Fine Hotels in Hawaii
hawaii: fire at your feet, seahorse farm,
° Hawaii ° Kauai ° Maui ° Oahu° Holidays in Hawaii ° Hilton Hawaiian Village
° Dawn Patrol ° The Seahorse Farm ° Our Environment
The Seahorse Farm (Ocean Rider)
I don't know how many people know about The Seahorse Farm in Kailua Kona, Hawaii, thereby missing this amazing project established in 1998 with the life savings of two biologists.
Among their goals is to save seahorses and sea dragons (image left top) from extinction; like so many rare and wonderful creatures, seahorses are endangered by our over-population and ever-increasing pollution . . . and from the medicine trade and pet trade.
Ocean Rider has had excellent success with various types of seahorses, especially the charming and shy Mustang.
During their one-hour guided tour, you will have an opportunity to "become" a coral reef by holding your fingers together and having one of these extraordinary little sea creatures wrap its tail around your finger to "hang out."
Seahorses (Hippocampus) are actually fish, although they certainly don't look like anything we normally consider as a fish. They live in shallow waters around the world in sheltered areas such as coral reefs. They generally swim in the upright position, using small fins on their front and back sides. They can also grasp seaweed or other structures with their flexible tail, and often "hitch a ride" on floating seaweed to travel great distances on ocean currents. Seahorses eat plankton and other tiny bits of debris, also water fleas and tiny fish. They're usually found in shallow water. They have no teeth, so when something edible floats near their mouth they suck it in.
Though close relatives of sea horses, sea dragons (image right) have larger bodies and leaf-like appendages which enable them to hide among floating seaweed or kelp beds.
As with their smaller common seahorse (and pipefish) cousins, the male sea dragon carries and incubates the eggs until they hatch. During mating the female deposits up to 250 eggs onto the "brood patch" on the underside of the male's tail. After about eight weeks, the brood hatches, but in nature only about 5 per cent of sea dragons survive to maturity (two years). A fully grown Leafy Sea Dragon grows to about 18 inches (45 cm).
Leafy Sea Dragons
Few creatures are more fascinating -- the leafy appendages are not used for movement. The body of a sea dragon scarcely appears to move at all. Steering and turning is through movement of tiny, translucent fins along the sides of the head (pectoral fins, visible above) and propulsion derives from the dorsal fins (along the spine). Their movement is as though an invisible hand were helping, causing them to glide and tumble in peculiar but graceful patterns in slow-motion. This movement appears to mimic the swaying movements of the seaweed and kelp. Only close observation reveals movement of an eye or tiny fins.
Sea dragons are found in the ocean waters of southern Western Australia, South Australia and further east along the coastline of Victoria province, Australia. They are protected under Australian law, and their export is strictly regulated. The Australian government's Department of Environmental Heritage is completely protecting the Sea Dragon in South Australia. Oddly, the demand for aquarium specimens threatened the species with extinction, this it is now protected under Australia's Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act of 1999.
At the Seahorse Farm, you will be surrounded by thousands of seahorses from 1/2 inch to over 10 inches in size from Brazil to Australia and Hawaii and will have an opportunity to view the amazing and elegant leafy Sea Dragon (top left), which is related to the sea horse and which is now being exhibited at various aquariums around the world. The downside to the aquarium exhibitions is that seahorses are quite shy and don't necessarily like being stared at and/or photographed. Like Canadian Geese (and a few humans), seahorses mate for life, which means, sadly, if one dies, the other shortly follows. If they are not cared for properly, that is what happens. And Aquariums . . . I have difficulty writing this . . . flush them down the drain all too frequently (as do people with home aquariums). Ocean Rider is raising seahorses for home aquariums and has a good success rate.
Their mating is fascinating. They link tales, court for several days, the eggs are placed into the male's pouch by the female, and he fertilizes and carries the young for a few weeks. Once they are born, the courtship starts over and he is kept pregnant virtually throughout his life.
Surprisingly (or not), Ocean Rider has been able to introduce polygamy into the Mustang seahorse community, which makes sense given Hawaii's background. The means that if a mate dies, the surviving seahorse does not die, but finds another mate.
Because some of Ocean Rider's work is new and groundbreaking (water-breaking?), we were not able to see all of their seahorses and, of course, there are many not yet represented.
Please take time to visit their site at Seahorse.com, or, if you are sufficiently fortunate to be near Kailua Kona in Hawaii, to visit the farm. I treated my daughter and her friend—both 26 years old—to the farm. It was not on their list of swimming, snorkeling and, uh, bar hopping. 
The joined me only because I offered to treat them and even at that seemed initially somewhat reluctant. However, my guess is that they will remember their experience being a "sea horse coral reef" for a few minutes above most of life's experiences, with, perhaps, the exception of the magic of standing on top of a Kilauea, Hawaii's live volcano . . .
Newly discovered tiny pygmie seahorses are being discovered in Loloata, Papua New Guinea and other areas of the western central Pacific; the pink one on the right was taken by our internationally known diver/photographer, author, and friend, Rick Tegeler, of Photodive International in Canada. Rick just sent us three amazing photographs of these small creatures (all on the right). His interests have taken him to the Red Sea, Fiji, the Cook Islands, Sri Lanka, the Netherland Antilles, Micronesia, Central and South America, all over the Caribbean, the Philippines, Australia, the Maldives, Papua New Guinea and many more exotic locations. Rick's images and corresponding text have graced the pages of numerous, major magazines, publications and books. In addition to his work in North America, he is currently diving, exploring and writing with a focus on areas of the Indo-Pacific.If you would to see more of Rick's work, or would like to order one of these images, please visit him and see more of his fine photography at Photodive International.
Also, please consider working with or donating to environmental groups working to save our natural world. Such treasures as these seahorses are irreplaceable and seeing one is nothing short of magical. Holding one of these gentle creatures is charming.
You can make a huge difference: Recycle everything; do not drop anything into streams or oceans—no cans, no bottles, no plastic, no used fishing line, no toothbrushes (you'd be surprised!). Most of all, PLEASE do not toss cigarette butts on the ground anywhere ever . . . they are NOT biodegradable, 278 trillion carcinogenic filters end up in our water each year, the poison in 100 filters will kill an adult human. Cigarette filters harm everything they touch.
Changes in Latitude, Changes in Attitude