On Thursday I was given a South American puffer by a friend who knows I keep them. She'd rescued this one from a tropical fish store that had allowed the teeth to become massively overgrown (now fixed). In addition, it has finrot. It is in generally bad shape, with no body fat at all, and that distressing situation where the head is broader than the body.
Anyway, it has shown no interest in the usual foods I offer: chopped seafood, pond snails, live daphnia, etc. It's in a community tank with the other SAPs, which seems to be a good thing. They rest together in a group, and the new specimen sort of follows the other ones about, even though it swims much more slowly.
For the last two days I have been force-feeding the fish. This involves holding the fish underwater, and then taking small (<1 mm) cubes of seafood and pushing them into the mouth of the fish using needle-nose forceps. In the photo below, you can see the "lumps" in the belly from the food I've given this fish.
While this fiddly, it is at least keeping some food down. I'm really worried that this fish is close to starvation, hence this drastic approach. But the odd thing is that the teeth seem to work differently to other SAPs I've handled. Specifically, the teeth splay out laterally when handled. This is something I've never observed with my own SAPs. I wonder if the teeth have been dislocated or the jaws broken by clumsy attempts at tooth-trimming? Any similar experiences?
One interesting thing about this SAP is its colouration. It's almost yellow, the shade of green is so metallic. The black bands are also odd, being oblique rather than vertical, and they merge to form a single black band running longitudinally from gill opening to tail. It is an SAP though: the head is absolutely correct in shape, and it also has the tell-tale black band around the caudal peduncle.
Any advice on force-feeding small (3 cm) pufferfish? What are the best foods for quickly putting on weight? Anyone know anything about the variation in SAP colours?
Cheers, Neale
