Enough Food?? [Seahorse, Pipefish 12g NanoCube]

[Jennfindingzen]

This is my second week having fish in my 12g NanoCube. I currently have:
1 firefish, 2 peppermint shirmps, 8 hermit crabs, banded (ringed) pipefish, dragonface pipefish.

1. My firefish has been acting funny, rubbing its body on the substrate.
2. I am uncertain of whether either pipefish are even eating as I cannot see whether food is entering its small mouth. The food I provide for them are frozen cubes of newly hatched baby brine shrimps. I feed them half a cube each day.

I plan to add 2 small black seahorses next Sunday, and I still am not sure of whether I provide enough food, as I try to prevent excess amounts of food to keep the water quality as clean as possible. Anyone else have a similar tank?

[melosu58]

Welcome aboard. We are glad you found us here at AA.

[redsea]

Welcome, thanks for joining!

Sometimes fish rub up against material if they have a disease, like ich (I think), so keep your eyes peeled.

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I would wait to add the seahorses until your pipefish eat for sure.

[George9]

Welcome to Aquarium Advice, and Happy Holidays!

[Jennfindingzen]

I think they are eating, they look healthy. My fire fish is eating now too, I think I use to feed them too early, and I didn't soak its food. But now I see everyone eat. Except I lost peppermint shirmp jr. I thought he has died, so I bought a bigger one to replace him, but discovered him when I put the new one in. After two days of the new shirmp, I found jr. dead.

[Jaden]

The two seahorse need a bigger tank then 12 g

[joy13]

Shrimp molt when stressed are you sure it one is dead? How long has your tank been cycled for? What kind of seahorses are you thinking about getting some get pretty large?

I ask a lot of questions lol. I try to wait a month or more between adding each fish just to be on the safe side especially when it is a nano tank.

[Jennfindingzen]

I bought the tank used. It took 2 weeks to mature the tank and I added a chromis and fire fish initially. Then a dragon faced pipe fish and a banded pipefish. The pipefish did very well, the green chromis & fire fish died in a month. Had just the pipefish for a while, and when my water conditions looked good, my boyfriend bought me two small seahorses for Christmas. When the banded pipefish died, my boyfriend replaced it with another small seahorse.

They started off eating live brine. Then I got worried when I read that live brine alone was not suffice, thus I got them enriched brine shrimp that I add Selco too and luckily they do eat frozen food. I have also integrated Cyclops by H2o, Nutramar Ova and the enriched brine soaked with Selco. I've noticed a significant growth of their body, their speed of eating has increased as well. I feed them 2-3 times a day as I read that they eat frequent for they do not have a stomach.

I notice the two larger ones that was first introduced to the tank are getting very bouncy. They like touching their tails on the floor and bouncing all the way to the stop. One also likes to stare at the mod skimmer or perhaps playing with the suction from it. I know that my tank may become too small in a few months, so I'm worried. I've been able to keep my tank conditions in good standing and my seahorses are quite healthy. I have never seen them so bouncy and active, and I hope they won't try to climb out of the tank or anything.

Anyone have an experience where they had to transition to a larger seahorse tank?

Another things, when I got the seahorses, two were yellow, for some reason they are all black now and they never see to go back to the beautiful yellow that they were when they first arrived.