The Lazy Hex Ranch -- My New Tank

jimroth

jimroth

Moving Money
Premium Member
I got a 20G hex at a garage sale so I decided to make a seahorse setup, something I wanted to do for a long time. I asked my LFS to get me one of those hex under gravel filters and I was in business. I have since learned that they have fallen somewhat out of favor, and that 20G is on the small side for a seahorse tank. No matter, it looks nice and I have a garage full of larger, empty aquaria, just not hex-shaped. I did remove the wimpy 8W fluorescent tube and retroft a 13W PC setup. Much brighter!

Inside the tank before substrate

Novemberpictures3004.jpg


Here's the tank as it appears today:

JanuaryReefPix1002.jpg


I'm using a cheap HOTB (Rio!) skimmer for some skimming. I plan to do generous water changes from my 240G system, so I'm not too concerned about water quality. It does skim, amazingly. I removed the existing heater so the horses wouldn't burn their tails, but then found the tank was dropping to around 66F. I have added a reptile heater to the bottom of the tank and now it's maintaining 72F. When it warms up outside I will just unplug it.

The macroalgae is Caulerpa Prolifera and Halymenia (Dragon's Breath) . There's a blue leg hermit, and a couple of hitchhikers from my big tank came over on the live rock. Experimentally I added a frag of Pocillopora and one of Montipora Hirstuta, the corals I can't even kill on purpose in my big reef.

Seahorses are coming tomorrow, a pair of CB Hippocampus Erectus!
 
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Swapped the reptile heater for a fancy fluval heater with a guard. The tank was just getting warmer and warmer with the non-thermostatic reptile heater. Seahorses are out for delivery!
 
nice setup keep us posted!
I have been in the planing stage for a few months now and this is deff. exciting :)
is the stand A DIY?
 
nice setup keep us posted!
I have been in the planing stage for a few months now and this is deff. exciting :)
is the stand A DIY?
 
Wow fantastic start up so far! :) 20g is a bit small for Erectus, but you should be alright for a while if they're young. Hexagon is the way to go though for seahorses so kudos on that! Sounds like its a great system off to a great start. Please post pics when your new horses arrive! :)
 
Maybe you could get dwarf seahorses if those outgrow it and you set up another seahorse tank. Anyways- I like the set up, I think it looks very nice.!
Best of wishes, would love to see pics.
 
Hmmm, sadly I lost one of the horses today. It stopped eating about 48hrs ago and was acting strangely. Not happy. The other one is eating, seems fine.
 
seahorses are social creatures, i'd think about buying another one from the same company. don't mix breeds and don't buy from different companies as you risk introducing bacteria
 
I would not purchase/add any more horses from anywhere until you determine what happened to the other one.


Would you like to share some details and we can try to figure out what happened.
 
Peka said:
I would not purchase/add any more horses from anywhere until you determine what happened to the other one.


Would you like to share some details and we can try to figure out what happened.
Click to expand...

Not sure exactly what details you would like.

Salinity has been right around 1026 (35ppt), The heater has done a good job of maintaining 71-72F.

I'm concerned I may have been throwing too much mysis in there and hurt the water quality. I also added some cold RO water at one point, having been spoiled by the ATO on my big tank.

When the male horse died, the day before I saw it kind of thrashing around in an alarming fashion, and also saw it turn nearly white at one point. After that it stayed towards the surface, and didn't hook its tail on anything until nearly the end.
 
I agree with Beth that you should wait to see if cause of death might be determined.
From your initial description of the problem it sounds like it may be parasitic in form so if the other starts to show the same symptoms, do a fresh water dip in water that matches the tank water for pH and temperature. Duration of the dip should be about 12 minutes. You only remove the seahorse earlier if it becomes unresponsive when you touch it.
Hopefully Beth will have other ideas for you as I've personally not been very successful in saving seahorses that come down with any maladies other than pouch emphysema.

While under gravel filters can draw food down into the substrate and provide a haven for bacteria to grow, I don't think it would have happened in the time you have had the seahorses for.
Do you remove uneaten pieces of food each day?
I personally would convert the UG filter to a "pre-filtered, reverse flow under gravel filter. This means the water is filtered first and then pushed "down" the uplift tube, under the plate, and up through the substrate.
In my case I used a Hagen power head with a quick filter attachment, but didn't use the reverse function of the power head. Instead, I shoved a short piece of 1/2" CPVC into the output tube of the power head and put a 90° elbow (again CPVC) on with another piece of 1/2" CPVC going downward.
On this piece I shoved the black cone piece (that came with the power head for normal installation of the power head on an uplift tube) onto the downward piece of CPVC and set the whole thing on the cut down uplift tube of the under gravel filter. Hope that makes sense as I don't have a picture of it.
I would STILL however, remove any uneaten food daily, AND I would clean the quickfilter on the power head to start with probably even 3 days until I found how much accumulation would happen in what time period. I would never let a filter go uncleaned for more than a week, for any tank I have.
 
Honestly, I'm not sure what happened but based on your description, it was something that progressed pretty quickly. I would test all the parameters every couple days in order to create the best possible environment for the other one and watch the other horse very closely for any symptoms. At the first sign of issues, move the other to a QT tank and let us know....
 
Peka said:
Honestly, I'm not sure what happened but based on your description, it was something that progressed pretty quickly. I would test all the parameters every couple days in order to create the best possible environment for the other one and watch the other horse very closely for any symptoms. At the first sign of issues, move the other to a QT tank and let us know....
Click to expand...

That's a good idea about the Q-tank, I could easily get that going.

I spoke to Seahorse Source and they had an idea, which was to add more cleanup crew. They said one cube of Hikari mysis per day was not excessive but that the main concern was preventing the horses from eating spoiled food from the bottom. Per their recommendation, I secured several nassarius snails at the LFS and added them.
I'm also going to move over a couple more small bluelegs. And I did a 5 gallon (25%) water change, just in case.
If everything stays OK, I will probably wait a week and order a replacement male, because a single seahorse looks kind of lonely.
 
jimroth said:
When the male horse died, the day before I saw it kind of thrashing around in an alarming fashion, and also saw it turn nearly white at one point. After that it stayed towards the surface, and didn't hook its tail on anything until nearly the end.
Click to expand...

Were his eyes cloudy? look closely at your other horse gills and poop. If its eyes cloudy or the poop is stringy you need to treat it ASAP.
 
wdt2000 said:
Were his eyes cloudy? look closely at your other horse gills and poop. If its eyes cloudy or the poop is stringy you need to treat it ASAP.
Click to expand...

See now here, I'm learning something. What is seahorse poop supposed to look like? I was impressed by the size, but otherwise dont know what to look for. The eyes are quite clear, I know because I love to look at them.
 
Seahorse poop should be purple if they eating frozen mysis... I'm sure Greg will post his famous "poop" picture shortly :)
 
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