Do pea puffers eat micro organisms/algea?

[Bluebellie]

I currently have 4 pea puffers in a tank.
I feed them snails through tongs. Two of the pea puffers (two girls) eat from the tongs. The male eats it when I drop the snail (he is tong shy).

The fourth pea puffer is my latest addition. She has been around with me for about 4 months. During feeding time, unlike my other three, she does not come out. I would say she stays hidden most of the day. I see her maybe once a week ( I have to try very hard to find her , I lean my head against the glass just to make sure she is still alive).
Every time I see her, she has a very full belly. She actually looks very nice and healthy, and is active the times I see her.

I just wonder where she is eating. There’s nothing else inside the tank beside them, plants and algea. When I feed the others, nothing is left over, and I don’t leave extra food out. Aside from the snail I feed them everyday, nothing gets put in. Where is she getting her food? Her belly is fat, and she hasn’t died. She is also growing ( I got her very small, now she’s almost as big as the others). She must be eating. Do they eat algea?

 

[Kribensis27]

They don't really touch algae or biofilm. They're carnivores, and don't often eat anything that isn't live or frozen. She must be finding some scraps from feeding, or maybe you have MTS and just don't know it yet .

 

[Bluebellie]

They don't really touch algae or biofilm. They're carnivores, and rarely eat anything that isn't live or frozen. She must be finding some scraps from feeding, or maybe you have MTS and just don't know it yet .

Possibly. Didn’t really think it might be that since I don’t see any snails.

I have put snails in there though. Originally I set up the tank with ramshorns and figured I let them populate and then introduce the puffers. I thought the tank would be self sustaining. I did that and they wiped everyone out within a week. Had to clean the tank and do many water changes (because of the dead snails and ammonia spikes). That was a bad idea. Anyways once the tank settled back to normal, I tried again but with Malaysian trumpet snails ( since they burrow themselves, maybe hey wouldn’t be hunted so fast). Since the first day I placed them, I haven’t seen them again

I was thinking they ate them or something. My other tanks with Malaysian snails I see a couple everyday, so I thought if i haven’t seen any in this one, they might be gone (I placed them over a year ago). So a year without any sight of them.

 

[Kribensis27]

Well, you might still have the trumpet snails. They can live their entire lives under the substrate. You might not be seeing them because the puffers eat any that emerge. That would keep the population low enough to go completely unseen, yet still sustain one of the puffers.

 

[aquachris]

I would bet she's the one keeping your MTS in check lol..

Would love to see some pics, I'm love pea puffers!

 

[Bluebellie]

I would bet she's the one keeping your MTS in check lol..

Would love to see some pics, I'm love pea puffers!

I have no recent pictures, but here’s a video of today’s feeding :

I would bet she's the one keeping your MTS in check lol..

Would love to see some pics, I'm love pea puffers!

I have no resent pictures, but here is today’s feeding ( ignore the ugly plants, I Have no clue what’s going on with my dwarf sags).
There’s the two bigger girls munching, and the boy. You can see he is shy, he was just staring at me with the camera.
Streamable Video
The video is during feeding, the photo after feeding (with their big bellies). The baby, like always, nowhere to be found. I saw her this morning though for a bit.

 

[aquachris]

I love watching these little guys eat.. they are so funny!