Phantom Thief said:
fish keeper sharks and mollies said:
do you have snails in your tank if you dont you need to get some they need to eat snails to keep thier teeth grinded down so they can eat if they dont get the snails thier teeth will grow together and they will starve to death. Also puffers require salt to. They are a brackish fish sorta like mollies.
WAIT!!
DO NOT PUT SALT IN. Dwarf Puffers are 100% freshwater. Any salt will cause its condition to deteriorate.
P.T.
here is some info that I pulled off from the web about the spotted puffer I knew that they required the salt
any info on these awesome fish?
Taken from a section on The Krib site. They are awesome, but.....
pH : Above 7.4 is ideal. High is good.
Temp: 78-82 preferred
Salinity: Brackish (tbs per gallon). Can live in fresh but should not adjusted to full marine. They do not do nearly as well in fres as in brackish
Terrain: Prefer a low level of water with lots of room. An ideal tank is a 40 long with lots of cave like structures, fine substrate, perhaps a sandy area for swimming and viewing.
Food : Live is preferred. Frozen brine shrimp or blood worms are suitable. Most puffers will accept freeze dried bloodworms or the like. In the wild they eat crustaceans and snails. Supplementing the puffers with snails or live ghost shrimp is a very good idea. Their teeth are developed for chewing threw snail shell, and their are reports of people having to trim the teeth of their puffers which are not fed hard foods.
Size: 4-7 inches. 5 is common in aquaria.
Disposition: The spotted puffers are able to be kept with other fish while young. This of course is limited to mates that can live in a saline environment. The problem is that when they've grown, they have a tendency to think of anything not a puffer as a food item. At just about any stage in their development if their tank mate is smaller than they are, they are most likely going to eat it. There are of course exceptions to all rules, but breaking this one yields an "I told you so." I've seen spotted puffers kept with Monos and Scats. The puffers were always quite small. Puffers will live with each other fairly well. However, keep in mind that at any moment they are able to take one another out. It is in their nature not to kill one another, but if they are fighting for food, or particularly cranky on that day, then you've lost a fish.
Finally, note that the temperament of puffers only worsens over time. Some will not tolerate anything else in the tank once they've gotten older.