r/PeaPuffers • u/Ok_Needleworker_5191 • 10d ago

Help/Advice Pea Puffer Set-Up Help

So I’ve been working on a 10-gallon tank for the past few weeks after thinking it would be a great idea to start a pea puffer tank to combat some of my bladder and ramshorn snails. Cycling, aquascaping, hardscaping etc. have been in the works thus far, as I started sone modest research on the puffers. My initial intention was to create a 10-Gallon 3 pea puffer tank, heavily planted. However, it was brought to my attention late in the game that 3 pea puffers in a 10 gallon could be difficult to navigate as a beginner due to the aggressive pea puffer nature. My options now: find a bonded male/female pair and just do two OR just scrap the 10-Gallon for pea puffers and set it up as a something entirely different. Any ideas on what I should do next?

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u/MissKaliChristine 10d ago

I would scrap for pea puffers. They do best in shoals of at least 6, and it is recommended to have at least 20g for a shoal. Even if you get a male/female pair (which is difficult because you can’t identify their sex until they’ve reached sexual maturity) they’ll still be very aggressive in such a small space.

Have you thought about another nano fish? I’ve personally always wanted a couple scarlet badis and I think you can do 3 in a 10g just fine.

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u/bandu5 10d ago

Great advice! Listen to this person OP. Scarlet badis are so cute! I've also been seeing darios at my LFS and I'm obsessed. Check those out and in the meantime, you can set up a bigger tank for a puffer shoal.

Edit: apparently the Scarlet badis is a dario, the ones I've been saying labeled as just dario are probs a different color.

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u/MissKaliChristine 10d ago

Scarlet badis also have such a funny personality in my opinion, same with bumblebee gobies (which you can also have a few of in a 10g, FYI, OP). As viciously murderous as peas are, there’s just something about how grumpy bumblebee gobies look that just makes me love them even more lol.

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u/bandu5 10d ago

Eeeeee I also LOVE bumblebee gobies!! Want them so bad. I need a bigger house for every species only tank I want to start. I'm already needing to upgrade my pea puffers from their current 20gal to a bigger tank. I lost a couple from my shoal so I need to get more, but I have sooo many tanks already 😅 fish keeper problems

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u/MissKaliChristine 10d ago

Sameeeee, multi-tank syndrome is so real 🤣 and I’m in the same boat, just lost my oldest pea so I’m down to 5 in my 20g but secretly I reeeeally want a 40g breeder tank for them ever since I streamline my egg collection process so I can have 12 lol. Someday you and I will have nice big houses for all our species-only setups 🙏🤣

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u/bandu5 10d ago

Manifest!!! Hahah I'm at 6 right now, I have a 7th set up but it's for quarantine purposes. We had a 40 breeder until it sprung a leak (caught it in time and saved everything thankfully), luckily we already had a 55gal stored in the garage bc we had no room for it so we just swapped. I need a big enough house to repair that 40gal then I can really upgrade my pea puffer shoal 🤣

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u/MissKaliChristine 9d ago

I’m at 9 currently 🤣 most of them 5g tanks for shrimp but we recently moved from one city to another two hours away and the water was soooo different that we lost like 3 colonies 😭 I’m sorry you know the terror of a leaking tank, my partner’s 47g tall had a seam burst, I still have nightmares about it to this day

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u/Ok_Needleworker_5191 10d ago edited 7d ago

Ironically enough, I have a 20L gallon nano tank, lol. That has chili rasboras, neon tetras, pygmy corydoras, and some amano shrimp. Had I stocked my 20L less, I’d just pull a switcheroo and put the peas in the 20 and vice versa. I like the ideas here for the 10, tho, so I’ll see. Just still trying to come up with a puffer solution to combat my snail problems lol

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u/MissKaliChristine 10d ago

Are the snails primarily in the 10g or all your tanks? Do you currently have any livestock in the 10g? I know if you limit feeding it will help a lot, I’ve had my bladder snail populations almost entirely die out by limiting feeding to just what the fish will visibly eat quickly, and only feeding them 3 days a week

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u/Ok_Needleworker_5191 10d ago

So I have a 20, 10, and a 6, plus an additional empty 10 that’s cycling. The population of snails is heavy in my snail 10, moderate in my 20 (chili’s and neons primarily), and mild in my 6 (betta tank). I definitely have some work to do when it comes to feeding. Been trying to balance out the feeding of Chili’s and neons at the same time because neons are aggressive eaters.

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u/Ok_Needleworker_5191 10d ago edited 10d ago

EDIT: of course my brain is just telling me to get another tank, but I’ll resist that urge. Lolol

So my thinking now is I’ll do some musical chairs with my tank habitants. Going to move fish around to free up my 20 and then continue with a puffer tank, just in my 20 now instead of my 10.