<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13226329#post13226329 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by mhltcob
I disagree about it not being that difficult to diagnose a bacterial infection. Most hobbyist would be unable to tell whether the infection that they are seeing is bacterial or parasitic (I often see hobbyist diagnose any reddening as bacterial). The vast majority of hobbyist are unable to accurately diagnose protozoan infections, and even less are able to diagnose bacterial infections. The different bacteria leave signs of their presence but it is impossible to diagnose without isolating and culturing them. You cannot look at a seahorse and tell that it has vibrio.
Hobbyists boards have been diagnosing and successfully treating bacterial infections for a few years now. Most often from a picture. IMO it's not that complicated. It's fine if your opinion differs.
If physical symptoms are presenting it is not hard IMO to determine whether or not the disease is bacterial. It is not possible for most hobbyist to then make a culture and grow it out to determine what bacteria or strain of bacteria is causing the problem. This would be futile any how since by the time the culture came back the seahorse would most likely be dead or to far gone for treatment.
Since vibrio is by far the most common bacterial , and the because treatments for other bacterial issues that present similarly ( like nocardia and myco) have proven ineffective, we currently treat all bacterial infections with the proven method for treating vibrio infection.
Also, to say that all vibrio sp. would act aggressively at say 80 degrees and significantly less so at 74 degrees is a bit presumptive.
Treatment for vibrio related problems includes dropping the temp down to 68F where it almost stops reproducing.
Your welcome to do the research for your self. The material is out there for anyone to find. I'm not at home right now so I don't have my "link" file but you can put in the vibrio species of your choice in google and get a good number of hits. I'll post some links up for you later.
As far as keeping the "proper" temperature, to keep a tank at 74 or lower in some climates requires a chiller. This is not exactly an inexpensive piece of equipment. 74 degrees is also a bit chilly for some of the other organisms that we keep with the seahorses (and in fact chilly for some species of seahorses themselves who may never see lower than 78 degrees in the winter).
If you can not afford the equipment to keep an animal happy, you can't afford the animal.
A pair of aquacultured seahorses is going to run you between $150 and $1900 dollars depending on species and vendor. This isn't a cheap hobby.
In keeping the lower temperatures we have not seen or experienced any problems with any of the species. Comes did seem to get a bit more sluggish but other species kept at this temperature did just fine. Many species have shown to do well at temps down to the mid 60's.
As far as tankmates. I have kep several other species of fish and coral at the lower temps and have not had an issue in doing so. JME If you were planning on keeping animals that needed higher temps (can't really put my finger on one at the moment for an example) then you shouldn't keep it with seahorses.
JMO
