teeth

[crazedpuffer]

Are you using clove oil?

[DRRT]

Yes, why? The other stuff PP recommended was on back order.

[Pufferpunk]

Sorry you are having such a hard time with this. I'm glad he's OK though. It sounds like you might need an assistant for this. It's easier if you can have someone else hold the puffer & you can hold it's lips back, to see what you are doing.

[DRRT]

I wish I had someone to help me. Everyone was against me doing it and don't want to watch much less help. I noticed when I enter my room the valentini is out and swimming, but then it sees me and hides. I think it hates me.

Yesturday the valentini did not eat. Today it ate a little bit, but it seemed as though it was having a hard time. I imagine it might have been a little painful. I tries to grab food and either misses it for lack of teeth that come together (there is still a little bit of teeth left on the right back side of the mouth) or it spits it out and waits a while before attempting to get more food. This is more unfortunate than it should be because it lives with two very competitive fish, the hawaiian and an achilles tang. I wish I could just feed the valentini and give it all the time in the world to heal and eat, but I can't.

So far it's okay, when it warms back up to me I'll get a decent pic. Thanks for all your support.

[Pufferpunk]

I think part of the problem was waiting so long to do this. You had no other choice, it would have eventually starved to death.

[DRRT]

Update:

The valentini is doing fine. It is not eating as much as before I clipped its teeth, but it is eating. I asked my LFS if they ever get the 1/2 shell clams, they said no. They told me to feed them prawns, never seen those at the store either. I am going to try to get some fresh oysters or manila clams whenever I go to china block. Vegas's "china town" covers two blocks, so that's what I call it. NEway, is there anything else I can give the puffers to keep their teeth down?

[crazedpuffer]

Prawns good for the teeth. Mysid, vitamin enriched krill, and crab legs if they take them will all work well enough too.

[Pufferpunk]

Did you read the feeding article in our Library?

[DRRT]

Yea, I read the article. No idea what cockle is. I don't know where I can get crab legs small enough.

I feed my puffers krill, crustecean(?) meat, squid, silversides, all that stuff, but they like eating the food that won't wear down their teeth. My LFS carries snails that are too large and ones they say will bury in the sand and can't be gotten to.

I guess I could try live shrimp if my coral banded doesn't kill it first.

[my name is mike]

you can get frozen prawn (essentially just big shrimp) at the supermarket - cut the tail off, leaving some meat -- this way they are forced to chew through some shell --

[my name is mike]

Here is a link to my little figure 8 going to town on some prawn -- since you puffers are much bigger, they will probably be able to crunch down even more on the sides of the shell

http://www.thepufferforum.com/forum/vie ... =39&t=8813

[StormySkiez]

Nice work on the puffers teeth DDRT .

As for the hard shell foods IMHO shrimp will not keep the a puffers teeth totally trimmed. Can you get mussel? I feed snow crab as well. I buy from the seafood counter at the grocery store and pick out the thinest legs I can find. Thaw them. You can cut the size down if you are worried about feeding to much.

[DRRT]

All that stuff I would have thought too big. I'll let you know when I try it.

[Pufferpunk]

Everything can either be easily cut to size or cracked open for the fish to get at the meat, while scraping it's teeth on the shell.

[schlecht13]

Something I picked up a long time ago and works great too keep most all Arothron at least, teeth worn down fine - I remove different pieces of rock (usually fiji or tonga pieces - I mention this because they arent too hard) and I smear sardine paste all over the rock - the puffers go nuts trying to "eat the rock" - yes sounds kinda weird but it works! They keep going at it until I have to assume most of the paste is worn off - not to mention the rock tends to crumble after awhile and their teeth always seem to stay pretty flat - somewhat of a curve on the smaller puffers - they don't go for it as much...just my 2 cents on keeping teeth worn down while being minimally invasive and avoiding any "manual wearing down" of their teeth....