Denizens
of the Lair 
Puffer Fish Lair
About My Puffers
I have too many tanks, a big pile stacked up ready to be put into use. I have farmed out and consolidated my tanks as my time available for maintenance has become limited. I went from 17 tanks running to 12. I also have reptiles & amphibians, so it becomes a lot of work quickly. At some point in the future, perhaps I will be able to set up all the tank with all the species I would like to keep. It may be when I retire....
ALL PHOTOGRAPHS ARE PROPRIETARY, AND MY PERMISSION MUST BE ASKED IF YOU WISH TO USE THEM.
Currently, I have six puffers. They are described as follows:
Ogre is a Fahaka Puffer, Tetraodon lineatus. He is a magnificent specimen of true Fahaka personality. He is currently in a 50 gallon breeder glass tank, plenty of grow up space. I got him in December 2000, and he was a total length of 1.5". 3 months later, he had doubled his total length, and tripled his body mass. Now, in February 2002 he is a sturdy 6" total length, and about 2" diameter! He is very interactive, and allows me to pet his head and cradle him in my hand when feeding. He can eat copious amounts of krill, and hunts the ghost shrimp down with a vengeance. He eats snails, beetles (my mealworms grew up!), and earthworms. He cuts a wake when he swims back and forth at the top of the tank. He is now too big to bother with brine shrimp or bloodworms. He has the yellow and burgundy colouration, but sometimes flashes his colours to a dark black on yellow. His eyes are amber, with blue iridescence in the centers. When he canıt find a ghost shrimp he knows is in the tank, he gets angry, and swims back and forth, biting the driftwood, the plastic plants, and any stray bubble from the filter. He has some Java moss in the tank, which I am testing with the brackish to see if I can keep it alive, so far, so good after about a year. The salinity is 1.005 in this tank. There has been a lot of differing opinions about the salinity for this puff. Originating from the Nile river system in Egypt, I felt that the brackish was best for now. As an estuary fish, the salinity tolerance is present, especially since the Nile floods from the Delta pretty regularly. I have not seen any records of this puffer being found in the Mediterranean, however, so I believe that a light brackish is the safest way to go. He will grow up to a full 12” standard length, with a caudal (tail) fin of anywhere from 4 to 5 inches. He will need a much larger tank soon, a corner tank with the rounded front is the plan, the largest one available is 92 gallons. But it has a nice deep turning radius so that beautiful tail fin wonıt get beat up. It is possible that I may go ahead with a long tank of 150 or so gallons, but that will depend on my living situation at that time. (and space available!) Back to Top
Sniz is a Tetraodon leiurus brevirostre, common names are Target, sometimes called a red-eye. Sniz is not the white and yellow colour phase, she is green and brown, and can change to yellow and tan colouration. Her target spots are an iridescent blue-green with a red center. She has the short nose associated with the brevirostre variation. I believe this puffer to be female, after having several different individuals, she has some of the characteristics I would associate with the female gender. But I may never know for sure. She lives in a 30 gallon tank with some of the only plants I have been able to keep alive. Apongeton, a Lily variation, and Riccia. She is the only survivor of a group of 4 I bought in the hopes of a successful breeding situation. The others died due to what I believe was massive parasitic infestation. She is currently in fresh water conditions.
I did consider breeding this species, but this is risky. I have seen reports of several living peacefully together, but they were raised together since they were babies. I have also seen reports of two in one tank killing or maiming each other. So I have a back up tank available. There has been success in tank breeding this species, several members of the Pufferfish List have had eggs hatch into fry, but neither has had successful survival of fry so far. Back to Top
Green Spotted, Tetraodon nigroviridis:
I did not get to know my first GS well. He also died shortly after my vacation. I acquired a large full grown adult in August 2002, who lives in full SW. He is wonderful, leaping to get food, even if I don't have any. Energetic and aggressive, he will likely be the sole inhabitant of the tank. King of all he surveys, fat and happy, this is how I want him to live out his years. Back to Top
Mr. Scary. My second attempt at this species. I did a preventative dosing of acriflavine upon arrival home. I was not about to go through the same thing as my first with the velvet. He has survived a nasty velvet case that came from the LFS and eats heartily now. Back to Top
Mr. Puff: Canthigaster solandri, Sharpnosed Puffer:
He is a salt water sharpnosed puffer. He lives in a reef tank with soft corals, and a Pixie Hawkfish. Other roommates are a bristle starfish and 2 porcelain crabs from the Sea of Cortez, and the ever necessary turbo snails. He is such a character, and bravely competes for food with the hawkfish. Most times he is successful. This particular individual has not picked on the star polyp coral, but has bothered the leather coral and the one stony coral we have. He does blow the sand looking for small creatures to eat. Typically eats any shrimp item, and loves krill. Occasionally will take scraps of raw fish. Back to Top
Diodon holocanthus, Porcupine Puffer:
He is a salt water puffer, we just could not walk away from him. He will need a huge tank. Currently housed with an eel Gymnothorax moringa, he is no longer the top fish in the tank. It was touch and go at first, the eels gets very excited at feeding time and bit the porc several times. The Porc inflated and the eel got a mouthful of spines. Now they have a healthy respect for each other, but this situation may not work out as well as planned. Note the orange colouration, spots, and the soft spines, identification points for his species. Back to Top
Figure 8:
Fatty, was very inquisitive and sociable. He was always up at the front of the tank doing the glass boogie. Up & down, up & down. He used to pop out of the water halfway to grab food from my fingers.
Tweedle-Dum, was the other half of Tweedle-Dee. He was the type with the squiggles instead of perfect 8's. He was killed by the other Figure 8's, a preventable tragedy for which I cannot forgive myself. No matter what we humans think, there is always the possibility for violence between puffs. My observations and suggestions to keep each puffer alone comes not only from other people, but my own tragic mistakes. These 4 puffers lived in so called harmony for 2 years, and yet suddenly killed.
Red October had the perfect 8 on his back. He was one of the first puffers I ever got. He was shy and startled easily.
Tweedle-Dee had the squiggly lines instead of perfect 8's. He remained much smaller than the other Fig. 8's with the perfect markings.
They loved to chase ghost shrimp and brine shrimp. The ghost shrimp flew all over the tank, with all the puffers on their tail. Quite a bit of excitement at feeding time. These puffers were grumpy in the morning when the light came on. They would look at me, and without raising more than a quarter inch off the bottom of the tank, they would turn & swim back behind the rocks into the dark. Back to Top
Bronze Puff, Chonerhinos modestus:
DıAnjou, one of the original pair I bought, died while I was on vacation. I will never know if he was sick, or just got eaten by Bartlett. Another sore lesson learned. But, he also was always smaller, skinnier, and never quite filled out. Could have had a problem, or may have just not been able to compete for food against the stronger Bartlett.
Bartlett became his name since he looked like a little pear. I am learning about these puffs as I go, there is not a lot of information about them and they have only recently been commonly available in my area for sale. I bought him in February 2001, and he was only 1/2" total length. Very tiny babies, they apparently grow to about 4”. He stared out only able to eat bloodworms and brine shrimp, due to how small he was. In one month, the he grew 1/4”, a much faster growth spurt than the Figure 8ıs and the SAıs. He was very predatory, sometimes I wonder if they are pirhanas in puffıs clothing. Their compressed body shape leads me to believe that they hunt fish mostly in the wild. Bartlett suddenly and inexplicably died.
My two baby Bronzes, Haas & Pinkerton, did not make it. The LFS had them in a community tank that was heavily medicated. Both were fairly heavily infested with ich, and my thoughts were that they died from damage to the gills.
I thought at first that these fish were Xenopterus naritus, but found out later that they were indeed the Chonerhinos modestus species. Back to Top
South American Puffs, Colomesus asellus:
Iggy & Ozzy. Iggy was skinny and frenetic. Ozzy was fat and more mellow. They had the clear stripes on their backs, olive green and black. Their little snouts were almost like little pig noses. They swam all the time, rarely resting. They seem to grow very slowly, after 4 months they had perhaps grown 1/4". When I first got them, Iggy would not eat much. He was knife thin, and I feared the worst for him, that I would lose him like the dwarf puff that never plumped out. I tried an internal worms medication with piperzine, soaking the food in it for 3 days. Then I fed them twice a day, bloodworms in the morning, and krill at night. Iggy seemed to get better, and when he ate, his belly bulged evenly, instead of a narrow section down the center of the belly. These little fellows were in light brackish, 1.004 salinity. These puffs were very jumpy at first, leaping out of the water at my approach to the tank. They began to crowd the glass when I went near the tank. They used to take food from my fingers, and liked to grab the pipette I use to dispense the bloodworms, and take an entire mouthful of them at once. They looked like they have an entire order of french fries in their mouths at once!
Iggy died recently, I believe he had some type of parasite in the stomach, he wasted away despite my best efforts. Ozzy followed with over long teeth, he never quite recovered after the clipping process. Back to Top
Dwarf Puffers, Carinotetraodon travancorius and C. imitator:
I had 7 of them, I intended to try to breed. All died very quickly. I got them from a LFS that had pretty poor conditions, and they wasted away. This was also the case with my first Dwarf puff, Spike. It seems that frequently this species has problems with internal parasites. The Discomed was unsuccessful.
A new set of four, 3 females and one male were also tough. I believe this set to be C. imitator, not C. travancorius. They also succumbed to whatever causes the wasting away. I do not believe I will get any more of this species. I can't take the frustration and sorrow of losing any more. Back to Top
Target, Tetraodon leiurus brevirostre:
Bela became constipated and died suddenly. He was one of my favourite puffers. Bela seemed an appropriate name, as one of the older names for this species is T. fangi, though it is no longer used, it describes his voracious hunger and vicious attack mode! Also, bella as "pretty" is a nice play on words as well.
Bela was about 5", and he had a 30 gallon long tank all to himself which was brackish. He had slate caves and plastic plants. He used to have a tank mate, a T. suvattii. But the T. suvattii died from a massive infestation. (One of the hazards of wild fish). We had a rough beginning, what with the other puffer dying, and Bela getting a nasty wound one day from the slate rocks. I treated the wound with Wound Control, such an adventure to catch him twice a day, put him in a container, handle him with gloves while squirting medicine... Then, after the other puffer died, I had to treat the whole tank to make sure he also did not die. I was sure I would lose him every day.
We also had problems with eating. As a wild caught puffer, and not a juvenile, he was not very interested in anything that was not alive. I had to feed ghost shrimp for a long time until he got used to the idea that I brought the food to the tank. He became fixated on clear food though. Then I started placing a thawed cockle or krill on top of one of the slate top of a cave, always in the same place. He got the idea & started eating whatever I placed there. However, it became obvious that there were foods he did not like as much as others. After learning the routine, he attacked the net with the ghost shrimp before it got all the way into the tank. He got very excited whenever I went into the kitchen, he hovered in one place, all his fins going crazy, wagging his head side to side. Occasionally he leapt out of the water, making a big noise and splash. His tank was also completely covered as a result of this behaviour. His tank was on top of a bar that separated my living room from the kitchen at my old apartment. He used to follow me inside the tank as I walked from one room to the other. If I was in the living room on the couch, he could not see me. But if I raised my arm, he exploded out from the favourite cave to the top of the tank. Very interactive and smart. He was "tame" in about one month.
Bela's hunting behaviour: Bela was a slow stalker. When he had ghost shrimp loose in the tank (that I have somehow managed to get in there without him grabbing them right away) he would find the shrimp, and then hover almost motionless. As he hovered, he changed colour. If he was over the garnet substrate, he turned very dark green & brown. If he was over the aragonite part of the tank, he turned yellow & tan. He pulled the muscles between his eyes, which brought his eyes to almost binocular vision. I swear these guys are closely related to octopus & cuttlefish! Then he would headstand, nose pointing down at the shrimp. He moved slowly back & forth like a floating plant would, then the strike. Usually this involved a bunch of gravel, sometimes the shrimp is in there, sometimes not. Those shrimp are really fast when they want to be. When the shrimp got away, he would get mad. He would race from one end of the tank to the other - back & forth. If I was nearby, he would look at me and beg to see if I will give him another one. Then he finally settles down and looks for the shrimp again. Noses around the caves, like a hovercraft, slowly and methodically he searches the tank, then sets up again, and strikes again. I don't think I could have kept a faster fish with him, he would not have ate much. It really seems that they need the space to do this hunting routine, which I believe a fast fish would interrupt constantly. Sometimes it seemed like he was lonely, he looks at the fish in the two tanks on either side of him, and follows them, but looking back on it, he was probably stalking them. When I had apple snails in one of those tanks, he kept trying to get the snails, biting on the glass while rotating in circles. Back to Top
Mobius: T. mbu:
(See Species page for his picture! Click here to go there now)
I adopted a Tetraodon mbu April 2001. His Dad could not keep him due to living situations, so I adopted him. He is currently 10" total length. He will need a very large tank. With a grow out of 75 cm (30") in the wild, I can expect to need a 200 gallon tank that is deep and wide. His buddies are three albino bristlenose plecostomus (two are a mated pair!), and a royal pleco. He is adjusting well to his new home, and eating well. When he came home from the airport, I had to lift him out of the bag to prevent the polluted water from getting into my system. He was incredibly soft, and did not thrash or puff, though the calm was probably due to the stress of travel. I still was thrilled to hold him in my hands like that! He blows at the sand looking for snails, and eats krill from my fingers, though I do watch those formidable teeth. I am monitoring the tank daily to prevent a system crash due to his large mass. It is always a good idea to beef up your bioload before introducing a large fish, but even then, watching the tank for the first couple of months is also critical. I am really pleased to have him in my "family" ! The move to our new house was successful, and he is now upstairs in the living area, with a skylight nearby, which he loves. The natural light made a big difference in his disposition, he eats much better now and swims in the tank quite a bit more. He watches TV, especially likes red objects and quick movement on the screen. His tank is near the Fahaka, and they get into staring matches all the time.
The bristlenoses were moved out, the male has developed huge bristles on his nose, and things were getting dicey. The royal was placed in a different tank, I felt the bioload was too heavy for the one tank. Back to Top
T. palembangensis
This fellow was a mystery puffer. I had never seen a picture of a puffer like this. His body shape is like the T. miurus, suvattii, and duboisi. But, he has remarkable patterns like a Persian rug. His colours are maroon, orange and red. His eyes are crimson and are highly light reflective. He has a tendency to hunch his back very high when he is scared (like when I scooped him at the LFS). His nasal tentacles are tubular, and rounded on the ends, and are not divided like the T. miurus & suvattii. I have not been able to view a clear enough photo of the T. duboisi to know what type of nasal tentacles that species possess. The markings are such that they do not follow the typical forms of any of the three species above. Also, his body is more compact and the proportions are very different from the other species. The common name the LFS purchased them under was "Black river puffer" which is typically used with Target puffers (T. leiurus), and this is definitely not a Target! What I had here was a T. palembangensis,which I found out after going to the Steinhart Aquarium's collections room and pored over their specimens and books. This should help clear up all those confusing names given to GS and Figure 8's! See more on the Species page.
Unfortunately he passed away, I believe he had a massive bacterial infection in his gills that prevented him from breathing properly. I hope to see another specimen soon, I would like to study this fish further.
Dave: T. palembangensis
Dave was brought home in August 2002. A large individual, he had some troubles from the start with a massive head injury. Healing well from that, he then was besieged with velvet. The T. suvattii that was in the same tank at the LFS also had ich and velvet, so I am fairly certain the shop was the origin. Back to Top
Ceylon, Tetraodon fluviatilis:
This puffer was sick from the beginning. I probably should not have purchased it, but I had never seen one for sale in my area, and have not since, so it was worth it to try and nurse him back to health. He did not make it past two weeks. I wish I had observations from a healthy specimen, I do not know if the calm and shy behaviour was only due to illness. Back to Top