Pea puffer tank… Done! Your opinion/suggestion?

[Karen B.]

Greetings Nerms!

so I have been annoying this channels for quite a while about this tank… and it’s finally done!

Well obviously it still need to finish cycling,  I have to top the water, clean the glass, vacuum the bottom, some plants were in a bucket so they need to straighten up and others to grow but here is the result for now.

Is there enough hides:line of sight breakage? Any advices?

 

Thank you in advance!

@Odd Duck Tagging you because you seem to be the puffers specialist ☺️

[Odd Duck]

On 3/16/2022 at 7:50 AM, Karen B. said:

Greetings Nerms!

so I have been annoying this channels for quite a while about this tank… and it’s finally done!

Well obviously it still need to finish cycling,  I have to top the water, clean the glass, vacuum the bottom, some plants were in a bucket so they need to straighten up and others to grow but here is the result for now.

Is there enough hides:line of sight breakage? Any advices?

 

Thank you in advance!

@Odd Duck Tagging you because you seem to be the puffers specialist ☺️

I don’t know about puffer specialist, but I think that’s looking really good!  No, great!  You will eventually end up overcrowded (I very much am in my 29 G, it desperately needs some thinning), but that’s a future maintenance thing that would happen no matter what.

Nice plant selection, nice hardscape, well placed all the way around.  I see good composition now and see the future composition, too.  Very nicely done!  Just like any new tank, you’ll have to see what does well and take out what doesn’t do well.  You might look for another plant that gets wide leaves, like maybe a radicans shape/style of sword (but radicans gets too big), maybe E. hadi ‘Red Pearl’, which stays smaller but eventually gets wide, rounded leaves on stems and will give you some nice color contrast.  Or another Anubias attached to a small rock low at left front like A. barteri or nana ‘Gold Coin’ variety of either fir some color contrast to the Anubias at back left.  Kind of fill in more hiding area at the base of the Crinum.

Your stems may fill in well enough that you may not need anything else.  I’m terrible at stems, so I always lean toward bulbs and epiphytes.  😝  I guess that’s just me projecting.  😉  Oh, another possible IF your stems behave like mine always do (😉) is Crypt. pontederiifolia.  It looks a bit E. radicans style with a broader leaf and longer stem than most crypts, plus a nice bright, lime green color.

Overall, I like it a lot!  Good job!  Looks like pea paradise!  Get your “pest” snails, scuds, and blackworms in there to start your colonies and you’re good to go for adding peas once cycled and plants are done doing any melting they decide to do.

[Karen B.]

On 3/16/2022 at 10:49 AM, Odd Duck said:

I don’t know about puffer specialist, but I think that’s looking really good!  No, great!  You will eventually end up overcrowded (I very much am in my 29 G, it desperately needs some thinning), but that’s a future maintenance thing that would happen no matter what.

Nice plant selection, nice hardscape, well placed all the way around.  I see good composition now and see the future composition, too.  Very nicely done!  Just like any new tank, you’ll have to see what does well and take out what doesn’t do well.  You might look for another plant that gets wide leaves, like maybe a radicans shape/style of sword (but radicans gets too big), maybe E. hadi ‘Red Pearl’, which stays smaller but eventually gets wide, rounded leaves on stems and will give you some nice color contrast.  Or another Anubias attached to a small rock low at left front like A. barteri or nana ‘Gold Coin’ variety of either fir some color contrast to the Anubias at back left.  Kind of fill in more hiding area at the base of the Crinum.

Your stems may fill in well enough that you may not need anything else.  I’m terrible at stems, so I always lean toward bulbs and epiphytes.  😝  I guess that’s just me projecting.  😉  Oh, another possible IF your stems behave like mine always do (😉) is Crypt. pontederiifolia.  It looks a bit E. radicans style with a broader leaf and longer stem than most crypts, plus a nice bright, lime green color.

Overall, I like it a lot!  Good job!  Looks like pea paradise!  Get your “pest” snails, scuds, and blackworms in there to start your colonies and you’re good to go for adding peas once cycled and plants are done doing any melting they decide to do.

Thank you so much for your kind words!  I am looking forward to see how the plants do. I am the opposite to you - my stem plants I use from aquarium to aquarium but I am totally new to bulb plant and the E. Ocelot is my first one. I hope it fares well. I am terribly at plants in the first place, but really good at algae, hehe. But seeing the difference real plants make in a fish behavior, I could not keep using plastic one.

So I am just waiting a little bit for my tank to establish itself. I will use a bag of dirty bioballs from one of my aquarium, a pre-filter sponge from another and a sponge from another as to not unbalance them too much and speed the process of the cycling. I already have a seeded sponge filter running and it had snails so now I can see plenty of baby snails crawling around. Sadly I can’t find black worms or scufs where I live (Québec) so hopefully I can get my pea to eat frozen daphnia and maybe Hikari vibra bites to bary their diet. Do they like BBS?

[Odd Duck]

Peas like most live foods, so BBS should be readily taken.  Scuds/amphipods often arrive with plants, so you may already have them somewhere in one of your tanks.  Leaf litter is a good way to grow them and I have stolen @Torrey’s idea and made culture jars for scuds with layers of air driven undergravel filter, ceramic biomedia to hold the UGF in place, then bioballs (tend to float), then plastic craft mesh, more layers (gravel for Torrey, ceramic biofilter balls and rings for me to hold down the bioballs and craft mesh), some leaves, then just add water and scuds.  All this done in a dispenser jar so water and scuds can be poured out and fed to the fish, fresh water in the top and your water change is done.

Blackworms can be difficult to locate and I have no suggestions for you there in Canada.  It’s hard enough finding them locally for myself.  You might look into whiteworms.  Those are the favorite among all my fish no matter the species.  If you can find warm acclimated worms they do well at typical room temps for me (72-74*F) but you might find that regular whiteworms do better for you - 10-20*C (50-68*F) if you can find the right spot.  That would be difficult most of the year for me here in Texas, USA, without a refrigerator.

Grindal worms are another option for feeding, but they are small enough not all peas will take to them (I have spoiled princesses).  Youngsters usually will, adults not always reliably.  Grindals like to be warmer, ranging from 65-80*F (~18.5-26.6*C) but are best between 70-75*F (~22-24*C).

There are ways to raise the whiteworms and Grindal worms soilless that I’m going to try since it appears to make for much easier harvesting.

I think we all dream of someday getting our peas to take Vibra Bites and making our lives simpler, but I’ve never had any luck with them and that’s even in the peas I raised from eggs, trying nearly every day with the Vibra Bites.  I’ve only seen 2 people post that they got their peas to eat any Vibra Bites and those were random strangers on other public forums (FB).  I’ve had only sporadic luck getting peas to take frozen foods since mine are so spoiled with live foods.

If you continue to check online on various sources, locally at any fish groups/clubs, swap meets/expos, etc, you will eventually be able to find sources for various live foods.  There are groups dedicated to the live fish food subject on certain forums (FB). It is worth it to get more variety in your pea puffer’s (and other fish’s) diet.

Edited March 17, 2022 by Odd Duck