Dwarf(?) puffer ID

[KentFishFanUK]

Hi all! 

These pics are posted from Reddit (with the owners permission).

This person got this little puffer with some pea puffers but they don't think it's the same as the others and noone seems to know what it is. 

Anyone know? I think it's currently the same size as the pea puffers but otherwise looks very different. 

[Odd Duck]

Looks like a very unhappy pea puffer.  The tiny speckles make me say it is a pea puffer.  I don’t know of any other puffers that have those tine speckles like that.  Super dark like that means very unhappy, though.  Tagging @mountaintoppufferkeeperto see if he can confirm.  He has far more puffer experience than I.

[mountaintoppufferkeeper]

On 4/3/2022 at 3:48 AM, Odd Duck said:

Looks like a very unhappy pea puffer.  The tiny speckles make me say it is a pea puffer.  I don’t know of any other puffers that have those tine speckles like that.  Super dark like that means very unhappy, though.  Tagging @mountaintoppufferkeeperto see if he can confirm.  He has far more puffer experience than I.

@KentFishFanUK I could easily be proven wrong as it grows. I am not an expert but to me it looks like a less than 2 month old puffer of one of the many species of pao puffer. I have not seen Pao abei fry but they do seem to have those brownish spots more than the dark green spots of the palustris color form. I think it would be hard to tell until it grows a bit more. 

I am basing that off of the smaller current size, general proportions of body at that size, and coloration vs what Ive seen with my palustris fry.

Ive seen that dark band between the eye and lower jaw, the light belly the darker body and that red eyespot centered on the body and between the leading edges of the dorsal and anal fins. I have not seen that outside of pao fry in my limited experiences.

The pao are fairly variable in pattern and color as they grow and attached to show how far they change colors and patterns to fit a situation.

I would also check with the Kyoto Freshwater Pufferfish Breeding Institute in Japan. They are on social media and responsive when time permits on their end.  Keep in mind it is a communication translated through something like google translate on both ends. It is nearly, but not  completly, 100% accurate on both ends of the translation to and from Japanese from English. When it has to deal with more complex sentence structures it gets more interesting than it should. 

Pictures to show the variation Pao cf palustris

Fry

Adolescents same group in each shot 

Adolescent male in darker green. Id bet the colors are chaged for all sorts of reasons in pao

 

 

My adult male in breeding color

Same adult male in non breeding color

[KentFishFanUK]

On 4/3/2022 at 5:10 PM, mountaintoppufferkeeper said:

@KentFishFanUK I could easily be proven wrong as it grows. I am not an expert but to me it looks like a less than 2 month old puffer of one of the many species of pao puffer. I have not seen Pao abei fry but they do seem to have those brownish spots more than the dark green spots of the palustris color form. I think it would be hard to tell until it grows a bit more. 

I am basing that off of the smaller current size, general proportions of body at that size, and coloration vs what Ive seen with my palustris fry.

Ive seen that dark band between the eye and lower jaw, the light belly the darker body and that red eyespot centered on the body and between the leading edges of the dorsal and anal fins. I have not seen that outside of pao fry in my limited experiences.

The pao are fairly variable in pattern and color as they grow and attached to show how far they change colors and patterns to fit a situation.

I would also check with the Kyoto Freshwater Pufferfish Breeding Institute in Japan. They are on social media and responsive when time permits on their end.  Keep in mind it is a communication translated through something like google translate on both ends. It is nearly, but not  completly, 100% accurate on both ends of the translation to and from Japanese from English. When it has to deal with more complex sentence structures it gets more interesting than it should. 

Pictures to show the variation Pao cf palustris

Fry

Adolescents same group in each shot 

Adolescent male in darker green. Id bet the colors are chaged for all sorts of reasons in pao

 

 

My adult male in breeding color

Same adult male in non breeding color

Thank you so much! I will let him know. Hopefully mystery solved! Will know as it grows up. 

Is it likely that it could come in accidentally with a batch of pea puffers? Assuming it was live caught, could they be caught at the same location or something?

[Odd Duck]

@mountaintoppufferkeeperand this is exactly why I tagged you!  Thank you for all that info.  I stumbled into being a pea puffer keeper, but have zero experience with any other species.  Awesome info all around!

Thank you for your time and expertise!

[Biotope Biologist]

I will second Pao abei. It appears that juveniles can have white spots and slowly start to color up along the belly as they age. Also if that spot on it’s lateral line behind the caudal fin starts turning red or red-orange we will know for sure. 
 

It looks like it too me

 

Fishbase:

”entire dorsolateral surface of body with numerous pale [orange]spots uniformly distributed over a dark background. ”

 

This can be differentiated from the target pufferfish by uniformly pale orange spots versus one orange spot surrounded by groupings of green spots

[mountaintoppufferkeeper]

On 4/3/2022 at 9:16 PM, KentFishFanUK said:

Thank you so much! I will let him know. Hopefully mystery solved! Will know as it grows up. 

Is it likely that it could come in accidentally with a batch of pea puffers? Assuming it was live caught, could they be caught at the same location or something?

I bet however it happened its a neat story. But Id guess as some point somewhere in the distribution line not too long before the retail  store one hatchling survived getting mixed into the pea puffers and and ended up in that photo. Something probably worth noting is Pao species are generally 10 to 15 cm ( 4 to 6 inches) grown.

[KentFishFanUK]

Thanks all, I reported back to him on Reddit with your info and some links/pics from the internet. Other people there however had already convinced him it's a carinotetraodon irrubesco (which to be fair was also my first guess before I spoke to you guys) so he doubts it being a pao abei 🤷‍♂️   

but he did say he would post more pics and keep me updated as it gets bigger. I'll let you all know when he does! 

[Biotope Biologist]

Carinotetraodon irrubesco are keel shaped hence the latin name “carina” this puffer species is not. While I am not entirely confident in Pao abei  I am confident it is not a red tailed puffer. The markings on the body are also not congruent with scientific data. Markings on red tailed puffer are striped in males with a cream ventral surface while females show irregular [striped] markings over a cream ventral surface. Males have a darker background and can be distinguished  from females by sporting bright red anal, dorsal, and caudal fins. Females likely have this cryptic background to blend into their surroundings as they are a rather smaller puffer species (44mm average).

Edited April 6, 2022 by Biotope Biologist