Fluval Edge and Dwarf Sea Horses for Sea Horse Noob

[Vandal996]

My daughter wants seahorses. Of course she does. She knows that they will not live in our 92 because of competition for food and such. I like the look and idea of the modded Fluval Edge. I have a healthy supply of copepods in my 92 and sump. My total system is around 170ga so water changes of 1.5ga weekly would be pretty easy. There is no way to plumb in to the main system because of the layout of the house.
I emailed "Seahorse Source" who said that they had no first hand experience with this tank but that they believed it would be ideal for a "Small Heard" of dwarfs.
You guys are the experts. No one I have talked to except the seller has thought this was a realistic idea. I would like her to have a positive experience with this and have pretty much told her to forget about it. It is however the Christmas season, so if I can make it happen I would like to try.
Your thoughts please.

 

[rayjay]

As long as the tank is appropriately sized, and with the modifications you can keep the temperatures at the recommended level of 68° to 74°F.
Most dwarf tanks are 10g or under depending on the herd size to limit the need for exorbitant levels of live food.
You will need to grow out newly hatched brine for a day and then enrich them in two 12 hours stages with new water and new enrichment for each stage, before using them as food for the dwarfs.
Some people do this daily while others do up enough for a few days and keep them in the refrigerator until used.
Other pod life you add are a bonus nutrition wise but it's recommended to be cultured pods, not from the wild or from another tank system that can introduce new pathogens to your dwarfs.
Seahorse Source has the best reputation in the business for seahorse stock and accessories and his Dan's Food with and without Beta Glucan is the best enrichment you can use for the live foods you use.

 

[Vandal996]

Thanks for confirming that I am dealing with the right people. I just pulled them from a search engine.
What constitutes a "small heard" in a 5ga?
Do any of you have a solution for keeping a pico tank like this cool. We keep our house at 75 in the summer.

 

[rayjay]

I've seen a few methods used such as a fan blowing on the tank, sized of course to take into consideration the system itself and the heat it produced, and the surrounding temps.
I've also seen mini chillers, like used in portable coolers, to keep the temps down a little.
Of course, some also modify the lighting to use less intensive heat producing light source.
Adding an overflow and sump can also help to reduce the temperature slightly but the overflow needs protection so the dwarfs cant get sucked up against it.
You could do with 2 or 3 pairs in that tank.

 

[namxas]

Altho I'm not a first-hand zot-keeper (I've set up systems for them tho), you could keep about 10 zots in a 5 gal with no problems. If your home stays at 75*F, you could run a small fan over the tank to give you a couple of degrees cushion.

I recommend setting them up in a faux seagrass setup using Caulerpa prolifera, which will provide hitches as well as hunting grounds for between meal snax.