New To Puffers

[atomicjade]

Hey everyone! I just recently set up a small 1 gallon tank on my computer desk, it has a small filter, larger rocks as a substrate, and a set of small plastic plants. I have treated it with a product from Tetra that is suppose to balance the alkinity and pH levels. I bought a small puffer fish from WalMart, I'm assuming he is freshwater. He is about 1.5 inches, has a white belly, and some greenish blotches if you will, iridescence on the top of his head most notedly, but the pattern fades throughout the top of him. I haven't been able to ID him just from looking online, the closest species he looks like is a GSP but not nearly quite. So far he is doing well, just seems a little spastic. I have been feeding him small grass shrimp. it is pretty cool to watch him "hunt". Anyway, I was just wondering if there is anything I can do better? I would like to put him in a bigger tank, but the spare 10 and 20 gals I have laying around just seem too much for just him, and I've heard puffers are not very friendly towards other fish. However I wouldn't mind putting him in a 10 if it's that much better for him. I'd appreciate any advice, links, or cautions anyone has to offer, it'd be very much appreciated!!

Also, I do not currently have the internet but my bf does, so he will check for responses for me and I may respond through him in the future.


Cheers,
Shannon

 

[Fella]

If you read my pinned topic at the top of the oddball forum on puffers, you will realise for GSPs there are a few things you will need to do -

Create a brackish environment. That means to add salt to his water.

Purchase some biospira! This is urgent. If the tank is not cycled (that means, there are no positive bacteria within the tank to consume the waste) then your puffer is on the equivalent of death row.

He will require AT LEAST a 55g tank. He will grow to over 6 inches. A 1 gallon tank is ludicrous to say the least, I cannot think of any fish, let alone a puffer, that I would want to keep in a tank that small.

Even if he is not a GSP, he will need to be in a bigger tank than 1 gallon. Keeping fish in tanks too small for them is also known as "stunting". That means that the small tank will shorten his lifespan, dramatically.

If you cannot look after the fish, I urge you to return it to the store. If you are willing to pay the expense of upgrading to a 55gallon tank and adding marine salt to his water, then you have got a great fish ahead of you.

 

[atomicjade]

Thanks a lot for the info. I get it, I'm a dumb newbie. I keep herps and it's always irritating to read about the person who has their 4 ft ball python in a 10 gallon aquarium, feeds it live rodents, and says it doesn't bite them because it "likes them". However, for all you knew that's fine and dandy. In truth? Not only is the 10 gallon equivalent entirely too small (unlike fish, snakes do not stunt their growth by growing up in an area smaller than adequate) aquarium type enclosures provide entirely too much vertical space for a ground dwelling animal. Frozen thawed mice are the best way to go, snakes (particularly ball pythons) can be finicky, and if left alone, the rat may chew on the snake, resulting in serious injuries and sometimes even death. Snakes are very primitive creatures, they have no real emotions.

Not only that, but there's literally over 80,000 page results on google for "ball python care". Pufferfish? Not so much.

And I did read the sticky's about puffer fish. I don't understand why I would follow instructions on how to care for a certain species when I'm uncertain as to what kind he is.

I understand a 1 gallon is too small if he is to grow larger. I have no problems moving him to a bigger tank, which I mentioned.

I'm curious, why such a large tank? From what I've been reading there are all different sizes of puffer fish, is there another reason not related to size that would dictate a larger tank? I also have a 35 gallon I could use at the moment. And how would I create a biospira? What would I have to do for that?

If I could not properly care for the fish, I'd have no problems finding him a more qualified home. I also conveniently have Instant Ocean (it's used for my hermit crabs, sometimes they like saltwater to drink), so I wouldn't have to wait to make his tank more proper. I do have pictures of him but my camera is ever so nicely set at my house, but I will say that I will very probably be able to get them up soon. Then I can have him looked at and identified much more clearly than I ever could .

Thanks again, I look forward to hearing advice as to how to care for him, I think he is really neat and may even look into more in the future.

 

[Fella]

Thanks a lot for the info. I get it, I'm a dumb newbie. I keep herps and it's always irritating to read about the person who has their 4 ft ball python in a 10 gallon aquarium, feeds it live rodents, and says it doesn't bite them because it "likes them". However, for all you knew that's fine and dandy. In truth? Not only is the 10 gallon equivalent entirely too small (unlike fish, snakes do not stunt their growth by growing up in an area smaller than adequate) aquarium type enclosures provide entirely too much vertical space for a ground dwelling animal. Frozen thawed mice are the best way to go, snakes (particularly ball pythons) can be finicky, and if left alone, the rat may chew on the snake, resulting in serious injuries and sometimes even death. Snakes are very primitive creatures, they have no real emotions.

Not only that, but there's literally over 80,000 page results on google for "ball python care". Pufferfish? Not so much.

And I did read the sticky's about puffer fish. I don't understand why I would follow instructions on how to care for a certain species when I'm uncertain as to what kind he is.

I understand a 1 gallon is too small if he is to grow larger. I have no problems moving him to a bigger tank, which I mentioned.

I'm curious, why such a large tank? From what I've been reading there are all different sizes of puffer fish, is there another reason not related to size that would dictate a larger tank? I also have a 35 gallon I could use at the moment. And how would I create a biospira? What would I have to do for that?

If I could not properly care for the fish, I'd have no problems finding him a more qualified home. I also conveniently have Instant Ocean (it's used for my hermit crabs, sometimes they like saltwater to drink), so I wouldn't have to wait to make his tank more proper. I do have pictures of him but my camera is ever so nicely set at my house, but I will say that I will very probably be able to get them up soon. Then I can have him looked at and identified much more clearly than I ever could .

Thanks again, I look forward to hearing advice as to how to care for him, I think he is really neat and may even look into more in the future.

Thanks for reading my reply, it's understand the advice people don't always appreciate hearing that what they're doing isn't the best way to care for their creature.

Green spotted puffers (if that is definitely the kind of puffer he is, you can always check on google image search) grow to around 6 inches. In a one gallon tank, obviously there isn't enough room for him to move around comfortably at that size. I think a 35g tank would be more than sufficient while he "grows on" (I'm not sure if that's a term used in reptile care, I imagine so).

It's not so much the amount of room that they have to move around in which is important, it's more the amount of water the creature is living in. Fish can only be as healthy as the water they are in; what that means is, if you keep a fish in polluted water (especially a pufferfish, they're very sensitive) then ineveitably you will have difficulties in keeping the fish in good health. If you add 1 drop of ammonia to a tank 100 gallons big, it will dilute far greater than it would in a tank 1 gallon big.

Fish create ammonia as waste, when a fish consumes food, through digestion it creates ammonia as waste. This is poisonous to fish, and in an aquarium you need bacteria that will consume ammonia. These will live in your filter. Originally there will be none, because the only way that they can establish is by the introduction of ammonia, in order to multiply, they need to be fed. These bacteria then create their own waste, they turn the ammonia into waste known as nitrite, and then more bacteria come along and turn it into nitrate, which is infinitely less toxic to fish than ammonia.

Biospira is an american product, which is the established bacteria ready to add to an aquarium. An aquarium filled with water, which hasn't been fed ammonia or nitrite can become very toxic to fish, however, biospira contains the necessary bacteria. If you add biospira to a new tank, it can "kick start" the whole process, which would be very beneficial in your situation. You could also (if you have any friends keeping freshwater tanks right now) add a sponge from another filter into your own filter, this also can kickstart the process.

Puffers are great fish, you're right. I currently keep A fahaka puffer, a pair of carinotetraodon borneensis (there aren't many pictures of these on the net, but they're fantastic), a pair of carinotetraodon salivator (likewise with the photos), a pair of carinotetraodon irrubesco, a tetraodon cochinchinensis, and a tetraodon biocellatus (I've provided scientific names in case you wanted to look them up). Puffers are definitely my favourite kind of fish, and they're great to keep, I hope we get on the right foot with your GSP so that you can keep many more!

 

[atomicjade]

Thanks a lot for the info. I get it, I'm a dumb newbie. I keep herps and it's always irritating to read about the person who has their 4 ft ball python in a 10 gallon aquarium, feeds it live rodents, and says it doesn't bite them because it "likes them". However, for all you knew that's fine and dandy. In truth? Not only is the 10 gallon equivalent entirely too small (unlike fish, snakes do not stunt their growth by growing up in an area smaller than adequate) aquarium type enclosures provide entirely too much vertical space for a ground dwelling animal. Frozen thawed mice are the best way to go, snakes (particularly ball pythons) can be finicky, and if left alone, the rat may chew on the snake, resulting in serious injuries and sometimes even death. Snakes are very primitive creatures, they have no real emotions.

Not only that, but there's literally over 80,000 page results on google for "ball python care". Pufferfish? Not so much.

And I did read the sticky's about puffer fish. I don't understand why I would follow instructions on how to care for a certain species when I'm uncertain as to what kind he is.

I understand a 1 gallon is too small if he is to grow larger. I have no problems moving him to a bigger tank, which I mentioned.

I'm curious, why such a large tank? From what I've been reading there are all different sizes of puffer fish, is there another reason not related to size that would dictate a larger tank? I also have a 35 gallon I could use at the moment. And how would I create a biospira? What would I have to do for that?

If I could not properly care for the fish, I'd have no problems finding him a more qualified home. I also conveniently have Instant Ocean (it's used for my hermit crabs, sometimes they like saltwater to drink), so I wouldn't have to wait to make his tank more proper. I do have pictures of him but my camera is ever so nicely set at my house, but I will say that I will very probably be able to get them up soon. Then I can have him looked at and identified much more clearly than I ever could .

Thanks again, I look forward to hearing advice as to how to care for him, I think he is really neat and may even look into more in the future.

Thanks for reading my reply, it's understand the advice people don't always appreciate hearing that what they're doing isn't the best way to care for their creature.

Green spotted puffers (if that is definitely the kind of puffer he is, you can always check on google image search) grow to around 6 inches. In a one gallon tank, obviously there isn't enough room for him to move around comfortably at that size. I think a 35g tank would be more than sufficient while he "grows on" (I'm not sure if that's a term used in reptile care, I imagine so).

It's not so much the amount of room that they have to move around in which is important, it's more the amount of water the creature is living in. Fish can only be as healthy as the water they are in; what that means is, if you keep a fish in polluted water (especially a pufferfish, they're very sensitive) then ineveitably you will have difficulties in keeping the fish in good health. If you add 1 drop of ammonia to a tank 100 gallons big, it will dilute far greater than it would in a tank 1 gallon big.

Fish create ammonia as waste, when a fish consumes food, through digestion it creates ammonia as waste. This is poisonous to fish, and in an aquarium you need bacteria that will consume ammonia. These will live in your filter. Originally there will be none, because the only way that they can establish is by the introduction of ammonia, in order to multiply, they need to be fed. These bacteria then create their own waste, they turn the ammonia into waste known as nitrite, and then more bacteria come along and turn it into nitrate, which is infinitely less toxic to fish than ammonia.

Biospira is an american product, which is the established bacteria ready to add to an aquarium. An aquarium filled with water, which hasn't been fed ammonia or nitrite can become very toxic to fish, however, biospira contains the necessary bacteria. If you add biospira to a new tank, it can "kick start" the whole process, which would be very beneficial in your situation. You could also (if you have any friends keeping freshwater tanks right now) add a sponge from another filter into your own filter, this also can kickstart the process.

Puffers are great fish, you're right. I currently keep A fahaka puffer, a pair of carinotetraodon borneensis (there aren't many pictures of these on the net, but they're fantastic), a pair of carinotetraodon salivator (likewise with the photos), a pair of carinotetraodon irrubesco, a tetraodon cochinchinensis, and a tetraodon biocellatus (I've provided scientific names in case you wanted to look them up). Puffers are definitely my favourite kind of fish, and they're great to keep, I hope we get on the right foot with your GSP so that you can keep many more!

Thanks very much for your very informative response! I will do my best to situate a new environment for him asap. I'm sure it is included in your information sticky's, but from what I've read puffer fish do not generally stay kept in traditional gravel. My 35 gallon is currently housing a snake, what I do to normally wash out and disinfect tanks for other reptiles is to dilute bleach, wash it out very well, and then mist lemon juice. What should I do that would be entirely safe for fish? Also, I got some pictures of the puffer fish they have at Wal Mart that is the same kind he is, I'm pretty sure that they are GSP. I wasn't sure before because mine changes colors and shades frequently, and the pictures I found off google weren't the best. Here are the pictures of those:

Another thing, I've heard that puffers generally stay alone due to their aggression. Would a 55 be big enough for even 2 of them, or is one best?

Thanks again, and sorry if I came off a bit defensive, your advice is invaluable!

 

[nmonks]

Those are definitely GSPs (or at least what the hobby calls GSPs... the science is apparently a bit more complex, and there may be multiple species involved or simply a continuum of different colour patterns within one big species).

Re: rinsing a tank. I'd skip the use of bleach and use something like hydrogen peroxide, which will sterilise but also break down very quickly, especially when you start rinsing with warm water. Lemon juice is harmless enough, though.

A 55 should be fine for two, but as ever with puffers, it depends on the fish. I'd wager two females would get on better than two males, but since we can't sex these fish visually, it comes down to dumb luck. One rule of thumb (Ebert, in the Aqualog puffer book) is to avoid any greedy and outgoing fish in the tank, and pick two nervous, shy, but healthy, fish. These are said to settle into communities better than the more outgoing fish. Perhaps they're the females? But who knows for sure!

Cheers,

Neale