Pipefish - anyone keep them?

[soggydrysuit]

These were my blue stripes who I lost due to the cats dumping wallpaper into the tank. I will be trying Syngnathids again in addition to the fw pipe I have.

Just wondering if anyone else kept any pipefish or seahorses?

I'm posting this because another member wanted a pic of bluestripes and they happen to be marine like most pipes.

pipes.jpg

[pufferpuggirl]

I have never kept pipefish, but I came very close to getting some BEFORE I did my research. Once I read about them, I changed my mind. Apparently the hardest thing about them, and very much in common with seahorses, is their need for very small live food given frequently. I read that most people that get them cannot keep them alive and I knew I wasn't up to the task, so I decided to pass on them.
I suppose if you've had any experience with seahorses then you are probably going to do well with pipefish.

[Rusty]

Hmmmm i wonder who that memeber could be ...........


Thanks your Doryrhamphus excisus look very nice indeed. what was their feeding regimen and tank setup? How easy is it to sex these beauties? is there a difference in the pipes from the different localities red sea vs Indonesian? have you ever seen the pre dawn mating rituals? I had read this species was more shy than other flag tail pipes. sorry about all the inquiries i just really want to get this thread going.i love syngnathids especially since many of them are livebearers and have very interesting breeding behaviors (so cool)

Rusty

[Pufferpunk]

I loved my dragon pipefish but eventually they just disappear.

[soggydrysuit]

Thanks for the replys - I have access to sources of small live food all year round

It's mainly cyclops and daphnia now it's warm. These come from a couple of water butts full of green water so they come pre-gut loaded In the winter, I either buy daphnia and blood worm or adult brine and enrich it with various reef foods or vit supplements. I also hatch my own baby brine and either enrich that for a day or two after they have hatched or feed within 12 hrs when there is still some nutrition in them.

The Bluestripes would eat any frost food I added - literally anything from bloodworm to mysis, soaked in vits as should be normal. They are very easy to sex with the male's prominent pouch. She even got him preggers once, but I didn't see any fry. I did see the eggs. I kept mine with H. barbori seahorses and they didn't seem timid at all. BTW, you can easily keep a pair of these or just girls together with no aggro but two males will fight to the death. Males have tiny tusks or bumps on top of their noses but you might need a magnifying glass to spot them in a small juvie

Actually PPG, the 'fw' pipe I have probably counts as more difficult than captive bred seahorses in feeding at least because there is no way mine will accept frozen food. Where I went wrong with the seahorses was keeping them with wild fish, not enough vitamins and IP's. Hopefully I've found out enough to try again now after thinking and researching for nearly another year.

[Deepbadawi]

Well I lived in saudi arabia we used to stock our own tank and we found one of these pipe. We took it home and managed to get it eating flake food . we had it for about 8 months untill we lost the fish as it was eaten by a crab they arrived in some live rock. We caught another one several years latter and this one wouldn't eat flake food sadly it died. Some fish seem to like flake food more than others but i wouldn't recomend trying just to feed them on flake food.