Is this ick? Dwarf puffer
Forum rules
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.
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.
-
Minipuff
- Dwarf Puffer
- Posts: 71
- Joined: Sat Jan 17, 2015 2:19 pm
- Gender: Female
- My Puffers: 5 dwarf puffers
- Location (country): Norway
Is this ick? Dwarf puffer
My male dwarf puffer has a small white, somewhat protruding spot on his dorsal fin - see photo. Is this ick? I have Esha Exit (and Esha 2000) at hand - is it safe to just treat the tank with this, even if it should turn out not to be ick?
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Last edited by Minipuff on Sat Dec 26, 2015 4:35 pm, edited 3 times in total.
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Minipuff
- Dwarf Puffer
- Posts: 71
- Joined: Sat Jan 17, 2015 2:19 pm
- Gender: Female
- My Puffers: 5 dwarf puffers
- Location (country): Norway
Re: Is this ick? Dwarf puffer
1) Your water parameters - pH, Ammonia, Nitrite, Nitrates and salinity (if appropriate).
Temperature 25-26 Celsius - stable, normal
pH 7 - stable, normal
GH 5 dH - stable, normal
NO3 not measured, was 7 ppm (normally 2-10 ppm) on Dec 22, when the spot was discovered.
NO2 0, was 0.025 on Dec 22 - did a water change the same day and the day after, NO2 has been 0 since the first water change was done
NH3 0
(Liquid test kits used)
2) Tank size and a list of ALL inhabitants.
112 litre planted tank, sand substrate, driftwood, stones, overfiltration with external canister filter. 5 dwarf puffers added Feb 2015, 4 amano shrimp added april 2015.
3) Feeding, water change schedule and a list of all products
Feeding: approx 6 days a week, bloodworms, snails.
Water change: 50 % weekly.
Products: Seachem prime, sodium bicarbonate, Easylife Ca, Mg and easycarbo, dry ferts (KNO3, KH2PO4, CSM+B).
4) What changes you've made in the tank in the last week or so.
Not much, but had to replant a crypt that had loosened from the substrate. Disturbance of substrate/root tabs is a possible cause of measured nitrite. Also light cleaning of canister filter a few weeks ago, has been done before without problems.
5) How long the aquarium has been set up, and how did you cycle it?
Fishless cycle with ammonia Jan/Feb 2015. Fish moved in feb 2015. No problems with disease until now.
Temperature 25-26 Celsius - stable, normal
pH 7 - stable, normal
GH 5 dH - stable, normal
NO3 not measured, was 7 ppm (normally 2-10 ppm) on Dec 22, when the spot was discovered.
NO2 0, was 0.025 on Dec 22 - did a water change the same day and the day after, NO2 has been 0 since the first water change was done
NH3 0
(Liquid test kits used)
2) Tank size and a list of ALL inhabitants.
112 litre planted tank, sand substrate, driftwood, stones, overfiltration with external canister filter. 5 dwarf puffers added Feb 2015, 4 amano shrimp added april 2015.
3) Feeding, water change schedule and a list of all products
Feeding: approx 6 days a week, bloodworms, snails.
Water change: 50 % weekly.
Products: Seachem prime, sodium bicarbonate, Easylife Ca, Mg and easycarbo, dry ferts (KNO3, KH2PO4, CSM+B).
4) What changes you've made in the tank in the last week or so.
Not much, but had to replant a crypt that had loosened from the substrate. Disturbance of substrate/root tabs is a possible cause of measured nitrite. Also light cleaning of canister filter a few weeks ago, has been done before without problems.
5) How long the aquarium has been set up, and how did you cycle it?
Fishless cycle with ammonia Jan/Feb 2015. Fish moved in feb 2015. No problems with disease until now.
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Pufferpunk
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Re: Is this ick? Dwarf puffer
Sorry I didn't get to this last night, Saw it right before bed. Thank you for your detailed response!
It is not ich. Usually just a bit of fungus that appears on fins after a scrape. Continue to keep pristine conditions. You could add pimafix.
I am wondering why you add: sodium bicarbonate, Easylife Ca, Mg and easycarbo? Sounds more like a SW system.
It is not ich. Usually just a bit of fungus that appears on fins after a scrape. Continue to keep pristine conditions. You could add pimafix.
I am wondering why you add: sodium bicarbonate, Easylife Ca, Mg and easycarbo? Sounds more like a SW system.
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!"
"The solution to pollution is dilution!"
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Minipuff
- Dwarf Puffer
- Posts: 71
- Joined: Sat Jan 17, 2015 2:19 pm
- Gender: Female
- My Puffers: 5 dwarf puffers
- Location (country): Norway
Re: Is this ick? Dwarf puffer
Thanks for your reply, PP! Aah... I decided to start treating... Silly me, I should have been more patient. 
The spot looked so much like what I have seen in photos of ick, and from what I've read it can be only a single or few spots at first. Oh well, this is my first time with some sort of disease-like stuff, so I guess I got overly nervous about my little guy 
I suppose I should finalize the treatment since I've already started it - I've given the first dose of Esha Exit, so two more doses (half the amount) remain, one today and one tomorrow. As far as I understand, this medication is harmless to livestock and filter bacteria. I will do a water change after finishing the treatment.
The water we have here is very soft, so I add bicarbonate to slightly increase the buffer capacity of the water, and Mg and Ca to increase the total hardness a bit (from GH 0 to GH 5, which is still soft). And the easycarbo is just liquid carbon for the plants, since I don't inject CO2. So no, this has nothing to do with SW, it's just a matter of slight adjustments to improve the nutrition and stabilize the system (I don't want pH to crash...).
The spot looked so much like what I have seen in photos of ick, and from what I've read it can be only a single or few spots at first. Oh well, this is my first time with some sort of disease-like stuff, so I guess I got overly nervous about my little guy I suppose I should finalize the treatment since I've already started it - I've given the first dose of Esha Exit, so two more doses (half the amount) remain, one today and one tomorrow. As far as I understand, this medication is harmless to livestock and filter bacteria. I will do a water change after finishing the treatment.The water we have here is very soft, so I add bicarbonate to slightly increase the buffer capacity of the water, and Mg and Ca to increase the total hardness a bit (from GH 0 to GH 5, which is still soft). And the easycarbo is just liquid carbon for the plants, since I don't inject CO2. So no, this has nothing to do with SW, it's just a matter of slight adjustments to improve the nutrition and stabilize the system (I don't want pH to crash...).
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Welch4
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Re: Is this ick? Dwarf puffer
hey PP easycarbo is much more widely know overseas but its comparable to flourish excel. I actually just saw the first bottle i have ever seen in the states yesterday.
Forget other advice about puffers you don't hear here - Pufferpunk
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Pufferpunk
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T miurus
A modestus
T biocellatus
C valentini
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C papuan
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T niphobles - Location (country): USA, Greenville, SC
- Location: Greenville, SC
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Re: Is this ick? Dwarf puffer
Puffers are VERY sensitive to ich meds, absolutely nn reason to ever use them, unless death is imminent anyway: http://www.thepufferforum.com/forum/vie ... =3&t=28113
Please do a large WC right now & run fresh carbon to remove the rest.
Please do a large WC right now & run fresh carbon to remove the rest.
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!"
"The solution to pollution is dilution!"
-
Minipuff
- Dwarf Puffer
- Posts: 71
- Joined: Sat Jan 17, 2015 2:19 pm
- Gender: Female
- My Puffers: 5 dwarf puffers
- Location (country): Norway
Re: Is this ick? Dwarf puffer
Happy new year!
Treatment was aborted, lesson learnt - don't act too hastily.
The puffers and the shrimp are doing good, no harm done, hopefully. The spot on the male puffer slowly disappeared over a few days - it's all gone now.
You posted a link about heat and salt treatment, thank you. I have a few questions about it, in case I ever actually encounter ich:
How fast should temperature and salt content be raised? Do you turn up the heater to the max temperature of the treatment and add all the salt at once? Will the filter bacteria tolerate this? Will otos tolerate this treatment?? (I've planned on adding otos to the tank in a not so distant future... But I will QT them first.)
Treatment was aborted, lesson learnt - don't act too hastily.
The puffers and the shrimp are doing good, no harm done, hopefully. The spot on the male puffer slowly disappeared over a few days - it's all gone now.
You posted a link about heat and salt treatment, thank you. I have a few questions about it, in case I ever actually encounter ich:
How fast should temperature and salt content be raised? Do you turn up the heater to the max temperature of the treatment and add all the salt at once? Will the filter bacteria tolerate this? Will otos tolerate this treatment?? (I've planned on adding otos to the tank in a not so distant future... But I will QT them first.)
-
Pufferpunk
- Queen Admin
- Posts: 32987
- Joined: Tue May 31, 2005 11:06 am
- Gender: Female
- My Puffers: Puffers I have kept:
T lineatus
T miurus
A modestus
T biocellatus
C valentini
C coranata
C papuan
C lorteti
DPs
suvattii
burrfish
T niphobles - Location (country): USA, Greenville, SC
- Location: Greenville, SC
- Contact:
Re: Is this ick? Dwarf puffer
You can add the 1bsp salt/10g at once but I suggest dissolving it in a pitcher of water, 1st. My heaters have temps on them, so I turn them up to 86.
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!"
"The solution to pollution is dilution!"