Jake's 50+ gallon seahorse tank

Corailline - I feed the seahorses Hikari mysis, spirulina brine shrimp, and krill. I'd like to expand their diet a bit, but I'm not sure what other foods they may eat. They completely ignore copepod-sized foods. I was considering blood worms, but I'm not sure they would eat them.

I am afraid to get pipefish as they are almost all wild-captured I believe and I am concerned about disease. I do agree they would look very cool though. Perhaps it is worth the risk.

 

After a crazy start to the semester, things have settled down a bit and I found time to finally give the tank a proper update.

Here is the stand finally completed. Walnut, chocolate stain, semi-gloss finish. If I could do it again I'd use a lighter stain.


A lot of people ask me why I have such a big stand for a small tank... well this is why! I use every inch of space. The two 10 gallon tanks are for freshwater top off and mixing new saltwater. While the display light is off, I have a fairly large refugium illuminated with a AquaRay LED (4 Cree cool white and 1 Cree blue - not well suited for a refugium, but it works). Skimmer is a Diablo DC170. I recently starting dosing two part as I was never good at manually maintaining calcium before I moved and the Halimeda consumes it as fast as any stony coral.


This gorg is my primary concern right now. It hasn't opened up since I moved and tends to get algae growing on it. I brush it off weekly and am hoping it will come back with time.


Right side. The colt coral doesn't "sting", but it definitely has some sort of defence as it would visibly harm the gorgonians (turn the tissue white and flaky) within a day of them touching. I played around for a few weeks trying to get the position "just right" - making it visible while ensuring it does not touch the surrounding gorgs. In the background you can see the surviving Halymenia I am trying to regrow.


Left side. The main issue with this species of gorge is that the branches are so dense that the upper branches tend to shade the lower ones, which seems to cause the differential polyp extension between the upper and lower parts of the gorg.


I mounted the touch screen on a gooseneck and it has really made maintaining the tank easier. All I have to do is press one button to turn off the Vortech's while I feed the seahorses or to turn off all pumps while I do a water change. Ignore the salinity, pH, and ORP... I need to calibrate all of those probes. The salinity is quite high right now, about 38-39 PPT as my refractometer was mis-calibrated when I first filled the tank. It must have gotten bumped or something during the move. I have never had issues with it before! I was kicking myself a couple of days ago when I calibrated it and found salinity was so high.


Our new family member has necessitated a cover for the tank.


A neat sequence:










The female just seems to take better photos... the male is either swimming in the open or inside that thick bush of gorgs on the left side of the tank.


Today's full tank shot


I'm going to start automatically dosing Fauna Marin's gorgonian feeding system next week. It'll be fun to for me to see if it does anything. I am hoping it brings back the gorg I mentioned earlier, and improves the non-photosynthetic gorg.

Thanks everyone for following!

 

This has turned into such a beautiful tank. Good job.

 

Is that a purple ribbon gorg? Mine has the habit of closing, shedding, and then miraculously opening and turning bright purple over night.

 

Soo nice! I just love your tank! You know I really like the darker stain, it really gives a modern/almost retro feel if that makes sense. It really highlights the tank well. Congrats on accomplishing a very successful move!

 

So awesome. Great tank.

 

Always a joy to see an update, never disappoints. First thing that popped into my mind was "why such a large stand" lol, it was first answer. Halymenia does look like it's making a nice come back. Don't you think in time you're going to have to rethink the Colt coral?

Love your new cat.

Do you think the Sea Horses will breed eventually?

Once you reconstitute the Fauna Marin's does it have to be refrigerated? Look forward to seeing how the Gorgonians and everything else responds to it.

 

Thank you so much everyone. It is always fun when like 5 people respond minutes after I post!

It is. The shedding aspect of them is neat. It almost looks like snakeskin! Mine shed immediately after the move, but hasn't changed much since then.

Thanks so much!

You are right. In time the colt coral will have to be removed as they grow fairly quickly. I'll watch it closely. I didn't know they could harm other coral or I would not have purchased it in the first place, but for now it looks good.

I have seen the seahorses do a breeding ritual twice, but not since I moved. I'm not sure if they will ever breed. I have a feeling they may be siblings as they were aquacultured (the Seahorse Coral in Florida) and were about the same size when I purchased them. I'm not sure if this reduces the likelihood of them breeding, but it may cause some issues in their offspring if they do breed.

The Fauna Marin food would need to be refrigerated. I was planning on mixing the food daily and automatically dosing it over a 6-8 hour period. If I clean the container daily and put an ice pack under it while it is dosing, I think bacterial growth would be within a safe range. I toyed with setting up a mini-fridge system like the ones that NPS hobbyists often use, but decided I didn't want to go that far!

 

good job i luv your tank just beautiful

 

You could always quarantine your pipefish? To see how it goes before introducing it properly?