Checkered Puffer, Sphoeroides testudineus
Checkered Puffer, Sphoeroides testudineus. Fish caught from coastal canal in the greater Boca Raton area, Florida, June 2023. Length: 11 cm (4.3 inches). Catch, photograph and identification courtesy of Chris Moore, Peoria, Arizona.
Checkered Puffer, Sphoeroides testudineus. Fish caught from coastal waters off Sebastian Florida, March 2021. Length: 12 cm (4.7 inches). Catch, photograph and identification courtesy of Ben Cantrell, Sebastian, Florida.
Checkered Puffer, Sphoeroides testudineus. Fish caught from within the John U Lloyd State Park, Fort Lauderdale, Florida, December 2013. Length: 20 cm (7.9 inches). Catch, photograph and identification courtesy of Kenneth Tse, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
Checkered Puffer, Sphoeroides testudineus. Fish caught from coastal waters off Key Largo, Florida, December 2013. Length: 20 cm (7.9 inches). Catch, photograph and identification courtesy of Eli (obsessiveangling.wordpress.com).
Checkered Puffer, Sphoeroides testudineus. Fish caught from coastal waters off Key Largo, Florida, March 2017. Length: 26 cm (10 inches). Catch, photograph, and identification courtesy of Josh Leisen (joshadventures.com), Gaylord, Michigan.
Checkered Puffer, Sphoeroides testudineus. Fish caught from coastal waters off Key Largo, Florida, April 2019. Length: 26 cm (10 inches). Catch, photograph and identification courtesy of Luke Ovgard, Klamath Falls, Oregon.
The Checkered Puffer, Sphoeroides testudineus, is a member of the Puffer or Tetraodontidae Family, and is known in Mexico as botete sapo or simply botete. Globally, there are twenty-three species in the genus Sphoeroides, of which thirteen are found in Mexican waters, eight in the Atlantic and five in the Pacific Ocean.
The Checkered Puffer has a moderately elongated oblong body. They are a pale tan to yellowish color with a polygonal or square network of dark gray or olive lines centered on a bulls-eye pattern on the mid-back in front of the dorsal fin. They have a pair of bars between the eyes, and they have small dark spots on their cheeks and lower sides. Ventrally they are whitish and unmarked. They have dark bands on their caudal fin. Their head is blunt with the eyes set high on the head and the jaws have 4 large, fused, powerful teeth, 2 on the top jaw and 2 on the bottom jaw. Their anal fin has 11 rays with a short base and is found under the last rays of the dorsal fin; their caudal fin is slightly rounded; their dorsal fin has 11 or 12 rays and has a short base and is found at the rear of the body; their pectoral fins have 15 rays;. and, they do not have pelvic fins. Their gill openings are reduced. They are covered with prickles for most of the body. They do not have fin spines, scales, skin spines, or fleshy skin flaps.
The Checkered Puffer is a demersal species that is found in bays, tidal creeks, protected coastal waters, seagrass beds, mangrove swamps, and estuaries and is confined to very shallow waters over sandy and muddy substrate at depths up to 20 m (65 feet) that are between 22oC (72oF) and 27oC (81oF). They are very tolerant of wide ranges of salinities, low pH, low dissolved oxygen and low transparency. They are known to form huge aggregations. They reach a maximum of 39 cm (15 inches) in length and 400 g (0.9 pounds) in weight. They Have the ability to bury themselves in sand and to blow themselves up like balloons, as a defense mechanism to deter predators. They spend the majority of their time at rest in protected areas and only emerge for feeding. They are voracious predators, consuming bivalves and crabs; the juveniles consume gastropods, bivalves and crabs. They are considered to be an important contributor to the food chain. This species is aggressive, and may restrict the feeding ranges of other members of the genus by competitive exclusion. Reproduction is oviparous during annual cycles with each female laying 300,000 to 400,000 eggs that are fertilized by the males. The Checkered Puffer is poorly studied with very limited information available about their lifestyle and behavioral patterns including specific details on age, growth, longevity, movement patterns, diet, habitat use, and reproduction.
The Checkered Puffer is a fairly easy fish to identify due to its coloration and markings. They are similar in shape and appearance to the Bandtail Puffer, Spoeroides spengleri, the Least Puffer, Spoeroides parvus, the Marbled Puffer, Sphoeroides dorsalis, and the Southern Puffer, Sphoeroides nephelus, all of which lack the network pattern of lines on the back.
The Checkered Puffer is a resident of all Mexican waters of the Atlantic Ocean including the Gulf of Mexico and the east coast of the Yucatán Peninsula in the Caribbean. They are abundant in the Gulf of Mexico from the Flower Garden Banks and surrounding area, and from Laguna Madre and Tuxpan, Veracruz along the northern Yucatán Peninsula including the Rio Largartos Estuary.
From a conservation perspective the Checkered Puffer is currently considered to be of Least Concern with stable, widely distributed populations. However, their long-term survival is threatened by human development and habitat destruction. They are caught infrequently via seines, traps, and hook-and-line. Due to their toxicity they are a banned fish in the State of Florida. They are utilized as an economical source to poison dogs and cats. They contain tetrodotoxin a key ingredient in the poison utilized to create Haitian Zombies. Note: Like many Puffers, the Checkered Puffer is reputed to be highly poisonous, even fatal, if eaten, due to the possible presence of the potent neurotoxins saxitoxin and/or tetrodotoxin, which is found in their skin, viscera, and gonads and is believed to protect them from predation by larger fish.