Puffer

[dulce]

Hi,
I bought 2 x figure of 8 puffers at the weekend to go in with 2 angels, who have been on their own in the tank for a couple of months now, water was fine. As soon as i put them in one could not balance and died within half an hour and the other seemed fine eating well (live bloodworms) and yesterday i came home to find him dead... what am i doing wrong. So gutted as waited ages to get them till i was sure the water was ok ??? not planning on getting more but cant figure out where i went wrong ?

PLEASE HELP !

 

[J-Money]

Figure 8 puffers are brackish. They could have gone into shock going from salty-ish water to freshwater, especially without a lenghty acclimation

 

[jflowers]

Yep J-Money is right, brackish and would do better in a species tank. Puffers of any sort should not be housed with long finned fish, if they had survived your angels would look very bad in a couple of weeks.

Jon

 

[dulce]

my lfs said they were ok in either, the one that lived a couple of days did touch the angels.. guess maybe he was not well ! think i will leave the puffers such a shame as they are such nice fish !

 

[pica_nuttalli]

my lfs said they were ok in either

weeeeelll.... some people know more than others, you know? puffers are one of those subjects where a little knowledge can do a lot of harm. f-8's do "manage" to live in fresh, but they thrive in brackish. if they had been struggling along in a mild-salt tank and then dumped into a no-salt tank, then yes, they would have kaput-ed.

i personally wouldn't take *anything* said at that LFS store at face value now anyways, because:
(1) they should have asked what the puffers were going to live with. NO puffer can go with a slow-moving, long-finned fish like an angels. puffers are just bitey fish.
(2) they were keeping a bw/fw puffer with plecos. plecos really, really don't like salt. a bw/fw may not need to be in a strong brackish environment, but it would be best to put at least a little salt in. that your LFS had the two together indicates that one or the other species was going to suffer and weaken in that tank. i've only known of one store to do something like that, and the ONE pleco in that tank wasn't for sale - it was a sacrifice to the maintenence gods.

so either your LFS doesn't know or doesn't care -- neither of which should inspire confidence in a consumer, especially one who just shelled out probably 15+ dollars on brand-new dead fish!

 

[Nyc]

If it wasn't the water, it might have been the temperature of the water.