would this tank be acceptable

[daveonbass]

I'm thinking of getting out of the freshwater hobby all together, and in doing so it will leave me with a 75g and a 100g tank to play with. So my plan is to move all my current SW livestock into the 100 gallon. I have 3 SW tanks. a 6g nano, a 24g nano (no fish) and a 37g w/overflow that is my current GEM of a tank. All that is in the 37 gallon are a cherub angelfish, a yellow tang, and a foxface. The 6g has two occelaris clowns. I can stand to get rid of all the other tanks...by selling them and what not. But the 37 gallon is my current pride and joy. So I only want to move the fish out of it. (and maybe some corals). I was hoping to move all the fish into the 100g, and leave the 37 gallon for something else. My wife and I have always wanted to try seahorses. We are nuts over them. the 37 currently has this list of corals.

2 branching frogspawn
1 branching hammer
1 green nepthia (probaly not but that's what it was sold to me as)
1 colt coral
1 mat of Green star pollyps
3 tufts of xenia
1 ricordia rock
2 little blue shrooms at the sand level
2 rocks with green centered polyps (species unknown)
2 rocks full of yellow pollyps
and
2 frags of a really pretty mont. (the first SPS to live in the tank)

Snails and hermits are a-plenty

Also it's 24x18x20, that's 24 side to side, 18 front to back and 20 tall. It's got a hang on the back fuge, and a sump that is one big fuge. It has a aqualight with 1x150 watt HQI, and 2 CF actinics and of course those pretty blue moon leds. Skimmer and UV sterilizer. the return is split at the top center of tank and has a hydor spinner on each output. Plus one more pump submerged in the tank proper that also has a spinner on it (but that one might be too much flow for wandering seahorses).

So what i'm asking. Is would it be possible to keep seahorses in this tank, and which ones? If I had to I would easily be willing to remove the corals that could harm them (gives me an excuse to get some more ). I just want to make sure that the tank would be big enough for two or more horses/pipefish. Horses mainly cause I hear that pipefish can be tough to feed. I'm hoping that this post isn't too long for you and you all get too bored to answer my questions. But I really don't know if an old reef set up would be ideal or not for horses.

Thanks in advance.

 

[ReefNutPA]

You would have to remove the frogspawns & hammer for sure along with the fish. Any corals, such as those, with sweepers could potentially harm the seahorses with their sting.

Under normal home reef conditions, seahorses usually don't fare too well. It is best to keep seahorses at 74F or under (depending on specie) and with low/moderate flow. Most reef tanks have high flow and temps in the 78F-82F range.

If your tanks water flow isn't TOO high and your temps fall in an acceptable range... yes, you could use the tank for seahorses. Being as you live in TX, most people I talk to from there say their tanks run on the warm side. If that's the case with your tank, you'd need to invest in a chiller or other means of lowering the tank temp so it would be a STABLE temp between 72-74F for best results.

Hope that helps a bit.

Tom

 

[Fredfish]

Your foxface and yellow tank will thank you for the move. They really do need more room than a 37 can provide.

The 37 is a great size for seahorses. As to water flow, ReefNut is right, they will not handle the really high flows that some reef tanks can get. If you can arrange the tank so that some areas receive almost no flow, your horses will like this. A number of people here, me included, have noticed our horses will venture into higher flow areas, but also need low flow areas.

I think that some of the tropical species like H. kuda will do ok in the 74 - 76 temperature range. Hopefully someone like DanU can chime in on this.

I agree with ReefNut on the corals. Don't know about Ricordia, but the rest sound OK.

Some folks keep hermits with their horses, some don't. You will probably want to move some of them to the 100g as cleanup crew anyway.

Let us know what you decide.

Fred

 

[daveonbass]

Well the tank is going to get a chiller no matter what. I just didn't know if seahorses would be ok under MH lights. The tang and foxface are still itty bitty...and were there only as a means to get rid of algae, which the foxface did wonderfuly. I was planning on either upgrading to the 100 or selling them back tot he LFS anyways. But as far as the 37 gallon they are tolorant for now. Like I said before, the tank has two pumps, (3 if you cound the fuge) and the one IN the tank could easily be removed. The other one is the return pump from the sump and it is split and has deflectors. I got a bigger pump for the sole purpose of moving the hydor deflectors...but I found out the hard way that by adding those the flow was decreased dramaticly. so there are plenty of dead spots. Which I hate...but I also figured that they would be nice for the seahorses. So I'm not worried about the return pump, just the one in the tank which can actually be adjusted to reduce the flow. But is the tank going to be tall enough...and how many seahorses could it hold...could I get aways with Two in there....?

 

[Fredfish]

Sorry didn't mean to sound like I was chastizing on the tang and the foxface.

The general rule for tank height is 3x the body length of the horse, and this is only so they can initiate their courship dance. 20" should be good for many species. My tank is 12" tall sand to water surface and it is good for my H. kuda/fuscus which are 4.5" - 5" in length.

a 37 is lots of room for 2 horses, 4 of many species without difficulty. You mentioned that you have a fuge. This ups the capacity of the system.

I have never run really high flows in my tank, but I suspect your horses will let you know by their behavior if there is too much flow. Pledosophy has more experience here.

Fred

 

[daveonbass]

no hostility taken...I just wanted to make it clear that I understood the situation which was temporay at best. Either way I'm hoping that I can get this all under controll soon, I really would love to have a 100g reef and a smaller horse tank.

 

[Poniegirl]

As long as your water parameters are great and there are no "nasties" (stinging corals) in the tank...the more mature the system is, the better the horses will fare. There should be some good populations of pods for them to snack in between the 2X daily that you will feed them.
Also, be sure to ask your seller to feed the horses frozen mysis before you agree to purchase. Be 100% sure they are captive bred.
As stated already, the tank height rquirements are generally geared to breeding, mated seahorses. If you choose to go with one gender (females are easiest) your tank height will not be an issue. Unless you are interested in breeding them (a noble, but heartbreaking endeavor) I would suggest a herd of females.
They are wonderful little creatures!

 

[daveonbass]

why females inparticular? I heard taht they can cause pollution problems from laying unferalized egg masses. And what is the problem with males?

 

[Poniegirl]

With females, you do not have the possibility of pouch problems. If you search on seahorse maladies, I think you will find this is a common area of illness.
Secondarily, IME, the females are more likely to be social (not exclusively, but more likely) and busy hunters. Conversely, my favorite horse was a male, but I believe females to be easier when you are first keeping.
JMO
I have not heard of females laying eggs with no mate available....

 

[Fredfish]

Those darn males! All they want to do is sit at home on the couch with a beer and watch the game!!

My female seems to hang out in the open a lot of the time while both of my males are more secrative. I almost never see my pregnant male. Used to worry he wasn't getting enough to eat, but that dosn't seem to be a problem.

On feeding, If you are introducing them to a large tank full of pods, I would section off a small part of the tank, say 1/4, and introduce the horses to that first, making sure they continue eating frozen food. The reason for this is simple, horses prefer live gourmet snacks to frozen food. When I introduced my horses to my 40g tank, I had to take them back out and retrain them on frozen because they refused it in the main tank.

In the process I lost one of my horses because it never went back to frozen.

Once you have them on a feeding schedule, you can let them roam the rest of the tank.

Fred

 

[Poniegirl]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8263903#post8263903 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Fredfish
Those darn males! All they want to do is sit at home on the couch with a beer and watch the game!! Fred

I said PPouch problems. not couch problems.:smurf:
Good idea on sectioning the tank to establish a feeding station! I think your idea is to keep them from becoming dependent on the live food (pods) that may be present? That's good insight.
A 37 is a lot of room and you want to be able to make sure each horse gets food. They are very much creatures of habit, DaveOnBass(guitar?), so to train them in a controllable environment, be consistent, and it will benefit everyone.
Michele

 

[Fredfish]

lol, my mistake. Couch was in the way when I was looking at the screen.

Exactly. Its more like addicted than dependant. They seem to have a VERY strong preference for live food. This is something I had never encountered in my many years of fish keeping.

My horses learned very quickly where the feeder was and came visiting regularly. This is now my female's home base. There are other ways to feed. Some people target feed their horses daily wherever there are and I remember reading about one person who randomly distributes the frozen mysis and lets the horses 'hunt' them. Just make sure they are firmly on frozen.

Fred