My Dwarf Puffer is a Glutton

[SilasMortimer]

Moe, my dwarf puffer, recently became single (much to my sadness). He currently lives alone with two otocinclus.

At first, I thought I hadn't cut back on his food enough. He always looked like I'd just fed him. Eventually, I stopped feeding him for a few days. He remained fat. He leaves the otos alone. There's nothing else living in the tank but plants.

The tank is right beside me here as I sit at my desk. Generally, if he sees me looking at him, he comes to the glass, so it's difficult to gauge his behavior. So I started watching him surreptitiously without turning my head directly at him. He's hunting. He's hunting and catching... something. Infusoria? Is my dwarf puffer getting fat on microbes?

And he doesn't stop when I feed him. He slurps up his bloodworms, brine shrimp, black worms or snail, then continues hunting for invisible edibles shortly thereafter. I've taken to feeding him every third day. He seems healthy, but this can't be good, can it?

[allycat]

I have no idea what they're up to, but this made me laugh because my DP's do the same thing! I can hide my face and try to outsmart them, but it seems like they really do recognize when I'm looking at them. I swear they recognize me from across the room. All three of them come rushing forward and moosh their little faces against the glass every time I take a peek, unless I hide my eyes

Mine especially seem to pick things out of the algae that grows in their sand by the 5th or 6th day after vacuuming. They don't have tank mates anymore so I lightly rinse all the decor every week--their ghost shrimp seemed to mysteriously get slaughtered in the night...

Are they omnivorous, I wonder? I read on another thread that algae is good for marine puffs. Cujo (DP) once ate a hearty piece of plant root while I was landscaping! Guess it looked like a blackworm.

Mine don't eat every day, Silas--they'd get sooo fat. Sometimes I can get them to share one worm; feeding them from an eyedropper works very well for me.

[SilasMortimer]

Thanks. And yeah, mine sometimes notices even when I have my eyes strained to the side. I had three at one time and one of them was REALLY cute when she mooshed her face against the glass. She'd come zooming up to me, but always forget the glass was there, so she'd hit it, bump off, glare at it for a second, then move back to it slowly to look at me.

I think a little incidental consumption of vegetable matter is okay for them, but if they're obligate carnivores, which seems likely to me, they can't metabolize it. I think probably in your case, they're finding microbes in the algae when they pick at it. I've seen most puffers do that.

It just worries me that he's picking it out from the water. First of all, it makes me wonder if there are too many nutrients in my tank if there's enough infusoria in there to keep him fat. I used to feed all three of them once a day for six days a week, then skip a day. I cut back on how much I feed by two thirds now that the other two are gone (I miss them SO much) and then this happens. I haven't fed him for almost four days now and he still looks gorged.

It's a planted tank, but one that I change the water of weekly nonetheless. I detect around 20ppm nitrates at most, but maybe I need a new testing kit. The water is very clear, though.