SMALLEST SEAHORSE

The smallest seahorse so far discovered was identified amongst the delicate corals of the Flores Sea off the coast of Indonesia in 2003 by Sara Lourie, a member of the UBC-based Project Seahorse marine conservation team and a doctoral student at McGill University in Montreal. Adults of the new species, a pygmy seahorse to be known as Hippocampus denise, are typically just 16 mm long -- smaller than most fingernails.

In the past they have been mistaken for the offspring of another of the 32 known species of seahorses.

(Above): Close up of Sara Lourie's hands holding a test tube containing Hippocampus denise. Photo: Joerg Adam. (Right): Hippocampus denise with its tail entwined around the stem of a gorgonian seafan, its natural habitat. Photo: Denise Tackett

Source: 'A New Pygmy Seahorse, Hippocampus denise (Teleostei: Syngnathidae), from the Indo-Pacific', Sara A. Lourie and John E. Randall Zoological Studies 42(2): 284-291.