Okay thank god, I didnt realize there was a smaller subspecies until I got him home, would have been pretty upset if he only got 3”
As mentioned, most of the time when people get these guys and they refuse to grow chances are they were being kept in conditions way to small for the fish for extended periods of time...
I find this happens mostly at stores with lower turnover (especially where i live), coz they can have upwards of 25-50, 1” puffers in approx 15-20G till they all sell out...
In some cases i’ve seen the un-wanted ones sitting in those same tanks for up to 5 months and barely reaching approx 3” in length when they should be at least 6”+...
All too often these fish can end up sitting around, thats why when possible i special order puffers to try and make sure they are as healthy as possible coz LFS’ here dont particularly take good care of their stock imo unless its worth a ton of money and even then its min spec for sure...