Long-snouted seahorse

Not to be confused with Longsnout seahorse.

Hippocampus guttulatus, commonly known as the long-snouted seahorse and in Great Britain as the spiny seahorse,^[4] is a marine fish belonging to the family Syngnathidae, native from the northeast Atlantic, including the Mediterranean.^[5]

Long-snouted seahorse
Conservation status
Data Deficient  (IUCN 3.1)[1]
CITES Appendix II (CITES)[2]
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Actinopterygii
Order:	Syngnathiformes
Family:	Syngnathidae
Genus:	Hippocampus
Species:	H. guttulatus
Binomial name
Hippocampus guttulatus (G. Cuvier, 1829)
Synonyms[3]
Hippocampus longirostris Schinz, 1822 Hippocampus ramulosus Leach, 1814 Hippocampus bicuspis Kaup, 1856 Hippocampus filamentosus Duméril, 1870

Synonyms

H. hippocampus microstephanus Slastenenko 1937; H. hippocampus microcoronatus Slastenenko 1938; H. guttulatus multiannularis Ginsburg 1937; H biscuspis Kaup 1856.

Description

The long-snouted seahorse is a small-sized fish that can reach a maximum length of 21.5 cm (8+1⁄2 in), but the average size is more or less 12 cm (5 in).^[6][7] The body is slender, the snout is long and the tail is prehensile. Its head and dorsal ridge have often some more or less long and numerous dermal filaments which can be simple or bifid. Its color ranges from dark green to different variants of brown to yellow, and the body is often speckled with small white dots.^[8]

Distribution and habitat

The long-snouted seahorse is widespread throughout the temperate waters of the eastern Atlantic Ocean from the south coast of the United Kingdom to the Netherlands and south to Morocco, including the Canary Islands, the Azores and Madeira, Italy ^[9] and the Mediterranean Sea.^{[7][10][11][1]}

The longsnout seahorse ranges from black to yellow, red, orange and brown with multiple white dots usually on the tail.

This seahorse likes shallow coastal waters from 1 to 20 m (3 to 66 ft) deep.^[12] It occurs close by Posidonia and seagrass meadows or in mixed habitat with sandy bottom and rocks with algae.^{[9][7][13][12]}

Biology

The long-snouted seahorse has a carnivorous diet and feeds on small crustaceans, larvae, fish eggs and other planktonic organisms.^[7] It is ovoviviparous and it is the male who broods the eggs in its ventral brood pouch. The latter includes villi rich in capillaries that surround each fertilized egg, creating a sort of placenta supplying the embryos. When fully grown, the young, called fry, will be expelled from the pocket and mature in complete autonomy. Many seahorse species are monogamous as mating occurs between the same two partners in one breeding season. However, the mating habits for H. guttulatus are unknown.^[14] An interesting aspect of seahorse coloration is the ability to rapidly transform color patterns to blend with their immediate surroundings. They swim upright and avoid predators by mimicking the colour of underwater plants.

Conservation status

The long-snouted seahorse is relatively rare, and limited data exist on its population and about the volume and the impact of trade for traditional Chinese medicine and for the aquarium. The species is therefore considered as "Data Deficient" on the IUCN Red List.^[15][1] Internationally, it is also listed in Appendix II of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). This means that it is on the list of species not necessarily threatened with extinction, but for which trade must be controlled in order to avoid utilization incompatible with their survival.^[1][16] A haven for this species was set up in Studland Bay, Devon, England. It was designated as a Marine Conservation Zone in 2019.^[17] Human activities influenced 42% of the habitat suitability of H. guttulatus, while only 30% of their potential distributions is protected by Italy's existing conservation area system, in accordance with the global average for seahorses.^[9] In particular, the central Adriatic Sea represents a critical area where the occurrence of this seahorses is lower and the anthropic impact is higher.^[9]

See also

• Hippocampus hippocampus