finally got a fahaka

[we_tigers]

and well I'm very happy.
I'm sure those who own one knows what I'm talking about.

He/She is about 4", by itself in a 90G but that will be upgraded appropriately.

Got him/her last Friday, but has only nipped on krill.. A couple of times.

I guess it's normal for them to be shy eaters while they settling down? Should I try garlic?

I'm not worried yet because it's still very round figured.. How long until I should be worried?

Seems to be 50% swimming around exploring, 50% shy hiding behind driftwood for behaviour.

I guess I'm asking you all how you got your new fahaka settle down quicker.

[marksrush]

First of all, its activity level seems pretty normal. It's also not uncommon for it to take puffers a while before they eat...on the other hand, it's also not uncommon for them to be voracious right from the start - it just depends on the puffer. What all have you offered it in terms of food items? I don't think you need to resort to garlic just yet, but it certainly won't hurt if you're worried. The fact that it's got a rounded tummy suggests that it could probably go without food for several more days without any negative effects.

This is a cycled tank you put it in, right? Do you monitor your water, testing for ammonia, nitrites, nitrates, etc.? Could your water be very different from the water at the LFS where you got it, such as a different pH? If the store uses RO/DI water, it would probably be on the soft side, whereas what comes from the city water supply can be very much harder. If that's the case, the rapid, major change in pH would probably stress it considerably.

[we_tigers]

Yup it's cycled properly.

Ammonia - 0
Nitrate - 0
Nitrite - 0
pH - 7.8
Water temp - 78

I have a master kit, and I test it frequently.

I just did a 50% water change as well yesterday and added prime because there was a slight peak in ammonia from the poop, but it's now back at 0.

I got a nice big jar of krill and frozen silversides... I've only offered krill so far.. That's what he/she mainly ate at the store along with feeder fish supposedly, but you know I don't want to give it live feeder because of the things we hear.

Should I try some bloodworms?

[Pufferpunk]

If the tank is cycled, it should be showing some nitrate & would be able to handle any ammonia caused by waste. How was it cycled?

[we_tigers]

Yeah I know what you mean, I was pretty sketched about that.

I did fishless cycle using old media from a trust worthy tank for 8 weeks,
Nitrate and nitrite eventually went down with water changes, stayed that way for the rest of the time.
Ammonia took a while to go down though.
I did about 30% weekly WC and added prime, except for the first 2 weeks, I didn't do any WC.

[Pufferpunk]

You added ammonia to the tank to cycle it?
This might help: library/water-filtration/fishless-cycling/

[we_tigers]

What do you mean? Like from a bottle? lol

I used media (substrate) from another tank.
I did notice a big peak when it started cycling.. but eventually went down.

I'm not an expert on the nitrogen cycle tbh. Always learning new things.

[Pufferpunk]

Yeah--ammonia from a bottle. Read that article i just linked to.
Also: library/water-filtration/aquariummicrobespart1/
library/water-filtration/aquariummicrobespart2/

[we_tigers]

Yes I have been reading, nice article.

Just wished I had read it before hand, I just followed what the fish guy told me at the lps,

I'm more of a reptile guy at heart, sorta new to the aquarium hobby.

It sounds like to me the tank is not completely stabilized, and I'm wondering what I can do to get it stable at this point..

[Pufferpunk]

There is an emergency cycling article in the Library with the others, under Water & Filtration.

[we_tigers]

It looks like my tank could be a tad undercycled.
I'm going to keep doing more water changes while adding prime and see what I can score from the LPS in terms of more used media to add to the canister.

The last thing I want is to lose this guy to a rookie mistake, I'mma make sure it doesn't happen.

Thanks

[Pufferpunk]

Sounds like a plan! Just follow my sig...

[pdg187]

where did purchase your fahaka puffer from and did they have any more and do they ship?

[Pufferpunk]

Please start a new thread looking for your puffer of choice, in our Classifieds forum.

[we_tigers]

where did purchase your fahaka puffer from and did they have any more and do they ship?

I got it from Big Al's in Vaughn, Ontario.

I don't know if they ship or not, but I somehow doubt that they do.

The good news is that my water quality is better than I thought, API master kit for nitrate goes up in intervals of 5,

I took some water into my LPS and there's some traces of it.. I don't know what caused that spike in ammonia when I put him in though, I'm still going to
keep a close eye.

The bad news is that it's been 5 days and my puffer doesn't really seem interested in food.
I threw in a thawed out silverside in this morning, was completely ignored.

In one of the articles I read that food may be ignored for anytime between a week or a month (!), I shall be trying out garlic this weekend if all else fails.

I do notice that he seems more comfortable when the tank light is off, so I left it off this morning.