I'm looking to stock my new 55g, and I'm really interested in puffers, the thing is there seems to be little species information on puffers stickied in this section. What I'm wondering is: what kind of water params does a puffer need, what do you feed a puffer, and would it be compatible with say a dempsey and pleco?
General Puffer Q's
- Thread starter Kengel
- Start date
Puffers need to have good water parameters - ammonia-0 nitrte-0, etc... they are compatible with a dempesy and a pleco... google fw puffers, and you'll find many cool puffers. One of my all time favourites is the green spotted puffer, but it needs to eventually go to brackish, then if you want, full marine...
http://www.**************.com/forum/ug.php/v/PufferPedia/
http://www.**************.com/forum/library/
http://www.**************.com/forum/library/
Thanks for the info, the website says these puffers need 120-1000 gallon tanks, for a fish that's about a foot long, that seems ridiculous, do they have any habits that warrant these size tanks?
massive bioloads, very messy eaters and you need pretty much the largest water volume to dilute the waste they put off. they are sensitive to high nitrate/nitrite levels so the more water volume the better. they get bored very easily and need areas to investigate. there are puffers you can get that dont need huge tanks like that. could do some dwarf puffers with some other schooling fast freshwater fish. gotta search the puffer pedia and find something that catches your attention for your tank size
Well I was looking or some that get larger than 2 inches..it seemed all I could find were puffers that needed 100+ gallon tanks, but I think the congo puffer may be a winner...do you need a sand substrate for them?
^ Sand substrate would be recommended for sure... since they do like to bury themselves and ambush prey that way... if possible try and make sure its a fine substrate as well so its easier on the puffer...
hopefully you get an active congo that will utilize the whole tank, because just a congo in a 55 will be like a neon tetra alone in a heavily 110 lol, barely be able to find it. they like to bury themselves so get a fine grade sand. it is awesome to watch them bury themselves, they lay parallel with the substrate then back up horizontally so their nose is right at the substrate then wave their tails extremely fast and all you see is a little cloud of sand for a second while it settles then you see some eyes and part of its mouth
they do prefer to bury themselves, so you'll need about a 3" sandbed. This means you'll have to hand-stir the entire thing weekly, to prevent anerobic (toxic) pockets of air forming in the bed. A chopstick works well. This means under ALL decor too.