Baby seahorses!!!

[Youkai]

::runs around in circles::
Babies!!
My mom and I have been watching one of the males for a while, we've even seen the babies 'kick'.
After paying bills today...we found babies! Tiny little suckers...

Yay!

=D

[Shane Tesser]

Awesome Youkai, is dad taking good care of them?

[Youkai]

No, he's pouting in a corner...the babies are dispersing amongst the plants, rocks and coral.
To be honest, I don't know how many will live. We're putting sponge around the filter intake for now. But the biggest concern to me are the other fish. Sure, a couple of fire fish gobies and a mandarin and scooter dragonette are fine with the adults..but...I think most of the babies will be lunch. It's going to be impossible to get them out of there.
On the plus side, my guess is every now and again a few will make it.
These babies are from CB animals themselves. :)

[corr]

Whoa! That's cool Youkai, good luck!

[KaHane]

Congrats Youkai, Hope you save most of them. We have raised Brazilian reds and Dwarfs species before and they are wonderful animals. What type of seahorse are they?

[Youkai]

That's the thing, we aren't sure...
I thought kuda, as they are yellowish with sort of brown and red spots. But they are developing spines like our barbouri now, so I'm really not sure...
I think next time, I'll set something up for the babies if I can get at any of them. But they were deep into the tank by the time we noticed.

[SilverTongue]

Post some pics if ya can :)

[Lizzy]

Would it be to hard to catch the babies and put them into that breeder net box that hangs form the side of the tank? That might be a solution so you can save more babies!

[Youkai]

Alright, so it's been a couple days...
And so far, we can still see a good chunck of the babies in the tank. And there weren't that many to begin with, this was a small male. Somewhere between 6-8 babies were born.
In any case, we still see them swimming around the tank eating microfauna and newly hatched brine shrimp. (we've been adding eggs to the tank).
Some of them are growing...
None of the fish in the tank are showing any interest in the young seahorses, and the babies seem to know to stay away from the polyps and such things. I've seen them make a point of swimming in a wide circle around them, keeping a certain distance away. They will rest on plants right near such polyps, only if they are a certain distance away from them.

According to everyone I've talked to, these young seahorses should be dead by now....so...I guess we'll see how it goes.

[Shane Tesser]

They'll do just fine, we have faith in you Youkai, good luck!

[Youkai]

lol, good to see you have so much faith in me!

[SilverTongue]

is there no chance we can have pictures of them? I have never seen baby seahorses

[Youkai]

Unfortunately, my camera turns even a 7"+ long adult into a blurry mess...the babies are so small I don't think they'd even show up...

[SilverTongue]

:( that is a heart breaker :(

[Clownfishie]

Congrats Youkai! Best of luck with them :) It's such a great feeling when you manage to raise a couple to adulthood...

SilverTongue -- just remember, you asked for it... hehe :) Here's a couple of baby pics -- and there's a LOT more here:

http://www.imagestation.com/album/?id=4291269371

3 days old:
http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid35/pf3f2f57bc01cd650ecb67d3655f4a45e/fd2f4764.jpg

1 week old, hunting:
http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid35/p7b855f2881b93e7b5757457b30c281f1/fd2f47c3.jpg

3 weeks old:
http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid35/p1b42b0c7bf510e45a97350210c78a1df/fd2f4737.jpg

7 weeks old:
http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid35/pac6d48062e7e845f22be365399a90d13/fd2f4671.jpg

14 weeks:
http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid35/p02677996870ff56f77eddd90817a8238/fd2f47d0.jpg

Hope you enjoyed :)
Jen

[Shane Tesser]

Very nice Jen, thank you for posting. :)

[SilverTongue]

Ohhhhhhhh :) Those are soooooooooooooo sweet thanks for posting them! :)

[Clownfishie]

You're very welcome! :)

These guys are just so damned cute -- definitely not easy to raise though -- out of that batch of babies (probably close to 300), I only managed to raise one to adulthood. It's so rewarding when you do though!

Good luck with yours Youkai :)

[snakedude_03]

good luck Youkai!

[Youkai]

Thanks for the support guys!
So far, there is one baby still alive out of the small group. We got it out of the tank, and it's doing well so far. Even after a run in with a bristle worm. :(
It eats like a little pig, and shows no signs of slowing down. Two more males pregnant, too. XD

[Youkai]

By the way Jen - those pictures were great. How did you set the babies up?

[beyowulf]

oh my god those are soooo cute!! They kinda look like mosquito larvae...

I've heard from several sources that seahorses are really hard to take care of....what do you guys do with yours to keep them so healthy?

[Clownfishie]

Hey Youkai -- glad to hear that you've got a survivor :) Just keep him eating, and I'm sure he'll do great...

I had the babies set up in a 5 gallon tank, with one of those old fashioned corner filters (the current produced isn't strong at all, so it seemed to work fine with them). I was suctioning crap off the bottom and doing partial water changes every day or 2... and feeding the babies at least twice a day with newly hatched brine.

Beyowulf -- the key to keeping seahorses is to buy them Captive Bred. You get a healthy animal that is usually guaranteed to be eating frozen shrimp (mysis is best). Wild caught animals usually pass away within weeks, or months at the most due to sickness or starvation. Many will refuse to touch frozen food, and sometimes finding live food for them is almost impossible.
Once you've got CB seahorse though, they're really not that difficult to keep, as long as you make sure to maintain quality water conditions for them, and feed them at least once a day.
If you have any other questions, feel free to ask :) Seahorses are amazing....

[Youkai]

::hangs head in shame::
Okay...I actually have a few WC ones. Four of them, to be exact. They are all eating VERY well on frozen mysis, and the oldest one I've had for...about 10 months. It was purchased as an adult. The other three I've had a just a few months less then that. One of the males that had babies was one of the WC animals. They're all plump (as far as seahorses go) active, eat well, breeding...in all honesty, they are doing as well as the CB ones.
I've had a ton of people ask me what I'm doing to have them do so well. And I honestly don't know.
The tank is a nice established reef tank. I'm not doing anything extra, besides hand feeding 2X daily. :/

Oh...and the baby I mentioned has probably grown 50%, and continues to spend all day eating live baby brine shrimp. :)

[PetCrazy]

Aw, Baby Sea Horses are so adorable!

BTW, Congrats Youkai on the babies.

[derek]

wow those pics are aswome! tnx for sharing