F8 Dentistry

[corinaswim]

I had to trim my figure eight puffer's teeth. I put him under the clove oil and everything went fine. He slowed down and rolled and once he was asleep I picked him up with a net and attempted to trim. I was so nervous that I did not do a good job and then I was afraid he was under too long so I put him in the clean water. He recovered fine but is only hanging out in one corner of the tank and not moving much. Lately the only thing he has been eating are worms since his teeth were so long. But when I tried to give him a worm about 2 hours after the procedure he attempted to eat it but then left it alone and never ate any of it. I am a little worried about him. It has been 3 hours and he is still acting goofy. Will he be ok? And when is it safe to do it again?

[mikeosoft]

I wouldn't be concerned yet, 3 hours is nothing. I would wait at least 24 hours after a procedure like that to feed. You should probably wait a couple weeks before trying again, unless of course the teeth are so long they're preventing the fish from eating.

[corinaswim]

Thank you, that makes me feel much better. I will wait a while but he has only been able to eat worms since he can just slurp them. I used to feed him snails and such to help his teeth but while I was at school for a few weeks I left him with my sister and left the wrong food. So he had nothing to grind his beak on. So his teeth have been quite large for a few weeks now. When I came back from school he was extremely skinny and would not eat any of his food. The only thing I can get him to eat is worms. So the sooner I can trim his teeth the better. I'm afraid that I am not doing it right. He is rather small and his teeth almost touch his bottom lip. How close should I cut them to his upper lip? Does it have to be perfect? I got so nervous and I cut about half earlier and it looks terrible. Does it hurt him now that I have allready done the cutting? Or does he not even notice a difference?

[Pufferpunk]

I always try to have an assistsnt, so I can pull back the lips & get a good look at how long they really are. Also, so I don't cut the lip off!