Miscallanious questions about dwarf puffer

[Mareva]

Hello all!
So, I read a lot and learned a lot about DP, but I do have still some questions.

Feeding:
what to do when going away 1-2 days? Once or twice a month I'm away from home for about 36 hours (leaving in the morning and coming back the next evening). So, I read in a post concerning a GSP (I think) that 2-4 days without food was ok, but what about DP? They are so tiny, can they do well even if they miss a meal once or twice a month, on a rather regular basis?
About blood worms. Are they the same as red worms (e. feotida) used for worm composting? A friend of mine said e. feotida is very good food for discus, so I was wondering if bloodworms were the same?

Tank set up:
I am totaly new at aquariums so, before I even think about getting a puffer, I need to learn the very basis of aquarium keeping...! I read everywhere that gravel is not so great for puffer and we should use some kind of sand or gravel and sanf mix. So... how do you clean the sand? I know it's a silly question! But with gravel you can suck the dirt out of it and it'll fall back at the bottom of the tank; but I can't see that happening with sand?
Now, seeing how puffers have sensitive skin, are plastic plants ok? Would they hurt themselves on the plastic edge or is it raher safe?

Well, that's it for now... I'll keep on reading and see if I have more questions!
Thanks all!
Maria

[Nick]

1) Bloodworms are fly larvae.
2) Gravel is fine for puffers, no sure where you got the idea they need sand, some lurkers may like to bury in it but it's certainly not needed for DP in any sense.
3) Well fed DPs take nearly a month to starve and easily do 5 days.
4) Compost worms are much too big for DPs
5) Plastic plants are fine, just make sure tehre's a lot of decor, especially tall stuff they can't see over.
6) Read up on cycling a tank before getting your puffer, this is VERY important.

[Myaj]

Agreed with Nick.

Sand is only nice for puffers that like to bury themselves, dwarf puffers do not do that so gravel is fine.

If you have a very heavily decorated tank (especially live plants) dwarf puffers will spend a lot of time hunting for little bits of food (lots of snails, etc that we don't see are in there). 2 days would be just fine, easily. Mine often were not even interested in the food I offered because they could catch way more goodies themselves by hunting in the live plants.

[Mareva]

Thank you Nick and Myaj,
I read about cycling the tank, no problem, it will be done and no puffers are getting in until it's cycled and I can keep my water parameters in order!

I was wondering some more about red worms (compost worms). I have a worm bin and my worms, at the biggest, are about 2" long and not even 1/16" thick. I know they are way too big for DP, but I was wondering if I cut them into small pieces and the puffers like them, would they be good food (quality wise) or would they be unsuitable for DP?

And since we're talking about food and myaj mentioned snails. Can we breed them in the puffer's tank or would the puffer eat all snails before they have time to reproduce?

Also, myaj mentionned live plants preferably, can anyone suggest low maintenance plants that puffers would enjoy?

Thank again for all the info!

[CoreyK]

You could probably put in fully grown ramshorn snails that were too big for the DP's to eat (though they'd try), and I'm sure they'd reproduce, but I'd think the DP's would eat the babies extremely quickly.

Java moss and Java fern are known to be extremely easy to grow.

[Nick]

I have heard DPs will nip large snails so continually they rarely get to move, eating off their eyes, antennae, and any other extremedes, they'll likely be slowly tortured to death and never get the chance to lay eggs. The worms would probably be ok for the puffers if you could get them to take them, but my Dps never really touch chopped up for for some reason. You could try though.

[Myaj]

I'm sure the dwarves would love to eat a worm, but the key would be not giving them too much at once, they fill up fast.

Snails will depend on your individual puffers and tank. My tank was 33 gallons (4ft tank) very very thick with plants, and there were always snails hiding in there somewhere. Even red cherry shrimp. It kept the dwarves busy. But without a TON of plants, I'm sure they would have chased down most of the inverts in a short time. They were always hunting, rarely resting.

For plants, the first thing to think about is your lighting. That's the biggest thing they need. If you only have 1-2 watts of lighting per gallon of water, you probably won't be able to grow much more than anubias, javas (moss, fern), najas grass and maybe some of the lower light crypts (all of these are slow growing plants). If you have 2 or more, it opens it up to a lot more plants, especially the stem plants (hygro, rotala, water sprite, hornwort, anacharis, etc). 3 watts per gallon or more, you would be able to grow most plants out there, and get good, strong growth from them.

[Mareva]

ok
So I think I'll plan for a snail tank to breed them so I have weekly snails for the puffers. The puffer tank would be a 10 gallons so I doubt the snails would be able to find so many places to hide, even if there's lots of plants!

The tank is one that was used for a turtle like 13 years ago so I'm not sure about the lightning used! I think the top was meant for an aquarium bulb (similar to our house bulbs but thinner and longer). I know there's 25W bulbs (so 2.5W per gallons), but I'm not sure it's the right kind of light for plants. I need to read more about aquarium plants! But thanks for the plant suggestions, I'll do some researchs.

Thanks again!

[Myaj]

If your hood takes a screw in type of bulb (incandescent) you can get those mini compact flourescent bulbs and they work great for live plants in tanks like this. You can order them online at places like DrsFosterSmith.com, or Walmart usually carries them in their fish supply section (much as I hate encouraging anyone to shop there). You can use a regular cf bulb too, but the color spectrum might not be right and it will look very pink or yellow.

If its the long tube bulb with pins on the end (not screw in) then you are a lot more limited.

[Mareva]

I beleive it is the screw on type. I'll try to get the mini compact fluorescent bulb in one of the LFS, since I can do a lot not to go to walmart! And 'm in canada so ordering for US webstores is not always cheap with the shipping and handling. I bet I can find them here.

I have more questions now about quarantine (I read the article in the library) and tank set up. Can I continue here or should I start new posts in the general forum?

Thanks

[Myaj]

You should probably start a new topic if its for a specific question.

Have you looked into http://www.bigalsonline.com? They have a US base and a Canadian base, so that might help you for online ordering. I think they carry the bulbs but its been a while since I shopped there.

[Mareva]

Hi,
I've looked at big al's, but found another online store (canadian) that offers amazingly low prices (no live stock though). For other canadians:
http://www.petsandponds.com/securestore/
I did find the bulbs at LFS though.

And, things have changed! While I was looking to get a 5G tank for quarantine, I saw this add for a 15G at 15$ (can)! The lady breeds discus at home and wanted to get rid of her smaller tank quickly! So I got my futur-puffers an upgrade! Instead of the 10G tank they'll live in the 15G tank and I'll do the quarantine tank in the 10G. The new tank works with long fluorescent tubes, which are easily available.

I'll start a new post for quarantine.
Thanks for all the help!