Green Spotted Puffer Fish help???

[StarryEyedTiGeR]

Hey everyone!
I recently got a gorgeous little green spotted puffer fish and need a little advice! Gizmo was origionally in freshwater at the petstore, but from what I understand I need to convert him slowly to brackish water. I have the salt and the aquarium hydrometer...what should my aim be as far as converting the water each week??

Also one more question! I feed Gizmo frozen blood worms and I also researched that they need to eat snails 2x a week to keep their beak trimmed down. What kind of snails??? I know they need to be the size of his eye...but so far the snails I've given him he won't eat...he plays with them tosses them around the tank, but doesn't eat them. When I went to the pet store and asked about the snails, the sales clerk gave me a few out of one of the tanks...so I took them home to start a small snail colony for Gizmo in a smaller tank. (Feeding them tiny bits of algae wafers & plants). These snails are kind of small but cone shaped...they're definitely bigger than Gizmo's eye....are these the wrong types of snails to be giving him???? If so, what should I ask for?

 

[DragonFish71]

Get the specific gravity of the water about 1.005. Mix the salt, reef salt works best, in a bucket with some tank water. Add it every few days until you have reached the desired specific gravity. Regular pond snails, the kind that come in hitch-hiking to plants works well, those spiral ones are fine. He will eventually start cracking them, which helps keep his beak from growing to big. You can also try ghost shrimp.

 

[StarryEyedTiGeR]

Get the specific gravity of the water about 1.005. Mix the salt, reef salt works best, in a bucket with some tank water. Add it every few days until you have reached the desired specific gravity. Regular pond snails, the kind that come in hitch-hiking to plants works well, those spiral ones are fine. He will eventually start cracking them, which helps keep his beak from growing to big. You can also try ghost shrimp.

Thankyou! I will be working on the water to get it to that setting!

Is it ok to put the pond snails in the same tank with the spiral ones I have now? Can I put the ghost shrimp in there too? It's a small little tank I started specifically for snails/etc to feed gizmo with!

 

[mfdrookie516]

yeah, i have a tank with nothing but snails and shrimp in it

 

[gzeiger]

The pond snails typically reproduce faster than the spiral shell varieties, although I'm generalizing since there are hundreds of species of each. If you want to culture them intensively enough to have one tank supply your puffer, you'll need to set them up with snails in mind. A bright light to grow algae, set on a timer for 16-18 hours a day, is ideal. This provides a more reliable food supply for a larger population of snails and is a lot less work for you than feeding algae wafers daily. You'll want to provide some sort of calcium supplement for their shells. This can consist of broken eggshells, crushed coral, oyster shell or sea shells. You'll also want to provide some kind of protein. The algae wafers you've been feeding are fine, but flake fish food or dry dog or cat food will work just fine too. The light doesn't need to be a fancy aquarium fixture. Any desk lamp will work if the tank is shallow, if you make sure the bulb is an appropriate plant-grow bulb.

Ghost shrimp will not reproduce in an aquarium in any meaningful numbers. There is one commonly traded species that will hatch eggs in fresh water, but for all species the larvae are small vulnerable filter feeders that are weak swimmers and usually get killed by the filter. They will coexist fine with snails if you want to buy a bunch of feeders and keep some for later, but they're terribly expensive as feeders.

 

[mfdrookie516]

The light doesn't need to be a fancy aquarium fixture. Any desk lamp will work if the tank is shallow, if you make sure the bulb is an appropriate plant-grow bulb.

or even setting a tank in a window that gets alot of light would work... my 150 gets one little spot of algae in one corner where the blind doesnt cover the window its in front of.. just a cheap thought

 

[StarryEyedTiGeR]

The pond snails typically reproduce faster than the spiral shell varieties, although I'm generalizing since there are hundreds of species of each. If you want to culture them intensively enough to have one tank supply your puffer, you'll need to set them up with snails in mind. A bright light to grow algae, set on a timer for 16-18 hours a day, is ideal. This provides a more reliable food supply for a larger population of snails and is a lot less work for you than feeding algae wafers daily. You'll want to provide some sort of calcium supplement for their shells. This can consist of broken eggshells, crushed coral, oyster shell or sea shells. You'll also want to provide some kind of protein. The algae wafers you've been feeding are fine, but flake fish food or dry dog or cat food will work just fine too. The light doesn't need to be a fancy aquarium fixture. Any desk lamp will work if the tank is shallow, if you make sure the bulb is an appropriate plant-grow bulb.

Ghost shrimp will not reproduce in an aquarium in any meaningful numbers. There is one commonly traded species that will hatch eggs in fresh water, but for all species the larvae are small vulnerable filter feeders that are weak swimmers and usually get killed by the filter. They will coexist fine with snails if you want to buy a bunch of feeders and keep some for later, but they're terribly expensive as feeders.

Thankyou so much; that information is very helpful! / I cook constantly, so it won't be an issue to add some broken eggshell pieces to the snail tank! I also have cat & dog food as well as fish flakes if I need to vary their diet??

As far as the ghost shrimp go, I might just do those as an occassional treat for Gizmo since you're saying they're hard to reproduce in large numbers.

or even setting a tank in a window that gets alot of light would work... my 150 gets one little spot of algae in one corner where the blind doesnt cover the window its in front of.. just a cheap thought

I get good sunlight where I live at! I can certainly try placing them near a window. I've also got a small desk light if I need to use that. Should I put substrate on the bottom of the mini tank? Right now I don't have any in there (only substrate I have currently is black, and it makes the snails hard to see.)

Also...a bit of a morbid question, but how can I tell if a snail has died?

 

[mfdrookie516]

Also...a bit of a morbid question, but how can I tell if a snail has died?

it quits moving... lol. sounds like a smart remark, but its the only way i know of other than the hairy fungus/mold stuff that grows on them when they die. Ive got about 4,596,534,345,433 malaysian trumpet snails (just an overly ambitious estimate) in my 10g and ill see one occasionally laying on the sand with the ball of mold/fungus growing from it. The bigger snails like my yellow mystery snails, i found one dead today, only reason i knew is that it had been in the same spot for about 4 days now. As for the substrate, if you get mts, you needs something they can burrow in like pfs, if not, gravel would be fine... pfs is the best all around substrate imo especially if you go with shrimp too

 

[gzeiger]

I don't think a substrate is strictly necessary. I haven't kept trumpet snails, and maybe it is for them, but pond snails will be quite happy on bare glass. I raise my snails in fry tanks that get overfed and where I try to encourage the algae anyway. The only substrate is a thin layer of crushed oystershell, since both snails and young fish need the harder water.

Varying their diet is more for the benefit of your fish than the snails - they're adapted to eat whatever algae is in season. 90% of the point of feeding at all, besides raising population density, is to provide nutrients to encourage algae growth in the tank. However, the snails will contain whatever you've been feeding, so if you think your fish needs some vitamins...

You should be able to get a supply of pond snails to start the project from any pond. They haven't frozen over yet in TN have they? If so, I'm sure you can find them in a pet store too.

Snails can be an intermediate host for some fish parasites, and also leeches. Both will die off on their own if quarantined for a week or two, so initially it would be a good idea to keep them in their own fish-free tank. This isn't a huge risk, and I feed wild-caught snails all the time, but if you can avoid it it would be better.

 

[DragonFish71]

The ghost shrimp that you can buy as feeders will live in brackish water. We have about 2 dozen now living in the 80. Another good thing about the shrimp is they make a great clean up crew. If your puffer doesn't eat all the snails the shrimp (at least our's do) will eat them. They don't care if they're dead or not. We've watched ours tear the snails out of their shells piece by piece.

You can also let some of the snails populate the puffers tank. That's your choice. I keep regular pond snails in our brackish tank.(yep they live just fine in it) Our bumblebee gobys actually eat the small ones. But the point I was getting at is if that's an easier option, use reef salt with calcium. It will help the shrimp and the snails.

 

[StarryEyedTiGeR]

Such great information! Thankyou again everyone for your help!

I have another question today! I was recently told by my LFS that I could include little pieces of plain baked chicken in my GSP's diet. Since I made some in my crock pot today I decided to give it a try and see what Gizmo would do. When I put a little pinch on reptile tongs and put it in the tank, he went nuts!! He loved the baked chicken and ate the entire thing.

Is this safe to give him on a regular or occassional basis?

 

[mfdrookie516]

personally, i would be afraid to for the same reason youre not supposed to give dogs human food... preservatives... if it was a plain ole chicken that you went out in the back yard and caught, i wouldnt worry, if you bought it, id be afraid to.. just my opinion though

 

[gzeiger]

I wouldn't worry about it being unsafe, but plain muscle tissue isn't very good nutrition for him. It has protein and really not much else. If you want to give him cheap meat, liver and heart should be available at the grocery store and will be much better for him.