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Getting pods from the wild ought to be okay, if at all possible, strain them out of the water, and just use the pods, although temporarily, he'll probably be okay with the seawater. I just wanted to stress the hydroid issue because since he is so small, that is something that could be overlooked, and ultimately his system will need to be safe from them. I would still like to determine what species he is. It will help determine his longterm care and the setup that you need to be putting together for him. You might be able to do a bit of research on his species yourself, by looking up pics of hippocampus zosterae and juvenile hippocampus erectus in the gallery on seahorse.org
I don't know what the laws are in Texas, but I was under the impression that you couldn't release him back into the wild once you took him out. Anyway, once he is exposed to you reef water, any medicines, or anything else that didn't come straight out of the ocean with him, it would be irresponsible to put him back, for the sake of the wild population.
I am really glad that you are reading all you can, and I see you are a marine biology grad student, so if I had noticed that before, I might have given you more credit for thinking this through. From my point of view, taking on a wild caught seahorse is quite a difficult task, and taking on a possibly injured seahorse a bigger task. Add into that the fact that he is either a baby seahorse or a dwarf seahorse, both requiring even more specialized care, and I was worried that he would end up dying in that jug, having been put there by what I was guessing was a well-meaning but potentially clueless (when it comes to syngnathids) reefer. So I pressed the need for the setup and the reading and the specialized care, on the seahorse's behalf, but I am glad to know that you are taking the initiative on your own. There are specialized forums on both dwarf seahorses and the rearing of larger species seahorse fry, and without a positive I.D., I would suggest focusing your reading on both of those forums.
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