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Saving seahorses

With a $20,000 grant from the Maine Aquaculture Innovation Center, Søren Hansen is developing cultivation methods for new species, including one of the fish world's more bizarre citizens: the seahorse.

Popular with aquarium enthusiasts and extremely sensitive to changes in the environment, dozens of species of seahorses around the world are threatened by human activities. Slow swimmers, seahorses spend most of their lives using their unique, prehensile tails to hang on to algae, making them easy pickings for divers. Their only defense is their extremely effective camouflage.

Hansen's grant from MAIC promises to benefit seahorses and other aquarium fish. Most recently, he received $16,000 for a new research project aimed at optimizing shipping methods for marine ornamental fish.