Seahorses in a mixed reef..........

[jrossjr79]

As you most know I am part of a saltwter fish group on FB. A guy on there suggest I get a seahorse to combat my over population of pods, I have that part of the convo below. But what is yalls take on this?

Craig King I have a seahorse in my DT and he munches on em .. He basically hunts em all day - cool to watch
9 hours ago · Like

Joe Ross cant have a seahorse, flow to harsh and other fish in tank to fast when it comes to eating time
9 hours ago · Like

Craig King So  they say ... Mine does great and had him for ages in a tank with a  variety of peaceful fish
- 4 different tangs , flame angel , pair  maroons , blenny , 2 chromis , 2 anthias .. Don't be afraid of flow
with  seahorses .. They don't occupy a still lake  ..also if your live rock is established it is very do-able ..
They  learn to swim free with the crowd  and feed at feeding time .. I believe  they can be successful in a
 DT after watching mine 

[Kristy]

1. You really don't have a problem with pods. They will absolutely sort themselves out. And didn't you say you added a mandarin to your tank? You definitely dont have a pod overpopulation problem. The zoas could actually be closed for 1000 other reasons.
2. Seahorses require very specific conditions and don't fare we'll with the amount of flow that most of us prefer for a reef tank.

[Scutterborn]

What Kristy said. Also, I posted on your thread on FB.


-Ben-

[Flyride95]

Man please do not get a seahorse. The take sooooo much to keep them healthy. For instance you can not be gone for more then 24hours or they will starve. Or the low flow and low light. Prestine water paremeters ect ect ect. I have an aquarium that I have set up right now that had been running for close to 7 months that is finally ready to bring in seahorses. In a fairly new aquarium (under 6 months) you will get a huge bloom of Copepods esp if you bought the bags of live sand. Trust me over 75% will die off. A matter of fact you may be in trouble with the mandarin you have already bought. I do not want to come off as being mean at all but I also do not want to see you have creatures dependent on pods and all of a suddon the are gone and now you are buying them to keep your tank up. Trust me they will die off.

[jrossjr79]

Thank you all for the input, and thanks for the comment Ben on FB .

I was already in the process of setting up my tank to cultivate pods in my fuge so I could get a mandarin, however I was not fully ready just yet, wanted more chaeto and live rock in my fuge first. I have a bag of rotis and pods sitting in the fridge waiting for me to add to my sump now, bought it when I bought the mandarin, just waiting on a shipment of phytoplankton to come in though before I add the bag to my sump.

I wont be getting the seahorses, mainly because the comment Ben left on my FB post about it. As far as where they came from, I have a few hunches:

1. didnt buy live sand, bought sugar sand from Keller, so I doubt very serious they came from there
2. Could of possibly came with a bag of Chaeto I bought a month ago
3. The third possibility is a few of the frags I bought were streaming with pods (stupid of me that I did not dip my corals first)

The one zoa colony that is affected I am going to fresh water dip it, this would be the second time, first time was due to zoa eating nudis, I dont see any on there, but I guess they might be to small to see, so just in case I am going to dip again.