HELP!! Pufferfish Teeth
 

I noticed today that my green spotted puffer broke half of his tooth, to be more specific the left side. His teeth are also getting long, and that has me worried. So two questions, one, will he be fine having broken his tooth in half, and two, what should I do about his long teeth. Any suggestions are welcome.

Thanks for the help

Simon

I've seen puffers that grow teeth so long that they can barely eat anything. I fed mine shrimp tails. Very little meat inside. So it had to chew through the tuff outer shell and work hard for it's food. I only had mine for a year so I don't know about the long term affects. There might be a way to subdue a puffer safely with chemicals and take a file to shave down the teeth.

Does the puffer typically nibble on the rock in your tank - if so it's a good sign that it's taking care of itself. Puffers need to constantly nibble on rock or shells to keep their teeth from growing too long. For yours, I wouldn't worry about the chipped tooth, but you may want to include some hard shelled items in your food to help wear down the other tooth. Sometimes it helps to leave some rock rubble in there for the puffers to gnaw on.

I currently have a porcupine puffer and i put a few small snails in every week... occasionally they actually crush through the shells and eat but most of them just get gnawed on. On a regular basis i feed mine frozen krill and silversides and i have never had an issue with teeth.

talk to Kelly Jedliki over on the marine depot forums, she is a fish expert there and the one person that i personally know that has actually sedated a puffer and done some dental work to them. IMHO, she would be you very best bet to on puffers, her name there is "pufferqueen"