How many of you keep spiny puffer's or cowfish???

[Lynn]

Just wondering how many of you keep a spiny puffer or longhorn cowfish or a helmet cowfish? If so, do you have them in your reeftank or a FO tank. Also, how large have they grown??
thanks

 

[Anonymous]

Never kept in my own tanks, but have had experience with them. You have to be careful with the puffs in a reef tank. Reef implies certain inverts, which the puffs are definitely wont to eat. With the box/cowfishes you have a bit more leeway, especially in regards to growth as they don't seem to grow as quickly as the puffs. Sorry this wasn't more along the lines of what you're looking for, but it does give the thread a bump, eh?

 

[Anonymous]

Lynn, I have seen several instances of puffers being kept in reef tanks (burrfish and porcupines) on another board (RC). I wouldn't do it but there are some that get away with it. Cowfish I'd be more worried about it nuking the tank though I hear this is a pretty rare occurrence. Biggest worry would be size most of these fish can get fairly large over the long haul and are not the most graceful thing to have in a nicely decorated reef

 

[danmhippo]

Both could get quite large in the typical reef tank. I'd stay away from puffers in reef setting especially there are fish smaller enough to be its appetizers. Cow fish, due to their mouth size and slow growth rate, are more suitable for reef tank. I've had several cowfish and I've yet experienced them nuking the tank at death. I've had cowfish that died in my tank, and I have not witnessed the phenomenom. Spiney puffers, on the other hand grow very fast.

I had the spiny puffer back when the tank was FO. It was kept with triggers, snowflake, and lionfish. At the time, it was fed with feeder crab, fresh seafood, krill and occassional treat of earthworms. It quickly grow from 1" body size to over 6" in 18 months.