fahaka puffer

[Pufferpunk]

There are about 1% of the Fahakas that do allow tank mates. Even though, everyone needs their own territory & the tank has to be large enough. I happen to have a 12" fahaka that was moved to a 55g (at 5") with 2 with plecos & a soft-shell turtle. Within 2 days, the whole back rim of the turtle's shell was scalloped, so he got his own tank.

He now lives in a 125g with:
12" Goldspot pleco
6" sailfin pleco
10" Yellow-finned chalcius
2 7" Clown loaches
9" Lancer catfish
5" Rainbow shark
6" Redtail shark
5" Bosmani rainbow
7" Frontosa
8" & 9" Elephant noses (18 years old)
12” Black Ghost Knife

Occasionally there is a fin nipped but all in all, he's a wimp & the Goldspot & Frontosa are always kicking him out of his cave. After living with all these guys for years, my stepdaughter needed somewhere for her large parrot cichlid, since she was moving. I watch them for about an hour, went out that evening & within the 5 hours I was gone, it was dead--tail & eyes missing. Moral of this story: You can never really trust a fahaka!

Most killings will happen overnight.

 

[Danger_Chicken]

I've only had a fahaka for 2 months. That whole time he had a 1-1.5" white convict as a tank mate (he had 2 but the first one was breakfast within the first 2 weeks). Last week he finially caught the other one. I found him with big chunks missing. That con was great as a clean up crew....until I had to clean im up.

here's the video but you have to skip most of the video to 5:00 in the video to see him feeding on the crab....or you can just watch the whole 6: something minutes...but its quicker to skip... enjoy lol

http://youtube.com/watch?v=I8-4ce_5618

This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by a third party.

 

[harris777]

My fahaka won't eat. Hes been good eater for about 6 months. He did this one other time for about a week. He has been eating raw shrimp soaked in fishtamine. He eats a snail evey few weeks. Now a week and he is getting skinniny. Has your puffer every did this?

 

[Pufferpunk]

http://www.**************.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=3

 

[Hicks]

If you are only feeding him the shrimp and snails he is probably sick (bored) of the same food all the time. Give him a variety of foods

I feed mine

Frozen:
Shrimp
Clams Mussels
Crab meat

Live:
Fiddler crabs
Crayfish
Snails

 

[heavyhitter]

I had one that I raised to the size of a football. He was not very aggresive but would take "sample" bites out of other fish so he was kept alone.

Any way at that size he took and "exploritory" bite out of my python hose and cut a perfect dime size chunk out of it.