Sea horses on exhibit at the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago INTERACTIVE: Image gallery from Chicago's Shedd Aquarium

December 28, 1998
Web posted at: 6:55 p.m. EST (2355 GMT)

From Correspondent Patty Davis

CHICAGO (CNN) -- From the conventional sea horse to the potbellied kind to the leafy sea dragon, sea horses are a curiosity. And since an exhibit opened last May, they've been thriving at Chicago's Shedd Aquarium.

But the delicate creatures, prized for their use in Chinese medicine and the aquarium trade, have been overfished. The World Conservation Union now lists them as a "threatened" species.

"Where we work in the Philippines, we have lost perhaps 70 percent over ten years," said Dr. Amanda Vincent of Montreal's McGill University. "Clearly such declines have to be reversed very rapidly. We cannot wait until we are literally hovering on the bring of extinction."

The Shedd exhibit is helping to educate people about the problem. And the aquarium recently held the first ever international conference on the problems facing sea horses.

Sea horses are used in many Chinese medicines

It's also taking another tack -- Shedd officials taught Philippine villagers, dependent on sea horse fishing, how to make crafts depicting sea horses. The aquarium stocks its gift store shelves with everything from picture frames to baskets to purses made in the South Pacific islands.

The villagers have also agreed to a protected area for the sea horses so their populations can have time to grow.

Sea horses are unique because the males are the ones who bear the young. Scientists are still uncovering many mysteries about the creatures and their place in the world's ecological system.

"Frankly, I can't imagine a world without sea horses," Vincent said. "It would be a much sadder place.

Visitors to the Shedd Aquarium agree.

"I think they are really cool animals and God put them here for some reason," said one young girl. "I guess we should just leave them alone."