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Swell UK > FAQs > Marine Advice > Fishes and Invertebrates
Simple easy to follow advice from the Experts
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Fishes and Invertebrates
- Do seahorses have any special requirements?
Seahorses need a special environment to survive as they are quite delicate animals. A Berlin method style set up is appropriate as the live rock will act as your biological filtration and it will also help to replicate their natural habitat: - Sea grass fields and plenty of macro algae with small clearings in between and maybe the odd coral dotted around within the clearings.
Seahorses love to hold on to the vegetation with their tails. If you purchase good quality live rock then you will find that a lot of macro algae will start growing off this within the first 3 months. You can also add many different caulerpa species that are available to buy from most aquatic retailers.
I would recommend getting the environment well established before adding any seahorses or invertebrates.
Pipefish are the ideal tank mates for seahorses, mandarin fish, gobies, leaf fish (Taenianotus triacanthus), black and blue ribbon eels (Rhinomuraena quaesita), and blennies. You must also add a cleaning crew i.e hermit crabs, cleaner shrimps, various other shrimps, turbo snails, small crabs, arrow head crab (to eat any nuisance bristle worms) and small star fish. Be careful with the later two as some of the larger species will have predatory tendencies.
I would recommend a running temperature of 25 degrees Celsius, a cooler may have to be installed for the summer months. You would be best keeping about eight sea horses, preferably one male and seven females as males tend to fight. This will leave room for some pipe fish and other suitable tank mates as mentioned above.
There are many frozen food choices available for seahorses i.e mysis, brine shrimp etc.. You can also purchase a brine shrimp hatcher kit to produce your own live foods.
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