The Puffer Forum

Hi

Iam new to this forum.

I recently bought a 6 inch MBU puffer and I have been keeping it for about 2 months now. The fish is living on its own in the tank.

The fish is healthy as far as I know but when I feed it, it sometimes (frozen musscle mostly) goes "crazy" by darting about the tank and hitting its head against the glass for a second or so...nearly jumping out of the water

i defrost the musscle in tap water before feeding....I have been thinking it does this because either..

1. It has eaten too much in one go - it seems to try and swallow the musscle whole sometimes
2. Maybe some shell has got into his stomach which is causing pain - i break up the shell a little before feeding
3. He sees his own reflection in the tank and thinks another fish is going to eat the food...feeding time can cause a bit of tension from my experience with keeping 2 rottweillers in the past!

what do you think? have you seen this before?

Anyway, different subject....I do weekly water change about 40%, gravel clean (1 week seems to accumalate quite alot of s***)

What size tank is he in? Does he seem to be hurting himself or is he fine? He may just be exited that he is being fed, if that is his favourite food.

1. I wouldn't have thought he would go crazy from eating too much.
2. I don't think you really need to break the shell up. That why you give them stuff with shell, to wear the teeth down.
3. Fish can't see their own reflection from inside the tank.

How much decor have you got in the tank?

It's best to scoop out a small amount of tank water to defrost the frozen food.
Do you dechlorinate your tap water when defrosting the food?

When I feed mussles I just open the shell and throw it in there. My stars & stripes goes nuts when he see's the mussle, he splashes water & swims back and forth until I drop it in the tank. Actually he does this when he see's the cup I defrost his food in. He gets totally excited! But he does all this before not after he eats. Then when I try to take the shell out he will chase it down, after that he sits in his cave and digest then takes a nap. Are you putting your hand in the tank after feeding? Is there anything that you are doing that might spook him after he eats? I use tongs to get the shell out. But sometimes when we walk into the room we spook him and he goes nuts like your mbu and will hit himself on the glass or the rocks. One time we spooked him and he blew up like a volley ball.

My #1 Q would be: How large is the tank? It could be he feels closed in.

riggers wrote:What size tank is he in? Does he seem to be hurting himself or is he fine? He may just be exited that he is being fed, if that is his favourite food.

1. I wouldn't have thought he would go crazy from eating too much.
2. I don't think you really need to break the shell up. That why you give them stuff with shell, to wear the teeth down.
3. Fish can't see their own reflection from inside the tank.

How much decor have you got in the tank?

I have to admit hes not in the biggest of tanks...tank is about 130L and I have it about half full. In time when he gets bigger i will think about getting a bigger house for him. Well he didnt go crazy today when i fed him but he does have his moment, hes not hurt or anything, he just carries out swimming...hes quite hardy.

well i would like him to wear his beak down but when I have put a whole shell in he cant get into it and i end up fishing it out. i smash the shell a bit to give him a head start, he does bite the shell so iam happy hes wearing it down a bit.

Iliveinazoo wrote:It's best to scoop out a small amount of tank water to defrost the frozen food.
Do you dechlorinate your tap water when defrosting the food?

No I dont decholrinate the tap water when i defrost the food....i dont think that is necessary but that is just my opinion.

edmlfc1 wrote:When I feed mussles I just open the shell and throw it in there. My stars & stripes goes nuts when he see's the mussle, he splashes water & swims back and forth until I drop it in the tank. Actually he does this when he see's the cup I defrost his food in. He gets totally excited! But he does all this before not after he eats. Then when I try to take the shell out he will chase it down, after that he sits in his cave and digest then takes a nap. Are you putting your hand in the tank after feeding? Is there anything that you are doing that might spook him after he eats? I use tongs to get the shell out. But sometimes when we walk into the room we spook him and he goes nuts like your mbu and will hit himself on the glass or the rocks. One time we spooked him and he blew up like a volley ball.

when i feed him, i just throw the food in...he normally swallows in one go. I dont put my hand in afterwards. I net out the shell on the weekends when i do a water change.

he seems to be getting very greedy these days, swimming up to me trying to beg for food...i gave in today and fed him but normally i will give him one muscle every 2 days as i dont want to pollute the tank with his droppings.

Just a quick question, did you mean 130L or 130 gallons?

That's a 6" mbu in a 34g tank? I'm afraid you aren't going to find any pufferlovers here that will be happy at all about that...Please read the sticky on them in this forum & also the article on them in our Library.

i was hoping it was a typo and they meant 130G

That would be nice!

Oh gosh, yes you will definitely need a larger tank, even if he is not giant yet, it could be bad for his health if he's in there too long. Please start looking for a larger tank asap.

blondenblue wrote:Just a quick question, did you mean 130L or 130 gallons?

No typo, its a 130L tank not gallon.

I got it half full as well!

Ive got a pretty decent external fluval filter and i do 40% weekly water changes so in terms of water quality, I think its OK (obviously not as good in the rivers of Africa of course!)

I know its going to get big as Ive seen a huge one in a fish shop a few months ago....at some point I will see if i can house him in a bigger place...but hey, i want to upgrade my house also...lol

why only half full?