دیکشنری

 THE SEAHORSE

The seahorse is a very strange animal. It is a fish, but its head looks like a horse. The male takes care of the eggs until they hatch into baby fish. The seahorse swims " standing up " . Its eyes can move seperately so it can see everywhere at once. Its mouth is at the end of it nose

The female seahorse deposits her eggs in a small pouch under the male's tail. ( A kangaroo also has a pouch for her babies. ) Then she swims away and never sees the male or her babies again. Six weeks later, the baby fish are born. At birth, each one is about one centimeter long and as thin as a piece of string. They are very hard to see because they are almost as clear as glass. however, their skin is very tough. About 300 are born at once

After the fish are born, the father pays no attention to them. They attach themselves to each other by their tails. Other fish swim head first, using their tails to move through the water. The seahorse swims " standing up " . It uses a tiny fin on its back to move. This fin moves up to 70 times a second. If the fish loses this fin, another one grows back. The seahorse moves very fast, with its head leaning forward

The mouth of the seahorse is at the end of its long nose. It pulls in food the way we drink a soft drink through a straw. It eats only tiny living and moving animals, but it eats a lot. It stores fat in its body

Seahorses live in warm, shallow water where there is lots of sea grass. They can change their color to match the color of the grass, so it is very hard to see them. Their coloring protects them. This is called protective coloring. In warm weather, they spend their time mostly about a meter below the surface of the water. When it gets cold, they go down to about seven meters below the surface. At this depth, the temperature of the water does not change very much. When there is a storm, the seahorse holds onto a piece of grass with its tail. Then it cannot be carried to the shore

A seahorse lives for two or three years and produces around 1,000 young. Some bigger fish and sea animals eat seahorses, so many of the young never grow up. Many animals leave them alone, but no one knows why

When a seahorse is grown up, it searches for a mate. The female deposits eggs in the male's pouch, and the cycle begins again

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