Ornate Ghost Pipefish

There are no known major threats to this species. But coral reefs in Southeast Asia are threatened by destructive fishing practices (e.g. poison fishing, blast fishing), coastal development, pollution (e.g. oil spills, agricultural run-off), sedimentation, overfishing, and climate change (Burke et al. 2002, Chan and Hodgson 2017, Selgrath et al. 2018). Coral reefs within the Coral Triangle are also projected to continue declining in the future from increases in ocean temperature and acidification (Cornwall et al. 2021, McManus et al. 2020). This species occurs in seven of the ten regions denoted by the Global Coral Reef Monitoring Network. These seven regions contribute to over 88.9% of global coral reefs and, in 2020, were all reported to be under long-term decline, where region-specific loss ranged from 0.1 to 8.7% since 2005 (Souter et al. 2021).

Seagrass beds are declining globally (Waycott et al. 2009). Water quality (e.g., algal blooms, ocean acidification, sedimentation) and coastal development (e.g., port construction, land-use change, dredging) are the most well-attributed drivers of seagrass declines (Dunic et al. 2021). Hydrology (e.g., coastal erosion, flooding), storms, poor land management, and aquaculture are other threats to global seagrass beds (Dunic et al. 2021, Van Niekerk et al. 2019). Seagrass beds may also be threatened by higher temperatures from climate change, for example, by increasing grazing pressures from poleward shifts in tropical herbivores (Duarte et al. 2018). From 1880 to 2016, global seagrass extent is estimated to have declined by 19.1% (Dunic et al. 2021). Net change in seagrass area for assessed regions of this species' distribution exhibit declines ranging from 16.2 to 32.3% between 1900 and 2016 (Dunic et al. 2021).

Estuaries have been affected globally in the last decade by increased salt intrusion due to anthropogenic pollution from coastal development and climate change (Lee et al. 2024, Kennish 2002).

Overall, several habitats this species uses are threatened, but it is somewhat of a habitat generalist.

This species may also be taken incidentally as by-catch, but this has not been documented.