2 and i was truly clueless as to what it(or the tank) really needed

 

[AydenLincoln]

I used to collect them all the time here in New York where they are rare but you can find them. I kept them for many years, spawned them and raised a few generations.

Here is my female transferring the eggs to the male in my reef.

Wild ones? I didn’t know that wow!

 

[Gumbies R Us]

Never had a seahorse, maybe one day I might keep some

 

[vlangel]

I have kept seahorses for over 6 years and even raised fry to young adult. I started with 24 fry, (gave away the rest) and raised 17 of them. It was super rewarding but also very labor intensive for about 5 months. I only did it once and after that I gave away all my fry.

I would still have seahorses because I loved them but our grandchildren live out of state and seahorses need a very good reliable fish sitter, which I did not have.

They can flourish IF they are properly cared for, but it is heart breaking when they die of bacterial infections. In the beginning of keeping them, I learned that the hard way.

 

[KrisReef]

When I went to Australia I was able to catch a few Leafy Seadragons and they are difficult to acclimate to captivity and require a significant amount of resources, especially live food items to keep them happy. I didn’t know it wasn’t legal to keep them until the first day of this month.

Not really, but I have always wanted to see the seahorses that live around San Diego Bay but have not seen them in the wild except for the sundry ones that the seagulls dropped off on the commercial docks where they perished but made fascinating curios that I had in my office cubicle for decoration.
I don’t think I would be able to keep a tank running with the proper habitat that they should have to be happy in captivity so I have not acquired them when I have seen them for sale.

I have seen a wild pair on Cayman Brac snorkeling in the shallow waters with very swift current flowing through a “weedy” patch on an open shoreline/reef where presumably they were hanging out and grabbing drift prey items as they came by. Sorry I don’t have a picture but I think the slow currents in captive reefs is a mistake for these “shy” animals that really need to be left in the wild to catch abundant prey, a situation that is basically impossible to recreate in a home aquarium unless the budget and space used to construct their habitat is significantly larger than my annual salary.

Sadly this is not my status in life, but I am okay with it.

 

[Paul B]

Are they expensive I’m in ny too.

I don't even know if they sell them. I just collect them.

 

[docforestal]

~14 years ago , had a tank with softies and non-photosynthetic gorgonians for 2 years with erectus; I am gonna say i was somewhat succesful but not fully - first batch got sick quick - did a necropsy, and found a renal abscess that cultured out vibrio (by it's appearance on microscope); 2nd batch had for 3 years; was working on trying to keep babies alive with phyto/rots/brine and flow in a small tank to prevent them from getting stuck in the surface tension of the water - never succeeded in part due to working all day.
I would love to have some again but feel working full time, not fair to them.

 

[tnw50cal]

I voted have kept them in the past. That would be 1968 when I was 8 years old. Bought 2 "mated" pairs and a pregnant male dwarf seahorses from a ad in Boys Life magazine, cost was 4.99 shipped next day air from Florida. Killed the first bunch less than 10 minutes after getting them. Second bunch lived almost a year(well the last of the babies having grown died then). This led to a life time of keeping Saltwater fish, 1967 would be the last time I had freshwater fish.

 

[1979fishgeek]

I kept them for several years and found their constant breeding a pain to deal with. House became a baby seahorse nursery with brine shrimp farming almost in every available space. They produce hundreds of fry and rearing them to take frozen was always hard work as some just never wanted to transition.

Also worth mentioning they need such particular setups as they are incredibly clumsy swimmers and I found it they could get their heads stuck in something they always would!

Safe to say I doubt I’ll be keeping them again.

 

[jimk60]

I also had some as a kid back in the sixties. Unfortunately they didn't last very long.

 

[Fishfreak2009]

I currently keep 4 ponies (2 pairs of erectus). They are prone to bacterial infection as stated earlier, and I lost 1 pair (originally had 3 pair). I keep my ponies at 71-72 F to help with keeping bacterial counts down, and do 50% water changes twice weekly. I also have a lot of macroalgae growing in their system (and constantly battle hair algae as well) which helps to reduce waste in the water. They share a tank with a couple mollies and an atlantic pygmy angel, and will have a firefish and blackcap basslet joining them at some point in the future. I have not bothered trying to raise fry so far, as I do not have all the phyto and brine going currently to feed the fry.

My 4 specimens are wild caughts from Florida, and only eat live ghost shrimp. The 4 seahorses eat roughly 80-100 ghost shrimp weekly, depending on how large the ghost shrimp are. They are actually less wasteful (i.e. eat the whole shrimp vs half) and seem to do better with larger numbers of smaller ghost shrimp, but I am limited by what I can find available to feed them. Ghost shrimp from LFS here are hit or miss, and the last 2 orders I've placed online all showed up dead. Luckily, we have enough LFS in our area that I can always find enough to feed them.

 

[Redemptioner]

I keep 3 different types in a 70 gal reef tank, heavily UV sterilised and kept at 23C.

I think the trick to them is the freshwater baths and reliable breeders, that and a whopping big UV sterilizer