# Puffer Fish



## Parallaxus (Apr 21, 2014)

Greetings,
I'm new to Puffer Fish, but have a background in keeping Mbuna Cichlids.

I have a new cylced 65 gal (3 foot) tank ready for some Puffers.
I'm having a difficult time figuring out what type of Puffer to go with.
Green Spotted? Figure Eight? or other?

I'd like to have 3 or 4 of them in my tank, and it would be really nice if I could get some other fish in there as well.
I'm cool with going Brackish or Freshwater.

From my research it seems that 'Figure 8 Puffer fish' are the best selection for my needs.

Thoughts/ideas?


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## Wiccandove (May 19, 2012)

I have some experience with dwarf puffers - Indian Dwarf puffers and Red-eye puffers. In general puffers are not community fish, most of them don't even like each others company. Amazon puffers aka South American Puffers are an exception to this rule.

Figure 8's are brackish, as are Green Spotted puffers. In general tank mates with puffer fish would not be recommended. There are always people who claim they have community fish with their puffers and have had no problems, however it's a gamble and I highly suggest you do a species only tank.

Feeding is important with puffers - live snails are a must as well as other shelled creatures (shrimps) because puffers teeth always grow and need to be kept in check. Larger puffer species may even need teeth trims. The dwarf species do not need teeth trims because they suck the snail out of the shell instead of biting through it.

In addition they will need frozen or live food such as blood worms, blackworms and mysis shrimp - puffers do not eat pellets or flake. My red-eye has learned to eat freeze dried blackworms but it took me months to do it.

Puffers are also considered scaleless fish so keep that in mind if you ever have to treat your tank with anything, they can be very sensitive.


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## Parallaxus (Apr 21, 2014)

Hi Wiccandove,
Thanks so much for taking the time to help educate me on Puffer Fish.
It's definitely going to be a big departure from the Mbuna I'm used to caring for, but I think I'm up for the challenge.

But first, more research!

Cheers


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