July 2011

Its with sadness we have to say goodbye to our original volunteer Steve at the Seahorse Tagging Project at Studland. Without Steve this project would not have happened and he has worked hard over the last few years in spotting Seahorses and helping us with the tagging work.

Steve is well known for his marine and terrestrial conservation work and was very instrumental in getting Lyme Bay made into a protected area. His photography is well known and he has kindly lent The Seahorse Trust a number of images in the past.

Steve has decided to go a different route in his conservation work and we wish him all the best for the future and should he wish to come back we would appreciate his ‘eagle’ eye in spotting Seahorses.

Steve holding a Seahorse prior to its profile picture being taken.

During one of our dives last Saturday (24/7/2010) we spotted two new seahorses a male and a female and excitingly it was the first seahorses that our volunteer Beccy has seen on the site. Beccy is being trained to be part of our survey tagging team and you can see from the pictures as the Seahorse is being measured and having its profile picture being taken for the database.

Beccy holding the seahorse to have its profile taken for the database.

The female Spiny Seahorse being measured, this just takes seconds and does not cause the Seahorse any stress at all. The spines on younger Seahorses tend to be longer and they ‘wear’ as the seahorse gets older.

The Seahorses profile which is used to help identify individual Seahorses that are too small to tag. Each Seahorses has a unique set of spines and by taking a profile picture we can keep a record in our database. As can be seen from the picture the spines branch which led to the original name of Many Bracnched Seahorse.

All pictures on this site are subject to copryright of The Seahorse Trust 2010

We now have a Membership and Adopt a Seahorse schemes which would make great presents for familly and friends.

For a minimum of £4 per months (more if you can afford it) you can adopt one of our 9 Seahorses (more to follow) and for £25 a year you can become a member of the trust.

Dont forget if you are a UK tax Payer then please gift aid your donation, we can claim 25p for every pound you donate from tax you have already paid.

Sign up to adopt a Seahorse or become a member here on the website, without you we cannot do the much needed work with Seahorses.

Thank you.