H. Zosterae Tank Idea (please shoot this full of holes)

Here’s my idea. I will be graduating soon and eventually find myself stuffed in an office and behind a desk for a good chunk of the day. This will suck, no doubt, but I had an epiphany the other night that may keep me sane.
Imagine, if you will, a large, professional desk with a set of good sized drawers on both sides. I want to buy/build an acrylic cube (12x12x12 or similar). Drill out two holes in the bottom panel with a loc-line return and a mini standpipe overflow. I will match these holes up with two holes drilled into the top of my desk in the far left hand corner through which I will run the plumbing down. The drawers on that side get torn out, a pull-out shelf is built in and the fronts of the drawers are fixed up into a door.
Underneath will go a 15-20g sump, depending on available room. In the sump goes a section for LR and some Chaeto with a CFL grow light, a drop in filter, I doubt I will need a skimmer but if I can find something small enough I will throw it in there, also some sort of ice probe (CoolWorks ice probe?) as well as keeping to mostly external pumps I should be able to keep the heat down.
The DT up top will have 4 horses with some decorative macro and grasses and very little LR to hide the plumbing. The light I’m looking at for the DT is the Azoo Neo LED Light. No power heads, the flow from the return will be the only movement. I think about 10x turn over would be sufficient.
What I hope to achieve is a very minimalistic, simple and uncluttered mini tank that seems to be magically running on my desk without any plumbing.

What have I over looked? What isn't going to work? Tell me I'm an idiot. This tank is at LEAST a year away from being built but the point of this thread is to gather as much experience and wisdom and head off any oversights before I even think about buying anything.

 

Depending on how high the standpipe drain and return line are in the bottom you might need to plan for power outages. If you're coming through the bottom of the tank, you'll need check valves on the drain and return lines. At a minimum, I would consider having the standpipe go all the way to the top and hiding it with rock for efficient surface skimming.

 

Not sure how long the desk wood would last with all the humidity bottled up in what was a drawer before.
Not sure also, just how hard to service everything unless the sump + whatever in the drawer space maybe slides out on old drawer hardware to get at.
Might not be able to long term keep the desk surface in good shape after numerous cleanings and water changes for the tank.
12" cube is a bit large for just 4 H. Zostera and most people I've seen posting on seahorse.org have mentioned that they don't like to go after food, it has to swim by where they are hitched.
Are you going to hatch the BBS at home and bring them to work or do you have an area at work that will allow you to grow them there? They only eat live food.

OK, you're an idiot. ;D
Don't know why you want someone to tell you that but you asked and I did. Never met one myself, but have come across a lot of people (including myself) that at times aren't able to see the forest for the trees.
Anyway, how does one learn if no questions are asked?
Good luck with your project and I think it's great you are taking the time to get it right before you actually do it.

 

inwall, we are on the same page. i was invisioning the standpipe as a glorified surface skimmer that pretty much establishes the water level. though i may need to find a way to quite it down. Check valves are always a good idea.

rayjay, thanks for the insight. i just arbitrarily picked a 12 in cube. i figured i would breed the BBS myself in a couple of upside down two liters with air pumps and supplementing copepods in the sump and hope they will eventually take off. i suppose a good coat or two of exterior paint would do a world of good for the humidity issue. worst case scenario a fan could be installed discretely on the side, maybe?

as for the idiot comment, many people in this hobby dream way too much and i am one of them. i often need someone to tell me that i can't do something and i'm being unrealistic.

 

oh! by the way, has anyone ever used that CoolWorks ice probe? is it just a bunch of crap?

 

You will always have to add BBS as you cannot maintain enough pods for what they will eat.
DanU from Seahorse Source has a thread right now on the Org about growing supplemental live food in dwarf set ups only he is using mysids as most copepods are suitable for the fry but not the adults because the pods are so small.
DanU's thread on mysids for dwarf seahorses

 

that link didnt work for me, but i've been cruising the nets and picking up a bit on breeding shrimp (s?). yeah, i knew i would have to constantly breed BBS for the entire lifetime of the tank. i thought that they would always pick at pods for some variety or in between meal snacking. like me with chips and queso.

 

one more question i have about feeding these guys. now i understand why feeding frozen foods to full-size horses is deliberate in so much as you can't have uneaten food laying around and rotting, but if you are using live food, if it goes uneaten won't it just swim around some more until it gets eaten later on? or is it bad for a seahorse to overeat?

 

Sorry, I don't know why the link wouldn't work for you as I've tried it twice and it worked both times.
Yes, uneaten BBS will just swim around until they ARE eaten. Unfortunately, as the egg sack is self consumed, they loose their fatty acid content, or if you are feeding gut loaded nauplii after they develop into the second instar stage, they are loosing that "extra" nutrient value.
I would experiment and find just what they are going to consume in about an hour in order to minimize how many remain. The larger the tank though, the more dense you have to feed to be able to target the horses directly as many will not go after the food, only sit by and wait for it to come to them.
I have never kept a dwarf tank but my larger seahorses will stop eating when they get satisfaction.

 

Awesome idea!!!! Start now!!! Buy the desk and equipment!!! You might want to make sure any cleaning personnel stay away from your tank,they may feed your horses junk food and spray the whole thing with windex w/ammonia!!!!