The Puffer Forum

Yeah super cool. Sounds like you have a really good feeding regimen. Funny thing is a have only had my indostomus about a week, but they have already been going for tiny chopped up bit of bloodworm( frozen, of course newly hatched bbs, moina, whatever micro-organism's are in the tank) and these guys are much smaller than your pipe. I'll post some pics if I can get them so far all have been awful( need a macro). Supposedly they also go for golden pearls. I think the genus dorichthys pipefish are mostly freshwater. Probably one of them. Good work keeping him healthy as they are a very difficult fish.

Don't want to steal your thread so here is a link to see my little buggers. I also use a sponge, they are some of my favorite filters.
viewtopic.php?f=7&t=22743
How big is your guy?
It may have been that your females weren't actually freshwater but a different species altogether.

Feel free to steal! The more info out there on these, the better

He's about four to five inches but has a very long 'tail' Alot fatter but only maybe an inch or so's growth. I do wonder what those females were. Looked the same species, but much skinnier... Tanks

Think I need to look at the latin names and pics and will edit just under here:

Microphis aculeatus??? I'm checking fishbase now but that's what I had it nailed down to.

Amazing you got yours feeding on dead food, I'm impressed

I used to have a pair of marine blue stripe pipes, (Doryrhamphus excisus) until the wallpaper incident if you know of it. Poisoned both of my main marine tanks last summer. I'm still regrouping on that with more emphasis on my fw tanks. Just the one ytb damsel just now but you know how it goes - 'gently bently' The blue stripes would eat pretty much anything, dead mysis, bloodworm, bbs anything like that.

Cheers

Im really sorry to hear about the "incident" I have always wanted blue stripes. I hear you when it comes to tanks, my feeling is they should just appear slowly. That way nobody is overwhelmed suddenly.

Your pipe is probably about full grown as i think( not positive) that "freshwater" species stay around 6".

Mine aren't technically pipefish, but an exotic much smaller cousin, with similar care requirements.

hey
i am just starting to get them going on frozen stuff, by target feeding it during the live feeding's.

I saw all my indostomus come out yesterday for a mass feeding on some planaria, it was so cool, seeing their little eyes search about (I think they can move independently of each other) and then sucking up the food,.

You have any idea what species it is yet? Or perhaps some pics of you blue stripes and their setup ? im jonesing for some pipefish discussion.

Hi Rusty,

I should have some pics of the bluestripes on my laptop - I'll have a dig tonight. I also like 'bendy' pipefish: aka seahorses

I still think mine is a either a Microphis aculeatus or a Doryichthys martensii (Thailand) from pics in various sources including fishbase. A couple of years ago I found a snake pipefish on a UK beach, there seems to have been a population explosion of them. I kept it for a few months and released it when my garage got too warm.

Hi Rusty,

I'm starting a thread in the marine section with a pic of my bluestripes that used to be. Plus a few other bits.

HTH

I'm checking it out as we speak!!

If this 'pond' goes ok for another year with cosmetic mods, I wonder if I could do something bigger but still 'compact'? You know, something that holds more water than it looks like it does. The vat seems fairly easy to look after - with the pumps it's as easy as doing a change on my three foot fancy goldie tank

Do you know how much 1000g gallons of water weighs? About four flipping tons

Some of you will know why I picked a figure of 1000g

I didn't think your tank looked all that ugly. By the way you spoke about it, I was really expecting something horrid, but it wasn't bad at all.
Very cool that you're able to keep the pipefish going. I really wanted one at one time, but thought better of it, as I didn't think I could give it what it needs. You seem to do very well with small live foods.

Thanks PPG. That was really appreciated.

My trouble is I want to keep literally everything but there are limits - just the pacu in the vat plus it's attendant tiddlers (angels, plecs, keyholes) for now. The vat is just not big enough for anyone else as PP pointed out at one juncture. I'll continue to watch the nitrates (still 10 - 20ppm with a 50% wc every other week, pH stays where I left it which tells me things, if not anyone else) in case it needs something bigger. {please grow, please, please give me an excuse}

I think it is growing again

Maybe a half grown Oscar, but that would be it.

I was trawling the MBU posts earlier and found the ones with 'OldGuy' as the original poster. There is someone who knows how to treat animals. His tanks shots gave me some ideas on cosmetics for the vat and quite a few more ideas as well. Nice one if you are still out there 'Old Guy'

Anyway, here's a pic of 'manky puff' - just got some decent batts for my camera. Just dumping this cropped pic on the site - I should have cleaned the tank glass and puff is the wrong way around for you to see the wound site that was. Literally a point and shoot job...
I think I will have another crack at seahorses in a while, maybe after the summer. There's the 240l GSP/ytb damsel marine tank to set up in the mean time. I have the tank, MT, all the gear and the 40kg of LR for that.

The sh tank would be an existing 120 lido because it is 22'' deep. I'd run it with an external powerfilter, over rated UV, skimmer and about eight air powered sponges but no LR - totally synthetic. Keep my Calcuim up to 420ppm like a twig coral reef tank and worm the bu***rs. Airstones in marine - I can live with salt creep if there is no metal anywhere near! You need to saturate the water with O2 for these...

The fw pipe is getting quite nicely filled out these days - I'm on the lookout for a lady pipe to share his tank or a slightly larger one for the two.

Think that lot's enough to keep anyone occupied