The Puffer Forum

Hello, I'm loving this forum, Great resource for newbies like me.

I've been considering puffs for a very long time, and after much deliberation I am going for my first brackish setup.
The tank is fully cycled, 180l, with canister filter tetratec ex 700. (this tank until yesterday was an fully planted amazon biotype, which is now dowonsized in another tank) It has been running for 9 months.
I have lots of java moss, and javafern, a light sand substrate and a bucket of red sea marine salt. I'll hold off on salt as the puffs are in fresh so will need a gradual raise.

I'm ready to get fish.Been considering a single f8, or two. and a decent shoal of bumblebee gobies.
But just cant decide whether or not to risk more f8's. They ones i'd be buying are juvenile.

Also should i get something to act as PH buffer, any suggestions. Water in my area is soft, great for amazons but not for brackish?

Just looking for opinions, before i go for it.
All comments welcome!

As long as you have plenty of plant cover and hiding places, you could have two F8s. You just have to make sure that if they don't want to see each other, they don't have to. Just breaking up their line of sight reduces aggression substantially.
Bumblebee gobies are so much fun. I think you could put five of them in that size tank (Maybe more??) without having to worry too much about aggression problems. As long as there is enough room for each of them to have their own space, they should be fine.
What's the pH of the water? It is more important that the pH is stable, than it is the "perfect" level.

Marine salt will naturally raise the pH most of the time anyway. If not, don't worry about it. ladyonyx is right - stable is more important.

I think you could have up to four F8s, as we generally say 15 for the first and 10 for each of the others. If you want BBGs, of course, you'd do two or three F8s. +1 on breaking lines of sight.

I'd use a substrate of either crushed coral or aragonite. That will naturally raise it, and combined wiht the marine salt, that should bring it pretty close if not perfect. But yeah, otherwise messing with pH is not the greatest. The main thing is a stable pH, but the substrate will help keep it where you want it and shouldn't be a problem. That's what I used to bring my 7.0 tap water to the 8.0 brackish tank level for my F8.

I agree that you could do 2 F8s with good cover and lots to explore. I'd be hesitant to do 3 just because of how they like to roam the tank and might disturb the others territories. You could do quite a few bbgs. I have 8 in my 44g corner tank, but I wish I had more. They are so small that they really don't add much to the bioload, but they add quite a lot of interest to the tank. IMHO, anyway. I think you could easily do more than that. Mine really don't get territorial at all (had 'em for over a year), even though there are plenty of pots, caves, shells, etc., that they can use for "dens." I think you could easily do 15 or 20.

And if you are looking for some color later on or something, you could add mollies to the mix. Those 3 kinds of fish are doing great together in my tank, but you do have to allow for the personalities of your fish too. I'd do the bbgs and F8s first and then decide if you want anything else. I've heard chromides have done well with F8s as well, but I couldn't find them around here. So, I have no personal experience with that.

Thank you all for your input, I'm very grateful for your helpful comments. I've ordered 2 f8's and 10 bb gobies.
I may get more gobies in the future, as I have a load of tiny little terractoa pots, which i am hoping will make good caves so territory problems can be avoided.
I also have loads of plants.

The tank is fully cycled, and currently freshwater only which i will gradually raise to low end brackish.
The fish are not available in my area so I've ordered online and they should be arriving tomorrow.
Really excited. Will post pictures once they are all in and happy.

The current PH of my tapwater is 7, but, lower in my tank about 6.8. (tank used ot be amazon tank with c02 and had tannins from bogwwod etc maing it more acidic.)

I'm going to add argonite tonight.
Should i go for Marine argonite that has marine bacteria? or just the plain jane variety.
This will mix with exsisting play sand. Only going to have a small depth of substrate anyway, and my plants are all attached to things.

so excited!

I had no clue what BBG were when I started reading this so I looked them up and they look so cool!(and small) Now, if only my parents would let me do brackish.. Hmm.

Ulysees wrote:Thank you all for your input, I'm very grateful for your helpful comments. I've ordered 2 f8's and 10 bb gobies.
I may get more gobies in the future, as I have a load of tiny little terractoa pots, which i am hoping will make good caves so territory problems can be avoided.
I also have loads of plants.

The tank is fully cycled, and currently freshwater only which i will gradually raise to low end brackish.
The fish are not available in my area so I've ordered online and they should be arriving tomorrow.
Really excited. Will post pictures once they are all in and happy.

The current PH of my tapwater is 7, but, lower in my tank about 6.8. (tank used ot be amazon tank with c02 and had tannins from bogwwod etc maing it more acidic.)

I'm going to add argonite tonight.
Should i go for Marine argonite that has marine bacteria? or just the plain jane variety.
This will mix with exsisting play sand. Only going to have a small depth of substrate anyway, and my plants are all attached to things.

so excited!

Marine bacteria won't survive in brackish, and anyway the bacteria doesn't survive for more than a day after it's packaged. Just get the "plain Jane" kind.

LilGreen, does that go for all bacteria or just marine?

All live sand, you mean? The only live sand that's still alive is fresh out of the tank.

Ohh. And BTW I love your signature!

Thanks. PM me if you want some banners (these and others). Sorry for the little derail - back to topic now!

All arrived and in tank safe and well. so far,

Did make some changed though i decided to add salt to a spg of 1.002, yesterday. Which was stupid.....After lost of reading thought the salinity change wouldn't effect the fish but might help the ph.

This caused a little mini cycle which really stressed me, luckily I have another tank with another external filter that is freshwater but cycled. So now i have two external filters in the tank.
I've no amonia (phew) but did have some nitrite. Currently between 2.5 and 5 ppm. That what the fish are all in just now.


I've ran in a totally overkill airline to keep oxygen levels high as possible.
I am holding off large water changes, I dont want to stress the fish out more and I'm hoping with the kind of filtration i have now in place this spike will be gone very soon?

But I'm testing regular. The combined turnover of filtration is about 700lph for the tetratec ex700 and 440lph for my eheim 2213 so 1140lph.
That's 301 gph for non metrics. So my turnover rate is 6.1 tank volume per hour.

So i learned something, dont add salt the day before your fish arrives....

That said, the fish look fine, getting colour back from the journey nicely. and those bbg's are tiny, but , very cool.
I've tested again mid post 2.5ppm nitrite, i think it's falling. I'll test again first thing tomorrow.

I repeat - don't worry about pH! Do the large water changes. Water changes do NOT stress fish, unless the new water has toxins in it. Do a big change ASAP, 'kay?

Well i tested the water today first thing, 0ppm nitrite and Amonia.
Releived to see that nice blue and yellow on my api test kit.

I know, right? Those are the best colors EVER.