oldbrownies Posted February 13, 2007 Share Posted February 13, 2007 Okay, these guys are the CUTEST little guys ever, I thought my bangai's were cool, but they don't even come close to this... And a couple myths I had read before I got them I've noticed not to be so true with these guys... Like this, a pipefish can't swim with any current and they need slow moving water... well here is one swimming directly at a seio 2600 about 18" away from it and at a pretty quick pace, with out any stuggle And, pipefish can't be housed with corals because they will sting and kill them... well here she is on her favorite perch, all the yummy pods hide here too Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
impur Posted February 13, 2007 Share Posted February 13, 2007 So cool, i love pipe fish. I've thought about getting them before many times. Great pics!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vanz Posted February 13, 2007 Share Posted February 13, 2007 very nice! how many did you pick up? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldbrownies Posted February 14, 2007 Author Share Posted February 14, 2007 Thanks impur, they are great fish, the lined pipefish and the others in the Doryrhamphus species are less active and from what I've seen, are the ones that aren't reef compatible, I would suggest Corythoichthys (dragonface) over the other ones. Tons of personality, they love to watch you in the room and play in the current, and thier coloring is really cool, with their sides being dotted with blue and yellow stars. And they eat red bugs if you have them! very nice! how many did you pick up? I origionally got two, and the pregnant one I received didn't make it through the first night, so I ordered two more so I can have two in my main tank and one in the other tank Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldbrownies Posted February 14, 2007 Author Share Posted February 14, 2007 Okay some new pics with the new pipefish, the little one is hiding so I couldn't get a pic of her. These two just wont leave eachothers side, its really cute The more vibrantly colored one is the male Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fly guy Posted February 14, 2007 Share Posted February 14, 2007 Those guys ARE cool. So they are reef safe huh?? Are they jumpers?? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldbrownies Posted February 14, 2007 Author Share Posted February 14, 2007 They are reef safe, and good for the reef because they eat the red bugs if you got em. I don't see how these guys would be jumpers, whenever they get startled they just cuddle up with eachother in a rock or wrap around a coral, it's really cool how they always cuddle up with eachother too, the larger two have to constantly touch. And they seem a little too slow to jump. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holly Posted February 14, 2007 Share Posted February 14, 2007 CUTE! Love 'em. I read that they're hard to keep alive, but yours like happy and healthy =) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Piero Posted February 15, 2007 Share Posted February 15, 2007 One of my favorites for sure, but I rarely hear of anyone keeping them long term, which is unfortunate. Also because they are so cute, often they are bought without adequate knowledge etc. (not the case here blah blah) Has anyone kept them long term? Of course I can't help but wonder how many hundreds or thousands of these little guys the trade consumes annually, unsustainably. I'm assuming it's not yet possible or we'd be getting them farmed, but what are the biggest obstacles to culture? if we can farm them, I'll stop pointing out how cute they are and start selling pipefish jerky snacks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldbrownies Posted February 15, 2007 Author Share Posted February 15, 2007 The reason they aren't being farmed on any large scale is their fry, they are TINY, and I am sure they would eat their young, they are VERY tiny about 1mm or less, about the food size they are looking for. Cleaning a tank with a batch of fry that small is hard too, and keeping the water filtered is just as hard. One thing that makes them hard to keep long term is keeping them fed a mixed diet, because they eat very very tiny food, so I've shrunk my food particle sizes to near planktonic, my tang will just have to deal with it. They are loving frozen brine and my homemade food, which is a mix of cycopees, brine shrimp, mysis and kelp (for the tang), I'm hoping to also start feeding live nano and maybe other phytoplankton and probably rotifers as well. I think another thing they require to keep them happy is company. After seeing them even after just a few minutes, its obvious that they need friends. It is kind of like signal gobies, they always have to be near eachother, and touching and cuddling. Maybe the ones that have been jumpers in tanks have been because they were kept singly, because if these guys are ever startled, which I've only seen a couple times because they are very bold fish, they just fall to the sand or rocks and hold eachother. It helps that their tank mates are calm too, chromis, six line wrasse, scooter blenny, rex damsels (they are beautifull and very peacefull for adult damsels), and the two tough guys in the tank are the scopas tang, which is only agressive towards my hand, and the fire clown, but he is kind of a creepy troll and never comes out of his cave. I imagine that if I had something like a domino damsel I would have issues because they might seperate the friends when they chase them and cause them to get too stressed and jump. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
impur Posted February 15, 2007 Share Posted February 15, 2007 Do they eat pods as well? How about flatworms? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Piero Posted February 15, 2007 Share Posted February 15, 2007 hrm, if I get a hankerin' for some PipeJerky. I may have to give culture a shot. I'm guessing the food sources used to farm seahorses are somehow inadequate? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lowman Posted February 16, 2007 Share Posted February 16, 2007 I kept a pair for over a year in a reef tank. They died while I was on vacation and my house sitter let the sump go dry.....but I am going to get some more real soon. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldbrownies Posted February 16, 2007 Author Share Posted February 16, 2007 Do they eat pods as well? How about flatworms? They don't eat any of the bigger pods but they do hang out around the edge of the sand along the tank walls and eat the tiny little bugs that live in that little bit of film that I don't scrape. Other than that cyclopees, daphnia, and red bugs are about the biggest things they can eat, and they don't seem to like to nipple at things or chew off bits of chunk food. I have to mush up the brine shrimp to get em nice and small for them to eat, or put the mysis through the blender. They might eat the tiny baby flat worms, but I wouldn't know because they would be too small for me to see if they did. So far, with my regular food I was feeding before (which was a mix of stuff thrown in the blender) and a cube of frozen brine shrimp everyday, they seem fat and happy, I just rub the cube of shrimp between my fingers and it breaks them up enough for the pipes to get stuff the size they like. I kept a pair for over a year in a reef tank. They died while I was on vacation and my house sitter let the sump go dry.....but I am going to get some more real soon. They are pretty hard to find, but that was a goodthing, gave me about 8 months to look into them and do a bunch more research. Nothing really prepared me for keeping them because 99% of what I read was "I've heard that..." and "seahorses like..., so pipefish do too", most of it was totally wrong and very contradictory, but it did prepare me to be ready for almost anything with them. Luckily I found a few people's first hand accounts of them, and that really put my mind at ease. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dippin61 Posted February 20, 2007 Share Posted February 20, 2007 mind if i ask where you got them? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldbrownies Posted February 20, 2007 Author Share Posted February 20, 2007 liveaquaria.com I had been waiting for about 6 months for a couple stores trying to order them in. When they came available online I jumped on em Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Randy-S Posted February 22, 2007 Share Posted February 22, 2007 Fantaseas has at three in stock right but they are very hit and miss with the LFS Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
illcssd Posted March 3, 2007 Share Posted March 3, 2007 We can get them anytime, at fantaseas. We still have two atm. I believe we have more coming in on tue. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldbrownies Posted March 3, 2007 Author Share Posted March 3, 2007 I tried fanta-seas a while ago, never got em in and never heard back so I just waited to get them online Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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