Bad luck, maybe but not a failure (edited by SG)

Oh no! Sick fish?! Come here and see if someone can help!
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Since this board has been up, we have found there are several questions that routinely get asked in order to help diagnose problems. If you can have that information to begin with in your post, we'll be able to help right away (if we can!) without having to wait for you to post the info we need.

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.

3) Feeding, water change schedule and a list of all products you are using or have added to the tank (examples: Cycle, Amquel, salt, etc)

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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lunarflame
Puffer Fry
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Bad luck, maybe but not a failure (edited by SG)

Post by lunarflame »

Maybe I'm being too hard on myself, but I feel so incredibly terrible.

You see, my F-8 puffer, whom I had for only 2 months, died this morning. I cannot, for the life of me figure out why. He seemed completly fine. There are so many things of course, that could have gone wrong, but I don't know what.

I have never been this upset over a fish, ever. All of my other tanks are flourishing.. why did my Bumble die? I feel like such a failure. I feel so terrible that I couldn't care for him properly.

My boyfriend wants to get another puff, but I don't know if I can bring myself to it. If I could only keep him alive for two months, why should i get another one?

:(
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Pamela
Green Spotted Puffer
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Post by Pamela »

So sorry about that.
Can someone move this to the hospital forum?
Ok, Lunarflame...before you dismantle the tank, can you get us the water params, feeding and water change schedule, tankmates...all the details of the tank, and we'll try and work out what happened to Bumble so's you can prevent it happening again.
Everyone here has lost at least one puffer, so don't beat yourself up. It's hard not to, but you can't control these things, and fish do die for unknown reasons sometimes. However, if we can work out what it was, then you'll have learnt something that'll make you a better fishkeeper in the future.
Sorry for your loss.
Pami.
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lunarflame
Puffer Fry
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Post by lunarflame »

Ammonia 0, nitrites 0.

Ph 7.2, SG 1.005

He was fed 3 snails every other day. I believe that on my other post, we figured out that he likely had an internal parasite.

:(
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lunarflame
Puffer Fry
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Post by lunarflame »

My LPS just got more f8's in, and they are in quarentine.

How should i ensure that a new puffer dosent have internal parasites? how do i treat them?
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Post by Pufferpunk »

Even a nice fat puffer in the store could show signs of IPs weeks or even months later, so it's hard to tell, but definately start out w/a fat, alert, happy-looking puffer.

See: http://www.thepufferforum.org/viewtopic.php?t=7
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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Steelgeek
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Post by Steelgeek »

Ok, I used my admin powers, hopefully for good, since I didn't like the title of that post since it was untrue.
Bad luck, and yes, ignorance, but not failure.
It's obvious you care and you are learning and asking the right questions.
We all know how you feel, having been there ourselves when we lost our puffers, and let me tell you a LOT of us here have lost our first few puffers before learning how to take care of them.
The rare and elusive SteelGeek has been known to cause great damage to his environs...
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RTR
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Post by RTR »

And for that matter, we still lose fish. When you deal with wild caught specimens, you cannot save them all. But when you get one established and stable, they are your buddy for a l_o_n_g time. I have never regreted a fish that I brought home, I only regret the ones that I did not, or could not or would not get.
Where's the fish? - Neptune
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lunarflame
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Post by lunarflame »

thanks for the support everyone. I am getting over my loss, and realizing that I did what I could with what i knew. Im glad I know better now.

I don't know when I will get anotehr puff, but I know I will someday, and when I do, I will know even more on how to properly care for it.
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