High intelligence, personality and impressive expansion abilities have catapulted Jackson to being the “teacher’s pet” in school – a school of fish that is.

“A lot of people have fish, but you never really hear them call the fish pets; it’s always, ‘I have fish,’” owner Blakely Fountain, a graduate student in the public health school, said. “But, I think that pufferfish are the one species that can really be called a pet because they are so intelligent and friendly.”

A part-time fish breeder, Fountain said Jackson is the most personable fish he’s owned.

Jackson even can recognize Fountain as his owner when he enters the room, as opposed to merely realizing that a human is on the other side of the glass. He even will come to the surface and let Fountain pet his smooth, spineless body on occasion.

“Whenever I walk into the room, he will be doing whatever and swimming, but as soon as he sees that it is me, he will stop and come to the side to examine me and look at my face,” the 23-year-old from Vidalia said.

“Most fish just come to the top of the tank when a person is outside because they think they have food, but I am sure that Jackson really knows that it is me.”

In addition to facial recognition, Jackson also is able to develop methods in order to solve problems such as how to eat his favorite food, crayfish, without being injured by their large

pinchers.

“He usually eats crayfish, snails and earthworms, but the crayfish will fight back and he has developed methods for how to disarm them,” he said. “He will come at them from the side to bite the pinchers off, eat him from the tail up or even bite at his head where his brain is so he can eat him.”

According to Fountain, if the food is too fast for him to catch, such as feeder fish, Jackson will try a few times and then ignore them until it gets dark. He instinctively knows the fish will be unable to see clearly in the dark environment and cannot protect themselves.

Snails, his second favorite food, also present Jackson with an opportunity to show off how developed his brain and eyes. The snails are almost identical to the pebbles that cover the bottom of his 100-gallon tank.

“Its amazing that he has such good eyesight that he can tell that a snail is a snail and not a pebble because I hardly can when they are in their shell,” Fountain said. “But he will pick them out, look them over and find the weakest part of the shell to bite.”

Earthworms make up the rest of this red and orange-striped puffer’s diet, but they can be served only in moderation. Their lack of a hard shell to crunch on during the meal makes it difficult for Jackson to grind down his sharp front teeth. According to Fountain, if his teeth are not ground down by food, his mouth may become stuck shut.

If this happened, although it never has, he would have to be placed in a special solution to make him fall asleep so he could be taken out of the tank and have his teeth filed down by hand.

But, ensuring a proper diet for dental reasons is not the only special monitoring Fountain must do in order to keep Jackson healthy. He also must ensure that Jackson’s puff is filled with water and not air when cleaning the tanks. Otherwise, it could be the last puff that Jackson ever has.

“Puffer fish puff as a defense mechanism or when they are stressed, and Jackson will do it sometimes when I am trying to get him out of the tank or something,” he said. “I have to make sure that he puffs with water and not air because sometimes puffer fish are unable to get the air out of their bodies, and they can die from it.”

The most widely known puffer fish reaction, puffing to show stress or fear, is actually much less common than merely changing or flashing colors to show mood.

“He can actually change his color patterns from his normal color, olive with stripes, and turn darker or lighter, red or no red, and from blotchy to really clean lines,” he said. “When he is attacking food he turns darker and he will flash his colors in a pattern.”