Sustainable tank for dwarf puffers?

[czcz]

If I get a huge breeding colony of shrimp and snails going in a ten gal, will two or three introduced dwarf puffers just kill everything instead of killing something when hungry? It will be very densely planted with fine leaved plants.

With proper acclimation, any problems with keeping dwarf puffers in very acidic (<6.2 pH, ~2 dKH) water?

Thank you.

 

[workfortheman]

Well, I'm pretty sure the DPs will knock out a population of shrimp or snails in no time. What if you were able to set up a "breeding refugium" of sorts? Like, put a semi-fine mesh over a HOB filter, and make the holes only big enough for babies to get out?

Don't know about the acidic water, but i bet they would adapt. they are hardy!

 

[czcz]

Breeding fuge in an HOB is a great idea -- thanks!

 

[workfortheman]

NP that's been on my mind for a while. Aquaclear comes to mind . . . . i hope you try it!! I dunno if shrimp would work, but i'm sure it could work with snails!

 

[Fluff]

When I had my DP's, they didn't go around and massacre things just for the heck of it. They would peck off the occassional snail and never touched any of the shrimp that I could tell. I had put the shrimp in there for them but the shrimp grew and bred like crazy. The DP's as I understand it, are raised on black worms. This was preferred by mine and they only ate the snails as a last resort. All fish are different of course but that's been my experience.

 

[EMTtony]

DP's love snails. I had a huge overpopulation of snails in my 10 gal, added 1 DP and the problem has never returned. I added 5 shrimp to the tank a month ago and he didn't bother them. So they went into my 20 gal, and my mollies took care of them. With no snails in the tank my DP now feeds off of frozen blood worms, he loves them.

 

[czcz]

Appreciated. I will have to try, and will post results.

 

[TankGirl]

My DPs completely wiped out my snails, MTS included, and they also did not touch the ghost shrimp I put in there - I think they were too big - but cherries or other shrimp that size would not last long at all. I like the fuge idea a lot.