Judy Howard, age 9, of Shreveport, Louisiana, for her question:
How do baby sea horses get born?
Some of Andy's readers have tried to keep pet sea horses in a home aquarium. The stately little creatures are amazing to behold. But sad to say, they seldom if ever live very long in our homes. Naturally we do not wish to risk their lives, to is kinder to populate the home aquarium with other tropical fish, or goldfish.
If you have never seen a sea horse, you may expect him to be a huge, sea going steed with prancing hoofs. You are in for a surprise. The sea horse is a dainty midget, most of them just about big enough to.hold in your hand. He has no flowing mane, no prancing hooves and even no legs. But the little fellow has a horsy looking head and snout. Actually, he is a true fish, though instead of scales, his body is covered with oblong plates of armor. Down his back and sides there are tough little bumps like rows of buttons.
He does not move forward like a prancing steed. Instead, the stately creature holds his body straight up in the water with the horsy neck gracefully arched and his graceful tail pointing down. It is a monkey type tail that can be used to grasp and hold 6nto things. The sea horse lives a rather slow and lazy life and he spends a lot of his time just resting among the water weeds. He coils his tail around a stem and holds on to keep from drifting away.
We find the sea horse and his 50 cousins in warm shallow seas. In spring and summer he forgets his lazy life to go courting a lady sea horse. She swims by at a slow and stately pace, all ready to lay her eggs. And you would never guess where she decides to lay them. Papa Sea Horse happens to have a sort of kangaroo type pouch on the front of his fat tummy. Yes, this is the very spot where his lady love stuffs her eggs. She pokes in a few at a time. Altogether, she puts ten eggs, or as many as 200, into Papa's pouch. Then off she goes, leaving the rest of the family duties to her husband.
The tiny door into Papa's pouch seals shut and the fertilized eggs inside begin to develop. In a week or two, his swollen tummy bulges with a batch of unborn baby sea horses. Their wriggly antics make the poor Papa uncomfortable. Soon he senses that the babies are ready to come forth into their watery world. He finds a sheltered spot among the shaggy seaweeds and begins to rub his tummy against a rock or a stiff stem. This helps to open the door of his pouch. The eager youngsters waste no time in coming out, two by two and three by three. Soon the water is clouded with baby sea horses swimming away to find food and shelter among the drifting seaweeds. The babies of the smallest kind of sea horse are a quarter inch long. The larger kinds of sea horse have babies that measure half an inch.
One of the most amazing things about a sea horse is his fins. When you see him, you may be quite sure that he has no fishy fins at all. But he does. On each shoulder he has a gauzy little fin that looks like the wing of a tiny bug. His filmy fins are glassy clear and he beats them very fast to paddle his way through the water. They are too weak for fast swimming. This is why the handsome little sea horse moves through the water like a slow and stately horse on parade.