Well... the Porcupine puffer I was concerned about in the fish 911 thread, has officially made it over 2 weeks, and is still going strong. he's eating from my hand, he's acting normally for a puffer, and his color's look really good. And he gets so excited when he sees me, his tail fin wags so fast its almost like a happy puppy. of course he only does that cause he thinks I'm going to feed him again.... but its still nice to be recognized. lol

So I decided to finally give him a name.

Umi (Which means Ocean in Japanese)

Here's is pictures. (Forgive me for the extra poor quality. This is done on a cheap digital camera. The one I got for my birthday last year is missing. :sook: )





(also in the picture- my Blue Chromis, Cloud. I tried to get my clown Naruto in there... but he wasn't cooperating.)

As you can see, Umi is eating pretty well. (these were taken right after he was fed... thus the distended belly)

He's looking a lot better than he did when the pet store sent him home. he looked on death's door. but now he's doing really well!

He's a cute little bugger, good job on resuscitating him. :)

You should enter a picture in the fish of the month comp.

good looking fish, looks like you are doing a great job taking care of him.:tup:

I've always been curious, how do these go in a community tank? They have freshwater ones at the LFS about the size of a molly.

Took the words from my mouth. That is so cool looking.

In general, Tetradons (puffers) run from "pretty nippy" to "downright vicious". The freshwater and brackish water puffers you find for sale in the hobby typically don't do well in the community setting...Also...if anything larger than them (like a big American Cichlid) decides to eat them, it is "game over" for that predator. Puffers are quite poisonous when eaten.

I think if I was going to get a freshwater puffer it would probably have to be T. mbu from Africa...These guys get HUGE and have a lot of personality. Kinda like swimming dogs...

hi Guys-
He's a beauty! I can't get my pix to load on this site. It keeps saying the files are too big for parameters set. Is there something I can do about this? I'm a compete newbie at this!
Thanks

hmmm. not sure about that... you may need to re-size the pics?

anyway... Yeah all fish have their own personalities... for example... even in the smaller tank when I was circulating the 120g for him, he left my other fish alone...

(There was an accident a few weeks ago... but it wasn't his fault... the other fish swam in front of him as he was lunging for his krill and there was nothing he could do to stop mid lunge.) but in general- he got along with them... and still gets along with the remaining clown.

However, this has never been my experience with puffers normally. Usually they are fairly agressive with other fish, and, yes... very posionous to those fish who get bitten or try to bite them.

It would be like adding an albino tiger stripped oscar to your guppy tank.

there are ultra tiny dwarf puffers that get to be only about an 1 1/2...but...

Let me tell you. For their "I'm cute... look how widdle I am" size... they can be just as aggressive as a porcupine puffer.

You're always taking a crap shoot when you're adding any puffer to any tank that has pre-existing fish. In my case, I had no choice. he was a gift from a well-meaning, although not very wise brother. I just lucked out when it came to his temperment. (minus the one accident. *Sigh*) but that wasn't intentional.

So just keep that in mind. when it comes to puffers- unless you have a huge tank, and/or are an expert in puffer care... your probably best doing a one puffer, and just a puffer kind of tank.


man.... if I had the tank... I'd love a T. mbu. they're adorable.