Maine Animals Sea Horses By: Veronica Messina

Animal's Name My animal is called a seahorse. Their scientific name is hippocampus. Something interesting about their name is that they are called sea horses because of the shape of their heads. Babies are called ponies.

Classification Seahorses are fish. Seahorses are vertebrates, that means they have a backbone and it is also a fish because it has gills.

Appearance Their colors can be: white, black, green, orange or red and they can actually change colors! They are 6 to 8 inches.       

Movement Sea horses swim upright, drifting in the sea.  

Diet They suck food up into their tube-shaped mouths. They have no teeth and eat their food whole. Sea horses mostly eat shrimp, tiny fish, and plankton.

Habitat Seahorses are generally found in warm waters, but sometimes found as far as Cape Cod and the Gulf of Maine.

Adaptations Sea horses use their tails to grab onto sea grasses and coral. A sea horse's eyes are like a lizard's because one eye looks left and the other looks right.

Life Cycle & Reproduction Some male sea horses die a few days after birth because of the dead ponies left in the pouch that rot and cause infection. The mail carries the babies but does not care for them.

Behavior A sea horse snaps at the prey that comes near. With its tube shaped mouth they create a vacuum that gets the food into its mouth.

    Defense &  Offense They have bone plates that help protect their bodies.

Enemies crabs  rays  tuna  people  birds 

Species Survival Status If the population is stable, only two of thousands of young that a pair produces will reach maturity.

Bibliography Here are the sites I used for my research: http://www.kidcyber.com/seahorses.htm http://www.allthesea.com/seahorses.html

Something Special Sea horses utter musical sounds.

Quiz Time What are 3 things a sea horses eats?   On the slide called "Appearance" what colors are they? What are the 5 enemies of sea horses? What's the name of the slide where you learned that a seahorse is a fish? Does a sea horse have eyes like a lizard's?  yes or no?

Answer 1. Shrimp, tiny, fish, and plankton     2. white, black, green, orange or red      3. crabs, rays, tuna, birds, and people       4. classification        5. yes