Are any cowfish or puffers reef safe?
- Thread starter <3Oscar
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"Reef Safe" can mean a lot of things. Most common is "Reef Safe = Fish that do not eat/pick at corals", which a puffer would fall under that category, but another meaning is "Reef Safe = safe for inverts" which is where you will find many fish do not fit that category, like puffers, some wrasses, etc, will eat crabs, snails, and shrimp. I have seen a few reef/coral tanks that had porcupine puffers in them and did just fine.. but obviously no inverts in the tank unless they are meant to be food.
Catpicklesdog
Hindsight is a wonderful thing!
Everything Ace said!
But
I have a porcupine puffer in my reef tank with hermits and snails and a pistol shrimp. He's been in there quite a few months now and absolutely no trouble.
I do tend to push the rules and what i put in my tank I don't necessarily advise to others
But
I have a porcupine puffer in my reef tank with hermits and snails and a pistol shrimp. He's been in there quite a few months now and absolutely no trouble.
I do tend to push the rules and what i put in my tank I don't necessarily advise to others
What corals are in there? How long has this worked for you? I kept a valentini & coronata in my reef tank for a few months but eventually caught them both picking at corals.
Well, both of those are "toby" type puffers which I think are more prone to coral picking that their larger cousins like Porcupine, dogface, stars and stripes, etc.
Still, IMO it is "iffy" to get a larger puffer to not eat inverts in the long run. When they are small and well fed they seem to be fine not eating inverts, but as they grow up some of them gain their invert appetite and once that happens there is no going back. I have a yellow wrasse that was a model citizen in my tank for 5 years around inverts, then one day it got its shrimp appetite and from that day on no more shrimp in my tank with that fish.
Still, IMO it is "iffy" to get a larger puffer to not eat inverts in the long run. When they are small and well fed they seem to be fine not eating inverts, but as they grow up some of them gain their invert appetite and once that happens there is no going back. I have a yellow wrasse that was a model citizen in my tank for 5 years around inverts, then one day it got its shrimp appetite and from that day on no more shrimp in my tank with that fish.
It's all "iffy," unfortunately. You'll never find one that is 100% "reef safe". As far as corals are concerned, porcupines are usually not a problem. That certainly does not mean that they can't be, but usually not. Tobies tend to be a bit nippier, but can sometime fare okay in reef tanks without too many problems. Arothron species are just a big no-no. They are going to be, by far, the most destructive. Much of the former applies to the boxfish/cowfish. Many individuals will never touch a coral, whereas others will decimate them. In almost all of the above cases, crustaceans will be a favorite--CPD is a rare exception there.
Curious. Can you elaborate on what damage they would do? I googled and don't see anything related to problems around corals (other than the shear size of them which could easily make coral frags for you), only inverts are listed as non compatible. Are they like the Bluejaw Trigger in reef tanks... just so clumsy they don't care what corals they break?
That said, I would not recommend an Arothron species in a coral tank for a few reasons, biggest being you pretty much rule out all the small colorful reef fish living happily in the same tank with the puffer. I think it could be doable, but would require a VERY large tank to do so, talking 1000G minimum to start with as long as they don't nip at corals on purpose. The stars and stripes puffer I used to have was by far the meanest fish I ever owned. I felt like it would take off a finger if I was dumb enough to let it try.