Dwarf Puffer Update

Posted by Sarah on March 19, 2008

Unfortunately, we don’t have dwarf puffers any more.

Shortly after we got our puffers they started wasting away, and there was nothing we could do to save them.

I believe that they had parasites when we got them. Although they had plump bellies and were very active at the store they quickly stopped eating and died.

All of our test results were normal during this time, and we’d seeded the aquarium with a used filter from a healthy tank, so I don’t think that the water quality caused the problems that we had.

Although we tried to treat the parasites with Gel Tek Ultra Cure PX (See picture and link at the end of the post) it’s a little hard to convince puffers to eat gel drops, especially when they aren’t eating anything else.

We did discover that even one one of the puffers wouldn’t eat anything else, he would eat krill, so if you have puffers who aren’t eating, it’s good to try a variety of different foods.

It was heartbreaking to see the little puffers wasting away and not being able to do anything.

I never want to go through that again.

Although we got our dwarf puffers from a pet store that was about an hour away from us, I was uncomfortable getting more from them, and I was also uncomfortable ordering dwarf puffers from our local fish store.

From now on when I get a puffer I want to be able to see him first, and make sure that he (or she) is eating properly.

A few days after we got our dwarf puffers we visited a local store which had Figure 8 puffers in.

By the time our puffers were gone, we knew that these puffers had been in the store for several weeks, and we knew that they were eating well – ours even eats Shrimp Pellets, although we do feed him live baby brine shrimp (which he doesn’t seem to excited about), frozen and thawed brine shrimp, frozen and thawed bloodworms, freeze dried krill, and the occasional snail.

The Figure 8 puffer also fit into our 14 gallon puffer tank (although if reports that Figure 8 puffers can really get to be 6 inches, instead of the usually mentioned 3 inches, we’ll be upgrading that soon) and hasn’t been noted to be aggressive to Bumblebee gobies, which are currently in the tank.

We have had our Figure 8 puffer, named 8 ball, for a little over a month, and he is still doing well, eating everything that comes his wayexcept for the Baby Brine Shrimp, which the Bumblebee Gobies love, and leaving the Bumblebee Gobies alone.

Although we started out with 2 ghost shrimp in that tank, both of them have died – I’m not certain if it their deaths were a result of the puffers picking on them or not, but I believe that it was.

Although I was really happy with our Dwarf Puffers when we first got them, I do wish that I had waited a while to determine their health before we got them, or that we had found someone else who had bought dwarf puffers from the same store so we could learn about their experiences.

I’m sure that that would have saved us a lot of heartbreak in the long run.

Ghost Shrimp

Posted by Sarah on January 15, 2008

I wrote yesterday that I was concerned about the dwarf puffers not eating.

Fortunately, it’s a little easier to tell when the ghost shrimp have eaten – their “guts” turn the color of the food they’ve eaten.

I find the shrimp interesting.

I think they’re neat, but I wouldn’t let my husband get any for a while because they grossed me out.

I finally decided it was time, and since some dwarf puffers eat shrimp, we decided to go for the relatively cheap ghost shrimp.

So far they seem to be doing good, and it’s nice that I can tell that they’ve eaten.

All I need is to have to worry about more shrimp that haven’t eaten in my aquarium.

Dwarf Puffers

Posted by Sarah on January 14, 2008

We got three dwarf puffers and two ghost shrimp last Tuesday.

They seem to be pretty happy in their 14 gallon aquarium so far, although we still haven’t seen the puffers eat too much.

The people at the store where we bought them only gave us 3 snails for them, and they were too big for the puffers to eat.

At least one of those snails is still crawling around in the tank, and we’ve gotten a few more much smaller snails, so hopefully the puffers are finding and eating them.

We’re also feeding them frozen bloodworms, and we’ve seen two of them take a few bites.

We’ve also seen them picking at the gravel and at the filter in the tank, so I’m sure they are finding something to eat.

So far we haven’t seen any sunken bellies, or signs that they are too hungry, and I’ve heard that they can go a week or so without eating when you first get them, so I’m a little worried, but not overly worried yet.

These guys are really small – it’s one thing to see that they only get to be an inch or an inch and a half on paper – it’s another thing completely to see one of them curled up on the leaf of a fake plant in their aquarium.

They’re so tiny, and so cute.

So far we haven’t had any squabbling, although one dwarf puffer who does appear to be a male has been seen chasing the other two away from him.

He only chases them a couple of inches though, and I haven’t seen them nip at each other.