55 gallon - Possible Congo Puffer tank. Have questions.

[RichGSR]

Hello everyone,

I miss having a puffer so I'm going to convert my African cichlid tank to a single fish tank. I owned a T. Suvattii for years, and unfortunately lost him due to a tank crash (stupid power outage), and I miss having a fish like that. I'll be re-homing the cichlids, but the tank has been established for 3 years, over filtered and water is pristine.

I do have a few questions. I was wondering if I could get some input.

1. Can't seem to find a congo puffer at my LFS. I was wondering if anyone could recommend an online store with good stock and good reputation.

2. I'm going to feed it what I fed my suvattii, namely a mix of frozen silversides, krill, shrimp, worms, but was also thinking about breeding some fish as an occasional live treat for it. I know not to use feeder fish, but was thinking about either mollies or platys? Is this a bad idea? I will be raising them and gut loading them prior to feeding, so I don't think it'll do any harm, but I just want to be sure.

3. Tank has a sand substrate with a mixture of decorations: drift wood, pots, rocks and fake plants. I plan on removing some of the rocks as to give the puffer for sand surface area to burrow into, but my question is: Is 55 gallon too big of a tank for a single congo puffer? I do have a 26 gallon bow tank as well that's housing a few community fish and a pleco. Would that be a better choice for an inactive puffer?

4. Other than hand scrubbing the glass and frequent water changes, how do you control algae? Are there any animals (maybe snails?) that can act as algae control?

Thanks in advance for any help.
Rich

[Pufferpunk]

Nothing wrong with feeding it fish, as long as you breed them yourself. Mine never eats snails, so they are a possibility for housekeeping. My guy isn't very messy.
IMO though, a 55g is kind of a waste for these fish, as they stay buried 90% of the time.

[RichGSR]

What would you suggest as an alternative? I'd like to keep it FW.

[moh]

If it were me with a 55 gallon tank wanting puffers. Id get between 3 and 5 south american puffers. Not sure what would be an accurate number in that tank size (hopefully PP will help here again). But make sure to feed them lots of snails or crunchy foods to keep their teeth trim or youll be trimming them

[Pufferpunk]

No way would I keep all those in a tank. Imagine catching them every 4 months to clip their teeth! I'd prefer a BW environment with 3 F8s, knight gobies, chromides, BB gobies & glassfish.

[moh]

PP.. do you think a 2 foot long tank is sufficent for a congo since they are very inactive and stay burried for the most part? What about a 30 in long tank?

[Pufferpunk]

Mine lives in a 20 long (30"). Seems perfectly happy in there.