The Puffer Forum

Hey all, my Porcupine Puffer hasn't been acting like himself lately. Nothing crazy, just a bit different. I've notice a few soft quills and was wondering if other PP owners have noticed those as well on their porcs???

Here's a picture of it, close up

http://i480.photobucket.com/albums/rr16 ... ufferb.jpg

Any thoughts?

I think they shed their spines sometimes & grow new ones. How else isn't he acting like himself?

I didn't know if having a few 'limp' quills was common or not. Do you currently have a PP? Can you do a quick check to see if he/she has any? On my PP, there always seems to be a few limp quills on him at all times.

As to how else he isn't acting himself....honestly nothing much, probably all in my head. When you look for something, you usually find it, even if it doesn't really exist.

No i don't have one but I've seen this before.

My porc puff has a few of these.

However, they are symmetrically orientated, that is to say if he has one on his "cheek" on the left side, he also has one on the same spot on the right side.

That led me to believe its a morphological feature of most porc puffs.

Mine looks a lot like this one i pulled from google: http://www.reefhotspot.com/store/images ... cupine.jpg

Not all porc puffs exhibit it, but its completely normal. The porc puff in the picture likely has as many as 13 "lazy" or "soft" spines.

Expect more to show up, take a few pics of ur porc puff if its still young every couple of weeks to keep an eye on its growth.

This is totally different than inflamed/infected spines, which I've also seen.

john007h wrote:My porc puff has a few of these.

However, they are symmetrically orientated, that is to say if he has one on his "cheek" on the left side, he also has one on the same spot on the right side.

That led me to believe its a morphological feature of most porc puffs.

Mine looks a lot like this one i pulled from google: http://www.reefhotspot.com/store/images ... cupine.jpg

Not all porc puffs exhibit it, but its completely normal. The porc puff in the picture likely has as many as 13 "lazy" or "soft" spines.

Expect more to show up, take a few pics of ur porc puff if its still young every couple of weeks to keep an eye on its growth.

I haven't noticed any being symmetrical. Mine looks pretty similar to the picture you linked too. Does your porc puff up at all? Mine does every now and then for apparently no reason. I used to think it was just when he was stressed, but he doesn't even look worried at all when he does it.

Porcs are known for "practice" puffing. Keep a camera on hand!

Pufferpunk wrote:Porcs are known for "practice" puffing. Keep a camera on hand!

Yeah, I really should keep my old digital camera by the tank.....I have never seen him actually puff up....just in the puffed up state and deflating. He's a funny one.
My foxface isn't even startled by him anymore, so I'm guessing he does it a lot when I'm not around.

He does puff up, although not recently, and not since I removed him from the lion fish I owned based on advice from this forum. He's with a yellow tang now and they seem to comfortably sleep beside each other, so he hasn't puffed up b/c I think he's comfortable with his environment.

I came downstairs once where my tank is and saw him puffed with my phone in hand, managed to capture this in time:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txxuA6Cfs_0

I think it was a practice puff (it was a day after tank cleaning and some sand was settling, I heard they sometimes puff to clear debris from under their spines), I've been careful cleaning since then.

These "loose" spines are no disease, many D. holocanthus have them (other porcupine puffers may not). They are also very sensitive and it is even possible they have some use as a tactile organ.

Corvus is always full of interesting pufferfacts!

john007h wrote:He does puff up, although not recently, and not since I removed him from the lion fish I owned based on advice from this forum. He's with a yellow tang now and they seem to comfortably sleep beside each other, so he hasn't puffed up b/c I think he's comfortable with his environment.

I came downstairs once where my tank is and saw him puffed with my phone in hand, managed to capture this in time:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txxuA6Cfs_0

I think it was a practice puff (it was a day after tank cleaning and some sand was settling, I heard they sometimes puff to clear debris from under their spines), I've been careful cleaning since then.

Great job on managing to get the puff on tape....I have to have my camera ready and charged just in case. I only catch him doing once a month or so. Tang are a similar shape to foxfaces, so maybe in the wild they live around each other too.

Could be, my tang literally seems right beside the puffer even brushing along against him, the puffer doesn't seem to mind at all, he could I guess take a big bite out of the tang's very large dorsal fin, but I guess he likes his new tank mate.

The puffer was by himself before, I swear these fish can get lonely if you don't give them a lot of attention, I moved around my LR every third week to give him some opportunity to explore some new surroundings.