freshwater puffers?

[StevieM]

I had a little chat with my girlfriend tonight and she told me I wasn' allowed to get another tank unless I put freshwater puffers in it......"cause they are cute". So, I thought I would be a nice guy and get her into the fish thing by maybe getting her a tank of her own for XMAS with the fixins so she could have her puffers. This is a touchy subject because like so many of you I'm sure....I spend LOTS of time caring for my fish as opposed to focusing on her and I would like to get her into the hobby, to understand. If anyone has kept these fish or has info about them they could share I would be quite happy. I know from what I read before , aren't they a Brackish fish?? . I also heard there is a strictly freshwater variety. What I am most concerned about is temperment. I heard they can be agressive, what kinds of fish could mix with puffers?? Do they need a species tank?? what do they eat?? Thanks everyone in advance!

steve

[JamisonBWolsh]

dude,


do a search on the forums.. we had this same discussion. Check it out.

[Bobs]

There are freshwater puffers that are not brackish. I have a couple of South American Freshwater Puffers (Colomesus Asellus) that live in fresh water. They are very hardy, and not too aggressive. They eat freeze dried Krill, plankton, frozen brine shrimp, and even flake food. Here's a link so you can see what they look like.

http://www.pufferfish.co.uk/aquaria/species/pufferfish/types/coloasel.htm

Bob

[tyler]

the dwarf puffer is also a freshwater puffer, and cute too...

http://www.pufferfish.co.uk/aquaria/species/pufferfish/types/tetrtrav.htm

[fishfreek]

A few months back there was a nice write up in the FAM about freshwater puffers. It was the cover story so if you dont get Fish Aquarium Mag it might be a good trip to your local library and check a few issues back. It might have been the Oct issue maybe.

[rjl420]

The only two freshwater puffers suitable to a community tank that I know of are Tetraodon travancoricus (http://puffernet.tripod.com/travancoricus.html), the true freshwater dwarf puffer, and Colomesus asellus (http://puffernet.tripod.com/asellus.html) AKA south american puffer, among others. each of these can be trusted with tankmates.

I'm sure there are others, but these are the 2 common FW puffers that don't require a species tank. if you wanted to setup a species tank with just puffers, you could get green spotted puffers or Figure 8 puffers, but they do best in brackish water and have a tendancy to nip at other tankmates. both are fairly common.

one word of advice though. puffers are VERY sensitive to ammonia and nitrIte (it causes permanent gill damage) so it is best to put them into a cycled tank (I recommend fishless so that there isn't any danger of spikes when adding a puffer to an established tank).


BTW fishfreak-

that magazine article had WAY too much mis-information. half of the species they listed as freshwater are in fact brackish and their behavior is not quite what the listed.