The Secret Language of Seahorses

Seahorses are entirely non-verbal (meaning they make no known communicative sounds) but that doesn’t mean they don’t communicate. On the contrary, seahorses develop complex and important relationships that range from aggressive to friendly and romantic, and they spend a lot of time interacting with other seahorses in their environment. Curiously, the adults show similar patience with my smallest seahorse, Magellan, who has a physical disability that stunted his growth. Although the same age as the larger seahorses, Magellan remains about the size of a six-month old juvenile, and the adults allow him to hitch to them, grab them, and interact with them

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Spotlight on Kirin

I’m returning to the old blogging schedule, which means that Tuesday is…tank day. And I’m kicking it off with a spotlight post about each of the seahorses. First up…Kirin. Ironically, Kirin arrived as one of the weakest of my current seahorse crew. She had with a wonky tail (most likely pinched in shipping from the breeder) and had to be hospitalized (in a separate hospital tank I keep for this purpose) almost immediately upon arrival. She was also the seahorse with the most cirri–the little projections that rise from the seahorse’s spine and crest–and the only one of the group to keep them into adulthood. In the

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Ghillie – Then, Now, and Always

It’s always sad when we lose a pet, particularly one we’ve had for a while. But death isn’t always a sad event–especially when the creature in question has lived a long, productive, and happy life. And that’s the case today. Ghillie joined my reef in early 2011, when he was just under six months old. He adored my adult seahorse, Cygnus–then the dominant male in the tank–and followed him everywhere. Ghillie even got along with Emperor Maximus Angryfish I, our watchman goby. Which led to Ghillie becoming a father: When I returned from dinner, she had died–but Ghillie stayed with her to the

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Love on the Reef

Seahorses mate in mid-water, and mated pairs engage in elaborate courtship rituals involving tail-holding, “carouseling” around one another while swimming, and color-changing displays. Mated pairs also seem to enjoy spending time together, and often hitch together in a sea fan or other favorite hitching spot. The young seahorses in my tank haven’t had a chance to observe any older seahorses “dancing,” but that hasn’t stopped them from figuring the courtship rituals out on their own. Over the weekend, Vega and Moya (who ended up being male, despite his feminine-sounding name) started courtship behaviors. They spent a lot of time together, hitched in

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Lessons Learned From a Baby Seahorse

Last December, I acquired some new baby seahorses for my aquarium. I quickly realized that one of the four was born without a “snick” – the snapping suction action that seahorses use to capture and eat their prey. Where seahorses normally snick up food, this little fellow could only inhale weakly and hope something made it far enough up his snout to reach his belly. Writing isn’t an easy life. The odds are against a writer from the start. In addition to learning how to write–a difficult task in itself–the writer must finish a novel, edit the novel, choose and pursue a

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January 2014 on the Reef

  This year, I’m trying to keep up with the monthly reef-retrospectives, where I share some of the best images from the month before. Here’s a little of what I saw in January: Ghillie and Ceti, the seahorses, sharing dinner: Some new purple mushrooms (settling in well – despite the adventurous hermit): Max. Being Max. Emo the clownfish, hiding in a cave: And, last but not least, Red Spot the fire shrimp enjoying a rare trip into the open: Which is your favorite? I can never decide.

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A Shiny New Yamaha for Christmas

Last week my husband accompanied me on my regular trip to the fish store. He likes to go from time to time, to look at the fish and the corals. A seahorse tank has strong restrictions on species compatability, so many lovely specimens will never come home with us–we have to enjoy them at the store. This trip, my husband saw a brilliant purple pseudochromis (sometimes also called a purple dottyback or a strawberry gramma) swimming around in the reef store’s tank. The fish’s brilliant color caught his eye – in part because he used to have a Yamaha FZR motorcycle

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The Most Patient Shrimp in the World

Most of the time, my seahorses eat at regular places in the tank. The large male (Cygnus) and the female (Ceti) eat near the top of the tank, while the little male (Ghillie) eats alone near his favorite hitch at the bottom of the reef. Last night, however, Ceti noticed me feeding Ghillie and decided to share his dinner instead of swimming up for her own. She quickly discovered there wasn’t enough room for two on Ghillie’s coral hitch, so she snaked her tail around the closest object – in this case, a cleaner shrimp. I ran for my camera,

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I miss my anxiety … but lately, my aim is improving.

For the most part, authors are wriggling balls of anxieties held together by dreams and duct tape. We like to pretend we’re not, but if you catch a writer in an honest moment, (s)he’ll admit it’s true. Before I had an agent, I thought my anxiety would disappear when I found one. Before I had a publishing deal, I thought a contract would cure my nervous woes. I believed a multiple-book deal would leave me smiling forever. I should have asked for a unicorn too – because clearly, I was dreaming. The question for authors – and, truly, for every

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