Spotted Puffers

[rc50cal]

I have a spotted puffer that my girlfriend convinced me to buy at the lfs. The other fish in the tank (bristle nose pleco, rainbow shark, tiretrack eel) all seem to get along but the puffer eats everything I put into the tank. This is a really stupid question. but how do I feed the other fish? I am also a concerned that the puffer will eat himself to death. Any help is greatly appreciated.

[Aquarius0015]

Might wanna try over in the brackish water forums. :)

[prerunnedyota]

well for the pleco try putting a sinking food tablet in once the lights are out theres a better chance he will get it for the tiretrack ell jsut feed whastever ur feeding him with tweezers that worked for me eel and for the other fish im not sure maybe someone else might have some ideas

[ewok]

puffers are a pretty specialized fish, you *should* ask in brackishwater....... this one may not be, but almost all of them are either brackish or full marine. the first thing to do would be to find out exactly what type you have. alot of the names are pretty ambiguous.....

they also *have* to have a decent amount of crunchy stuff in their diet, to keep the "tooth" under control. otherwise it will overgrow to the point they won't be able to eat any more. stuff like snails is almost always recommended, but i have also seen stuff like shrimp and crab and some other hard shelled things mentioned too.

good luck.

[OrionGirl]

Agree with the above, moving this to Brackish, where all puffer talk is kept. OG

A note of caution--some puffers become extremely aggressive as they mature, and tank mates will become snacks. Also, many require salt as they mature, so species identification is crucial.

[RTR]

ewok's advice is good. If the spotted puffer is the Green Spotted Puffer or GSP, Tetraodon nigroviridis, it is brackish water to full marine when adult, gets to 6" standard length and is notious for eating tankmates. Their diet does need to be crunchy to control incissor growth. This is not anybody's idea of a community fish.

[cdawson]

If you're not prepared to care for only the puffer, then return it to where you bought it. Otherwise return the rest of the fish because you'll need to get some marine salt, a hydrometer and begin to add marine salt with every water change.

Puffers are not community fish as RTR said, they're probably the last thing anybody should keep with other fish.