Dwarf puffer with eye protrusion

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1) Your water parameters - pH, Ammonia, Nitrite, Nitrates and salinity (if appropriate). This is by far the most important information you can provide! Do not answer this with "Fine" "Perfect" "ok", that tells us nothing. We need hard numbers.

2) Tank size and a list of ALL inhabitants. Include algae eaters, plecos, everything. We need to know what you have and how big the tank is.

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4) What changes you've made in the tank in the last week or so. Sometimes its the little things that make all the difference.

5) How long the aquarium has been set up, and how did you cycle it? If you don't know what cycling is read this: Fishless Cycling Article and familiarize yourself with all the information. Yes. All of it.

We want to help, and providing this information will go a LONG way to getting a diagnosis and hopeful cure that much faster.

While you wait for assistance:
One of the easiest and best ways to help your fish feel better is clean water! If you are already on a regular water change schedule (50% weekly is recommended) a good step to making your fish more comfortable while waiting for diagnosis/suggestions is to do a large water change immediately. Feel free to repeat daily or as often as you can, clean water is always a good thing! Use of Amquel or Prime as a dechlor may help with any ammonia or nitrite issues, and is highly recommended.

Note - if you do not normally do large water changes, doing a sudden, large water change could shock your fish by suddenly changing their established water chemistry. Clean water is still your first goal, so in this case, do several smaller (10%) water changes over the next day or two before starting any large ones.
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roberamo
Puffer Fry
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Joined: Sat Jan 13, 2018 7:31 pm
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Dwarf puffer with eye protrusion

Post by roberamo »

Hey,

Glad to find this forum! I've recently brought home six dwarf puffers and as I was feeding I noticed one of them had an object protruding from its eye. As soon as I noticed, I recorded it. The video is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DyWCbKdqchc

Basically, I was wondering what could cause this, and whether or not the other inhabitants look affected. They are differing a bit in their coloration, https://i.imgur.com/MDhxNzZ.jpg, https://i.imgur.com/uAv19Oi.jpg and https://i.imgur.com/1NJ2gvS.jpg which I understood is natural. As I'm newly getting into the hobby again, I can't distinguish disease symptoms from natural variation unless it's obvious.

Here's the info:

1) 92 liter (25 gallon) long aquarium with pH 7.5, temp 24 C, ammonia <0.25 ppm, nitrite 0 ppm, nitrate <5 ppm.

2) six juvenile dwarf puffers, four amano shrimps, one assassin snail (so far no interaction with puffers). Feeding frozen bloodworms.

3) Tetra Bactozym and Easy-Life Easystart on start-up and water changes. Tetra Aquasafe as tap water treatment. Did a 25% water change after noticing the symptoms, plan is weekly 25% water changes unless water parameters start to increase.

4) It's a fresh tank with a pre-cycled filter. I've introduced all of the inhabitants and all of the plants over the last week, starting with snail and amano shrimps.

5) I started fishless cycle of the filter in december, using Tetra Tetramin fish food as ammonia source, and the aquarium itself was set up a week ago.
Bleedingheartmommy
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Re: Dwarf puffer with eye protrusion

Post by Bleedingheartmommy »

1.) source? Where did they come from
2) treated for parasites?? If so what did you use and how
3.) are you 100% it’s the eye, it almost looks look a parasite coming out the gills. External and internal parasites are very common in puffers, especially wild caught. I have peas as well and I KNOW how hard it is to get good pics of their flighty butts, can you try and get a closer one of the eye?

TBH the puff looks much healthier than I would have thought, which is a good sign. Are you noticing labored breathing (besides after feeding)? Any red around the eye or the gill? Does the whole thread move at all on its own?
"Genetics loads the gun, and environment pulls the trigger."-Brené Brown
Bleedingheartmommy
Figure 8 Puffer
Posts: 185
Joined: Wed Dec 28, 2016 9:39 pm
My Puffers: Honey (SIP Cantaloupe): C. Travancoricus
Mad Max: P. Cochinchinensis
Apollo: T. Miurus
(SIP Bonnie) Clyde: C. Irrubesco
SIP Orchid
Location (country): USA-Seattle, WA

Re: Dwarf puffer with eye protrusion

Post by Bleedingheartmommy »

Also, you must get that Amonia down. Puffs are extremely sensitive to nitrites and ammonia and should not be put into a tank that isn’t cycled: I would do a 50% water change ASAP and get some SeaChem stability. Keep up the water changes
"Genetics loads the gun, and environment pulls the trigger."-Brené Brown
roberamo
Puffer Fry
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Joined: Sat Jan 13, 2018 7:31 pm
Location (country): Sweden

Re: Dwarf puffer with eye protrusion

Post by roberamo »

Hi, just to update all the puffers are okay and water parameters are good.

It was probably just stress from the initial move that made them a bit on the weak side, it was quite cold outside. They are all active and eating and exploring as they should now. I had to rearrange the aquarium to provide more areas to form territories. I'm happy they have not even looked at the amano shrimps, and I've started breeding live ramshorn, bladder snail and blackworms for them. :)
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Re: Dwarf puffer with eye protrusion

Post by Pufferpunk »

Great news!
You are getting sleepy... you only hear the sound of my voice... you must do water changes... water changes... water changes... water changes...

"The solution to pollution is dilution!"
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