"Dwarf Puffer" question

[Pywakyt]

I just bought my sister a 10g tank she just wants these guys in it. Now I know they have total Nepolian complex. So I wanna know how good or bad of an idea is this and how many would be okay? Also I am giving her 9g of my tank water from my 100g tank to start the cycle how long should the cycle take with my old tank water starting it?

[Bully]

Using tank water to cycle a tank would be ineffective in cycling a tank. If you wished to speed the cycle along you would do better to use a proportion of your mature filter media, not the water If by Dwarf Puffer, you mean Carinotetraodon travancoricus then you could get away with 2-3 females and 1 male in a 10g tank but it should really be heavily planted, and have lots of wood to help break up lines-of-sight. The more complicated the decor, the better stimulated the fish will remain.

Puffers shouldn't really be introduced to newly cycled tanks, they are very sensitive to poor water quality and need mature filters in order to thrive. Over filtering the tank (with reduced flow) is a good option, for example I have a 600lph external filter running on my 60l puffer tank. As they are carnivorous and don't take dry foods they really do need efficient filtration to cope with the waste produced by a protein rich diet of frozen meaty foods and live foods.

All that said, they are fantastic fish to keep and have bags of character!

Some further info here:

http://seriouslyfish.com/profile.php?ge ... cus&id=793

[Diana]

What Bully said! ^

If you start a tank with used tank water and do a fishless cycle it will take about 3 weeks to fully cycle.

If you start with filter media from a healthy, well cycled tank and start a fishless cycle you might find that you added so much filter media that the tank is already fully cycled. A day or two of adding ammonia and you may see that the bacteria remove it very fast, with little or no indication of nitrite.

Maximum bacteria population is on surfaces, not in the water. Filter media, substrate, decorations (in that order).

Also, if you can set up a well planted tank (really good for Puffers as noted above) the plants are part of the bio filter, too.

[ruthcatrin]

I've never had puffers in a NEW tank, so donno anything about that, however I've had dwarf puffers a couple times, and both times found them to be remarkably laid back fish. I was quite suprised. They DID stand up to the bully cichlid, but they DIDN'T bully anyone else either. They did do a wonderfull job on the pond snails though! Can't say that my experiance is normal for these fish, but it is an experience.