The Puffer Forum

Hi, i have had my figure 8 puffer a while now and some things are starting to freak me out:
1. when he is calm the belly is white, when i am about to feed him his belly is black and he hunts down krill at lightning speed...is this normal?
2. i am thinking that his beak is getting mighty long, how can i get it down to the right size?
3. will feeding him jumbo krill work his teeth down?
4. is it normal for a f8 to sleep at the bottom of a tank?
5. i have never seen my puffer poop... i feed him krill normally and lots of it. still i have never seen him poop. whats up with that?
6. how much should i feed my puffer, it seems like he could eat forever.

he is alone in a 55g fully established aquarium he is sharing the space with 3 algae eaters and some feeder fish he has not ate.

First off, welcome to the forum! Glad you found us.

Secondly, that's not a figure 8. It's a ceylon puffer.
Check it out: http://www.thepufferforum.com/forum/ug. ... uviatilis/

Much different puffer than the F8. Can grow to 8 inches, require high end brackish to marine conditions as it grows, and requires about 40g to be comfortable. The 55g tank you have him in now is perfect for him. For his best health you'll have to start looking into getting some marine salt and a refractometer or hydrometer to measure the salinity. We can talk about that later.

As for your questions:

1. That's normal. It especially seems to be the case with ceylons, but all puffers have some colour changing abilities to show off their different moods, be it sleeping, hunting, attacking, sickness or stress. All will cause some colour change, and is usually normal if the tank is in good order.

2. The teeth don't look too bad from the pictures. Unless they are poking out or he has trouble eating, you still ahve time to keep them worn down with foods like snails.

3. Jumbo shrimp may help a little bit, but you really need to start feeding him snails pretty much every day.
Check this out for feeding ideas: http://www.thepufferforum.com/articles/puffer/food.html

Setting up a little 2-5 gallon tank as a snail breeder is a great idea and very easy to do.
See here: http://www.thepufferforum.com/articles/ ... snail.html

4. It is normal for puffers to lay around at the bottom of the tank when they sleep. If you provide a cave or over hang of some sort they will usually claim it as their home.

5. Are you sure there is no poop in there? Does his belly get sunken soon after eating?

6. How often and how much do you feed him? For his size probably ever other day or every 2 days would be a good schedule. How big is he?

You've got a great looking puffer there! I'm jealous! I always keep an eye out for ceylons that are actually mislabled as ceylons. They can be kind of rare.

Definitely a Ceylon, at least you have the tank space to keep him happy. Very good looking puffer.

Just an FYI, I've never seen any of my puffers poop. Not once. However, I'm pretty sure that they've all been pooping for two reason: 1, they haven't exploded yet and 2, there's tons of crap in the substrate that has to be vacuumed up every week.

Nice puffer ... and well travelled!

Cool! Did you get it at the F8 price? Most Ceylons at that size cost around $30-40.

WOW you guys know your stuff. i am amazed.
1. i have added instant ocean already and the specific gravity is at 1.010 last time i checked.
2. i bought him as a F8 $9
3. i am shocked at his possibly size growth. right now he is 3-4 inches
4. i have had him for a few months
5. i feed him everyday, his big eyes get me everytime he starts to beg.
6. i folllowed your instructions and looked around my area for snails...sadly i got nothing. same goes for java moss.
7. its a little scary knowing that i need lots of snails.

here is another pic of him just to make sure he is a ceylon puffer:


pictures of my other tanks:

that was the right of my 40 gallon with a Black Ghost Knife Fish that is really smart.


that is my 20 gallon cycling away only 1 day in...haha.

How did you raise the salinity of the tank? If you raise more than 0.002/ week you will most likely kill off the bacteria in your tank.

if you talking about my puffer tank, i took my time raising the specific gravity.

I'd dump those live plants. They won't fair well at higher SGs. I rarely feed my puffs snails. I go by the other crunchy foods listed in the Feeing Your Puffer Article in our Library.

Cool, just wanted to make sure

BTW, a couple more questions.

What are your tank parameters for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, ph, etc?

How much and how often do you change water?

How do you measure your SG?

I'm wondering if it's accurate since the feeder fish and algae eaters and plants probably won't survive much longer if it actually is that high.

i use an instant ocean hydrometer. but my parameters are: 0,0,4,7.8. i change the water once a week.

Boxermom wrote:Just an FYI, I've never seen any of my puffers poop. Not once. However, I'm pretty sure that they've all been pooping for two reason: 1, they haven't exploded yet and 2, there's tons of crap in the substrate that has to be vacuumed up every week.

Hehe, same with me. I've only seen my F8 poo once.

Although I see my modestus go all the time...its kinda hard to miss

How much water are you changing weekly?