Puffer Health risks?

[HaoleDiver]

On a recent trip to Cozumel, our DM harassed a small puffer until he filled himself up and floated away from the group. I had seen people do it before, so I just kind of disregarded it and went back to my drifting, while one of my dive buddies got enraged. Later on the boat she said that puffers can only fully puff 3-4 times in their lives, so when divers harass them, we'r effectively shortening their life spans. Now, I have no intention of going out and playing dodgeball with scared puffers, but is there any validity to that claim? Is it a limited time-only thing? Should I be scolding all divers that harass them (fortunately, I live in San Jose and dive 95% of my time in Monterey, so its not such an issue for us there)?

 

[Damselfish]

I've never heard 3-4 times in their lives, but I have heard it's stressful on them and they might not be able to do it again right away. If that's true, and they puffed up when someone harrassed them for no good reason, if 5 minutes later something want to make them lunch they'd be in trouble. Even if it's not true, there's just no good reason to go around puffing puffers.

 

[Sideband]

I'm not a biologist or anything like that, but that doesn't even make sense. A defensive reaction that can ONLY be deployed 3 to 4 times in their entire life? I would think that if that were the case then Puffers and any water they lived in would be off limits to diving.

Joe

 

[BungyJumper]

I found this online at http://www.edge-of-reef.com/tetraodontidi/tetraodontidien.htm

Is is clear from a recent study that the power of inflating has dramatic effects on blood circulation (due to the increased internal pressure) and on digestion (due to the stomach change in volume), and it is therefore the last resource, that a puffer fish can use for a limited number of times (7 to 12), to avoid death. For this reason we invite all the divers to not provoke puffer fish "inflation": this means a useless stress for the fish, that significantly reduces its life span.

However, there's no mention of this on other sites, like:

http://www.pufferfish.co.uk/aquaria/species/pufferfish/general/index.htm

I'm not a fish expert and question anything I find online until it can be corroberated with additional sources, so I don't consider this automatically reliable.

 

[herman]

While I can't claim to be an expert, that really does not make any sence. Why would nature design such a poor defense mech. All a predator would have to do is harrass the puffer a few times before eating it. Kind of like building a revolver that you can't reload, shoot 6 times and throw it away. While it may be a little stressful to them I doubt to does any harm except making them dislike divers.

 

[SueMermaid]

While I can't claim to be an expert, that really does not make any sence. Why would nature design such a poor defense mech. All a predator would have to do is harrass the puffer a few times before eating it. Kind of like building a revolver that you can't reload, shoot 6 times and throw it away. While it may be a little stressful to them I doubt to does any harm except making them dislike divers.

They evolved that way, so it actually does make sense. It works for them, apparently, otherwise, they would have gone extinct a long time ago. I had a similar discussion with my boss today and eventually ended the argument by asking him if he was questioning God. :11:

It does do them harm. Stress is a major factor in many physiological processes. You can easily kill a fish by stressing it out.

 

[Sideband]

They evolved that way, so it actually does make sense. It works for them, apparently, otherwise, they would have gone extinct a long time ago. I had a similar discussion with my boss today and eventually ended the argument by asking him if he was questioning God. :11:

It does do them harm. Stress is a major factor in many physiological processes. You can easily kill a fish by stressing it out.

OR, it is a crock and they didn't evolve that way at all, which would explain why they are still around. For an animal to only get stressed a handful of times in its life would be a rare occurance, even in their own habitat. They are obviously a prey fish or they wouldn't need the defense. If they were limited in the use of their defense then other fish could easily have, over time, learned to constantly harass the fish to death. <shrug> Like I said earlier, it doesn't make any sense to me.

Joe

 

[SueMermaid]

Bees can only sting once.

Edited to add: And I am a biologist. I am finding your arguments sorta perplexing.

 

[Rick Murchison]

Bees can only sting once.

But those bees don't reproduce...
But then, perhaps we should look at the hive as the individual... but then the individual can sting many times, as can the queen.
While I don't doubt that puffing up is stressful for a pufferfish, and I don't advocate "puffing" them just to see 'em do it, having observed the entire cycle from unpuffed through puffed to unpuffed again, where the post-puff behavior appears to be (appears may be the operative word here) the same as the pre-puffed - and unfazed by the puffing episode - absent a verifiable study I must conclude the dire warnings of significant life-shortening are a bit (can't resist...) overblown.
Rick

 

[Mako Mark]

Why would nature design such a poor defense mech. .

Think of a gekko that loses its tail?? It is a last resort type of thing. They only do it if tehy thing that there is no alternative to being eaten. In diving it is the bouyant ascent of OOA options.

Kind of like building a revolver that you can't reload, shoot 6 times and throw it away. .

like disposable cameras???

Hey I can just imagine Charlton Heston introducing disposable revolvers in vending machines.. Now that is a scary thought.