Blue Dot Puffer

[afriars]

Hello
I have had a small blue dot puffer in a 55 gallon fowlr tank with 1 false clown and a 3 stripe damsel.
I do weekly 10% water changes

I have had him for a couple of months and he seems to be doing well.
I currently feed frozen mysis shrimp and usually drop in a scallop once a week.

I know they need shelled foods to wear their teeth down and that is my questions.

What should I be giving him for his teeth
He has gone after the Astrial snails in my tank but is too small to hurt the shells.
Would Ghost Shrimp or those small fresh water snails you get on plants be good?
I was thinking of maybe just buying a bag of frozen uncooked shrimp with the shell still on.

Thanks
Andrew

[nay,kid]

try krill, but not all the time theres speculation it can cause lockjaw if its the only thing you feed. A woman in our club uses a dremel to file down her puffers teeth. Dont try this at home though she's an expert.

[CarmieJo]

Hi Andrew and to TR.

I have never kept a puffer but with them like all fish I think that variety in their diet is important. There is a lot of discussion about if it is good to feed freshwater food to saltwater fish.

[puffyluv]

To tell the truth, I have never had to put anything special in to wear down the teeth of my saltwater puffers - but that may be because of some things I am doing anyway.

For one, I always use some type of tough shelled shrimp when they get big enough. A young dwarf puffer may only be able to handle mysis, but when he is maybe two and a half inches they can begin taking down half a piece of krill, usually! Shrimp from the grocery store are okay, but usually WAY too big - the smaller 'popcorn" kind usually don't have shells.........Especially the blue spot will be food aggressive and every other way to be aggressive, too - VERY aggressive for a dwarf, I have one at the store almost full grown I am haing trouble GIVING away!

Anyway, cute litle fish, though. Also, with the liverock, seems to me they are always trying to rasp something off of it, some little stomatella or somethin', so I bet they're wearing them down that way, too.

You know me, Carmie, I always keep my puffers in my reefs, so there is plenty of little snails and stuff coming in on the corals for them to chew on.

Guess you can always buy some stomatella off someone who is breeding them - but I think that is probably really unnessasary............worst case scenario if they ever got too long they can be put to sleep and filed.....but I don't think it will ever get to that if you get him on a shelled shimp part time and have liverock -

Kudos to you for a varied diet! Also give him clam meat and fish flesh, he will like that, too!

[CarmieJo]

Hi Grace! to TR!

[lReef lKeeper]

oh great !! another North Carolinian !!

welcome aboard Grace.