Puffers Or Shelldwellers?

[timmystood]

Go for Puffer's their the best. And also, timmystood is quite good-looking. He's such a great guy.

It says so here in this quote! You must just not remember saying it! Thanks for the comments btw!

 

[stang1]

Go for Puffer's their the best. And also, timmystood is quite good-looking. He's such a great guy.

It says so here in this quote! You must just not remember saying it! Thanks for the comments btw!

Amnesia's kicked in methinks!!

 

[ptyson21]

Yeah mind is made up n im gonna go for shelldwellers, the fact that they little fish can fit in such tiny shells is so cool.

 

[Teelie]

I'm partial to shelldwellers too. Most interesting fish I've kept yet.

 

[ptyson21]

I'm partial to shelldwellers too. Most interesting fish I've kept yet.

How hard are they to keep and how do you keep your pH level up above 8?

 

[MojoDex]

well i keep both i started out with multies and tomorrow i will be picking up 2 more species of shell dwellers! although puffers r curious little critters they really do seem a waste of the 120 litre tank i have them in at the moment.

shell dwellers all the way i feel

 

[Teelie]

Not hard to keep at all though they do require different keeping than typical fish. I have them in a 30 gallon with about 2" of sand and close to 50 shells for 5 L. stappersi. Depending on the species and if you want them to breed, you can go much smaller with fewer fish and shells though.

Tap water is already hard for most people and the shells help keep it buffered and stable so there's not much to add to the water to raise the pH. Most tank raised species are fine with lower pH in the mid to upper 7 range anyways so you shouldn't worry too much about raising the pH over 8.

Since they are micropredators though, you do have to feed them smaller foods and be careful not to over do it. They don't need much and a little bit goes a long way with them. I also feed the occasional frozen bloodworms but these can even be too big for them so I sometimes chop them up.

 

[ptyson21]

so what do you feed them on a day to day basis? So you just leave the pH as it is with the tap water?

 

[Teelie]

I feed them small or micro pellet food (Hikari has some great stuff) or flake food every other day. You can feed them every day but they often pick around at left overs so I often skip a day. I leave the pH alone with the tap. I have some buffering powder and salts from their native lake but they do fine without it. My old batch actually spawned in the water I use with no special treatments. I don't what your water is like though but unless it is unsually soft, they shouldn't have any problems.