Yellow cube boxfish

[TonyD]

I saw a yellow cube boxfish in a lfs. I've read that if they are stressed, they will release toxins into the tank and kill everything. Anyone with experience keeping this type of fish?

[khalid]

Great cool fish but not a good idea if you have powerful powerheads. They are not powerful swimmers and I lost mine to the vortec. :(

[TonyD]

Was that the only fish you had or did you have other fish and it killed everything in the tank? I have a porc puffer in the tank that took me awhile to find.

[Vadim]

If it was me, i'd keep the boxfish by itself in the tank. It has a chance of killing other fish and picking at corals. I've looked into getting a boxfish, never did, because of those reasons.

[davelin315]

The boxfish will all release toxins when they get stressed or die, but it's hard to say whether they will actually nuke your tank or not. Obviously if it's a smaller fish, less toxins to release, but you never know what will happen.

 

I had a blue box fish in my tank in college (neatest fish ever), Ostracion meleagris meleagris, which was the life of the party. It would swim around and squirt water out of the tank when it wanted my attention or food and was so docile that I could reach in and touch it without it freaking out, almost like a dog. Anyway, this was in a 55 gallon tank and it eventually died in the tank without killing any of the other fish.

 

Dandy7200 had a cowfish in his tank that disappeared out of the blue and as far as I know, his livestock didn't crash as a result of it disappearing/dying.

 

That said, it could happen...

[TonyD]

It would go in a FOWLR tank with the porcupine puffer. I got the puffer for my wife so if my boxfish nuked the tank, she'd be pissed. I've generally stayed away because of the toxins, but another thread with the sea apple said people have had it and died without nuking a tank. It seems like it's hit or miss.

[Chad]

It is more of understanding both the risk and means transferring the toxin to your system. I am not sure what that means is with boxfish for sure, yet I suspect that the fish itself is poisonous with perhaps some excretion as a taste related means of identifying the poison (IIRC). This would mean (in my hypothetical, what I think world) that disrupting the gland is what would cause toxin release, for example severe damage caused by another fish or piece of equipment or perhaps the decay of the fish to the point where the gland is compromised.

 

Anyway, my whole point to all this is understand what, specifically, the risk is, how that risk would cause a consequence in your system and then determine if you are willing to accept the risk.

[davelin315]

With the boxfish, it can secrete the toxins through its skin.

 

I'd avoid putting it with a porcupine puffer - they have a tendency to sample things and I personally don't think it would be a good combination having had boxfish and porc puffers.

[TonyD]

Since the puffer tank is really "her" tank (although I take care of it), I'm going to opt out of adding the boxfish and potentially killing her puffer.

 

Thanks for all of the advice.

[khalid]

Was that the only fish you had or did you have other fish and it killed everything in the tank? I have a porc puffer in the tank that took me awhile to find.

 

Yup had some other fish in the tank but nothing aggressive and nothing was affected by the small box fishes death. He was real cool and it was sad when he died. I would only get another one if I had a dedicated tank since I don't think I would take the risk again.