I went to a friends house for lunch today and noticed they had gotten a fish tank. Its about 2-3 gallons and its one of the "cutesy" kits you can get from a fish store. She has a dwarf puffer in the tank and has had it in there by itself for about 2 months. When looking at it I noticed it seems almost skinny and has a sort of shrunken in back half of the main body. What do think is causing this? She said she feeds it flake food and that it eats it. Is it because they need other foods such as snails or brine shrimp? She doesn't have a test kit so I couldn't look at the parimeters but she says she does about 30-40% water changes every week. What do you guys think? I told her I would look into it for her.
Dwarf Puffer Fish, "sunkin in belly"
- Thread starter SWerner13
- Start date
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FishCrazyBenBOMB
Aquarium Advice Addict
I would say it's the feeding for sure. Most people don't even feed dwarf puffers flake foods. They are predators and need their meaty foods. Tell them to start feed the puffer things like blood worms, live snails, and other meaty foods.
FishCrazyBenBOMB
Aquarium Advice Addict
There are tons of people that sell snails online from their planted aquariums. the snails get out of control so they remove them and sell them. They are perfect sizes for dwarf puffers.
When I thought about getting one I did a lot of research and found this Puffer dentistry [Archive] - Practical Fishkeeping Forum
Hmm I'll have to give it another look before I suggest anything like that. As far as I know the puffer only eats flake food so it may just need a bit of protein in its diet. I'll keep ya'll updated after I offer it a snail or two.
