what does it mean if a gsp loses his colors

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Read this before posting!!

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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SharkBait
Puffer Fry
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Joined: Fri Sep 04, 2009 10:54 pm

what does it mean if a gsp loses his colors

Post by SharkBait »

what does it mean if a gsp loses his colors ?
like his green becomes white or light green~yellow
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marksrush
Fahaka Puffer
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My Puffers: One GSP.
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Location: Raymore, Missouri USA

Re: what does it mean if a gsp loses his colors

Post by marksrush »

First thing that comes to mind is that he was or is sleeping. I see this fading and lightening of colors all the time, especially in my Ceylon puffer, who seems to change colors more than a chameleon - and it's mainly when he's been sleeping down at the bottom of the tank in his favorite resting spot. The time to worry is when your GSP turns dark olive with black sides and belly.
SharkBait
Puffer Fry
Posts: 35
Joined: Fri Sep 04, 2009 10:54 pm

Re: what does it mean if a gsp loses his colors

Post by SharkBait »

he has blacksides in the morning but no black belly
his blacksides goes alway at dark
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marksrush
Fahaka Puffer
Posts: 856
Joined: Sat Sep 13, 2008 8:10 pm
Gender: Male
My Puffers: One GSP.
Location (country): USA
Location: Raymore, Missouri USA

Re: what does it mean if a gsp loses his colors

Post by marksrush »

Black anywhere on a GSP is usually not good. Up at the top of the page, there is a pink area where it tells you what information to give us, so get that all together and post it here.
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Myaj
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Re: what does it mean if a gsp loses his colors

Post by Myaj »

Some puffers go nocturnal too.. they are used to being out and about at nighttime and will go into "hiding colors" during the day. Generally they will switch over to a normal schedule given enough time. I've had GSP's in the past that hid all day but during the night you could hear them crunching snails and sucking them out of their shells.. quite disturbing when you are trying to sleep!

If the puffer's weight is good, generally I don't worry too much about odd colors, each one is unique and some tend to stay darker, some lighter.. but if its skinny or having skin lesions or anything like that, then further investigation is required.

But of course, when in doubt, clean water can only help! ;)
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