Seahorse - Facts & Links - Facts

Seahorse Facts

Did You Know:

-Seahorses gained international protection on May 15, 2004

-What do South American Spider Monkeys, Ringtail Opossums and seahorses have in common? They all have prehensile tails.

-Seahorses are members of the Teleost suborder, or bony fish.

-Seahorses usually live in the tropics or along temperate coasts.

-The average height of a full-grown sea horse is 2-8 inches.
Seahorses also vary in color, including orange, red, yellows, grey, and greens.

-Seahorses can come in patterns like “zebra stripes” and spots.

-Seahorses change color to blend in with their surroundings.

-Seahorses feed on small living animals such as daphnia, cyclops, larvae of water insects, or mysids.

-Seahorses like to swim in pairs linked by their tales.

-Seahorses cannot curl their tails backwards.

-Seahorses belong to the vertabra group, meaning they have an interior skeleton.

-The small dorsal fins propel it through the water in an upright position, while it beats them back and forth, almost as fast as a humming bird flapping its wings.

-Seahorses usually mate under a full moon.

-The pectoral fins control turning and steering. When resting, the seahorse curls its tail around seaweed, to keep it from floating away...

-Seahorse natural predators are crabs, tuna, skates and rays.

-Seahorses are loyal and mate for life.

-During mating, the Seahorses utter musical sounds.

-The female deposits eggs into the male’s small pouch, and then leaves. Out of the entire animal kingdom, these are the only animals in which the male has babies!

-Twenty-five million seahorses a year are now being traded around the world - 64 percent more than in the mid-1990s - and environmentalists are increasingly concerned that the booming trade in seahorses is putting the creatures at risk.