My seahorse tank is finally complete and now I am starting a 30

[viperfish]

A 14 gallon Biocube is plenty for Dwarf Seahorses. Of course the bigger the better but you're fine for now.

[rayjay]

If you are that offended by his post then perhaps this isn't the forum for you.
It was an honest post elicited by the facts stated in your original post.
IMO, you need to start to trust more knowledgeable people regarding seahorse keeping as just knowing salt water aquariums is far from sufficient.
Even keeping H. fuscus would be challenging long term in a tank that small, but H. reidi, H. erectus, or H. kuda and other standard sized seahorses would require very due diligence to housekeeping, and, frequent large water changes, to ensure long term survival.

Viperfish, a 14g is actually not good for dwarf seahorses. (unless you have about 150 or so dwarfs in it)
Better to use a 5g because dwarf seahorses usually don't hunt for their food but rather stay hitched and wait for their food to come by so they can snick it up, requiring heavy food density, a big waste in larger tanks. (uneaten bbs need to be removed before adding the new enriched bbs)
Sengerseahorse will have a chore to keep his dwarfs fed properly in the long term.

[somewherebeyondthesea]

Originally Posted by rayjay

If you are that offended by his post then perhaps this isn't the forum for you.
It was an honest post elicited by the facts stated in your original post.
IMO, you need to start to trust more knowledgeable people regarding seahorse keeping as just knowing salt water aquariums is far from sufficient.
Even keeping H. fuscus would be challenging long term in a tank that small, but H. reidi, H. erectus, or H. kuda and other standard sized seahorses would require very due diligence to housekeeping, and, frequent large water changes, to ensure long term survival.

Viperfish, a 14g is actually not good for dwarf seahorses. (unless you have about 150 or so dwarfs in it)
Better to use a 5g because dwarf seahorses usually don't hunt for their food but rather stay hitched and wait for their food to come by so they can snick it up, requiring heavy food density, a big waste in larger tanks. (uneaten bbs need to be removed before adding the new enriched bbs)
Sengerseahorse will have a chore to keep his dwarfs fed properly in the long term.

I am also setting up a seahorse tank, and by using the same site as you described, many of the species can be kept in tanks smaller than 30 G. (according to the chart) for example H.Zosterae can be kept in a min 5 G tank, and a H.Procerus could be kept in a min 10 G tank.

Don't get me wrong there are many larger species that require minimum 29-65 G, but if one did enough research, couldn't they properly keep a specific species in a tank smaller than 30 G?

Again just so I don't get read the riot act by other passionate canreefers, I want to really stress the fact that I've been researching seahorse care since November 2012 (I've been collecting a binder full of info). I have started building a seahorse tank since January, with the intent of placing them in said tank in April once I beleive the parameters are correct and the tank parameters are stable.

I welcome your thoughts with an open mind, and maybe even a little thick skin. I realize canreefers can be aggressive, but realize it is tough love, I too have a newfound strong passion for this hobby and I hope I never come across as offensive...but rather informative!

[fishoholic]

For the record I wasn't trying to offend, and IMO I wasn't asking in a rude manner. I was just asking a question out of curiosity, because sometimes you never know.

[somewherebeyondthesea]

Originally Posted by fishoholic

For the record I wasn't trying to offend, and IMO I wasn't asking in a rude manner. I was just asking a question out of curiosity, because sometimes you never know.

I can vouch for you Laurie! I beleive we met at the last Edmonton meet! I can safely say you did not throw off any negative vibes, nor were you rude by any means. In fact you were very chipper...almost too chipper

But you were also very passionate about your many tanks that you've spent many countless hours on. I really enjoyed talking with you and everyone there, as it truly excites people to talk about this hobby.

What I was trying to convey in my last post was that because of the emotionlessness nature of text....it has no feeling! So the emotion side is left to the interpriter, and as a result of that, misunderstandings of tone and feeling are bound to happen!

That and I'm finding there are very few people with any Seahorse Experience.....or they are keping all their valuable experience to themselves!

Hope that cools everyones jets! I really enjoy this forum because I can really nerd out about my reefing! (nobody else understands me )

Cheers! and Keep posting!


Steve

[Pan]

From the view of the original OP, who might never have been on a forum to have been called a troll from the start, or at least suspected of it could have triggered their anger.

A pm might have worked better in this case

But I agree the quicker and unfortunately more forcefully we stick to an ethical view towards livestock the better - we are all of course keeping animals in a glass box would would prefer the wild..Tank raised perhaps aside.

But there are most assuredly minimums required in this hobby..(strange word when you think about the welfare of living creatures as a hobby).

The Original Poster does not meet them, and their lack of knowledge is seemingly quite large (the quip about a friend recommending is not good enough to defend against poor research, what Laurie was taking issiue with I think is the desire to become responsible for the welfare of living creatures without first properly researching them. It is not enough to say oh I will fix it later, much like the Its okay for now I'm gonna upgrade....upgrade first lie later...

Just because they look healthy now does not mean they are, and one day when you come home and they are dead you will either try again (remember living creatures) or be fed up with the keeping of marine creatures. One who practices good, reliable, conscientious husbandry is always preferable to the oh it died i'll just get another.

Most people on this forum feel strongly towards the animals in their care...you will not find much sympathy for lack of research or bad husbandry practices I don't think.

But all that being said, Welcome to Canreef...let the lifelong learning commence

[rayjay]

Yes, he says he has dwarfs and they are H. zosterae. You can fit 3 or 4 on a loonie. Smaller species (pygmy) cannot at this time be kept in captivity, at least by hobbyists and I don't think public aquaria have succeeded long term.
Many species, including H. procerus, are not available to the hobbyist, especially to us here in Canada.
H. fuscus can be kept a pair to a 20g tank but at the moment there are none of those available in the US and I've never seen them in Canada in my 10 plus years of seahorse keeping.
Availability is worse now than some years back when we could get true captive bred from Australia. I used to have H. barbouri and H. angustus that now are not shipped to Canada.
I have now H. zosterae, H. reidi, H. kuda, and H. erectus.
The erectus I imported from seahorsecorral.com about 15 months ago because I couldn't talk any store into bringing them in. Now, Sea U Marine in Markham in Ontario is bringing them in.
I also brought in dwarf H. zosterae at that time.
I didn't know there were any available out west until he posted that he had dwarfs.
There HAVE been successes keeping seahorses in situations not recommended, but the are the exceptions and not the norm. Many seahorses are lost in the attempts to do so.
The successes would have to do much more extreme houskeeping and larger and more frequent water changes to be successful when kept in smaller tanks than recommended.
Unfortunately, people being people, sometimes when everything is going good with no apparent problems, a water change gets skipped here or there, or a housekeeping chore is delayed, and then all of a sudden, a seahorse or seahorses are in trouble, often leading to their demise.
Normally, the water can be problematic and you don't know it because all the hobbyists kits don't test for things like the advancing vibrio type species, or pathogens picked up from tankmates, the two biggest causes of seahorse losses.
Seahorse.org is the most up to date source of information, but a lot of the articles in the library have become outdated so one needs to frequent the forums to really know what is currently known for best chances of success.

[Sengerseahorse]

This forum was recommended to me from a friend. Obviously you people are not very accepting of new people coming on here.

What offends me might not offend you, but how would you feel if the first post you do you get your ass chewed off by a bunch of people and are asked if you are for real or are just trying to get a rise out of people.

If this is what the saltwater community in Canada is like, **** it! Do yourselves a favor, drink and beer, smoke your drugs, watch your fish, and enjoy your little life of making mine miserable for the last 48 hours.

I have more in life to worry about then this bull****. I am not into these high school games. You wanted me out, I'm out!

[fishoholic]

Originally Posted by somewherebeyondthesea

I can vouch for you Laurie! I beleive we met at the last Edmonton meet! I can safely say you did not throw off any negative vibes, nor were you rude by any means. In fact you were very chipper...almost too chipper

But you were also very passionate about your many tanks that you've spent many countless hours on. I really enjoyed talking with you and everyone there, as it truly excites people to talk about this hobby.

Thank-you, we did, and it was nice meeting you too I am very bubbly and generally a very happy person, I am quite passionate about the hobby and at times I get carried away and I sometimes go a bit overboard. Ironically some people have wondered (and actually asked me) if I was for real because of how I'm always usually fairly chipper/happy and easy going. It's just the way I am, but if someone is not used to that, I can see how it could throw people off.

Originally Posted by Pan

From the view of the original OP, who might never have been on a forum to have been called a troll from the start, or at least suspected of it could have triggered their anger.

A pm might have worked better in this case

Good point.

I will confess I was originally thinking the OP was MarkoD. I had overheard him say if he ever got banned (for a prolonged period of time) then he'd go to a friends house and create a new account and start controversial threads. So I do apologize to the OP, for this not being the case, but at the time, I couldn't help but wonder if it was.

Originally Posted by Pan

what Laurie was taking issiue with I think is the desire to become responsible for the welfare of living creatures without first properly researching them.

Exactly

[Zoaelite]

Originally Posted by Sengerseahorse

This forum was recommended to me from a friend. Obviously you people are not very accepting of new people coming on here.

What offends me might not offend you, but how would you feel if the first post you do you get your ass chewed off by a bunch of people and are asked if you are for real or are just trying to get a rise out of people.

If this is what the saltwater community in Canada is like, **** it! Do yourselves a favor, drink and beer, smoke your drugs, watch your fish, and enjoy your little life of making mine miserable for the last 48 hours.

I have more in life to worry about then this bull****. I am not into these high school games. You wanted me out, I'm out!

So you were here to get a rise out of people...?
What is it with all of these Seahorse crazies making accounts and posting gibber jabber?