Dave

mmmmpuffers I agree with the above posters. A light brackish tank will support 2-3 F8's and some variety with Bumblebee Gobies and some hardy plants. I stress hardy, as once you get up to 1.005 SG, even those will start to die off or cease to grow. Other than that, there are no real puffers that stay brackish water for their life. If you'd like to slowly graduate to a marine tank, a GSP or a Ceylon would be a good choice. They do get larger, so I would only house it as a singleton if the 33g is going to be its home for life. If you'd like to upgrade the size of the tank, Scats, Monos, and Archerfish all graduate to full marine conditions eventually(and they grow very big!) Freshwater puffers are fairly common. Most common being the dwarf puffer. You've got several options in a 33g, with dwarf puffers, irubesso puffers, and all the lurker species(arrowhead puffer, humpback puffer, brown puffer, fang's puffer).

I have one that you can try for free. It may make noise. I believe the noise is just the impeller housing though. Worth a shot if its free?

Epsom Salts are a good laxative for fish.

Maybe you just need to come to the realization that you have really poopy fish! :rofl:

yup, something like that. Here is my sump diagram: #1 Return from the tank. Flex hose in my case #2 Drip Tray. Drilled with 5/32 holes all over except right in the middle, allowing even water distribution over the entire tray. This sits on a few little braces siliconed to the walls of the sump. #3 Thin filter foam that can be rinsed, a precautionary measure to avoid the drip tray from clogging. This also muffles the sound of the return water entering the sump. #4 Bioballs, or in your case, dish scrubbers(I love it!). People have used all sorts of media from green army men to your grandma's old curlers. Basically, you're looking for something with a really big surface area. #5 Eggcrate, found at your local home depot. This sits on a couple of little braces, holding up the media. #6 Heater. #7 A small baffle to discourage any sediment from travelling through the sump, and also eliminates air bubbles if you do ever get any. #8 Stick whatever you want in here. Plants, lava rock, extra filter media, etc. #9 Foam block or fine filter floss as the last measure to keep detrius out of the pump compartment. #10 Pump. To each their own, but I aim for at least 7-8 water turnovers an hour. Read the rating on your pump and see if it will meet your demands with the head pressure. #11 Supply water to the tank. I have this done in hard pvc. I do not have any way of regulating my pump speed, and I didn't want to put a 1/4 turn valve in-line, as I assumed it would be too much stress on the pump, so I cameup with this solution: I show a fine tuning measure that I implemented just on the offhand that I initially didn't drill the driptray holes big enough, or my standpipe couldn't take the flow that the pump was wanting to pump out. Its a return pipe back into the sump, fitted with a 1/4 turn ball valve. This way, if I want to completely cut off flow to the main tank, I can open up the valve and it will just recirculate through the pump. Handy for feeding times and whatnot. If you make allowances in your driptray for major flow, you could even pipe it into there and double-filter the water somewhat before it goes back to the main tank. #12 Notice how the drip tray edge is lower than the actual top of the tank. This is another precautionary measure, allowing for the fact that the drip tray might clog and you are not around to catch the flood. This way, if you either #1 underside the tray, or #2 keep it below the top of the sump, the extra water will just spill down into section #8. This is what my sump is modeled after: http://www.csd.net/~cgadd/aqua/wetdry.htm As others have said on this site, you don't have to have a fancy sump. Anything that will hold water will do. One rubbermaid tub and one stacking drawer set from Wal-Mart will work, as seen in this article: http://www.cichlid-forum.com/articles/diy_wet_dry.php The drawers can hold your media, and if you get the 3 tier drawer unit, you can use the first drawer as your drip tray, your second as your media storage compartment, and remove the 3rd to allow the water to flow into the rest of your sump. El-cheapo, but if it fits under your stand, go for it No one is going to see

I suppose it would depend on the population of the tank. Is the surface visibly agitated or just ripples? I would imagine that it'd be ok as long as regular water changes were kept up as to prevent a biofilm from building up on the surface, impeding the absorbtion of oxygen.

FW nitrates are removed via regular water changes. This is not feasible with saltwater as it would get very expensive very fast if you were doing 50% changes every week The bacteria populations will regulate themselves to the bioload of the tank and will correspondingly put out a proportionate amount of nitrate.

It looks good to me. One thing I will mention though, is the great advantage of a sump is you can make it a trickle filter(wet/dry sump). That is where you would need a spraybar or as I did, a drip tray. The advantage of a trickle filter lies in taking good care of your bacteria. Treat it as if it were your brother. Nitrosomonas and nitrobacter organisms that provide the biofiltration also need oxygen to survive. If they have access to gaseous oxygen rather than relying on the oxygen in the water, they will be performing at their peak. For yours to act as a wet/dry, I'd move the heaters to another compartment, move the bioballs/dish scrubbers(good idea!) to the first compartment, lower the water line a bit, and find some way of dispersing the water. Now that can be anything from a spraybar(effective, but high maintenance as its prone to clogging), a drip tray(easy concept, just takes some fiddling to get the holes the right diameter for the amt of flow you have), or even just something the water splashes onto to disperse the water somewhat over the biofiltration(noisy, but effective). Other points to consider, The plants will require a light source otherwise they will die and become a hindrance rather than a benefit. Have you considered doing a reverse photoperiod if your main tank is going to be planted? You'll avoid the pH shift that way, especially if you use pressurized CO2(which you may need to if you do this as a trickle filter. DIY yeast just doesn't cut it for large tanks or tanks with trickle filters) Plumbing, hard pvc, or soft hose? Hard will cause more noise on your intake into the filter, but doesn't really matter on the return. Is your tank drilled or will you have an overflow box? Syphon break on the return? Otherwise you'll have to be fairly careful of how full you fill the sump. I have a min/max line drawn on mine so I know not to overfill. If the power gets shut off for whatever reason, you don't want to syphon off your tank and flood the sump

You got it! the ACs do a wonderful job of mechanical filtration

I prefer canister filters myself due to the fact that they are virtually silent. No splashing water from the return, and I can place the return where I want it for optimal circulation around the tank. Aquaclear HOB filters are fantastic filters, but I do find that you have to give the impeller a little nudge after an interruption in power. This could be a make-or-break decision for you if you have frequent power outages in your area. I also agree that canister filters are, for the most part, strictly a biological filtration system. I pre-filter my intake with a piece of aquaclear foam to avoid a lot of sludge buildup. I also supplement the filtration with submersible filters in the back corners. These are the primary mechanical filtration workhorses. They get washed out every few days. The Eheim Aquaball series are my favourite as you can position the powerhead to face whichever direction you want. I try to get a circular flow throughout the entire tank, eventually transporting debris to the filter intakes. http://www.eheim.com/aquaball.htm These also will come on after a power interruption. I've had problems with Fluvals in the past in that aspect. edit: I have the previous version of the 2028, the 2228, on my 90g http://www.eheim.com/pro2.htm In short, you want to be practical, but you also want to be effective. There are many choices in filtration as you can see. You just need to make sure that the biological and the mechanical filtration needs are met. However you meet those needs, is your choice

I've been half tempted to just use my regular SLR for tank photos, but the disadvantage of not finding out whether or not the photos turn out untill you develop them just plain sucks. I've got a remote flash that I can use above the tank to avoid glare I just can't ever get the exposure right. After reading the basic aquarium photo section, I may give this a shot again. The only problem I have is getting my fish used to the camera. They are quite shy of anything unfamiliar. Perhaps if I set the tripod up and let them acclimatie to its presence for a few days.

I've pulled pieces of food too large for the fish out of their mouthes, but I've never heard of one going the entire length of the digestive tract. I suppose, like you said, keep an eye on him. As stated, they are herbivores, so hopefully he'll get some digesting done

I'm running short on practical ideas, so I'm looking for a little bit of input. I'd like to build a top for my 90g that will contain a ton of lighting. At least 4, and perhaps 6 flourescent tubes with a ventilation fan and a concave metal reflector to maximize light efficiency. The fan is no problem, and the general structure is easy for me to conceptualize. I'm just trying to figure out how to configure a way to gain access to the tank. Maybe a section of the reflector will have to be removed so if I create a hinged "door" that swings upwards, I'll be able to get my hands in there. That still doesn't seem like a lot of room. Any ideas?

Hey, no problemo The nice thing about electronic ballasts is that you can run even smaller lights on 'em The lights that I use now are the T6 Lightnight Rod flourescent lights from Pisces. Even though they are T6's, which as the general rule goes, should be lower wattage than their larger diameter counterparts, they are higher in wattage and brightness. They are also cheaper than the Hagen Power-Glo lights.

Excellent. Nice puffer too! I am a big fan of FW puffers. The cutcutia is "cute" hehe.

have you ever seen any Carinotetraodon irrubesco or lorteti puffers come through Calgary?

I swap out ballasts at the workplace on a daily basis. Here is what you need to do. easy peasy Cut #4, and insert it into the little slot of the tombstone by #1, as it is done in #3' Install electronic ballast. Red from ballast goes to #1 & #2 Blue from ballast goes to #5 & #6 Blue from ballast goes to #7 & #8 Then you splice your neutral(white), then your hot(black), and you're done. Make sure the fixture is grounded as electronic ballasts tend to be troublesome if they are not. Its always a good idea to put the neutral on first, and then the hot, As then you'd be doing two hot splices, increasing your exposure to electricity. It really doesn't matter though if you're not working on live circuits. You can do it your way as well. This way just minimizes the clutter of wires when you're putting the cover back on. cheers!

Fed-Ex was good to me as well. I did have major problems with UPS though, charging a 30$ brokerage fee on a 20$ item..

That is a tough one. I forgot you showed that over at thepufferforum. I'm pretty sure he unidentified spot is another bitemark. Fang's will usually have a bit of white surrounding the spot, similar to yours. As I see that the bitemarks remain, I imagine that he is not back to 100% health, and the red could be abscent because of this. On the other hand, most Fang's I've seen have a squattier body than your elongated shape. Time will tell I suppose.

Ambient light should work fine unless you're growing plants. Just as long as the fish have a consistent light cycle, they should be ok. When I was building my custom light fixture, my little guys went for about a week with just room light. They seem none the worse for wear. I'm not sure what kind of fixture you have for your 33g though. Most likely it has a starter which can be replaced. Ballasts can be replaced as well, and are not hard to do as a DIY. Just make sure you unplug it before you start

Unless its food, I don't think the puffers will go for them. Two F8's in a 20 would be fine, but even a single GSP will soon outgrow the 20. Besides snails, there is a variety of foods that you can feed puffers that will give them that extra crunch needed for proper dental health. Krill, mussels, cockles, shrimp with the shell on, etc, mostly available at the grocery store. Ghost shrmp, if the puffers are interested, also provide some entertainment for the owner as the puffers devise and execute a plan of attack A varied diet is important for the health of any fish. I recently found this out first-hand. On top of the crunchy foods listed above, I know that blackworms and bloodworms are taken readily. If they do not have the required crunch in their diets, expect to be devling into the world of puffer dentistry... sedating the fish and manually trimming their teeth for them. I think a proper diet is a safer, healthier, and easier way to go.

yah, I got the tank sizes fairly quickly It was the 0.0.4 and so on that I didn't understand. I have seen it in the past but never knew what it meant. Thanks.

I mainly keep puffers and breed apple snails. Unrealted question: What do those numbers mean in your sig?

could you provide a photo for a positive ID? A Fang's puffer, Tetraodon cochinchinensis, will usually have a red spot towards its rear end, and remains closer to 3-4 inches in length. Brown puffers, Tetraodon turgidus, will get quite a bit larger at 6 inches in length and lack the red colouration. I suspect you have the latter if you purchased him at Pisces. I've only ever seen a few true Fang's there. http://www.pufferlist.com/

hmmmm... :w00t: