The Puffer Forum

Heya guys,

well I have a question. I want to turn my 15g into a home for a F8 puffer that I've fallen in love with. It's freshwater right now. Will changing it to salt kill all the good bacteria? I know for marine yes, not sure about brackish. Will I have to recycle it? If so should I get a molly or two for the job? Or are there better brackish cycling fish. Pure ammonia is iffy, I can never find it with ingredients and I don't want to dump it into my aquarium if I don't know what's in it....

Help? lol thanks!

Is the Fig8 at the LFS in brackish water? Most likely it's in freshwater as most LFS don't bother to put them in brackish. If it's in fresh, you could add it to your tank and then very slowly raise the SG. That way there would be no shock to your fish or your bacteria.

Yes, they know what they're doing and it is in a brackish tank

Which I was happy to see. It says Eau saumâtre which means brackish in english(I live in a french place). They have two with some other fish(mollies, scats, monos)and I just want one. He is far to cute.

Check the specific gravity/salinity at the store. Wthout number we cannot tell. Generally it is best (read as: safest) not to change the specific gravity more than 0.002 per week to allow the bacteria time to adjust. With figures from the store it may be possible/practical to adjust the fish downward in density and later back up slowly - the fish are better at adaptation than are the bacteria.

Hmm thanks, I'll go back and check tommorow. I went and paid for him, they are going to keep and take care of him until I'm ready. I've been going there for awhile so I know he's in good care. I'll let you know , I'm going to purchase a hydro meter and salt on sunday when I make my bi-weekly trip to the downtown LFS this weekend. I think I'll also buy a few mollies for the time being. Need to move my other fishies out. I've had dwarf puffers for awhile and recently saved two more from a friend. They are some of my favorite fish and I'm looking forward to this guy.

The gravity for F8's I've heard is 1.05 or so correct? I've heard they can be kept in fresh but I've also heard they live longer in brackish(15 years?). I'd love to have another long lived fish, I have 2 balloon kissing gouramis in my large community tank . They're awesome. Anyway I'm getting off topic sorry.

Thanks for the help!

I keep my F8 at SG of 1.05 (=8.5ppt salinity).

"Brackish" can be anything from 1ppt salt to low 20's depending on who you talk to. So if he's in lower SG, raise it very slowly with your weekly water changes.

Use Marine salt only.
Good Luck - the F8 is a beautiful and enjoyable fish.

Thanks for the info . If he is in higher salinity can I assimilate him to lower via drip acclimation in bag?

yes, just go slow as you would from low to high.

Cool, I'll do it over the period of an evening then if needed.

Thanks again! I'm so excited to have a larger puffer. I love dwarfs but sometimes I "lose" them haha. They love to come and say hi most of the time though

update.

Everythings great! I got a few mollies today to keep the cycle going and moved my danios and betta girls on out. Upped the salinity a little bit, the mollies were in fresh originally. Got my hydrometer(yay )and some Marine Salt that the store uses on their own tanks. I'm a pretty good customer so they gave me an extra 25% off the allready 25% off. Woohoo. I'll keep monitoring all my reading to make sure every things stable before going for the puffer. '

Once the tanks stable and the puffer is in it should I leave the salinity at a constant 8.5 or is some fluctuation actually good for him? I read on a few sites about giving them different salinity levels but I figured I'd ask here first. I understand to fast of a change may lead to stressing out the fish. Also this is my first attempt at brackish. I hear with salt water changes should be less frequent? How about brackish? What's a good amount to change and how often? I do all my other tanks at least once a week, sometimes twice. 50% gravel vac aprox. a week also.

Now I gotta think of a name lol .

I keep my F8 in a 30 gal; after measuring inside LxWxH of actual water/231 and subtracting for displacement of gravel, ornaments, etc, I estimate that there's 25.5 gals of water in there. I change 11.25 gals every 7 days. That works out to about 44% weekly. I would increase that % if he was in a smaller tank.

Additional space and water well beyond the suggested minimum is IMHO & IME almost never a bad thing. More room and more water almost always translates directly in higher water quality and in turn a healthier and longer-lived fish.

For some young/small singletons, a dither fish or two may be needed initially to help assure the singleton that it is "safe" to be out and about.

Would an allright dither be a molly? In a few months(maybe 4-6?)he will be getting a bigger tank, most likely 25-30g or so. I'm not 100% sure what size he will be as they are getting him in this week. When he comes in I'll go check him out and in a week or two buy him. I've started slowly upping the salt, the mollies that I bought seem much happier with it. I was planning on returning all of them but I guess I could keep one or two if they'd be good dither fish. If not what would be?

Thank you!

What's a dither fish?

Do we have an English to American translator?

A dither fish is a fish added simply to distract, entertain, or comfort the fish for which the tank is atually intended.

ok, just read RTR's post - appears the dither fish is a sort of escort service for shy fish?