The Puffer Forum

Currently, I am new to pufferfish and have recently gotten a dwarf pufferfish around 3 days ago. He is currently in a heavily planted 7-gallon tank and stopped glass surfing after the second day. I am currently making this post to make sure that everything is in line. I am probably over-worried but he/she has been nibbling at food and not eating it. I cycled this tank for ~1 month before adding the puffer to it and it was 0/0/0 before but after I introduced him/her and 1-2 extra plants the ammonia spiked a bit. I have been doing daily water changes to and the levels have slowly started to reach zero. If I had to guess the ammonia spikes probably have to do with the frozen blood worms that I attempted to feed him but he didn't eat (have had trouble cleaning them). I will include a picture of a tank and a video of him nibbling.

1) pH=7.4-7.7, ammonia= ~.1, Nitrite=0, Nitrate=~2.5
2) 7 gallon, dwarf pea puffer (plus 3 pond snails)
3)attempt feeding at least once a day, water changes once a day since I got him/her
4) just the 3 plants in the tank, snails, and pufferfish
5) tank has been cycled/cycling for 3-4 weeks

To sum it up I'm looking for advice towards the food nibbling (and some slightly heavy breathing).

video: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1JiVIF- ... sp=sharing
picture:https://imgur.com/NLmc0Gt

All advice/responses are appreciated

Welcome! Gorgeous tank! I'm surprised you have issues with your parameters with all those plants. Peas are a shoaling species, who prefer to live in groups of 6 or more.
Great articles on them here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/peapuff ... 5411360151

Oh ok, I was constantly told that I could keep one of these guys alone in this 7 gallon. Other than the nibbling he seems to enjoy the tank (I rarely see him and when I do it looks like he's hunting in the back plants or the buce on the back wall). I also believe that the ammonia spike/ parameter problem that I have is because some of the lower parts of the stem plants have dead leaves that I have yet to trim.

Puffers are VERY sensitive to toxins since they have no scales. Please do keep on top of cleaning out your dead plants/leaves.