The Puffer Forum

Hi I have a 20 gallon tank with 5 harlequin rasporas and 3 leopard catfish I was thinking of getting a couple of SAPS is there anything wrong with this idea ??

That tank isn't large enough for 2 SAPs & they prefer to be in groups of 3 or more: library/puffers-in-focus/sap/

You would have them pacing the glass constantly, it drives you mad. Then you would have the teeth problem, when mixed in community tanks the saps will take the soft foods and don't need to bother with the hard stuff. This means dentistry 4x yearly minimum. It's not really worth the hassle, plus as pp said not big enough. All this is from personal experience. They are great fish to own but tricky to keep if that makes sense

+1to both the above comments. Puffers in general are not community fish. IME SAPs are relatively easy to keep IF (1) they are kept in largish tanks with 3-5 or more SAPs, good circular current along the glasses, (2) with dense plants along the center spine of the tank, and (3) fed a diet of ~95% home-reared snails (ramshorn and common pond, appropriately sized). Their only tankmates, if any, should be Otocinclus catfish if the plantings are mature enough to support those. They are not tight schoolers like Danios or Rasboras, but swim more loosely much of the time. I do add most feeder snails during the tank dark cycle so that the fish need to search through the plantings for much of their food. Over-large snails can result in chipped incisor plates and follow-up dentistry. Some light cycle snail feeding is done with forceps to check each fish's incisors.

In a largish set-up as described, they are very active fish.