Oto or new baby Dwarf Puffer??

[jeromecarlyoung]

Hello,
I got a 10 gallon (uk) set up which had 2 Otos and one Dwarf Puffer.
One Oto has vanished after 6 months good service; no body has been found. The water parameters are fine.
Do I get another Dwarf Puffer or another Oto?
Dwarf Puffers have more chararcter but I have heard that Otos need another Oto for company.
My 1 year old DP is female but a lot bigger than a new baby DP. As being female I hope that she will be less territorial but fear that she just maybe hungry one day and terrorise the new DP. The Tank is planted so a fish can hide a little.

Any advice please.

-Jerry

[RTR]

Otos do prefer and are more comfortable with their own kind in the tank, but IME a 10 is way too small to support two of them without a lot of diatom algae and a fair bit of soft green algae.

[xrayjeeper83]

obviously I full agree with RTR. Ive always read that you should keep oto's in groups of 3-4 but need a tank that has been set up for a long time so it has plenty of algae growth to feed them.

[jeromecarlyoung]

Thanks.
The Tank has been going for a year. I have tried and failed with a few Otos (two didn't settled and one had a Fish Lice and this latest one is a mystery) so far and thought these two I had were in for the long haul.
Dwarf Puffers generally try to kill anything else than Otos so as far as a cleaning crew I am limited to them. Shrimp, Catfish, and Snails are there to be bitten or chewed up.

-Jerry

[Pufferpunk]

When you shop for otos, be sure you get one with a rounded belly, not concave.

[jeromecarlyoung]

It seems the LFS people give me the fish that they can scoop out. Bless them.
This fish is probably the slowest and nearest to death. Otos are said to usually have a good dose of cyanide in them as the fishermen add this to the rivers so the fish are easy to catch. Nice.
I have looked at the Otos website http://www.otocinclus.com which has previoulsy been some help.
Some people have said that take out the DP and the otos would be happy; nasty puffer!!

Thanks Jerry

[RTR]

Personally I have not had issues between Otos and DPs, but mine have been in very heavily planted tanks, all at least a bit larger than you are using. I also have not had OTos in with DPs I wanted to breed.

But I do not buy Otos which are newly received at the LFS, and do pick ones with rounded bellies as PP suggests and do QT them in unoccupied planted QT tanks. My water does have enough soluble silicates that if I do frequent large-scale changes I will have diatoms on the glasses. Once these fish are established in my tanks,they do tend to be fairly lasting.