The Puffer Forum

To be predators, puffers have an amazingly poor aim when they try to attack their food. My puffers very often miss, when they try to attack the dead food I give them. It makes me laugh every time, watching a puffer miss a piece of shrimp by several centimeters.

Yeah, I think my favorite is watching my my Trugdis go after live shrimp! He never can get them, misses on every strike! Usually he get them after a few day when he stumbles on them unexpectedly.

hehe
i have 2 kinds of experiences:
1.- my 2 GSP are pure hunters with chicken heart (yet) the never miss the food i put in the tank, the food never touch the ground, cuz they´re eating when is falling... and even cherry shrimps or baby fish are fast enough to scape a puffer attack (GSP)...

2.- M. Abei.... well this guy was incredibly aggressive but incredibly slow and blind i guess, cuz some times the food falls right in front of his mouth... and yes, he fail the attack!

AT DAY LIGHT M. Abei is not more than a simple living stone... but at night, things changes... this guy was a effective killer at night, he moves slow.. the preys didn't even notice him around.. and ZOOM! he bites, the prey tried to scape but was broken in half...

If Camille sees a pod crawling around on the rock she comes flying out of her little cave like a Mk 48 torpedo and tags it. She does the same thing to my hand, I have a few marks...

Camille puffs up when she gets excited, and therefore has trouble catching ghost shrimp. Hopefully she'll figure out one day that 'mouth wide open while puffed up to capacity' is not the ideal posture for catching agile ghost shrimp.

Maybe yours are duds. Feight was amazing at hunting, never missed a thing. Even shrimp didn't make it to the bottom of the tank. The irrubescos are similar but not as good. They've gotten better with time. All 3 join in on getting food or hunting it and even a crayfish doesn't last more than 15 seconds.

Ya so far Bacon is my best hunter, nothing ever makes it to the bottom with out getting hit hard first.

Huey has horrible aim even when he sits and hovers for a min above the food like he is trying to line up the kill shot

Bloat has gotten so dang lazy unless it walks right infront of him he usually doesnt care during the day. But at night I see him up and actively hunting, although not very well lol

I dont think Pig really understands what hunting is. He is more like a golden retriever puppy happily zooming around looking at stuff excitedly but when you toss something in he completely ignores it. Though he did seemed to recognize sand hermits as food and killed the one I had. SO there might still be hope. Maybe I shouldnt try to toss in live food in the evening when he already had his morning meal.

My two F8s have vastly different hunting skills. One of them is a brilliant hunter and can nail a ghost shrimp within 10 seconds of it entering the tank. The other one just blunders after the shrimp and looks surprised when the shrimp do that "whoooosh!" thing, every single time.

LOL! Why is everyone shocked? There are professional hunters and there are duds. No doubt the same curves could be drawn on humans. There are always individual differences. We do not have natural selection in captivity. We love and care for the duds just as much or maybe more than the pros.

RTR wrote:LOL! Why is everyone shocked? There are professional hunters and there are duds. No doubt the same curves could be drawn on humans. There are always individual differences. We do not have natural selection in captivity. We love and care for the duds just as much or maybe more than the pros.

+1

Probably love the duds even more because it's cute watching them bumble and fumble around

My saddled toby, Aphrodite has pretty poor aim. Both my DPs are pretty adept.

Fed Pig the GSP some of the new pond snails, he's only had crushed MTS so far, he took to them immediately and has been begging for more since . He seems quite adept at catching them before they hit the floor so there is hope for him yet.

RTR wrote:LOL! Why is everyone shocked?

Because it seems so common. I would understand it if only one of my puffers were bad at hunting. But it's not only one puffer. Besides they are so funny to watch when they miss. My turgidus just gets too excited when he sees the food, and that's why he misses. He forgets to concentrate!

Troender wrote:

RTR wrote:LOL! Why is everyone shocked?

Because it seems so common. I would understand it if only one of my puffers were bad at hunting. But it's not only one puffer. Besides they are so funny to watch when they miss. My turgidus just gets too excited when he sees the food, and that's why he misses. He forgets to concentrate!

I've love to see that . My puffer has a similar problem in the mornings. He gets all excited because I am getting ready to toss the food in. Once the food is in he will continue being excited, looking at me, even though the food is behind him. It usually takes him a minute to realize

Tim wrote:Once the food is in he will continue being excited, looking at me, even though the food is behind him. It usually takes him a minute to realize

i always loved seeing my puff do this. im always like "yo dummy, its in the water already". sometimes i had to lure him to the area with the food with the thawing cup since he got just as excited to see that as he was to see food. im sure i actually didnt need to do that but i was one to watch him eat and immediately remove anything he didnt eat so it wasnt in there for any longer than it needed to be.