TCMAS : Articles : Puffy & Mr. Nasty

Even though I am fascinated and thoroughly enjoy the reefkeeping part of our hobby, I must admit that saltwater fish are my first love. For it may be true that corals are some of the most beautiful living specimens in the oceans, I have yet to find one that has a personality. The following story is about two of my fish who have lots of personality (mostly bad). “Puffy” a stupid stars and stripes puffer and “Mr. Nasty”, his buddy, a clown trigger.

My wife purchased my stars and stripes puffer for me in 1993 from Something Fishy. He was about 3 inches long. My wife immediately took a liking to him and named him “Puffy”. I liked the idea because it got her to take a little interest in my hobby when she had no interest before.

On a steady diet of squid, shrimp and greenshell mussels, Puffy began to grow and grow. He is now about 12 inches long with a girth of about 18 inches! Puffy has been a challenge to me because he could quite possibly be the stupidest fish on earth. My thoughts concerning his stupidity were confirmed when I had friends tell me they would not come over to feed my fish because “That puffer is too damn stupid!”

Feeding Puffy is difficult. Even though he can hold his own with the aggressive fish he has been housed with over the years (triggers, groupers, sharks, etc.) he has trouble competing for food. He has to be fed with a feeder stick. Not because he is slow, but because he spends most of his time trying to grab the reflection of the food in the glass. One night, I dropped a piece of squid behind him. Although the food landed directly behind him, he only saw the reflection in the glass in front of him. For 25 minutes, he fiercely smashed his nose against the glass and bit his parrot beak-like teeth against the glass making a loud scraping noise. He never did find the squid. Mr. Nasty (his tank buddy) came over and took the food for himself.

Puffy also he has a habit of spitting water at you when the tank lid is open for feeding. It isn't just a little bit of water either. He can completely soak the front of your shirt in one spit! I realize that this is natural for puffers since they do this in the wild to knock insects off tree branches into the water for feeding. But c'mon, does it make sense to anger the guy who is feeding you to the point that you get NO FOOD for the day?

I must admit that if it weren't for my wife, I would have gotten rid of this “big blob” a long time ago. Luckily for me, he served a very valuable purpose recently. Puffy and Mr. Nasty were housed together in a 75-gallon tank that was way too small for such large fish. I informed my wife that we had to either get rid of Puffy or buy a bigger tank. Since getting rid of her favorite fish was out of the question, I was able to use that stupid fish as an excuse to buy another 125-gallon tank. I guess there is a useful purpose for a seemingly worthless creature!

Mr. Nasty, my clown trigger was purchased at Something Fishy in 1995. He was about 5-6 inches long and had nice coloration. At the fish store, he was housed in a very large tank all by himself. I asked the storekeeper why he was all by himself. They told me that Mr. Nasty had killed every thing they had tried to put in the tank with him, even an undulating trigger. For those of you who are unfamiliar with saltwater fish, the undulating trigger is quite possibly one of the nastiest saltwater fishes. (I owned one once but that is a story for another time). I was pretty excited. I thought I could buy Mr. Nasty and put him in the same tank with my stupid puffer. With any luck, Puffy would be dead by sundown and I could blame it on the trigger. My wife would have no reason to blame me. So Mr. Nasty came home with me. After 6 years, I still haven't had the success I was hoping for. As a matter of fact, Puffy and Mr. Nasty seem to get along like buddies. How pathetic!! To this day, Mr. Nasty is not very concerned about his “tankmates”.

He isn't too happy about foreign objects in his tank though. He has bitten my hand and arm several times and has chewed up pump wires, skimmer boxes, etc.… One day I was feeding my fish in a tank across the room when I heard a strange noise. It sounded like a mantis shrimp clicking against glass. I looked over at Mr. Nasty's tank and to my amazement, he had picked up a piece of coral decoration about 4 inches square in his mouth. At the time, he was only about 8 inches long. He was ramming the coral against the front of the aquarium glass. I can only assume that he was trying to break his way out. I am not sure but isn't the use of “tools” a sign of higher intelligence?

One other incident with Mr. Nasty, I used to have a hang-on Amiracle venturi protein skimmer on his tank. The skimmer worked okay but the air inlet hose (a little black hose about 4 inches long) kept disappearing. I would search and search but could never find it. So, I would cut another piece and fit it to the skimmer. Then that one would be missing so I would replace it. This kept happening over the course of about 6 months. I just couldn't figure it out. Then, one day while I was doing a water change I found 7 or 8 little black hoses jammed under a big rock in Mr. Nasty's cave. Apparently, he was saving them for a rainy day (for what, I don't know).

In conclusion, I must say that these two fish have tried my patience, and I have occasionally wanted to get rid of them. But then, they do something that makes me laugh. I have to admit they do have personality and provide me with some entertainment. Some of my friends never ask me about my corals and reef tank but they always seem to be interested in my puffer and obnoxious clown trigger.

Scott Harvieux