Starting a seahorse/pipefish tank

[Water flea]

Hi,
Im thinking of starting a 58 gallon tank.I just wanted to get some advise on how to go about setting it up.I was thinking of a deep sand bed with caulerpa only no live rock in the main tank.I built a sump out of a 40 breeder tank were I plan to put about 40 lbs of live rock.I still havent decided on the external water pump.I was thinking of a turbo sea pump 586 gph.Is this to much?Also is there any good books on sea horses?Thanks

 

[Kolognekoral]

Yo, Flea,

I'm heading in the same direction, just a bit further along. I have a 300L (90 gal?) tank with a DSB attached to my reef. There are live rocks, which I believe bring more possibilities for live food to hang about, not to mention I find them attractive. In the sand I have a few Halimeda and Thalassia (turtle grass), no Caulerpa and just added 2 pipe fish (D. pessuliferus). They do find enough to eat and have not accepted any frozen food to this point.

One thing I did was to set-up the rocks so that water flows easily under them, after all, the DSB should be as exposed as possible. There is a circulation pump in the tank, as well as a feed from the reef which then overflows back into the main tank. The pipefish seem to like a bit of water movement, unlike seahorses. In the night they like to ride the current, pressumably seeking food.

There is one book out ther on Seahorses and Relatives by Rudi Kuipers. I have yet to obtain it, but plan to pick it up next week, if I find it. Also, checkout www.seahorse.org

 

[Water flea]

You think im heading in the right direction?

 

[Kolognekoral]

Oh, yeah! The only part I would loose is the Caulerpa. It can crash and release toxins into the water. I would try to get ahold of some sea grasses or go the other way and do gorgonians. Different species prefer different environments.

For my taste, the rocks would be better under light, so into the main tank. In the sump they will certainly help denitrify, but they wil do that anyway. With a DSB, as much life in the sand a possible is the idea. The rocks will simply increase the bio-diversity and help provide live foods for the seahorses.

Ther is a lot of info on DSBs out there and most do not find a skimmer 100% required. I do use one, but I have a Reef tank on this circuit as well.

I notice many prefering simple, somewhat sparse systems for dedicated aquariums. I tend to go the opposite direction and creat as much variety and diversity as possible with my star captives as main attraction. After all, they do not live in a clean and sterile ocean. As fas as I know, they would rarely come in contact with a Caulerpa as they inhabit different niches.

The more I read about seahorses and pipefish, the more it seems they inhabit quite a few different niches, some down to 50M deep. Some associate with reefs, while others with mangrove estuaries. It is wrong to think they all enjoy a sandy bottom and grass. From what I've read, this is only a small portion of the group!

Before you get too deep into the decoration, find the seahorses you wish to keep, learn about them, then tackle the holdfasts for their tails. Your not in a rush, anyway, are you? (yes, yes, I want it all, I want it now:eek1

By the way, I read today that you can often not tell the sexes of pipefish, unless, of course, the male is carrying the eggs!

 

[Fredfish]

The more I read about seahorses and pipefish, the more it seems they inhabit quite a few different niches

This includes algae beds so caulerpa or some other macro algae would not be unusual in their environment.

The tank sounds good waterflea. Starting simple is not a bad idea. It is easy to add stuff as your idea of what you want evolves.

I started with a few rocks, a sandbed and algae. I have very gradually added organisms like a cool brittle star, a cuke, a bangai cardinal and a couple of gorgonians.

The other advantage of slowly adding things it that you allow your system to ramp up its capacity to process waste from the additional organisms.

580gph is probably lots of flow between the refugium and the main tank, but it is not much flow for the main tank. This may or may not be a problem depending on what other things you want to keep with your seahorses/pipefish.

Before I had gorgonians, I had almost no flow in my main tank. I added a Tunze Nanostream (awesome pump!!) to the tank before adding the corals so that they would have half decent flow.

Good luck and let us know how the tank turns out.

Fred

 

[Water flea]

I just got the sand yesterday.Two 40 pound bags.I was planing to put a light on the sump for the live rock.I wouldnt mind putting sea grass were can I find some.