The Puffer Forum

My snail tank is currently up and running & I'm waiting for them to breed...

Issue is, my small F8's teeth have grown to the point where it's difficult for him to even eat blood worms now. He often swims around with bloodworm hanging from his mouth! I can't see how he could ever get a little snail in his mouth to help grind down his teeth.

How can I help this poor little bugger out??

How long have you had him? Mine sometimes carries the bloodworms around, I had the same snail problem so I fed him shell on prawns, I just hold in the tank for a few minutes so he has his fill and then remove it.

Dental work is required if he can't eat. Read this for step by step instructions:
http://www.thepufferforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=8

Good information, but it's very very vague.

How much clove oil is needed to tranquilize them? Does that toothache medicine contain clove oil & no other chemicals that can harm the fish or is that picture intended to be cute? Can I find straight clove oil and just use that to tranquilize him? Shouldn't I use some Brackish water (salinity he is accustomed to) along with the clove oil during the tranquilization & use straight brackish water in his 'recovery' cup?

He can eat, but it's quite aparant that he's struggling with food getting stuck in his teeth. Unfortunately my snails haven't started breeding yet.

The toothache medicine IS clove oil. Check it out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_of_cloves

The amount will vary on puffer size, so I'll let someone who's had more experience with trimming to give you an estimate, but 2 or 3 drops in a 1g bucket maybe?

How big is your F8?

I trimmed my f8's teeth a couple of weeks ago. He was having difficulty eating worms and got stuff stuck in his teeth too.

I used pure clove oil from the drug store.

3 drops in 3 cups of tank water. Trimmed with cuticle scissors.

My puff was almost 3" if yours is smaller try 2 drops and if it doesn't go belly up after 2 minutes add the third.

Make sure you stir the water before adding the puff and if you add another drop make sure you scoop up a little water add the drop and pour it back into the bucket. If pure undiluted clove oil comes into contact with your puff it will burn his skin terribly.

Damn! You guys are freakin' awesome!

Thanks a ton for the help! If it weren't for this forum, I don't know what I would have done!

Thanks again!!

Hey guys, I'm sure some of you remember this thread...

Well, I have the clove oil. I've been waiting for his teeth to get a bit larger, as this would be my first attempt at trimming teeth & 'tranquilizing' a fish....

Last night I fed them a treat of mealworm and as usual, the puffer with huge teeth couldn't eat any, but he was able to consume bloodworms with a little effort.

Today I got home from work and the puffer has no front teeth. INTERESTING! I have a sandy substrate along with a couple large rocks with sharp points. Is it possible a bloodworm landed on the rocks and he got a little too excited and destroyed his teeth doing so?

BTW, the snail tank is alive and kicking and now I can start feeding and avoid this problem in the future...wooh!

When the beaks get very long, they are much easier for the puffer to break. However, if he damaged the tooth root, it might not grow back, in which case he will have to live on a diet of worms and other soft food. Keep your eye on him for regrowth, and make sure you feed some soft food whenver you add food for now so he doesn't hurt the exposed quick of the beak on something hard.

Interesting. It looks like the root is still there on the right side - but it is very very short. The left side has a little bit more of tooth than the other.

I thought I made that article as UN-vague as humanly possible. Maybe you didn't read it very thoroughly? Your above questions are all mentioned in that article. No reason to wait till their teeth break off & then can not eat the proper foods. That's why I wrote it. Check the bottom teeth, they may still be overgrown.

i have a baby fig 8 (about the size of a grape) -- how soon could i possibly start having teeth problems---??? they look good now (as far as i can tell)

i am also getting a snail tank up and runnning, but it may still be a little ways off before i get them breeding and have babies to feed my baby ---

i feed my larger fig 8 (~3") prawn tails and he does a great job of nawing on the shell --- the baby wont touch the stuff --

anything else i can do in the mean time?

Try opening shells on cockles & such. They will scrape their teeth against the shell, trying to get the meat out.

that sounds like a plan ---

Pufferpunk, i also liive in chicago -- can you recommend a place to get frozen cockle ???