Seahorses

[SaintG]

I've been working on a seahorse tank for about 6 months now. last week i was finally ready to add the seahorses. my tank perameters we perfect and stable for at least 6 weeks. i've got a cleaner shrimp, a mandarin fish, a couple hermit crabs, two feather dusters and a turbo snail in there (besides the pair of seahorses recently added.) i have caulerpa growing everywhere as well as a sea cactus and another macroalgae that i've yet to identify. my question is this, i am worried about the horses as i've yet to see them eat anything. i've been trying frozen brine and blood worms as well as live black worms, but i haven't seen them eat anything. there is a healthy colony of copepods and amphipods in the tank that the mandarin fish grazes off of. can the seahorses eat such tiny prey?
any ideas on trying to get these little guys to eat would be greatly appreciated.
thanks!
s.g.

 

[Reefman150]

Are your horses tank raised or wild caught? Did you see them eat in the store? You can try thawing your frozen mysis shrimp with a few drops of garlic juice and allow to soak for 15 minutes or so before feeding. The garlic may help stimulate attitite. Be sure to turn off your pumps so the horses don't have to chase the food. Drop the pieces in so they drop right in front of them. Feeding should be done 3-4 times a day. If they are wild caught, they are used to eating live food. You should try to find a store that has live brine shrimp and feed them it and start weaning them over to frozen once they are eating again. Unfortunatly, you may never get wild caught horses to eat after all the stress from shipping and so forth and one of the top reasons to buy tank raised horses only.

 

[Reefman150]

Also...go to SeaHorse.org, As this board is full of reefers, they are full of horsers!

 

[SaintG]

thanks very much for the info. i will try the garlic thing to see if it works.
s.g.

 

[reefann]

How big is the tank?
Another concern is the Manderin.
What type of seahorse are they and are they CB or wild caught
I would also say you should check out seahorse.org
JJ
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Honda NSX

 

[parvo]

How big are the seahorses? You should try live paleo's (ghost shrimp) or live mysis or/and brine

 

[fishfanatic2]

Pods, pods, pods!

Definitely try and get a culture of pods up and running for both the horses and the mandarin. Also, always get captive raised horses, since they are much easier to feed and take care of!