Delaware tropical fish arriving early

[mari.harutunian]

Tropical fish species come up the Gulf Stream and are pushed to shore on the Delaware coast which i had never heard of before. Just thought this was interesting. There’s also an article with a juvenile lookdown fish.

 

 

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[gmerek2]

I have always wanted to hunt for and save tropic strays

Edited July 2, 2018 by gmerek2

[mari.harutunian]

I have always wanted to hunt for and save tropic strays

Do they need saving?

 

 

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[gmerek2]

Yea water gets too cold for them in the winter :(

[mari.harutunian]

Yea water gets too cold for them in the winter :(

Oh i didnt know they couldn’t get back. Does Delaware have collection laws for these fish?

 

 

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[Tommy]

I go fishing quite often in the summer and my boat is docked at a marina near the Bay Bridge, MD.  I have a crab pot that submerged near the boat and I used to get a bunch of these blennies everytime I pulled the crab pot up   https://www.chesapeakebay.net/discover/field-guide/entry/blennies     Sometimes there's also pipefish    https://www.chesapeakebay.net/discover/field-guide/entry/pipefish    I used to take them home and put in my reef tank all the time but they dont survived very long ( I guessing because of the bay is brackish water and my reef tank is salt?  ) 

[Matt LeBaron]

Pipefish, like Seahorses require multiple feedings per day (2 at a minimum 3-4 is better) along with food that they like, generally mysis for Seahorses, some pipefish will eat the same but getting them to eat frozen vice live can be tough. Basically the reason you only see captive bred seahorses now is that wild caught have a *very* high mortality rate due to trying to get them to eat and other illnesses that affect wild specimen. Pipefish share the majority of the same challenges as Seahorses, which is probably why most did not last long. MD/DE/VA is right on the edge of the range for some seahorses so I imagine it is the same for some species of pipefish. They can live in the higher temperatures that our reef tanks are generally kept at but vibro infection is a concern for both seahorses and pipefish and it is significantly less of an issue if the water temperature is 75 degrees or lower.

 

The transition from brackish to salt likely does not help but you could likely acclimate them over a period of time.

[treesprite]

 

Found this when I went to look up the cute feather blenny.

 

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/chesapeake-bay-oyster-reef-biotope-tank.303105/

[mari.harutunian]

Found this when I went to look up the cute feather blenny.

 

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/chesapeake-bay-oyster-reef-biotope-tank.303105/

Very cool. I would go to the marina on Bethany and net all sorts of life off the side of the floating dock. Caught many red and orange sponges, macro algae’s, shrimp, crabs, and small fish.

 

 

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[mari.harutunian]

I just saw a dinner plate size sea turtle on my way back to shore on the Judy V head boat. Didn’t know Delaware had those??? Or do they not usually hang around here?

 

 

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[treesprite]

I just saw a dinner plate size sea turtle on my way back to shore on the Judy V head boat. Didn’t know Delaware had those??? Or do they not usually hang around here?

 

 

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When I was a kid, my grandparents had a bungalow on a dirt road along a lagoon on the Indian River, near Massey's Landing, which was just a few miles by boat to the bay. There was a vast grassy field full of bay-area wildlife, and often very large sea turtles would come up onto the field. My brothers rescued some that came too far inland. Then, when I was in my teens, someone decided to dig up the entire area to create more water strips and put mobile homes all along the sides of them (they also put my grandparents out of their waterfront property). So many turtles and so much other wildlife lost their habitats because of it. This was before the internet and hence before bay conservation became a well-known thing. People didn't care that they were killing turtles and other things. Very sad situation.