The Puffer Forum

my stars and stripes has this habit of diving the sand, picking up big mouthfuls and then spitting it out through his gills and his mouth... (whilst annoying covering hiself in sand and giving me 'ich' heart attacks...

but as soon as he's spat it all out, he does it again.


why would he do that.. it's live sand, could he be going for little things in the sand? or the algae on the sand?


anyone's elses marine puffs do this?

Id say he is eating things in the sand. I have twinspot gobies that do that, thats how they eat.

My puffers used to peck at the sand, but not really eat enough to filter it through them.

I think they shuffle through the sand to find tiny pieces of food.

Shakespeare does this habitually, a habit that leads to him having fart blasts of pure argonite. See the topic "Shakespeare farts argonite sand."

i saw that thread, and wondered if it was the same thing...

but my stars doesn't fart it out (that i've seen- he may of course be shy!)

he just filters it through his gills and spits it out of his mouth.

Doesn't seem to be doing him any harm, and his colour is lighter and lighter everyday, which i'm taking as a good sign, as he was almost black when i got him.

He's probably catching copepods, worms, snails, etc...

My friends stars and stripes did the exact same thing. it would hover close to the sand then dive in for a mouthful and shoot it all out of its gills. we didnt know what he was doing but hes doing fine. it was probably just looking for food