Seahorse Setup ???

[Beverly]

Originally Posted by StirCrazy

I see no problem with sustainable harvesting also. it is non sustainable harvesting that I have a problem with.

In theory, sustainable harvesting of wild seahorses sounds like a pretty good idea. The problem begins when newly caught SHs are not fed for days prior to shipping. Once at the lfs, almost all WC SHs will only eat live food, and many, or probably most, lfs are not set up to feed anything but frozen brine and/or frozen mysis.

Seahorses have a very short intestinal tract and feed almost constantly in the wild. In a lfs that feeds once daily foods that the WC SH will probably not eat, the WCs are doomed to slow starvation.

Then a customer comes into the lfs and sees the SHs in their special tank. It is often love at first sight for the customer. The SHs will be ID-ed on the tank by a common name such as Oceanic Seahorse, Spotted Seahorse, Lined Seahorse, Pacific Seahorse, etc. The customer may or may not know anything about SHs and will probably ask a few questions. Staff at the store may know that SHs need a tank of their own, but may not know much more than that, especially dietary requirements, scientific name, or even if the SH requires tropical, sub-tropical, or temperate water temps. Staff may say that they have been feeding the WC SHs frozen brine and/or mysis, but may not know if the SHs have actually eaten any of these foods since staff move quickly from tank to tank dropping in food so they can get on with other tasks.

So the customer goes home with little to no real information about the new loves of their lives and go about putting together a tank for their soon to be new SHs. Setting up a new tank could be easy to do if the person is already a marine hobbiest and has an extra tank laying around (who doesn't?) and can scrounge LR and sandbed from an established tank or two.

A few days pass, and the new tank is ready for the SHs. The customer goes back to the lfs and notices that the SHs are getting thinner. OMG!, they think, I've especially now got to take home these darling SHs because the lfs isn't taking care of them right and I can surely do better than them.

SHs get acclimatized to the new tank and the customer tries feeding the frozen foods that the lfs says they have been feeding them. The new WCs may look at the food drifting by, but largely ignore it. After a few days of this kind of feeding, the customer contacts the lfs and says their new SHs are not eating. The lfs staffer says they should be eating brine or mysis, so the customer goes back to feeding their getting-skinnier SHs more frozen that does not get eaten.

Depending on the condition of the WC SHs when they were brought home and on how many pods are in the tank, the SHs may last a few short weeks before they eat all the pods and starve to death, never to eat frozen foods at all.

So, imo, sustainable seahorse harvesting would be a great idea if everyone involved in their care after harvesting actually knew how to care for them. However, I believe it is rare that WC SHs get the kind of care required for them to successfully make the transition from the wild to our home aquaria.