The Puffer Forum

You're probably on an iPad. It looks like that on my iPad too but not on my pc.

Nope, 24" monitor.

arrivalanche on Mon Jan 07, 2013 12:12 am
We are also looking at houses right now with the plan of a new 500+ gallons for them within the year. Its all for the puffers in the end. The current tank will become a reef for my office.

Man...500g would be nice! My problem is that I do not have a local option which has a good reputation, and that the difference between the 300g deep dimension + stand + lights + canopy [$11.6666/gal, tank only] and JUST the 500g tank [$20/gal] is about $6k [10K tank only]...not cool. I could get TWO 300g and STILL have $3k left over...
I also do not like acrylic. No, I vehemently DEPLORE it.

There is a local guy who builds tanks, but he kinda got sued a few times for tanks catastrophically failing because he just used silicone, instead of silicone+epoxy...and I am NOT a gambling man [unless you count my life...but never money. ].

What is the quote you have for the 500g, and from what material is it constructed?

BTW the picture truncation issue Pufferpunk mentioned can be replicated with my iPad2 in addition to the POS Lenovo 15" work laptop I have been cursed with as well. That laptop needs to be killed with fire, and then the fire must be set on fire...just to be sure, so who knows. Maybe try cropping to 800x600, then save it as PNG? GIMP will do it if you dont have PhotoShop or PhotoPaint.

Your Mappy puff is a handsome one...well, at least his snout is.
Yours seems to have what appears to be yellow "scribbles", whereas mine is white and lime green...until he changes colors, which he does frequently. Silly puff.

Mine taught my Arothron Manilinsis to spit water too, so now I have two spitters...good job Mappa.

Ian

hope this one is better

arrivalanche wrote:hope this one is better

What a beautiful puff!

Your Mappa is nearly identical in appearance to mine at a similar size.

Ian

Yes, thank you. It's stunning!

now the question is, how much did they charge you for yours?

gdsentropy wrote: Yours seems to have what appears to be yellow "scribbles", whereas mine is white and lime green...until he changes colors, which he does frequently. Silly puff.

Mine taught my Arothron Manilinsis to spit water too, so now I have two spitters...good job Mappa.

Ian

Haha good stuff! Puffers are great!

Pufferpunk wrote:Nope, 24" monitor.

Hey PP, do you have your screen resolution set to 1920x1200? I have a 24inch screen and can see the large pic fine

No I do not, the writing is too small to see then.

arrivalanche wrote:now the question is, how much did they charge you for yours?

Please find below the answer to your question and perhaps THE perfect example of why you should remain dubious to purchasing fish online.

The Arothron Mappa was $59.99+$21.99+$4.95 ordered online from PetesFish; my Mappa was an approximately 1.5" D shaped little guy in perfect condition, complete with a massive appetite.

I ordered my Arothron Nigropunctatus and Arothron Manilinsis from BlueStarAqua for $29.99 and $29.95 respectively with $38.99 shipping.

All three fish were shipped overnight.

I want to mention that what follows below is an accurate representation of my experience with BlueStarAqua; and conjecture will be obviously identified as such:
In the case of BlueStarAqua I was billed immediately [3/23/12], but the puffers were not shipped until 4/17/12.

During the interim all attempts at communication were in vain [three calls and messages left in addition to one e-mail per day], until my offer to refer them to both my lawyer and the NC office of the Attorney General.

Subsequently the Dogface arrived with ALL FOUR teeth broken out almost to the skull and the Narrow Lined puffer was half alive at best. Both were weak to the point of immobility, in addition to being emaciated well past the stage of starvation where you would expect death in hours.

It was immediately apparent, even from a distance, that the spine and skull were protruding from each such that their skeletal visage was that of the dead. I cannot impress upon you how bad it was...how truly, horribly abused they were. Heartbreaking.

People suck.

I carefully nursed them back to health in segregation, after the Lined puffer [named Linepuff] took a hit from the Mappa [named Mappa] immediately upon its introduction.

As of 1/8/2013 the teeth of my Dogface Puffer [named Puppy] are ALMOST back to normal. Were it not for Hikari Marin A, both of the poor little guys would have starved the rest of the way to death, which wasn't far.

Those two puffers love me now as much as a fish can be said to love. I can even pet them.

The information below is accurate, and any perceived assertion of connection with either company to the theft described is conjecture on the part of the reader:
Shortly after the last of my puffers arrived from BlueStar, a business in New York city [home to both companies] used my credit card [the one the puffs were ordered with] to pay a portion of their rent. Wells Fargo investigated and it was determined my card was used fraudulently. Those two companies are my only purchases from New York, ever.

I cannot say for a fact which, if either, is responsible, and am accusing neither. However I do not generally believe in coincidence.

Again, I am not accusing anyone, but I find it highly improbable that a puffer could break all four of its teeth out nearly to the skull, simply due to a lack of leverage once any two teeth are broken, resulting however unlikely in a maximum of three being broken.

Beyond my intention to present this as a nonspecific warning about online commerce generally, you may take this information as you will. I did my best to comply with the forum rules regarding the submission of individual shopping experience, and am open to removing the names of the companies involved should PufferPunk think it prudent.

Ian

My only online fish purchase was horrible. The congo puffer was starved so bad it died in two days. Never again will I condone online puffer purchases. The need to observe the puffer prior to purchase far outweighs any current, and soon to be puffer obsession. Fish was 40$,+ 40$ shipping. I was only refunded half and was at a loss of the shipping cost thats non refundable with nothing to show for. I was scarred from the congos image! They purposly sold me a fish that anyone could tell you if they saw it woould be a short lived tragedy of life. And they supposodly fully employed marine biologists on site to maintain the proper care of the livestock!

Thats pretty bad. I dont really condone buying fish online after seeing how shipping companies handle packages. Im glad you had good luck getting them back to health. Stressed out fish usually dont eat too well.

defool89 wrote:My only online fish purchase was horrible. The congo puffer was starved so bad it died in two days. Never again will I condone online puffer purchases. The need to observe the puffer prior to purchase far outweighs any current, and soon to be puffer obsession. Fish was 40$,+ 40$ shipping. I was only refunded half and was at a loss of the shipping cost thats non refundable with nothing to show for. I was scarred from the congos image! They purposly sold me a fish that anyone could tell you if they saw it woould be a short lived tragedy of life. And they supposodly fully employed marine biologists on site to maintain the proper care of the livestock!

I hope that their claim of marine biologist employment is an outright lie, because someone like that would have knowledge of the intelligence of fish. That IMO is a totally different and much more disturbing level of sociopathy than the same behavior commited in ignorance, because they would fully comprehend the fact they are torturing an innocent and intelligent being.

It is indeed a terrible feeling, seeing a poor little puffer who was already taken from its home starved and neglected like that by some callous waste of carbon.

I can't imagine how these people live with themselves. I hope they don't breed, we don't need anymore soulless tools running around.

How would their after work conversation go? Like this?
"Hey honey, I'm home! Guess what? I tortured and starved lots of little puffers today! It was great, I don't even have to buy food! AND I make a few dollars each! Who cares if most of these intelligent creatures die a horrible death? I'm SO cool! Wow I'm awesome, I'll sleep well tonight!"

arrivalanche wrote:Thats pretty bad. I dont really condone buying fish online after seeing how shipping companies handle packages. Im glad you had good luck getting them back to health. Stressed out fish usually dont eat too well.

I agree with both of you about buying puffs/fish online. Those three puffs were my first and last online fish purchases.

It is a sticky situation as they just die slowly if no one rescues them, but OTOH if you rescue them it enables continuation of the cycle of deplorable treatment of puffs.

It is crap like this that makes me feel like people should have to pass a test and get a license to keep puffs, and sellers/wholesalers should be inspected randomly and unannounced.

However, I dislike big government because they will practically regulate the fiber content of your turds if you let it continue to its extreme...but this isn't a political forum so I'll just stop now.

This is just depressing all around. What can we even do?
Boycotting won't work because, for a number of reasons, people will generally not participate in a volume sufficient to change anything. I'm all bummed out now.

Ian

I never talked about it but my GF got me a 2" porcupine puffer from Fresh Marine as a surprise for my B-Day. It was the skinniest puffer I had ever seen and it had a terribly convex body. (starving to death + IP's) It was a $65 DOA and a week late despite having rush delivery and she did not get a refund. I had told her to never do an online order like that again. I felt so horrible for the little guy.