The Puffer Forum

hey guys, just got home with my first marine puffer from the LFS.
Don't know exactly what he is but my guy at the store who keeps
puffs himself says he's a spotted dogface. He's got tan/brown desert
camouflage with white spots, bright yellow fins and yellow stripes on the
underside. Note the white spots around the mouth instead of the stripes.
I saw a different thread about a puff that looked like him but had stripes up to the mouth.

I want to ID my guy positively.
Here are a couple recent pics from different angles to help.
I saw a stars and stripes that looked a lot like him but I've also seen
some dogface puffs online that look like him. There are a couple with
flash on, flash off...etc. Any tips on how to best shoot him with my new
camera would be helpful.

It is an arothron hispidus aka stars and stripe puffer. Sometimes referred to as white spotted or hispid puffer.

Enjoy your new marine friend. He or she is very cute!
Best of luck

Puffers that "look like" a stars and stripes but have lines or stripes around the mouth and face are arothron reticularis aka reticulated puffers.

The reticulated dogface puffer "only" reaches 35 cm whereas the stars and stripes puffer reaches 50 cm.

Hope this clarifies.

I'll post a link to a pic of one of my reticulated puffers - maybe one of the computer experts will post so all can view on this thread

Hey thanks Kelly!

So it is a stars and stripes puffer eh? Man, my LFS guy was SO WRONG! Bah, well I see my 100 gallon tank being converted soon.

All the research I've done had to do with a dogface. Now I need to re-research it as a stars and stripes...*sigh*

Can I keep him with other fish? If he's going to be in a big 100+ I'd like to have tankmates if possible.
He destroyed the three snails and two hermet crabs(actually made it a
couple days) that came with the LR but I don't know about fish tankmates.

In my puffer tanks - I have more puffers, , tangs, a large mean jawfish, rabbitfish, groupers, porkfish, squirrels/soldierfish, sharks, remora, hawkfish and butterflyfish.

Puffers are just like people - on any given day, they might not like their neighbor.

crazy pic there!

All those fish sound nice but I wonder about the stars and stripes specifically. Generally what people do with them as far as tankmates go.

I'm going to start another thread about just that now that I know what it is. Thanks again kelly

oops sorry for the size of that pic - I just "mastered" photobucket but haven't learned resizing - help

Beautiful puffer!

He seems to be missing his top left dental plate, although it is hard to say definitively from the pics.

Lisa,

Both dental plates are intact - it must be the angle of the pic.

I did keep a reticulated puffer for about 8 years (died about 5 years ago) that had a severe malformed jaw. He had a severe underbite and required massive dentistry monthly in order to eat and prevent injury to self.

ok photo is fixed, its on my photbucket atm, but i can send you the resized one.

if you deal in alot of photos kelly i highly recommend this program
it saves the quality and detail and just shrinks the phot. also deals in batches so you an convert an entire folder to smaller sizes
http://bluefive.pair.com/pixresizer.htm

Thanks for the link.

Puffer Queen wrote:Lisa,

Both dental plates are intact - it must be the angle of the pic.

I didn't mean yours Kelly, sorry! I meant the one that you ID'd.

Hi lisa, yeah I was going to ask about that. It's there he's just chipped it way back. Of course the guy at the lfs said they grow back quickly blah blah blah but I wanted to ask about it.

He seems to use it well, eats just fine, cuts his shrimp fine, sucks snails out of their shell in a millisecond....but is the guy right in saying it grows back? I was thinking about this earlier. It's certainly not even. It's there just chipped back.

Do you foresee this as a problem?

Good to know I'm not going blind! And that it's not missing.

Puffers' dental plates grow constantly, which is why they need hard-shelled foods to keep them worn back. Do pay close attention to the other plates, as they may grow unevenly without the other one as long. You should be fine though, not to worry!