Figure 8 Puffers

[afireinside]

Well, yesterday i went to my lfs, about to buy this puffer and the guy said, "Since he's a baby, he'll be fine for now, but when he gets older, then you'll have some problems with the other fish." i knew what he ment, so i didn't buy it. so, can i have some info on figure 8 puffers?

 

[SirMinion]

You did right not to buy him, however cute he was.

Figure Eight puffers are brackish and like all puffers, are not suited to a comunity tank due to their 'waspish' behaviour.

They don't get very big, but like other puffers they need more room per individual than most other fish.

 

[afireinside]

when i get my 70, 80, 90 or 100 tank, would he do fine with cichlids?

 

[SirMinion]

when i get my 70, 80, 90 or 100 tank, would he do fine with cichlids?

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Once again, Figure eight puffers require brackish water and in any case would attack the cichlids and eat their fins leading to infection & stress.

Figure eight puffers can be kept with very little else although knight gobies seem to be compatable.

 

[nmonks]

Once again, Figure eight puffers require brackish water and in any case would attack the cichlids and eat their fins leading to infection & stress.

Actually, this isn't exactly true. To the best of anyone's knowledge, Tetraodon biocellatus comes from freshwater, not brackish, and it is the species most commonly (but not exclusively) sold as the figure-8 puffer.

The problem is that people who care about the fish do tend to be brackish water enthusiasts, so keep them properly otherwise as far as food and filtration goes. As the fish adapt to slightly brackish fine, these puffers thrive. But the people who buy them for freshwater tanks, who are largely ignorant about their needs, ignore the fact they are intolerant of poor filtration, need hig oxygen levels, do not like high nitrAtes, and need crunchy foods. Hence, although in water of the right chemistry, these puffers die because everything else is wrong.

The upshot is that people have "heard" these puffers do best in brackish.

There is also another (probable) species sold as the figure-8, Tetraodon palembangensis. Also naturally inhabits fresh, not brackish, water.

If you go to the Brackish Aquarium FAQ, there's a section of puffers that highlights their basic needs. It includes links to useful web sites as well as to the appropriate FishBase pages so you can read up on particular species.

http/homepage.mac.com/nmonks/aquaria/bra...#tetraodontidae

And no, don't keep them with cichlids. They are far too small but nasty. Very big cichlids will simply hammer them and prevent them from feeding properly, while smaller cichlids are likely to lose bits of their fins. There are more peaceful puffers that work much better. Try the South American puffer, for example. I've kept the normally marine species, Arothron hispidus in half-strength seawater with Colombian shark catfish, Tilapia rendalli and Sarotherodon melanotheron, and a garpike and that was a very effective combination. Admittedly it was a big tank, 200 gallons or so. Other (relatively) peaceful puffers include Tetraodon schoutedeni and Chelondon patoca.

Cheers,

Neale

 

[CFC]

They also work well with larger brackish fish like scats, monos and archers which can give it back just as well in the fin nipping stakes, infact most brackish fish tend to be quite mean


Can i ask where you got your information that Tetraodon biocellatus is a FW fish from? Everything i have ever read conserning the fish and peoples experience with them is that they only last a short while in FW even with experienced aquarists and that brackish water certainly leads to a longer life.
Lots of brackish fish are caught in freshwaters and would appear to spend much of their lives there but this is mainly down to the migratory nature of fish which live at the mouths of large tidal rivers where they will travel some distance up into FW to feed or spawn before returning once again to the brackish waters, brackish fish are extreemly hardy and can take pretty wild swings in pH and salinity without problems but eventually need to go back to saltier waters once their bio chemistry starts to go wrong.

 

[chris_1127]

i've never seen a t. palembangensis sold as a figure 8 before, but have seen t. biocellatus mislabelled with the incorrect latin name of t. palembangensis. If you look at stocklists from importers, some of those (wrongly) seem to give figure 8's the latin name t. palembangensis - maybe this is where the confusion there arises? but i dont think theres any way you could really confuse the two species. i have seen t. fluviatilis sold as figure 8's which is easier to understand with the similar saddle markings that some of them seem to have, but without the eyespots at the base of the fins.

with respect to the fresh/brackish water point, i tried to do as much research as possible before getting my two figure 8's, and must say that 99% of the literature i looked at stated brackish water - i'm also interested to see the source of your info. have you kept figure 8's in freshwater in the long-term with success? from what i read i understood them to be a lot more prone to ich/fungus in freshwater, and i dont think you can put all of that down to ignorance on the part of the fishkeepers

 

[nmonks]

Hi,

The most accessible resources for most people here will be FishBase. If you check out the FishBase entries for both T. biocellatus and T. pelambangensis you'll see that these fish come from fresh waters. For example, for the Figure-8 puffer is says, "Aggressive against conspecifics. Not a brackish water species. Feeds on snails and other benthic organisms."

http/www.fishbase.org/Summary/SpeciesSum...ame=biocellatus

The scientific papers / fish fauna books are pretty unambiguous about this as well. These are freshwater fish, non-migratory, that live and breed in fresh water. They are not found in estuaries or mangroves, but river systems.

The best aquarium books say exactly the same thing about figure-8 puffers, e.g. Sterba "Freshwater Fishes of the World", I quote, "Thailand, Sumatra, Borneo, in fresh water". Likewise, Baensch's Aquarium Atlas, "The water should be fresh, not brackish, soft to medium hard and neutral". Note that the older literature invariably calls figure-8s T. pelambangensis or T. steindachneri, the latter being a straight synonym for T. biocellatus and the former name being a confusion between species by importers and collectors.

So, in the wild, the scientific and (reliable) hobby literature seems to be of one mind on this topic. These are freshwater fish.

Whether 99% of the web sites written by hobbyists agree I don't know. But Ian West says much the same thing I do (i.e., they're from freshwater, but reported to do best in brackish) as does Bob Fenner ("sold as fresh water ... do best in slightly brackish").

http/www.pufferfish.co.uk/aquaria/specie...types/index.htm
http/www.wetwebmedia.com/BrackishSubWebI...bracpuffers.htm

I'll admit that's confusing, but it isn't unique. Another similar issue is with the needlefish, Xenentodon cancila which is almost never found in brackish water but is universally reported as doing slightly better in brackish water in captivity.

The tricky bit is knowing whether the brackish water actually helps for some physiological reason, or whether it is because people with brackish water tanks are usually more experienced and dedicated, so generally more likely to keep difficult fish alive for longer. I think this is the nub of the issue: unless we had a row of identical tanks all containing figure-8s but at different salinities, we cannot be sure whether or not they genuinely do better in brackish rather than fresh water.

My hunch is that the vast majority of these are sold to fishkeepers who don't know the specific needs of this fish and lose them for a variety of reasons other than osmoregulatory stress. Hence, the idea that somehow freshwater is "bad" for them is misleading; it would be better phrased that keeping them in an overcrowded, under-filtered freshwater community tank without the right food and correct management of things like pH fluctuations and oxygen concentration is bad for them.

If all else is right, puffers are phenomenally tolerant of adverse salinity. I've seen dog-faced puffers (a marine fish) sold in essentially freshwater. I've personally kept them at about half-strength seawater. So I have no doubt that if you carefully adapted a figure-8 to brackish it would do well.

It's all very interesting.

Cheers,

Neale

 

[chris_1127]

if only i had the room - actually i probably would have the room; start again, if only the mrs would allow me to have a row of tanks just with figure 8's at different SG's to compare how they fare in each set of conditions

cheers for the links, interesting to see the sources of info - one thing with information on hobbyist pages on the web is that it often seems to be info or opinions "regurgitated" from other sites so its hard to know exactly what to go with sometimes. Mind you going with a light brackish setup has worked out well as it allowed me to add to the tank with a small gsp and an assortment of gobies (knights/candy stripes/bumblebees).

 

[SirMinion]

Just to clear up the figure8/tetraodon palembangensis confusion, up until quite recently, Tetraodon biocellatus was assigned the name Tetraodon palembangensis but was then renamed as Tetraodon biocellatus with t.palembangensis becoming an invalid synonym.

The name tetraodon palembangensis was then re-asigned to another entirely different puffer, known as the Dragon Puffer or Humpback puffer or King Kong puffer.

As for the figure8 being brackish, there is considerable evidence for this fish being hardier and healthier in brackish water.

To quote one of the worlds formost experts on pufferfish, Klas Ebert who has been keeping and studying them for over 40 years:

Unfortunately if kept long term in fresh water this species becomes delicate and disease prone.
By contrast, Tetraodon biocellatus has proved hardy and resilient in brackish and marine aquaria.

 

[nmonks]

Hi,

I'm not arguing with Ebert or anyone else who has found these puffers to do well in brackish water. There are really two issues:

1. Is it a brackish water fish in the wild.

Answer: No.

2. Does it do best in brackish water in captivity.

Answer: Apparently yes.

Now, without experimenting in an objective way you cannot tell in it is the brackish water helping, or the higher pH, or the buffering caused by the hardness, or the way salt effects the toxicity of nitrite or ammonium, or any other factor.

Simply because one thing (longevity) follows a second (salinity) doesn't imply there is a direct link. They could both be related to some other, as yet unnamed factor. If you read something like Bob Fenner's comments on Fig-8s, you find that his experience is that they do best in light brackish with a calcaerous substrate, implying pH and hardness may be as much a factor as salinity.

There's also the issue that we may not all be talking about the same fish. Populations vary. There are brackish and marine populations of sticklebacks but if I took some from the stream flowing near my house here in Hertfordshire and dumped them in brackish water, they'd die. Even if I adapted them slowly, they'd still die. It could quite easily be that the "official" Figure 8 as reported on by fish scientists isn't the same population as the one importers get their stocks from.

Coming to this as a biologist (admittedly a systematist rather than a fish physiologist) my gut feeling is that the whole Fig-8s in brackish versus freshwater is a lot more complex than we imagine. I think there are a bunch of factors at work.

For example, if the coastal populations of Figure 8s do best in brackish water, but the inland ones do not, then while the advice for keeping them in brackish might work well for the specimens imported from the coast, it would equally doom specimens drawn from inland waters.

I think the most practical solution is to make aquarists aware of the discussion, and aware of the fact that if it doesn't do well in their freshwater tank it may do better with some salt in the water. This is definitely a complicated issue and one that better people than I will hopefully be able to resolve in the future.

Sincerely,

Neale

for the figure8 being brackish, there is considerable evidence for this fish being hardier and healthier in brackish water.

To quote one of the worlds formost experts on pufferfish, Klas Ebert who has been keeping and studying them for over 40 years:

Unfortunately if kept long term in fresh water this species becomes delicate and disease prone.
By contrast, Tetraodon biocellatus has proved hardy and resilient in brackish and marine aquaria.

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[ingo_1978]

I wouldn't be surprised if there was two species of figure 8 to be honest because all the ones we get here has the distinctive 8 like swirls quite spead out. Where as some pictures I see on here have got loads of squiggles and dots and look very different.

These for instance...

http/www.thepufferforum.org/viewtopic.php?t=566

 

[nmonks]

Folks,

The discussion here has been very interesting and enlightening. So that others can share, I've added what I hope is a fair summary to the Brackish Water Aquarium FAQ (see below). I've added a specific credit for this forum. If someone would like their actual name, e-mail, or web site added, then please say so. The FAQ has always been very dependent on people passing on information, though not everyone wants to be explicity credited.

http/homepage.mac.com/nmonks/aquaria/bra...#tetraodontidae

Incidentally, I have also moved the Figure-8 from the list of freshwater puffers to the list of puffers tolerant of a range of salinities, as well as some other editing and tidying up. In particular, have a look at the social behaviour comments and see if you think they're fair.

Please do let me know if you find errors or omissions, and I'll do my best to change things.

Thanks again,

Neale

Does the Figure 8 puffer need salt?

Note: Thanks to the people on the Tropical Fish Forums for this.

At least as far as the scientific literature goes, the figure-8 puffer, Tetraodon biocellatus, is a freshwater fish, not a brackish water one. So in theory at least, it shouldn't need salt and one would expect it to do best in neutral, soft to moderately hard water similar to its natural habitat.

However, many respected and experienced aquarists have found this species to do better in slightly brackish, alkaline water. By "better", they mean the fish lives longer and is less prone to diseases like white spot and fin rot. It isn't known why this is. There are several posibilities though. It may be that the puffer sold as the figure-8 puffer is not the same one as that going by that name among ichthyologists. Alternatively, it could be that aquarium conditions stress the fish in some way and the addition of salt to the water helps to mollify this. Finally, it could be that the fish only periodically inhabits fresh water but needs also to spend time in brackish water as well, and that ichthyologists simply haven't observed this yet, meaning that their distribution data is misleading. It could even be a combination of all these factors.

The bottom line is that these fish probably should be kept in brackish water with a specific gravity of around 1.005.

 

[CFC]

Great stuff!! Hopefully one day the mystery of the figure eight puffer will be solved but until then it is up to responsible hobbiests to share information to make the lives of our fish better.

Nice website by the way, very well presentated and great information.

 

[Pufferpunk]

Actually, Bob F asked me to write (correct) the FW & BW puffer profiles for WWM. A friend of mine, Robert T Recketts (also keeping puffers for over 40 years), did a decade long trial on the T biocellatus, keeping them in varying conditions. His conclusion was also SG of 1.005 was best for their long, healthy life & he has kept one in those conditions for 18+ years. A steady pH of around 8 was also important.