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I was in the LFS this weekend and seen a spotted puffer fish!!!! WOW !!!!! They are awsome! The lady at the pet store said a 10gal would work for just one. Can any one tell me were to start with this adventure, and how to do it all??????? THANKS

what you most likely have there is most likely a spotted green puffer. The little guys get about 7" when all grown up. yeah you could have one in your 10 gallon, which is a good thing considering they are extremely agressive, i would say the lady at the lfs dosent know much about how to keep fish from being cramped in a tank. you would need preferably a 29+ gallon tank, for just one. They are carnivors, so they need to eat foods such as: bloodworms, ghost shrimp, and snails, and they will eat themselfs to death, so limit what you feed them. Make sure they get hard foods such as snales to file down there teeth, otherwise they wont be able to eat becasue of there teeth. but i would strongly recomend aganst the puffer because of its size and how agressive it is supposed to be, and if you want to put any other fish in the tank.

You are probably looking at one of the brackish water puffers. Either the green spot http://pufferlist.com/puffer/brackpuff.php?puffid=15 or the figure eight http://pufferlist.com/puffer/brackpuff.php?puffid=13. Fish stores are horribly uneducated when it comes to puffers and many suffer because of it.

These puffers will not survive in freshwater tanks for their whole lifespan. They need to be acclimated to light brackish waters shortly after you aquire them. Figure 8s only need 1.005-1.008sg which is still light brackish. Green spots will need full marine condtions when they reach adulthood. You need to slowly increase the salinity of their water over several months to a year until it reaches at least minimum full marine which is usually considered to be around 1.025sg. You will need a hydrometer or refractometer for measuring salt levels.

Puffers are also fairly agressive and definite fin nippers so there is very little if anything that will get along with a puffer. You can potentially keep 2 or 3 puffers if your tank is large enough but that's it. A 10g is likely too small for either of these fish even singly and most definitely will not hold a green spot long term. Puffers are very messy fish that will require numerous water changes if placed in too small of tank. They often will not take dry or processed foods and need to be fed on frozen. They will also need to be fed live snails frequently because chewing the shell wears down their teeth. Otherwise you will be forced to do puffer dental work or eventuallly they will be unable to eat.

If you do want a puffer for a freshwater 10g try to find dwarf puffers. These guys still require frozen foods and sometimes live, are messy, and fairly agressive but they do not need snails to keep their teeth filed, are the most peaceful of the puffers so can be kept in small groups of their own kind, only reach 1-2", and are truely a freshwater fish. They still require some work but not as much as the larger, more agressive brackish puffers.

Good Post!

WOW!!!!!!! Thanks ya'll. we already have one tank with rams and such. So One tank with just a puffer would be ok by us. The store has there 10gallons and have 1 cup of sea salt in the tank. cept they got like 5 of them in there. So what all would you say to buy to start this set up. I've seen dwarfs and they were so small i couldn't hardly see um lol. Thanks

Also to puffer in the place we went are a dark color with dark spots and kind of a bluishgreen eye, and id say 3-4". every place in town says a 10gal will work for just one.

Do remember fish at stores are babies. They will usually at least double their size and in some cases grow to 100times their current size. You need to consider the adult size of the fish not the size you see at the store. Most of the time puffers like figure 8s at stores are about the size of a full grown dwarf puffer and 1/3rd the size they will eventually be. Personally I would not keep any puffers but dwarf in a 10g. You might get away with a figure 8 in a 10 but you would spend alot of time doing water changes because puffers are messy. The minimum recommended size on pufferlist is a 15g for 1. If it were me I'd go get a 20g(easier to find than a 15). Definitely make sure you are not looking at green spotted puffers which are more common around here and will require a 30g minimum. A 6" puffer is definitely not a good inhabitant for a 10g. If you aren't sure what puffer your dealing with go dig through the pics on pufferlist. There aren't that many:http://pufferlist.com/

I really suggest actually measuring the salinity. Overtime the salt level of the tank can easily get off. Especially for beginners who might not realize such things as salt does not evaporate so you shouldn't add salt to top off water but only when you also remove water. A cheap hydrometer is $5. Not the most accurate but better than nothing. A glass floating hydrometer is somewhere between $10-$20 and plenty accurate for your purpose. Decorate brackish or salt tanks with rock such as limestone. Brackish fish actually prefer hard water with a higher ph so the limestone helps while providing hiding places. It's hard to find plants for brackish water but java fern and anubias can survive very low end brackish if you want some live plants. Most any gravel or sand you use in freshwater can be used for brackish and the puffers won't really care.

If you want to see some full grown dps and how to care for them check out: http://www.dwarfpuffers.com/

None of them even look like the ones we seen. And all the petstore tells us is it's a spotted puffer.

Yes, they are green puffers. really pretty this time. SO would a 20gal high work? And what do you gotta do to feed them?