San Diego, California – An aquarium in San Diego has successfully bred a rare weedy sea dragon which is a distant cousin of seahorse and appears like a weed while floating.
The information of the birth of new Sea Dragon was confirmed by San Diego’s Birch Aquarium at Scripps Institution of Oceanography where they said that two weedy sea dragons have hatched this week which makes the aquarium one of the very few in the world to have successfully bred the rare breed of fish.
These newborn dragons are fed with tiny shrimps and are kept away from public view as of now. The dragons are said to have the appearance of leafy appendages and are less than an inch long. These dragons are difficult to breed in captivity.
“Sea dragons are charismatic, sensitive, and require detailed husbandry,” – Jennifer Nero Moffatt who is the aquarium’s senior director of animal care, science, and conservation, said in a statement, she also mentioned, “We have spent over 25 years working with these animals and love that we have made the next steps to conserve this delicate species.”
Birch aquarium has an 18-foot long tank which now has 11 weedy sea dragons and 3 leafy sea dragons, and they are concentrating on breeding many more sea dragons because of the track record of breeding in captivity and this will help the scientists to study them. It is difficult to study these animals because the numbers are small and are found in the remotest of the ocean.
The weedy sea dragon, or Phyllopteryx taeniolatus, is native to waters off Australia. They have long, thin snouts and small fins that propel them through the water, though they often drift like seaweed.
The weedy sea dragon can grow up to 18 inches. The fish was once a ‘near-threatened’ species but is now a ‘least concerned’ as the numbers are small and little data has been provided until now. These creatures are extremely rare and hard to track as these are situated at a remote habitat of Australian coasts.
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