The oldest babies are now growing quite quickly and a few are showing signs of pouches. This weekend I will be trying to separate them with a divider in the tank so that I can get an accurate count of male and female. Here are a few pictures of the babies now.
This is one of the 3 week old fry. It has a very full belly as you can see by the red coloration. At the moment there are about 180 left of these fry.
A 12 week old fry. There are still 57 of these ones left. There have been no losses of these ones since I returned from holiday. They are now eating whole Hikari Mysis instead of shaved which is so much easier at feeding time!
The 15 week old fry. The lower one in front is a male and the one above is a female. You can just barely see the diagonal shape of the pouch forming as opposed to the female who has more of a P shape. The males are also bigger at the moment.
The cirri on this little one are becoming more pronounced. They are also developing little branches.
Currently, there are still 73 of the oldest fry living. Also, no losses since I returned from holiday.
I must say, this has been a tremendous pleasure being able to raise these guys this far and know that, barring any catastrophe, I will be able to raise them to saleable size and age. When I first started keeping seahorses, I hoped, but didn't dare to dream that I would be able to raise some fry someday. Now I have realized that dream and it has been a wonderful experience.
