This gal needs help!!!

[Fish_are_friends]

Interesting. Thanks for the tip!

[Fish_are_friends]

Brought the boys home. They are doing great.
The latest parameters are:
nitrate-05
nitrite-0
hardness-80
alkalinity-110
PH-7.2
Ammonia-0


I dunno how I did it, but I did. Right?! These are what we were looking for, right?

[Pufferpunk]

I was just wondering about them. Yes, you're doing great with the parameters. Do you mean they're at your parent's now? Are they gonna get a bigger tank there?

[Fish_are_friends]

They are with me at my parents house. But my mother hates all animals. She threw a fit about me even bringing the 10g.

I was wondering though, I have an extra 5g tank in my dorm, would it be harmful to put one of the boys in the 5g tank and keep two in the 10g that I have until I can get more tanks for them or until May at the latest? The request was denied because of the liability of having 50g of water in one room. But I am appealing it when I get back to school.

Also, I have been giving the boys a muscle twice a week but the problem I am having is that Poofer won't touch them. He only wants the freeze dried shrimp. I was thinking about giving them a piece of raw shrimp but I wasn't sure that it would be healthy for them. Is there anything else I should be feeding them?
And yes, I am making sure to skip one day a week in their feeding schedule.



I did find that they stayed pretty active during the move. Bright colors and swimming around the bucket I had them in. I thought for sure they would be angry and try to hide under the plants and such that I put down in the water. Only Shark Bait hid, but not for long. He was swimming around most of the time with Crush and Poofer. Is this normal for them to be so active during a 4.5 hour car ride?

[Pufferpunk]

Yes, raw shrimp is a great food! More info on feeding: library/feeding/feeding-your-puffers/

Keeping one of them in the 5g & 2 in the 10g is better than 3 in a 10g.
What's going to change in May, if your mom won't let you keep a larger tank? How are you keeping up with daily water changes if the tank is at your parent's house?

[Fish_are_friends]

I am at my parents house with my boys. I do two water changes a day. Once around noon and one right before I go to bed(around midnight).

In May I am moving out of the dorms. No my mom is not happy about my boys being here but she will just have to deal.

She won't even come to the guest room where I am staying. I won't be coming back here. She has made WAY too many comments about how my boys should just die. She hates all animals.




I do have another question, I put a rather large snail in their tank, Crush nipped its shell after a few minutes of watching it move around. Now it won't even come out of it's shell. What should I do?
And what do I do about Poofer and his picking eating? He won't touch the mussels and he took one bite of the raw shrimp and spit it out. All he wants is the freeze dried shrimp... :/ Help?

[J-P]

how big is the snail?

Take a pair of pliers or a hammer and crush the shell. It will be bloody and that is an attractant. It "chums" the water. He'll go for it or your money back haha but since this advice was free ...

If it is the size of a nickel or smaller you can use 2 spoons to crush it.

Outside that have you tried garlic?

[Flutter]

Don't worry if they won't eat for a few days when you try new foods. Sometimes they just need to get hungry enough to suck it up and give the new food a real try. Just keep trying

I agree with crushing the snail, it's the only way ours will eat them. Get a pair of pliers, put the snail between, put the tip with the snail in the water, look the other way, and squeeze. It's kinder to the snail too as they die immediately.

I am SO proud of you for taking care of the fish the way you are after seeing the views that you were raised with. That's not right, animals have feelings too.

[Clowntje]

Good luck with the boys!

[Fish_are_friends]

I feel really bad for allowing my boyfriend to name the snail now. :/ I may have to wait until he gets home to let the boys eat the snail. I just don't think I can hurt it.


Something I noticed today when I did about a 75% water change (The ammonia sky rocketed over night not sure why ) is that after I treated the water and filled the tank back up, the boys seemed to be breathing really heavy and they just sat in corners and their fins were moving really fast. Did I do something wrong with them? If so what did I do?

They calmed down after about two hours and are swimming normally now but I was really worried. :/


Oh and the parameters right now are:
nitrate-08
nitrite-0
hardness-80
alkalinity-110
PH-7.5
Ammonia-.10 < working on fixing this! It was at 3.0 this morning Hence the BIG water change. I did two, one this morning and one just a few minutes ago.

[Pufferpunk]

Ammonia burns gills.

[Fish_are_friends]

I know that. But they were breathing hard after I did the WC. That's what worried me. They weren't breathing like that before. I did the 1st WC as soon as I woke up and did a parameter check and saw the ammonia. I thought about doing a bigger WC but then saw my note of never doing a 100% WC because of the bio load issues and not wanting to restart the cycling process...

[Pufferpunk]

Eventually, living in these conditions will do permanent damage to them.

[Fish_are_friends]

I am aware of that. That is why I am doing the best I can...

[Pufferpunk]

I'm aware of that too. Just telling what is happening to them.