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Photos: beauty and the beast

Just wanted to share some pics because i'm excited my anubias is blooming, and because puffers are always cool.
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Coming...
20030506-AQ-Anubias flower, Colomesus asellus 1.jpg

... going...
20030506-AQ-Anubias flower, Colomesus asellus 2.jpg

... gone!
20030506-AQ-Anubias flower, Colomesus asellus 3.jpg


Does anybody know if the anubias will set seed underwater?

PS Sorry about the algae - it always shows up better with a flash!
 
Oh wow, great looking puffers man! Are the figure 8 puffers?
 
Thanks!

Nope, not a Figure Eight. I wanted puffers that were completely freshwater, and there aren't very many like that because most need brackish water at some point in their life, at least. These are Colomesus asellus (sp?), AKA "Amazon Puffers". I think they're smaller than Figure Eights.

They're also supposed to be the most peaceful freshwater puffers. At least, they're not territorial. I have 4 (had 6
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) in the tank together. Unfortunately they're not keeping their teeth worn down, and some are having trouble eating. They don't eat the snails like they're supposed to.

So, my "peaceful" puffers completely took out one or two zebra danios, and removed the tail fin completely from another (it grew back, but he sure looked funny for a while). Peaceful like a rabid dog.

They're also psychotic. They'll go nuts on a fairly frequent basis, facing the glass and swimming like crazy. Strange critters, but very fun to watch.

-NL
 
D,

nice puffers.

they won't eat snails huh? have you tried different snails? some have toxins that make fish know they are not tasty.

I suggest the malasian trumpet snail, not only a good little live bearer that won't over run your tank, but they like black algae, a plauge that you look to be suffering from (I have too, once you have it, it's nearly impossible to get rid of unfortunately.) oh, as far as I know, puffers prefer round snails to horn type snails (both fortunate and unfortunate, most round snails are plauges in the planted aquarium, and the horned snails you should put in there for your plants they may not eat.

Anyhow, Puffers like to put the whole snail in their mouth before crushing it. Are the snails to big for them? maybe if you got a smaller group of snails?

I would advise putting together a little tank with some round snails, a little filtration and an airstone, and then throwing in something like a little piece of cooked shrimp for the snails to eat.

When you start seeing little snails that seem about right for feeding, take a couple out and feed them to your puffers... be careful to make sure they eat them, the last thing you want of course is a bunch of snails ripping though your pretty plants!

I don't think your anubis will set seed underwater, if I remember right, in nature anubis is a shore plan, existing both above and below water, meaning it probably get's it's flower above the water.

You might also want to get a siamese algae eater (not a chinese) but a siamese, they like black algae and black hair algae as well! awesome little fish.
 
Oh, just so you don't mix them up:
Siamese algae eater:
FalseSAEBst.jpg

Chinese algae eater:
Gyrinocheilus_aymon_2.small.jpg

Don't get the cinese algae eater, they can be little devils, I used to have one, it grew to 4 1/2 inches long, sometimes it was nice to other fish, sometimes it was a terror.
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-Spec
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Thanks guys, i actually have two SAEs, and they're getting fat, but that's because they eat the flake and are too lazy to eat the algae.
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I think your SAE pic looks a bit iffy, Spec. True SAEs have the black line continue into the tail fin, and it doesn't look to me like that one does.

Algae eater look-alikes from the Krib

RamPuppy, i thought that the Malaysians were trumpet-shaped. I don't understand what you mean when you say they'd be good for the puffers but then that the puffers don't like trumpet snails.

I have ordinary brown "football" pond snails. Our puffer we had years ago cleaned out our pond snails. I didn't realize that they typically like to put them in their mouth completely before crushing them - that's good to know. I'll try to get some smaller ones in the tank for them.
 
i love puffers!!! and you all would be surprised at how many species are truely freshwater! there are lots!! ive had quite a few different species. right now i have 2 target puffers (tetraodon leiurus) they are mean a heck!! wow!! very shy as well. very nice amazon puffers by the way!
 
good for your puffers in that if they ate them, so much the better, because they are small they would be nice morsels, but then there is the problem of their shape... it's like turning up a nice apple pie because someone stirred it up or something...

I agree on the Siamese Algae Eater, they do have a bar that goes all the way through the tail and this is typically a way to identify posers and what not...

I would honestly say, if your introducing flake food into the system, you might be defeating the purpose, are your puffers eating this? if so, they may not be hungry enough to go after the snails. if you don't provide them good nutritious food, they will take after the snails, and the algae eaters will start doing their job. try feeding less. black algae is a sigh of a nutrient load any way.
 
Hi Spec and D,

The photo you found of the SAE was mislabeled. That little guy is called an Indian Algae Eater and he doesn't eat algae
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. They come in as SAE's but they're one of the fakes.
The following guys are very good algae eaters:

1. Ameca splendens -- a goodied. They eat it ALL and then try the plants. You could use a couple to clear everything up and then take them out of the tank. They are weird little fish.

2. Pit Bull Pleco -- LDA 25 (I think). These little guys are amazing! They bury in the gravel when chased. They eat all algae like crazy. They're just hard to find in the stores.

3. Black Ruby Barbs -- these can be good if a bit hungry. Not dependable, but if they work they are pretty!

This will worry Spec
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, but large, frequent water changes
are great for algae control as they help get rid of all the organic build up, plus make sure the light is staying at 12 hours a day. The more floating plants you have, the less nutrients stay in solution as the floaters are heavy eaters so less algae.

Bobby
 
  • #10
RamPuppy, again i agree with you, the problem is the puffers aren't alone in the tank.  There are quite a few other critters in there that need to be fed, and the puffers eat the food intended for the others.

The Krib thread here is about some other residents of the very same tank (with the black algae problem - i hadn't noticed how bad it was until looking through these pictures.

I'm going to reduce the flake and see if the algae eaters and others will actually eat the algae.

Anyone who wants to read a bit more about these puffers and see some videos of their crazy antics can check them out on my webpage Inquisitive.org. It's currently out of date, but has some great stuff on the puffers.
 
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