The Puffer Forum

Ok guys I have an emergency on my hands need serious help. I'll give as much info as possible in hopes it will help sorry if it's to much. To start tank is a 90 gallon its been set up and running for 2 or 3 years now. Fresh water community tank so I usually keep water as neutral as possible. Tank mates are upside cat, vampire tetra and 3 parrots. I got a pair of avocado puffers on the 21st October, it was my bday so gf got them for me since I had been eyeing them at the local shop for about 2 months. Took them home acclimated them put them in tank and all seemed well. They were doin great, eating well and everything that was until about Tuesday or Wednesday I woke up and noticed the bigger of the pair of puffers was staying at top of tank and his fins were really rotted and beat up looking. so I tested the water and saw I had a major drop in ph and kh. So after goin to the local place and figureing it out with the guy there I started slowly fixing my water over the next couple of days with alkaline buffer and ph booster and also added 2 tsps per g salt sea salt. Got everything back to neutral (7.0 ph, 8 kh, 0 amonia 0 nitrite). nitrates were slightly high but I got ph and kh neutral first and did 30% water change and cleared that up). That was two almost three days ago now. the one puffer is still looking bad, even worse as of tonight honestly. The other was not affected at all, none of my other fish were. So tonight I took him out of the main tank and set up a little 2.5g that I had layin around filled it with water from the main tank and treat it with extra salt and a little pimafix, metafix and a little bit of Maracyn. Also i almost forgot when I was floating a bag of feeders in the tank a few days ago I noticed holes in the bag when I removed it clearly from the puffers so I'm not sure if he maybe injested some of the plastic and that could be what's causing all this for him. I'm not sure if I left anything out. I can upload pics or vids whatever will help save this little guy. I feel horrible. Thanks in advance for any help or info.

I'm sorry to hear you have a sick puffer. These are Auriglobus modestus? Very cool & rare fish!
I'm afraid your fish does not belong with any tank mates & will murder ALL of them in due time. The fact that your tank is so large, is probably why they haven't started their murderous rampage yet.

I can't really tell what is wrong with your fish from your description, other than it sounds bacterial Many fish develop issues due to stress. Adding marine salt to your tank is definitely the wrong move, as none of your fish are brackish & some of the species you keep actually prefer the opposite water. Also, stop with the buffer/booster, as that will only cause severe pH swings which is worse than the fish adjusting to the pH of your tap water (which is what?) You say nitrate was high. How high? High nitrate is cause by lack of proper water changes (50% weekly) while cleaning substrate & a dirty filter.

As far as treating your fish:
How is the quarantine tank cycled? Adding water from your main tank won't do it. You need cycled filter media in that tank's filter.
How big is the fish? 2.5g could cause more stress to the fish.
What do you mean by a "little" Maracyn/Pimafish/Melafix? Are you using the recommended dose?
Feeders??? What for?

Hey sorry I'm just writing back now. I didn't see that anyone answered me. I got some help from a person at the local store. She suggested that I treat him with metroplex and kanaplex. Surprisingly he is still hanging in there right now but doesn't look any better as of yet. Today was the second dosage of the metro and kana plea. He still hasn't eaten anything. Last night he had a long white string with what looked like white beads on it coming out of his anus. His rear fin is basically just a nub at this point and all red. He mostly just stays at top of water in one spot breathing heavily.

As far as the qt and water parameters...
I moved him from main tank to qt.
Qt is 2.5 gallon bow font I used to have a beta in. I didn't have it setup as a qt though. So I cleaned it really good and filled it with water from the main tank. I put a bunch of my sand substrate in a piece of panty hose and placed that in the bottom of tank to help keep up the biological filter and put a new piece of cotton in the filter. I didn't want to stress the fish worse by letting new water and filter cycle, he would not have survived it. So far that part worked out good. The water parameters are still good and holding steady.

And Water parameters are...
ph 7.0, kh 11 (went up because i added salt), ammo 0, nitrite 0, nitrates I haven't tested cuz I can't seem to find the bottle tonight for some reason but they should be ok because I did the 30% water change right before I moved him from main tank to qt.

Oh and I forgot the water temp in qt is 84

You need floss from your established filter.
library/hospital/qtine/
I would treat with Kanaplex & Paraguard. Add 1 tbsp salt. You're going to need to do WC every day in a tank that small.

I'm sorry floss is what I meant, that is what I put in the qt filter along with the sack of sand from main tank. Levels have been holding steady but I did a 50% water change in qt last night just to be on safe side. I've been treating him with about half a measure spoon each of the Kanaplex and Metroplex. I don't see any change in his fins or behavior good or bad. He has pooped out a decent amount of white strings and white dots on bottom of qt. I vacumed it all out last night and more there again today....I could really use some info on exactly how I should be handling this situation. The directions on all the bottles of different stuff is all so confusing. I really could use a step by step guide on what to do. So much different info on the Internet and local places I'm not sure what to do anymore. Doesn't seem like anything is helping, Im surprised he's held on this long honestly. I'm not sure how much he has left in him especially with no eating for like 5 days now. His tank mates in the main tank (mostly the of avocado) looks like they have what ever he has. The other puffer fins are starting to look a little rotted and one fin sometimes sticks to his body. The parrots look like they have a little white slime dots on their rear fins. Everyone is eating fine and I have been treating the main tank also this whole time with the kanaplex and metroplex so I'm not sure why it looks like it's spreading. All I can do right now is watch everything closely I'm not sure what else to do.

You're going to need to post photos for a better ID of the disease & how to treat. If you have Facebook, there is good advice here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/220024505125640/