red and orange seahorses for those interested at lfs

[isseym328]

At pasadena tropical fish. They got some cool looking ones. I bought one a week ago to make sure it's eating and I think it's eating all my pods. Bought another one yesterday and it seems to be doing well. Not eating any of the frozen mysis shrimp though but eating pods. It's kind of rare to see these colored seahorses in lfs so just wanted to share with ppl.

 

[simon.007]

Pics please

Simon

 

[ezcompany]

-.-

 

[isseym328]

I'll take some after I get home from work tonight. =)

 

[pecaco34]

These guys will decimate a pod population pretty quickly. It sounds like they are wild caught so it may take awhile to train on frozen if ever. A good food source for these guys are freshwater ghost shrimp. Before my horses switched to frozen I had to have a small tank set up just for the shrimp. Their GI tract isn't too complex and food essentially runs right through them and they can starve relatively quickly compared to reef fish, reidi ( most likely the species you have) can go through up to 10 ghost shrimp a day. Just keep an eye on them and you will get a feel for how much they can eat. If you do a search at seahorse.org you should find some methods on switching the horses to frozen.

 

[isseym328]

I think my tank's pod population will most likely be able to last a few more weeks. AFter that I'm not sure. I'm still feeding the tank with mysis shrimp since I have clownfishes in there. I've thrown both brine shrimp and mysis in but with no luck so far. Is it possible the seahorses are just full from eating the pods? Would they be more willing to pick up on frozen food if no other food is available?

 

[pecaco34]

If you are lucky they will start to eat the mysis but every horse is different. Mine did that way but some never will. They are probably eating the pods for now and should keep them full for a time, usually you can look at their body and actually see them starting to concave in when they aren't getting enough to eat. I wouldn't try to starve them into eating because most likely they will just end up starving to death. If they don't eat soon I would definitely throw some ghost shrimp in there.

 

[isseym328]

I think i'm going to go purchase some ghost shrimp just in case. I really don't want my pod population to run out. How big are the ghost shrimps? I don't want my seahorses to choke on them.

 

[pecaco34]

They come in a variety of sizes. They are pretty common feeders so they shouldn't be hard to find. Just ask for smaller ones. It depends on how large your horses are. You would be surprised at how big of shrimp they can eat. It is a good idea to feed the shrimp prior to feeding them to the horses with cyclopeeze or flake food. Then the horse also ingests the flake food while eating the shrimp, called gut loading.

 

[isseym328]

Here's a pic of the red seahorse i got. the other one is hiding out so no pics of him.

I checked liveaquaria earlier today and they are selling these for 400.

 

[pecaco34]

That's a beauty. If I could see the pouch area I could let you know if it's a boy or girl. Live Aquaria has gotten a little out of control with their prices on the divers den, but these guys are not cheap. I've seen reidi recently selling for up to 120 bucks apiece. The problem is their fry are very hard to raise compared to most seahorses so most that you see are wild caught and Cites has become very strict regarding seahorse conservation thus driving the price up. They used to sell for around 50 bucks each.

 

[isseym328]

Yes they are for 120 at the store in pasadena if that's where you saw them. Not sure if they still have them anymore. I'm not trying to raise the fry but i did get a male and female red reidis. Only thing i'm worried about is their food source. I hope they start eating frozen mysis soon.

 

[noschmo]

Most captive bred seahorses are trained to eat mysis. I assume that these guys are wild. Better hope that you can get them to eat mysis as they will eat pods down to nothing then you will have horses that will start starving. Seahorsesm are very challenging to keep.

 

[isseym328]

The second seahorse i got now is feeding on live brine shrimp. I'm going to mix live brine and frozen mysis next time hoping the seahorse will get a taste of the mysis. The first seahorse however is not looking good at all. It has turned a ghostly white and i'm afraid it will not make it. any other recommendations on getting it too eat? or is it too late?