mountaintoppufferkeeper

Mine is the Pao cf palustris My puffer trio of 1 Male 2 Female produces however many eggs are in this cave every 14 days or so. With 50 to 75 makimg it to pulling size once the male removes any bad ones. When I choose to pull a portion of eggs out to breeder boxes I could end up with approximately 50 per new fry every month easily. Its more than I expected going in. Anyone else have other species that really fire off for them in numbers that you didnt expect to achieve initially? Which was the most surprising success? Im at the point with these guys where I can make the 50 puffers a month fairly easily if I had the space and chose to do so.

Congratulations that is so cool

A bit of an oddball larger characin in which the males guard the spawn. This guarding is a bit indirect and is a result of their aggression in defending their territory. The fry hatch within the males area and no one bothers them. I hope to witness that in the coming months and years. The red gold body and deep red fins are impressive in person. I didnt even know these existed until 3 weeks ago. Not yet fully grown male chasing off a female Not entirely against other fish in the tank. These dwarf chain loaches are happy to be out with them feeding on live baby brineshrimp. The loaches have created the MTS graveyard you see

I generally guess 30-40% of retail price from a LFS but Im normally happy to move them on and take whatever is offered. Less expenses and more room for the next batch or project has value to me in addition to whatever the store pays/trades/credits me for them. I dont believe the store is trying to get rich off me any more than I am trying to get rich off them. Anything within the range of 25%-50% of their local retail pricing for the species and size I bring them seems fair to me.

They look like Tetraodon schoutedeni to me as well. Havent kept them in a while but id pay my schoutendeni money for them. Update Found the old pics of mine going full ramshorn in 2018

Update my O2 tests. The indepth tank stats - 75 gallon with heavy plants, 2 box filters, one bio wheel for surface agitation, temperature 74⁰-76⁰, 3/4" of pool filter sand for substrate. Stocking level : Pao cf palustris 1 adult male 2 adult females Plants: 1 crinum, +/- 1/2 lb of subwassertang, 12"x12" patch of a dwarf chain sword colony, 15"x6" pogostemon octopus. Anubias barteri, floating versions of moneywort and pennywort, duckweed, 15"x15" sword plant of some sort. My O2 test reads about 10 ppm dissolved oxygen at 148pm water temperature 75⁰ Light: fluval aquasky 900nm usimg these settings. More power has created more algae and less exploring by the puffers. I shoot for a subdued light that still grows plants for the water quality benefits This tank gets indirect and occasional direct sunlight through sliding glass door. Sunrise up here was 653am today. other two checked : A 50 gallon with butterfly fish and baby dolphin runs at 77⁰-78⁰ with 30% light power and less live plants or algae. That reading was closer to 8ppm which could be a function of the temperature of the water. A 35 gallon tank with goodied and java moss 66⁰-72⁰ depending on the furnace cycle of the day. That was +/-12 ppm dissolved O2 The results were varied and im sure would be lower at sunrise due to the plants. My guess is if i run live plants and airstones it stays between 8ppm and 12ppm of dissolved oxygen up here and the temperature is more of the determining factor than the altitude. Final results 1pm-2pm (lights on + 5 hours to lights on +6 hours) 77⁰-78⁰ 50 gallon tank +/- 8ppm dissolved O2 74⁰-76⁰ 75 gallon tank +/- 10ppm dissolved O2 70⁰-72⁰ 35 gallon tank +/- 12 ppm dissolved O2

I am looking forward to completing my tests as another high altitude keeper of the group and comparing the reaults. We are at 9,137 feet altitude up here. My only similar experience was a co2 diy set up blowing co2 all night full open and killing bucktooth tetra within hours. The video did seem like the water was a bit cloudy along with washed out color and rapid breathing. @Pinky I also keep a resin obsorber on hand like the square polyfilter, or those bag versions chemi-pure etc. They are my what is happening 911 response along with a waterchange just in case something got in the tank I wasnt aware of. I also have used the polyfilter cubed up in a box filter to give me a sense of water quality based off its color change for what it has taken in. @Guppysnail Im certainly not an expert but have a few observations ive picked up on the mountain. The oxygen in thinner air does change your blood a bit with more red blood cells by volume which allows proper oxygen levels in blood. I do not see why that system adjustment would be limted to mamals though. I assume that it is possible fish produce more blood cells to maintain some level of stability in oxygen capacity at lower o2 concentrations at high altitudes assuming the water conditions are good otherwise. If that is accurate I would also assume that younger fish and those individuals or species without some weakness in their circulatory systems adapt easier. I do not have my dissolved oxygen stats yet but I will update when I do and try for a few tanks of various flows temperstures and supplemental oxygen to compare. My tanks all run lots of plants, sponge or box filters, and airstones. Any differences in O2 havent negatively impacted survivability or reproduction of my freshwater puffers, dwarf pike, bolivian rams, rarer kribs, corydoras, or mouthbrooding betta. When I have recieved mature species up here breeding occured within a week or two. I believe that is partially attributable to air pressure difference ( similar to a weather front coming through). I have lost fish within hours to co2 failure on before, a cycle mini crash/a bad bottle of conditioner, or some substance interfering with the oxygen exchange of the fish would do it. More oxygen has never been a bad thing up here. My (subject to change) belief is that fish are highly adaptable to a huge range of ph, oxygen, temperature, and food source changes and most will thrive in the oxygen levels we have in aquariums at sea level up to at least 9,137 feet. There has been limited research on the subject with inverts at altitude: https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C6&q=oxygen+saturation+of+water+at+altitude&btnG=#d=gs_qabs&u=%23p%3DdVOKwTSbhJ4J

Agreed on the danger of improper disposal of species being a problem. That blows my mind everytime its reported. I remember baby snakeheads being in local fishstores in the 90s all the time. Colorful and fun looking .... then it grows up to a giant. The 57 species of snakehead, Channidae, were banned under a final rule under the lacey act in 2002. That dollowed a proposed rule, a period of public comment and peer review, before the FWS considered comments and adjusted the final rule on snakeheads. It was interesting to read the government addressing the respondent concerns to the proposed rule and how that process improved that final rule and the ability to enforce it clearly. I did not realize the FWS posted that it was a tremendous credit to the fish hobby that only a very few snakeheads were found in the wild despite their prevalence in the hobby at that time. It read like more of a hot topic due to the use of live snakeheads as a food fish in some grocery stores and markets at the time. The last fish species to be added to the list were done in 2016. I imagine that is both a function of the process to get something added to the list with a proposed rule, the process to consider and address concerns and adjustments in the final rule, and the economics of adding something to the list with that process. Only 189 non-salmon fish species on the federal list pre-presumptive bans and most of those are walking catfish, carp, or snakeheads. I know most US states ban quite a few species, crayfish, gambusia sp. livebearers etc, within their borders that other states may allow. https://www.fws.gov/injuriouswildlife/list-of-injurious-wildlife.html

I say whatever fish you enjoy keeping the most is the easiest to learn breeding with because you are that much more into their system set up, observation of the tank, and feeding /conditioning the group or pair. Even the percieved impossible species are attainable if I am all in on them. (Betta macrosoma in 2018, Pao puffers in 2021). Anything that you enjoy keeping that also exhibits some level of parental care is a good choice in my opinion. The parents do the hard work for you and you can often feed the same foods in one tank vs having a system to get fry from eggs and then raise those on micro foods until brine shrimp etc can be fed. I view mouthbrooding, cave spawing, and spawn guarding anything as easier than some livebearers. Cichlids, a few characin (tetra) species, some betta, and some puffers fall into these categories of spawn guarding. Livebearers have often been pretty heavy fry eaters (even in heavy plant cover for me) and often seasonal breeders. Goodeids, wild swordtails, limia, and true freshwater halfbeaks have all been fairly hard to keep going for me for these reasons. My black prince goodeids, Charcodon audax El Toboso, for example are especially prone to that fry eating and are seasonal spawners. They breed every 60 days or so for about half the year 3 or 4 batches a year per female if im lucky. Livebearers - like harder water, heavy plants in my setups Variatus platy Guppy ( though ive never really got into them) Goodeids - big fry are easy to feed day 1 Cichlids - like territory suitable to defend in my set ups Kribs - Pelvicachromis any species you like Crenicichla regani African butterfly cichlid ( they never stop up here...ever) African cichlid mouthbrooders aratus, egyptian dwarf mouthbrooders, etc Shell dweller cichlids - neolampralogus species and lamprologus species Betta and catfish - well fed and plant cover for fry to hid and feed in Betta Albimarginata, macrostoma, antuna, etc mouthbrooders Corydoras (most species) - heavy plants down low, good food, water changes, no snails. Some survive and grow in tank with enough cover for eggs to avoid predation.

AI have read the sections in the house bill ( pages 1661-1665) and the introduced senate bill on ammending the lacey act to a presumptive ban on importing, possessing, or crossing state lines with any species not approved by the secretary of the interior. The Lacey act defines wild as any creatures that, whether or not raised in captivity, normally are found in a wild state. The Which makes all aquarium inhabitants "wild" for the purposes of the law. This includes eggs and successive generations of captive born fish. For me it was concerning enough to voice my views to my Senators. The Sec of the Interior, if the ammendment is passed as written in the house bill, is who will define what minimum quantities imported means for eaxh species approved. You can already theoretically purchase a permit for many otherwise prohibited species under the lacey act through the US Fish and Wildlife Service but im sure thats a process and a half to do and not free. I imagine the presumptive ban on importation of transportation probably wont be as good or as bad as we think it could be. I also tend to view it as a way to be able to quickly change the status of a species under lacey when deemed necessary. It seems like a well intentioned paved road to make keeping species less enjoyable and more expensiveand risky to participate in moving forward. Im also not a lawyer and will not enjoy having to stay well versed in the lacey act if these ammendments become law

@Sandra the fish rookie I use the ziss hatchery for the baby brine with the coop eggs and they run on a 3 day rotation here when feeding fry or conditioning adults. I just harvest at 36 hours and reset the hatchery. I have also used bottles before with the same timeline of results. I do not keep the brine shrimp in there longer than 36 hours. I am only using it for the baby brine size of the shrimp. if I keep it going without a reset they generally will crash between 40 and 48 hours up here. I believe they are fairly nutritious but like all foods not a complete food by themselves. I rotate the puffer fry from live brine and vinegar eels to daphnia, whiteworms, cherry shrimp, snails, and earthworms I have done adult brine shrimp accidentally in the dish version of a hatcher before. Those are alien looking level nuts. I would probably try and do a longer term brine shrimp colony using a 10 gallon + tank with the standard salt concentration to hatch and some sort of filtration. That set up would also need some sort of water changing routine and maintaining salinity if the plan was a colony of different sizes. I am not that level of dedication to them or the chemistry of salt water. I hatch live brine myself in a hatcher as needed. If I had a LFS and needed them occasionally while I was there I would buy brine shrimp from a store especially if they had mature brine shrimp and that was something I was trying to feed to fish. ** additional info ** After further review of some of my fishroom references on live foods : the common brine shrimp culture is essentially an 80 degree saltwater version of a daphnia culture. The more volume of water is better for culture stability whixh is why it is done outside in simething like those plastic kid pools in some areas of the country. The shrimp eat similar foods to daphina like spirulina powder, green water, yeast mixes, planktons. The key to brine shrimp appears to be to try and keep the salinity matched between the water you add and the water in your brine shrimp culture tank. Im not a saltwater guy but id assume that is the same for all salt water fish. That consistency should limit some stress on the brine shrimp and lower the risk of reduced production or a complete crash of the culture Harvesting adults normally starts around day 30 with a fish net of a coarse enough mesh that it catches the larger sizes of shrimp needed to feed while the smaller shrimp can pass through the mesh and continue to grow and eventually reproduce. I am gueseing if a consistent portion of the bigger shrimp were harvested every 3 days or so it could be a reliable long term culture.

@Vinm they look great. Its probably me just trying to find a difference where there might not be but does the male have a shorter "nose" than the female? In the photo, The distance of the eyes to the top of the mouth looks to be shorter in the top puffer vs the bottom.

It works decsnt enough for me. I used 1/4" thick cast cell acrylic and weldon 4 acrylic glue to bond all seams into one piece. I was trying for the thinnest possible that still holds shape and is in theory tough enough for the puffers, not too expensive or hard to find, and is still fairly easy to cut with a scoring tool. I have not tried acrylic for an in tank sump/filter but I would guess the silicone would be more to hold it in place vs bond to it. I think a sump set up like that could possibly be done with twin wall polycarbonate and lighting diffuser "egg crate" if all glass were not an option. I havent tried either no idea if they work personally.

Day 3 . Fun to see those tiny puffer fry zipping around from overhead. Everything in the photo not duckweed is a Pao cf. palustris fry. I am looking to get 30-40 to 30 days in a 20 gallon then to 3 months in a 50 gallon grow out if we get them eating this week. This batch should be fun to improve witb even if that is learning what to not try next batch.

same here I haven't found a better way than that

My fahaka was a fan of ramshorn snails, mts, mystery snails, and cherry shrimp before moving out to a permanent home for a friend who wanted a fahaka and had a bigger tank. I assume that snails and crayfish work for keeping their beak trimmed. The ramshorn were the primary food sources up to its departure at 6" or so and i had plants to allow for the cherry shrimp to escape and hide. My plan following that was mystery snails and crayfish but i never got that far with that puffer. To the best of my knowledge crayfish are mostly scavengers that eat anything but if I am planning on using them as a food source I would view the food they eat as nutrition for my puffer; if its not good enough for my puffer its not good enough for the food culture I am feeding them. I have just started on the dwarf crayfish path ( about 4 times the size of a cherry shrimp as adults). I do have berried females and soon to be full with the crayfish version of shrimplets... crayfishlets? If crayfish are legal in your area, my process is to keep the crayfish species similar to cherry shrimp. Neutral ph good mineral content, caves or tubes to molt in, plants to provide cover, decent food quality, a variety of foods to gutload them. The dwarf crayfish culture tank is a polyculture with ramshorn snails and neocaradina. It is a 26"x18"x15" tank full of java moss and subbwassertang with a box filter that has crused coral for buffering. I feed shrimp foods, spirulina flake, nano blocks, pretty much everything and the colonies just grow. Ramshorn are pretty good puffer food for me they reproduce fast and grow like crazy on spirulina flake and any other quality food you have. My personal experience is they should work for a good long while with a fahaka. I could not get the mystery snails going but figured those could work for the life of the fahaka with adult mystery snails being my staple shelled food for the adult fahaka. I also culture earthworms for puffers which i would bet would be a food for a fahaka as well as insects and clams with a vitamin soak. In my opinion a puffer can eat its body weight in a sitting and especially when growing. I likely could not have too many snails or grow enough of the crawfish / shrimp to make that more than a once or twice a week food.

25Jan22 Male has left the cave the remaining eggs hatched and swam off in the 75 gallon. My buddy is now expecting his post spawning feast. A great day to be a mountain top puffer for him and the two females.

@Vinm That is a great looking setup and great information on the process of getting a pair. I also tend to view the larges as the female in my trio based off of how they behave when showing courtship behaviors. I am curious if you see any difference in the head shape or proportions of the mouth to eyes etc between the two? I haven't noticed any in my group but there are other pao that seem to have slight differences in these ratios. If you have one of those wyze type cameras I do use those to do a bit of surveillance on my groups and have used the IR function to see their activities at night. I did try the ziss tumbler with the palustris eggs but it did not work for me; it was my first time trying so likely just my inexperience with the set up but they all went bad quickly for some reason. After that experience I have not attempted to tumble puffer eggs again. I have had success using the coop specimen container with methylene blue (MB) at a concentration of a light blue tinge to the water. I put 1 drop in a container with some tank water in another container and siphon that solution through the airline to hopefully sanitize it before I use to siphon the eggs; I then siphon a little of the MB into the container then start the siphon through the airline with water from parents tank. For the Pao cf palustris, I take a long pair of tongs and use those to hold and guide the already primed airline into the cave and siphon the eggs out of there and into the container. I put that container floating/hanging inside a tank that I run at 74-76 degrees with a rigid airline tube bubbling 2 bubbles per second or so to maintain a little water movement. Once they hatch out I put a cube of polyfilter in to help maintain water quality and remove the remaining MB then feed them in there for 14 to 21 days before releasing them into a grow out tank. I may just be lucky but I have not had one egg go bad using that container method.

Me too - the guy with 3 adult, twelve 3 month old, and probably 75 1 day old Pao cf palustris

Beyond the pea puffer, Carinotetraodon travancoricus, i do not know of one. Redeye puffers of Carinotetraodon like the irrubesco and similar are generally on the smaller size. I haven't personally kept any redeyes (yet) but would consider them to be more of a 20 long or bigger puffer based on the reported adult size of 2" to 2.5".

Bigger is bigger volume wise. I haven't ever done a single pea puffer and defer to those who keep them for better advice. If I had a 5 that needed a resident i would try a single pea puffer and rearrange the plants etc occasionally to keep the puffer interested in the tank. This is an older video Cory did on the Pea puffer

Went ahead and pulled about 50% of the spawn today. The male has actually adjusted his strategy a bit he now will sit on the eggs and block the airline from sucking them up instead of actively attacking it. This is the 4 month old pao cf palustris and this spawn with fry actively hatching in the coop specimen container the background.

vinm123 read my mind when they were suggested on the wednesday stream. These guys were already being prepped for shipment. Tetraodon miurus : 5 wildcaught adolescents 1-1.5" added yesterday to a 26x18x12 (+/- 20 gallon) colony growout tank with blasting media substrate. The tank is an overflow sump system with their 20 gallon and three 26x18x15 (+/-28 gallon) tanks. Based of the palustris fry growth rates my guess is these are 1 or 2 months old. The color variation and ability to change color to communicate or camouflage is pretty cool to see. 2 larger solid colored seem to stay together. The tank is 73-76 degrees fahrenheit 7.0 ph 300tds. Daphnia, pond snails, ramshorn, blackworms, scuds, all in their tank to start. Whiteworms and smaller earthworms added to welcome them. They are very active and have eaten earthworms and scuds to this point. The three smaller of the group remain darker toned. This is the above congo puffer camouflaged into the substrate (blasting media) The more orange toned congo really wants to go play with the dogs in the snow Whatever happens this should be fun to raise them to adults and learn their group dynamics vs the Pao species I am working with .

I once had a diy co2 set up go full open overnight and woke up to 18 bucktooth tetra deaths. Worst fishroom morning ever. ****Not death but one that fakes it occasionally **** This is 3 minutes later. He just ate his body weight in worms this morning . This is 3 mins earlier he held this for 15 minutes. He also has always enjoyed floating belly up since I got him in 2018. Weird guy.

Nice set up