New from South Africa

[ehz_148]

Hi everyone

This week the family I work for gave me a little tank with 3 figure eight puffers along with 2 bumblebee gobies for company. In the past 4 days I have read a LOT about these cuties, I have learned a few tricks and have realized they need a much bigger tank and thankfully my brother in law has one spare that will hopefully be big enough (not sure of the dimensions yet but it's at least 4x as big as the current tiny thing I have now). I also spent a nice huge sum of money on water test kits and bits and bobs to keep the little flappers happy.

One of them is named Fig (the little girl named him/her). They used to own him with their flamboyantly finned freshwater fish, but he attacked their silver dollars so decided to give him to me and bought some tank buddies (that are yet to be named) to keep him company.

I'm very excited to be an owner of these funny little fishies and I look forward to any advice/comments or general discussion to be found here. Thanks for having me

Erin

[sevenyearnight]

Good luck getting these guys into the ideal conditions you have researched. Just a few tidbits of information, sorry if it's a repeat of what you have already read.
Keep their salinity 1.003 - 1.005. A lot of sites suggest a higher salinity, but they live longer in the lower range. Use marine salt to mix their water, not any other kind of salt. Use an aragonite substrate to maintain the KH. Make sure your salt is mixed thoroughly for several hours before adding to the tank. If the tank is freshwater at the moment, take 2 weeks to hit your target, raise no more than .02 a week to keep your bacteria intact.
15 gallons minimum per figure 8 puffer.
Some feeding ideas, you can get some non-seasoned, uncooked seafood from a grocery store, like mussels, shrimp, squid etc. I also like to include tilapia and earthworms to offer some thiaminase (An enzyme that inhibits the body's ability to uptake b1) free/low food sources. If you can get cockles, they are the only shelled bivalve I am aware of that does not contain thiaminase, so that is an excellent choice. If the seafood is fresh, freeze it first, and thaw/ soak the food in a bit of tank water (Don't use straight tap) with the addition of vitamins, such as vitachem and Selcon to make sure they are getting balanced nutrition, as freezing does break some of the nutritional value, but it is important to freeze to kill bacteria and or parasites.
And of course, pond and/or ramshorn snails are fantastic.

It's a good idea to treat them for internal parasites as well, you have to soak his food in medication. Get Jungle Fizz Tabs Parasite Clear, break off a piece of the tab and drop it in smallish container, and put a small amount of tank water in it, enough to cover the food you intend to soak. Add the tabs and some pressed or chopped garlic or garlic extract. Allow the food to marinade in the solution for about an hour. Feed him like this 3 -7 days. If you don't have Jungle products available to you, check for a medication containing praziquantel and/or metronidazole.

[Tim]

Welcome

[ehz_148]

Hi again... so this is just a sneak peak at the set up so far for Tsuki, Fig, Pakupaku (my figure eights) and Hanz and Franz (the grumpy gobies)



I want to introduce some live plants by the end of the year and I will be getting a hydrometer as soon as I can afford it.

thanks, kbai for now

[zombiefetus]

South Africa you say....
I don't suppose you could mosey on over to the ocean and pick me up one of these?
http://www.fishbase.org/summary/Chelono ... pilus.html

lol. Welcome to the forum!

[J-P]

either that decor is MASSIVE or they are TINY!! very cute BTW!!

[ehz_148]

haha, J-P, they were tiny. !!! They are bigger now though. I haven't noticed their growth but now looking back at old photos I can see how little they were.

and sorry zombie...I have no idea where to even look for one of those, and unfortunately I do not have the option of fishing for one anyway.

(sorry for late replies, been absent from forum for a while)

[Puffer King]

South Africa you say....
I don't suppose you could mosey on over to the ocean and pick me up one of these?
http://www.fishbase.org/summary/Chelono ... pilus.html

lol. Welcome to the forum!

thats an awesome looking puffer

[ehz_148]

Xora Mouth is a 7 hour drive from my house! I am tempted! so tempted.....maybe my boyfriend and I can go for a romantic valentines getaway to the hotel at that river mouth...oooooh....hmmm....

if one was to ship a cute little puffer overseas, what kind of packaging would one use? and how to secure it, full of water for save travelling that could take days?

[jus85411]

not sure what procedures to use for shipping, especially over seas. but if you figure it out and you can get more than 1 of these bad boys