The Puffer Forum

I totally agree with you Michelle, my experience has also been that F8s teeth grow pretty slowly.

tanhql wrote:while feeding the f8 with fd shrimp using a metal tweezers, i notice it'd bite the tweezers to get the remaining shrimp between the tweezers (i can actually feel the teeth grinding against the tweezers) . would this be able to keep its teeth in check?

I was always under the impression it's bad to put anything metal in your tank?

Can anyone confirm or deny?

Stainless steel is fine, brass is generally OK, aluminum is generally ok, and even regular steel is fine if it's not in for more than a minute or two. Having metal soaking in your tank, unless it's stainless, can be bad, but few metals will do much harm with just a "dip"

i'm back from the supermarket and lfs, and have bought a bag of feeder shrimps and clams. i've put the clams in the freezer, and the shrimps in a small bucket with a spare corner filter with filter floss seeded with seachem stability bacteria, and am feeding them spirulina flakes.

what is the best way of feeding feeder shrimps to a f8? hold it by a pair of tweezers and letting the f8 eat from it or letting the shrimp swim freely for the f8 to catch?

Let them chase it, it's good exercise and will engauge their puffery hunting minds at trying to sneak up on them. Overall, they will be in better physical condition and less bored if they have to chase the food.

Agreed, puffers aren't exactly the athletes of the fish world, and any opportunity for physical exercise should be encouraged... little tubs of lard!

well, i let it chase a feeder shrimp but it gave up halfway, so i took out the shrimp (fearing it won't live long in a brackish environment and die without me knowing, as there are places it can hide from me and the f8 ), pick it up with a tweezer and fed the f8 from it. lazy fellow ...

also, i fed the opened clam with the tweezer, but it wasn't interested in it. it just investigated the shell and meat and swam away. in the end, i took out the meat using my handy tweezer and it took chunks out of the meat (though there were leftovers, i threw it away).

Puffs may give up the chase, but if you leave the shrimp in there it will eventually become dinner. Just acclimate the shrimp like you would any other fish, and that way he will live in the tank until he's hunted down.

Shakespeare took a solid 2 weeks to chase down 3 ghost shrimp, but he got the job done all in due time.

Okay, very stupid question I'm sure, but having had pond snails go wild in an aquarium as a child, how does this NOT happen in the puffer tank? Do the snails not hide and lay zillions of obnoxious eggs?! I want to feed my figure 8 the right food, but I am afraid I carry emotional snail scars . I have plants and rocks and things for my puffer to swim around, and that is why I live in fear of a snail sneaking off and breeding mayhem. And yes, I have only had my puffer for 2 weeks.

Not a stupid question at all. Yes, pond snails have population explosions. But with a puffer in the tank, there will be no explosion. Matter of fact, you may find that you won't be able to breed snails in the same tank as the puffer. We usually use separate setups or the puffers will decimate the snail population.

Okay, thank you. And pet stores actually SELL pond snails? Years ago when we had our little nitemare, we got them for free on some live plants. Which is why I have used artificial plants for years now. I'm asking because since I moved, I have been unable to find a decent LFS. Where I used to live there were 2 terrific stores within 5 miles of my apartment. I have never seen pond snails in any of the local stores by me now.

Many will give them away free. Not around my area though, they use them for their puffers. Pet stores like PetCo and Petsmart supposedly will let you have their nuisance snails. You might consider getting ramshorns instead, they aren't nearly as prolific as pond snails so they tend to not overrun tanks as badly.

When you are buying plants/fish, ask if they can throw in a few snails. They will usually do it for free.