New Seahorse Tank Questions

[Mrc8858]

Ok so I've pretty much finished my reef tank which I told my GF when I did I would start helping her set up a seahorse tank.. yesterday I picked up a pretty good deal on CL for a 20 extra high (10 gallon footprint) and lots of accessories some of which are useless but as it sits I have the tank, stand, lid, light, heater, and 2 penguin biowheel minis rated at 100 gph a piece setup.

Now my questions are
- how much lace rock should I use (was thinking of 2-3 lrg show rocks total of 15-20 lbs)
- should I go with live or fake plants
- are the 2 biowheels suitable for this setup
- is there a preffered substrate
- and lastly most places I've found reccomend stocking 20-25 dwarfs in a 10 gallon tank but since mine has the same footprint should I stick with those numbers or could I up it to say 30-35

 

[Mrc8858]

The tank

 

[MacDracor]

Oooh, seahorse tank! This has been on my to do list since I started saltwater, so I have done a TON of reading on the subject.
- Your rock calculations sound good. Be wary of using any live rock as it may have hitchhikers that are not seahorse compatible.
- Live plants add more visual interest, are softer on the horses' tails, and can aid in nutrient export and water oxygenation.
- I'm not too familiar with biowheels. I'm a refugium man. More on that in a moment.
- Aragonite sand is probably the best. Like corals, seahorses need free floating calcium for the bony armor plating they make.
- As long as conditions are right, they'll breed. Personally, I'd stick with 20-25 and try to get them to breed. Plus, I think 25 is going to be more than enough. LOL

Seahorses have no stomachs, and as such need to be fed several times a day. This can get messy quick. If you have any space for a sump/refugium to breed copepods, I'd do it. It would also give you a safe place to keep extra live rock.

 

[Mrc8858]

Ya I was gonna start with 100% lace rock even though its tempting to just use rock from my other system lol and as for the copepods ill probably just order a few thousand from reefs2go.com and treat the whole tank as a refugium for a while before adding any ponies...my original plan was to add a herd to my 7 gallon refugium that is jam packed with pods but I know for a fact there are also hydroids so that's out the window : / ...another question though could I keep 2 species that need the same requirements or will there be some type of territory issues

 

[MacDracor]

Refugiums aren't the best seahorse environment anyway. Dedicated tank is the way to go.
What do you mean by keeping two species? Like two kinds of horses or, horse and pipefish, etc?

 

[Mrc8858]

Picked my show pieces today...very happy with them

 

[Mrc8858]

A better pic

 

[MacDracor]

Those are some awesome coralites! Will you be having any sort of substrate? I strongly recommend getting some decorative macro algae. It'll be softer for them to hitch on, plus provide surface area and food for pods. Not to mention add some color and texture.