The Puffer Forum

I know that F8's need to eat snails roughly every 4-6 weeks, but I was just wondering how big the snails have to be for a F8P that's about an inch and a half long? I put a snail in his tank and he kinda nibbled on it a bit, then swallowed a big chunk....will that hurt him if he swallows big chunks like that? Also if i give him a snail that's about the size of his head would he be able to eat it?

Generally you give them snails the size of their eyes. It won't hurt him to swallow big chunks, and also (normally) it won't hurt him to swallow some shell fragments. In the wild, snails are a huge part of their diet, so the puffer digestive system has evolved to handle the odd shell fragment and such. One of my puffers even ate a small whole snail once, without cracking it up first, and it didn't seem to bother him or affect him in the least. As far as giving him a big snail, probably what he'll do is just bite chunks out of it until it dies.

I'm not sure where you would have read that you give them snails every 4-6 weeks. More like every day, if possible.

Feed them snails as often as you want. Mine used to eat them shell and all. My dwarf puffers did as well.

the snails should be the size of thier eyes.