The Puffer Forum

Rakuen wrote:Thank you very much for everything, I'll let you know how this goes, I appreciate all your time and effort to help me and I'm going to get my GSP (bad bad pet store info grrrr) a much nicer and bigger tank.

It isn't your fault that the LFS gave you crappy info... (hug) At least you found us in time and he isn't too stunted....hopefully...

On top of a bigger tank, get a master test kit. not those strips. You'll wanna know the ammonia, nitrIte and nitrAte readings, as well as PH, and at they're more accurate than the strips...

a refractometer will help you measure salinity as well. He should be moving on to full marine soon.

Please read the section about cycling before you set up the bigger tank....Use the same filter stuff in your new filter (Over filtration = good for a puffer) so you might wanna get a bigger filter too...

They are funny little fish aren't they? I'd be devistated if something every happened to my Bubbles...very personable fish..sure changed the way I view aquatic pets that's for sure.

Thank you so much, I appreciate that. I'm glad they at least gave me the right salinty. Since last night thanks to all of you I've learned so much about them, and my gosh I don't know what I'll do if I lose him. He's such a sweetie.

Today I'm going out to look for a 29-30 gallon tank; we've been looking at the eclipse's but also at everyone's suggestions as well, such as the filters and whatnot.

If I happened to get an Eclipse, and I plan on using Bio-Spira, I so badly want to get him out of his current tank... would I need to use the filter in his old tank? Or the bio-wheel?

I'm sorry for so many questions; right now we're heading out to check tanks and everything. We're keeping a close eye on Mr. Fishie, lol the name just stuck when I first got him... and I'll keep all of you posted. *huggles*

Thanks so much for your support; I'd appreciate any more advice/suggestions at this time.. I won't be able to check the forums right now, but at least we can get started on checking tanks and what we need and we'll check here back soon.

You should get a new (bigger) filter for the bigger tank.

We're using a Fluval external canister I think..I dont remember the model though...

Look at the Gallon per minute ratio.

You can get biospira too, or you can just use the same stuffing you had in your old filter.

I dont know the mechanics of moving a fish from an smaller tank to a newly created bigger tank...except mabe using some of the same water from the old tank, and also the substrate too....

I deffer to the more wise ones on this subject

This may have been covered. But, another thing to think about, you may have nitrates present in your tap water. Test the water as it comes out of the tap.

I have an Eclipse system at home and I really like it, it's easy to clean and nice and compact - however you may find it doesn't provide enough filtration for a GSP.

In the library there is an article about the identification of F8 Puffers. Apparently F8 Puffers always have two eyspots, one either side of the base of the tail and one just below the dorsal fin.

The fish in this thread looks to me as though it has those ... does it not?

In any event, you can never give a Puffer too much room but the salinity may be an issue.

puffermama wrote:In the library there is an article about the identification of F8 Puffers. Apparently F8 Puffers always have two eyspots, one either side of the base of the tail and one just below the dorsal fin.

He does look a little different than most GSPs I've seen, but he doesn't look anything like my F8s, and if he has lived 3 years at 1.014 he must be a brackish puffer.

Between GSP, F8, or Ceylon -- Looks closer to a GSP to me.

he doesn't look anything like my F8s

I know, mine neither but the colour didn't look right for a GSP and the article by Robert T Ricketts on F8 Puffers states clearly that the eyespots in those positions are "diagnostic markings", over and above the figure 8 markings which give the fish their common name ... and I think I can see the eyespots in the picture, I could be wrong, but that would be my guess.

If you have a petsmart in your area I know they had 30 gallon tanks pretty cheap. I saw a complete 29 gallon set up for around $100 including heater and filter.

Good luck!!

After being up since yesterday and thankfully able to talk to all of you, may I first say my very appreciative thanks for your help and care. I have learned so much about Puffers in the last 48 hours. We now have a 29 Gallon Eclipse w/ an Eclipse 3 lighting and filtration system. We got the Instant Ocean salt, thermometer, heater, master testing kit, salinity checker, few little books, all for $229.99.

We left the old filter on top of the new one to help the system; we used 20 gallons worth of Bio-Spira. Of course before that we checked all of the water; we used Prime to clean it all out and let it sit for a bit while we got the tank setup.

We are using crushed coral sand for now, we were unable to found the Aragonite and Petco said they'd have some in stock soon.

The temp is being stabilized at 80F.
The salinity is 1.014 (as it has always been).
The nitrate is up from 0 at this point, at 20.
The nitrite is at absolute 0.
Water is very hard.
For the alkalinity its 300, showing in the ideal range.
And the PH level 7.8 or 8.4.
The ammonia level is at 0. (Yay ideal!!)

We're going to use the master kit later on, and found a very nice shop who said to take a sample of our water in just in case tomorrow. As you can probably guess we're very tired. We had to run an hour away to get a lot of the materials, and for the Bio-Spira we had to go 30 minutes away, thankfully we kept it cold. We rushed home as we didn't want to leave him along for too long.

And those dark stress spots, completely gone!!!

Here is a picture of his new tank:



And another picture of him:



BTW Mr. Fishy is acting much more normal now; I'm going to try and feed him some of his brine shrimp in a little bit; he seems to be really loving the new tank and he's swimming all over the place. He's back to his normal staring contest with me.

Again, I'd like to say thank you to all of you. If it weren't for the wonderful information and help, I don't know what we would have done. I'm going to stay on these forums and participate much as possible, as I'd like to learn much more about these cute, personable puffers. I fully believe he'll be back to good now; we will keep checking the water on a daily basis, and I'll be keeping in touch with all of you.

I believe he is a GSP, from looking at other GSP's today, he looks pretty much the same. I was told numerous times today that it's incredible he's lived this long in a 5 gallon tank, and that makes me happy because I absolutely love my Mr. Fishie.

Rakuen wrote:We are using crushed coral sand for now, we were unable to found the Aragonite and Petco said they'd have some in stock soon.

The crushed coral is good enough, I wouldn't bother replacing it when Petco gets the aragonite in stock.

If you can find it, you could also pick up some Lace rock. Lace rock is Aragonite, so it will help also with the buffering. I love the way it looks, and it gives the puffer caves to explore/hide. It's a local rock here, so it's really cheap ($.50 - $.75 per pound). I don't know how much you would expect to pay where you are, but it shouldn't be expensive.

I have one more suggestion; Don't throw out your old 5 gallon tank yet. Your puffer's diet should include snails, and that tank would be great for a snail breeder. Just change it over to freshwater and keep the filter/heater running. You should be able to get common pond snails or ramshorn snails at about any pet store (they will probably give away common pond snails). You will need to feed them fish flake food or veggies, as you probably won't have enough algae to support a large population. Look in the library section of this site for more information.

Good job BTW, It sounds like your puffer has a great home now.

Dang, didn't reply in time to say that 30 gallons is the absolute minimum. That's why it says that in the Pufferpedia. A 29 gallon is really only 25 gallons at best. If your GSP is not stunted (although I'd be pretty surprised if he's not) then you will eventually need to get another, bigger tank when he's closer to full-grown. When they are 6"+, a 55 gallon tank is much more appropriate. I'm sure he'll be much happier with the new tank in the mean time, though.

puffermama wrote:In the library there is an article about the identification of F8 Puffers. Apparently F8 Puffers always have two eyspots, one either side of the base of the tail and one just below the dorsal fin.

The fish in this thread looks to me as though it has those ... does it not?

In any event, you can never give a Puffer too much room but the salinity may be an issue.

He kinda looks like a F8. I've seen some F8's that looked like this fish. I have read that f8's have the two eyespots near the base of the tail and just below the dorsal fin. I think he does have these spots.

In the new pic of him, his pattern looks like an F8. F8 or GSP he's a cute little guy!

Good luck!!

I concur. He's a figure 8 if I've ever seen one. The LFS I work at carries fluviatilis, nigroviridus, and biocellatus. This is what about one-third of our biocellatus' look like. Granted, it's not the "normal" markings of a figure 8, but they are the markings of a figure 8. With all that said, I'm not expert, just an educated enthusiast.

I felt confident in saying that because I have the luxury at work of viewing GSP's and F-8's side by side. When the F-8's with those markings are placed in a tank next to GSP's It is rather easy to distinguish the differences.

You have a GSP, absolutely no doubt in my mind (I mean I did write an article on them!). It sounds to me, that the 5g tank you had him in all these years had finally gotten to the point that it couldn't support the bioload of your fish & the parameters went out of wack. You found us just in time!