The Puffer Forum

Wow, good pics man!
At least both selections will work, one in diffuse conditions and other in excellent view, except my M.leiurus ID, i was totally lost with it, thanks for clearing my thought on it... but now I see what you mean:

Irregular spots pattern, no head texture and larger mandibles in that "green leiurus" comparing it with those you linked... it will be interesting to ID it as a M. hilgendorfii...

By the way, what do you say about this:

http://s287.photobucket.com/albums/ll13 ... Abei-1.jpg

It was sold as a M. Abei, but i is clearly not, it also looks like the "green leiurus" i linked above, but the spott pattern does not match for me...

Would like to see more pics, the colors seem faded (stress? bright light?). Cannot exclude this is M. abei, but it looks more like M. leiurus.

However, it is my personal opinion that what so far is IDd as M. abei in the hobby (including the IDs I give) actually belongs to two species. There's one which closely corresponds to the original description (which can turn very dark with silver to orange spots) and one of which the stress colors look different, the body shape is also slightly different with the original one being more club shaped and the other one like the one you just posted a little more leiurus like.

I hope future research will clarify that. Until that I'd call both M. abei since I do not know for sure how to tell them apart and if the are two species or maybe not. Meybe I'm totally wrong about that.

I´ve got no more pictures of him, he was much more darker when he arrived (stress color is darker) this picture was taken 30 minutes after he was in the tank, a couple of days after, his skin was still green but spots were darker and solid, but all of them from the same color.

Lets wait for the final description of the other 3 puffer species and see if this one match one of it, i will call it M.Abei too as long as i can decide one or another (M.leiurus or M. abei or maybe M. hilgendorfii).