Healthy? Eating? Not 100% sure? Help?

[andythorntonjr]

So of the four seahorses I received on Friday, all of them I have visibly seen eating at various times and varying amounts. One is now currently hunting actively for copepods, but is developing a nice healthy belly. The fourth one, however, I'm not 100% is eating a lot/enough/any. I've tried enticing him with bits of mysis right in front of him and he seems interested, but doesn't grab any of it. He might be eating copepods too and is just 'full' when I try; not sure. Here is a couple pictures for review. How's he look? Starving? Healthy? Since its been four days now, I'd think he'd show worse signs if he wasn't eating at all, so... input please?

 

[wdt2000]

Are they supposed to be eating mysid? I mean are they captive bred? If not you will need to train them to eat the good stuff. If they are eating mysid, but feel they are not eating enough offer them some adult enriched live brine with the mysid.

Also what type of mysid or mysis are you using?

 

[rayjay]

If the fourth one isn't eating frozen foods now, he will have to start very soon because four seahorses will decimate the pod life in the tank and they would starve without the frozen food added.
Some seahorses take to the tank change better than others so hopefully you will see it start to eat very soon.
If not, place it in a hospital tank, bare bottom, and add a know quantity of mysis so you can count later and know if he eats while you are not looking.
If he still doesn't eat, you will need to get some live food, brine shrimp, glass shrimp, mysids, or whatever is available, and enrich them and then feed to the seahorse. Perhaps put a couple of what you are going to enrich so that the seahorse has at least something to latch onto while the main part are being enriched.

 

[andythorntonjr]

Well, slightly less worried about him as of this morning. I woke up to find him off on his own eating copepods. After talking with the source (got them all from SeahorseSource, which Dan replied to my questions within hours and gave me some excellent information), this guy is likely just a bit shy compared to the others. The fact he's been hunting up copepods and does show SOME interest in the frozen (Hakkari) mysis (what he was trained on and fed before), just tells me he's probably full from hunting.

Gonna still keep a close eye on him over the next few weeks to make absolutely sure he's doing good, but initial panic is offset thanks to seeing him happily hunting away.