Sea horse hunting newly hatched peppermint shrimp

I happend to walk past the seahorse tank and thought I saw some "food" pieces floating in the tank. I thought to myself it's been a while since I last fed them why are there all these food? Upon closer examination I realized they are newly hatched peppermint shrimp floating around, and the seahorse is having a nice treat!

20141028 Reef Safe

A Cleaner Shimp

One of the most common terms one hears or asks in the marine aquaria is "Is ____ Reef safe?"

Well, to answer that question, first we must define what is "reef safe"?

Here is an article from Wikipedia defining reef safe.

So in short, I think most people would agree reef sate in the home aquarium means the critter you are referring will NOT hurt invertebrates, including coral. Even though in the broad spectrum, there really is very limited true "reef safe" creatures as most fish, even those who are vegetarian, would need to consume crustacean at some point in there life journey. But for the sake of general reference, it means a fish/invertebrate will not attack or cause long term damage to other commonly available aquarium creatures. 

Even those that are considered reef safe, one can still find an occasional specimens that is a black horse who wants to redefine their diet habit.

To illustrate, here is a small sample of fish that are "reef safe"

Yellow Tang- Primarily vegetarian, very rarely harms invertebrates.

Clown fish- Not an herbivore but will not attack invertebrates.

Seahorse- Very gentle creature, will not attach invertebrates, but will eat pods.

A list of "reef safe" invertebrates

Tridacna clams- will not bother anyone, no feeding necessary with sufficient lighting and adequate water quality

Small Polyp Stony coral- same as above

Cleaner shrimp- will not bother anyone, will help pick on parasites on fish

What about "not reef safe" fish?

Any fish in the following family cannot be trusted:

Angel- most will nip on corals or clam

Butterfly- most will nip coral

Trigger- will eat any crustacean, will also harm smaller fish, but not necessarily corals

Puffer- Same as above

Lion- Same as above

Grouper- Same as above

Some not reef safe invertebrates:

Mantis shrimp- will eat ANYTHING alive

Lobster- will harm fish/clam

larger crabs- will harm fish/other invertebrates

Anemone- this is a tricky one, but they may consume smaller, weaker fish or crustacean. 

20141012 Neon Goby

So I decided to get some tank mates for my seahorse that are not other seahorses!

I have always wanted to have these tiny cute little gobies. But when I was a store manager at an aquarium store, I noticed sometimes these small fish would fall into the overflow and just vanish after a while. So I have been hesitant to place them in my reef tank. Now that I have an enclosed seahorse tank I think the timing is right! both are ORA captive bred gobies and they are eating frozen and flake food like crazy!

20141005 Seahorse! Hippocampus Erectus

I have had my 28 gallon cube sitting for a while running with just live rock for about 2-3 months. I have always wanted to get some seahorse in that tank. And the opportunity finally arrived! Last week while browsing Best Fish in Milwaukee, I noticed they had a tank full of captive raised seahorses!

 Initially I saw the label "Kuda" on the tank so I thought I was looking at Kuda seahorse. The store was feeding them live brine and frozen mysis shrimp. These guys gobble up the food very eagerly. So I decided to take a couple of these 3" ponies home!

Although at the time of purchase, one was significantly lighter color than the dark one, they do change color to match the environment. Over the course of a week, they have both shifted color slightly and are not not as far off from each other. I started by feeding them Hikari mysis since they are small in size. But then they were not accepting the mysis very well. After some forum posting on reef central, I decided to try PE mysis on them, with the fear that the big shrimp would not fit through their fused jaws. And to my surprise, they were able to chew up some pretty chunky shrimps!
Also, as I began to research more about seahorse, I realize they do not look like Kuda at all! Instead, I thought they look more like erectus. So I called the store today and confirmed that indeed they are erectus. The store only has females at this time, which is OK with me because I don't think I am ready for the difficult task of breeding seahorse just yet.

2014-06-17: Tank moving 7

This is one of the two tanks I have combined. It's a Marineland 27Gallon with the stand. I think I kept it at a very good shape. Despite of two years of usage, there are no scratches and all the parts still look very good~! It's a great tank to begin with. I have not decided whether I will sell this tank yet. I might hang on to it in case an occasion for a species tank arises- such as seahorse, mantis shrimp, etc.

Seahorse tank change of plan

First of all, change of plan. I decided seahorses are just way too much maintenance and work that I am not quite ready yet. So I am going to take time and put together a jewel tank- all the most colorful trinckets I can find out there in here.

I ordered my Tongan branching rocks from Bulkreefsupply.com. I was extremely pleasantly surprised with this shipment. These are the most beautiful rocks I have ever seen and for a really reasonable price! The shipping was amazingly fast as well! I would highly recommend buying from them.

Filled the tank with water finally. I did have to epoxy the rocks a little. Strangely enough, while there is no water in there, the weight of these rocks keeps everything in place. Once the water begins to lift the weight of these rocks, they begin to shift and tumble all over the place.

Setting up seahorse tank 1

So my wife and I have been talking about setting up a real peaceful species tank with seahorse. A friend from local reef group is selling his 20g drilled reef ready setup so I picked up this used unit.

It's a traditional 20g high with the top rim removed, in its place is a custom made screen to prevent jumpers. The overflow is built in but no plumbing in place.

My weekend assignment was to collect a 10 g tank to be used as sump. Bought plexy glass to build buffers and also purchased pvc plumbing parts.

I took a long time planning the pipes including valves and joints for easy moving, cleaning, and feeding time water flow control.

7 Saltwater fishes you should never get part 4

Unlike the three previous fish groups that I do NOT recommend (let's review, the cleaner wrasse, sharks and rays, and sweetlips) which all require a gigantic system with enough room and food for these creatures to survive in captivity. I am going to change the pace and focus on a group I call the "nano pod-eaters"

Bonded pair Mandarin Dragonets

This group of fish normally do not require a large system to thrive, but they have a very finicky diet. Furthermore, they are extremely slow and shy in their locomotion that if you keep them with other robust, fast moving fish they will doom to die from starvation due to the lack of chance to feed. Among them, the Green, Red, and Spotted Mandarin fish are the most popular. You might find them available in aquarium stores. But what the store employee don't tell you is how demanding their diet is, especially the wild caught ones- They only eat pods: copepod, anphipod, etc.

Red Mandarin Fish

If you are new to the hobby, or if you have a community tank less than 200 gallons with less than 200lb of liverock and has been up and running for less than a year, you MUST NOT buy them and send them to their death role. There are, however, certain ways to keep them in captivity under very strict care:

1) If you can find captive grown (They can be easily spawned in captivity, raising them though, is another story) mandarinfish, your best best is to get one that has already been fed and is accepting frozen enriched mysis shrimp and brine shrimp

2) If you have a mature reef tank with over 200lb of liverock crawling with all kinds of pods and is connected to a large enough refugium to replenish the pod population, you may also have a good chance to keep it alive

Red Scooter blenny

3) In a smaller system (30-40 gallon), keep mandarin, and nothing but mandarin minus some inverts of corals in the tank. The lack of competition will allow you chance to train them into accepting frozen food. Using a fry netting, I have successfully trained my mandarin to accept food by first feeding them live brine shrimp, then slip in a few frozen brine shrimp, and gradually increase the portion of frozen ones until it is completely frozen brine shrimp. That particular mandarin grew really fat in a 23 gallon tank with two other very shy percula clownfish babies. 

spotted mandarin fish

Another variation of the mandarin is the spotted mandarin fish. In addition to the common frozen offerings, they have an edge over their green/red striped cousins: They eat the pest flat worms. So if your tank happen to have a flatworm breakout, they are a good patron to help you with that problem. But make sure you can achieve step 1-3 above to keep them alive once the flatworm has been eliminated.

scooter blenny

Others in this family are the commonly seen scotter blennies. The name blenny is misleading since they do not behave like a blenny (at least not their diet) but their movement. They too, must take lots of care and consideration as the mandarin fish.

Seahorse

The next group is Seahorse and pipefish. These two families of fish are closely related. And have very similar behavior: cling onto a branch and remain still for most of their day, only to forage in very slow motion when feeding is required. And the key word is "slowly". As you can tell from the pictures they are not designed with a streamline shape nor born with strong swimming fins. Thus they are best suited for a small system where food will be in a compact, condensed environment during feeding time.

banded pipefish

Many of the seahorse and pipefish are also very sensitive to water chemistry changes: salinity, temperature, etc. So it makes it extra challenging to keep in a small system as things fluctuate easily in a smaller system. One way to avoid that issue is to connect the system with a large sump using the overflow device thus increase the overall water volume without increasing the area for these creatures to cover for food search.

Some of the wild caught pipefish and seahorse also have a very difficult time accepting frozen food. Again, you must then try to introduce them with their natural food (pods) then progress to substitute with frozen food little by little with great patience. The dragon face banded pipefish is an example of one of the most delicate jewel fish out there. They are slow, fragile, and very finicky in their diet preference. You must provide them with a small space with slow water movement, abundance of hiding places with no food competitors for them to thrive.

dragonface pipefish