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Sa and Ca in peticular. I want to get a large brackish puffer.

the answer is simple NO...... The main reason is the puffers will eat all there fins and then take chunks out of the fish till they die..... Size doesnt matter with puffers...... wat puffer are u thinking about getting? most brackish puffers dont get that big and the cichlids will out grow them..... puffers need to be feed crayfish and snails to ware down there teeth.....

agree with riri...besides, there are only a few species of brackish puffers and the largest only gets to around 6".

as for cichlids in brackish water...some sa/ca can survive brackish for a period of time but I don't think that long term exposure would be healthy for them. similar to keeping a brackish puffer in freshwater...they'll survivie <not thrive> for a while but they definitely won't, imo, live a long full life as they would in proper saline conditions.

Only Cichlids I know that would actually like living in brackish water are the unusual Asian Cichlids of the Genus Etroplus. Of these, only the Orange Chromide, Etroplus maculatus, is likely to be even intermittently available, and will probably have to be acclimatised to brackish water slowly because chances are that in a dealer tank, it'll be in freshwater. If you ever see specimens of Etroplus canarensis in a dealer aquarium, you probably won't be able to afford them because they're a rarity and command an astronomical price tag compared to your average CA/SA Cichlid, because it was thought to be extinct until recently, and it's CITES I as a consequence - ALL specimens available for sale will probably have to be captive bred, and the sort of prices I've heard of being charged here in the UK are of the order of £40 each (that's around $65 US at current exchange rates), and somehow I don't think you'd want to put something that expensive in with nippy Puffers!

The other possibility is Etroplus suratensis, which is a big beast - 8 inches SL as an adult - but again, compatibility with your Puffers is likely to be something you would want to research long and hard before committing yourself to these fishes. Usually, people tend to keep Puffers in species aquaria, because whilst they are slow moving, they are notoriously nippy, particularly the ones that migrate to different salinities throughout their lives, and so if you have something like Tetraodon nigroviridis, I'd keep them in a species aquarium and wouldn't trust them with ANY other fish, because if they get the chance, they'll dismantle any fish considered to be a territorial rival with those clam-cracking teeth!

Panda Catfish fan and keeper/breeder since Christmas 2002