Syngnathidae

Spotted seahorse

Hippocampus kuda

Tails gripping Sargassum twenty kilometers offshore

• Brown
• Yellow
• Tropical
• Globally widespread
• Marine fish
• Other
• Medium
• Tropical fish

Combining armor-plated nobility with a smooth, unspined silhouette, the spotted seahorse is an iconic syngnathid flourishing across shallow tropical waters of the Indo-Pacific. Its deep, compressed body displays a relatively smooth trunk rings profile crowned by a low, rounded coronet, varying dramatically in coloration from deep canary-yellow and orange to dark mahogany or velvet-black, frequently dusted with fine black spots. A long, prehensile muscular tail allows it to anchor tightly to seagrass blades, mangrove roots, and gorgonian branches in strong tidal currents. Distributed from the Red Sea and East Africa across the Indian Ocean and northern Australia to Hawaii and French Polynesia, it inhabits sheltered lagoons, estuarine mangroves, and coastal algae beds down to sixty-eight meters depth. A patient ambush carnivore, it anchors invisibly before rapidly snapping its tubular snout forward, using explosive elastic recoil in its neck to vacuum planktonic copepods and amphipods from the water. Monogamous males incubate fertilized eggs inside an abdominal brood pouch until birth. Maximum recorded length attains seventeen centimetres.

Sources: Australian Museum — Spotted Seahorse, Hippocampus kuda