The Puffer Forum

so every morning when i wake up i go and turn on the lights on my GSPs tank. This morning I woke up and did the same thing, except i slept in so i was about half an hour late. Well Verde (my GSP) comes and greets me at the front of the tank, "yawns" and puffs up! He was a good 3 inches from side to side, if not a bit more. And then deflates him self and swims away, I feed him his krill and he continues on like normal.

Now here I am sitting there saying "that was the coolest thing i've ever seen" but thinking about it. Ive read that puffers only "puff up" when theyre threatened or stressed. So I checked my water params. Everything checked out good.

Ammonia: 0
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: between 10-20
Ph: around 7.5
Salinty: 1.006

Should I be worried about this? Or was this just a fluke, or maybe the light startled him?

Some puffers do practice puffs. It's nothing to worry about. It's a bit scary the first time you experience it (I almost got a panic attack the first time one of my puffers puffed), but just relax and enjoy the sight.

I saw a GSP partially puff up once to force out a poop. Besides the krill what has he been eating?

well he has lots of ghost shrimp in the tank with him, i fed the shrimp spinach and some veggie discs before they go in the thank so there is some nutritional value in them. he eats the krill once a day (loves the eyes), sometimes we feed him bloodworms and brine shrimp (thawed in vitamin H20) anf of course snails. we tried squid once but he didnt go for it.

oh i just wanted to add we don't feed him freeze dried at all, only live(snails and shrimp) and frozen (krill, bloodworms, brine shrimp)

In the wild, puffing is avoid predation and as a threat. But all puffers do seem to "practice" especially when young. In one of my labs i had a tank of young puffers (GSPs) beside my desk - those were observed much more than I get to do with most fish. They puffed up not infrequently, just a quick gulp/series of gulps and instant tennis ball. It never seemed part of any interaction, just something they did from time to time. Quite a few of my puffers I never saw puffed. it is chance and lucky observation and harmless.

The statement saying the contrary was someone with too little puffer experience or a good imagination IMHO.

Try some meatier foods from your grocery store fish dept:
library/feeding/feeding-your-puffers/

thanks for the help guys. i was a little freaked out i thought something was wrong, but i guess its normal.

PufferPunk, so i can just go to my grocery store, by some crab legs or whatever, and feed them to him? do i cook them? lol

Just wanted to pop in - any raw seafood stuffs is fine... don't cook it, it cooks out all the good nutrients! Raw and thawed (freeze or keep frozen until you thaw to feed, to kill possible parasites!)

okay thanks i'm going grocery shopping tomorrow, so i'll check out some stuff

and krill can cause lock jaw right?

Only puffer so far that I've heard developing lockjaw from krill is the porc but I wouldn't feed it as a staple to any fish.

I had a turgidus who would puff evwery day about the same time. The tank was by my bed so in the morning I would watch him for a while. He would swim over by the filter intake and then just sit there until the filter sucked him up against the intake, he would puff swim around in a circle twice let it out and then repeat. 3 or 4 times then swim away

LOL @ Biffmalawi! I would love that tank! Real and literal puff play!

BiffMalawi wrote:I had a turgidus who would puff evwery day about the same time. The tank was by my bed so in the morning I would watch him for a while. He would swim over by the filter intake and then just sit there until the filter sucked him up against the intake, he would puff swim around in a circle twice let it out and then repeat. 3 or 4 times then swim away

LOL! That's awesome. They are so funny with the things they do sometimes. I would love to see that.