puffer struggling to eat?

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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indie
Figure 8 Puffer
Posts: 227
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My Puffers: 4 x 1.25" Green Spotted Puffers
1 x Suvatti Puffer
2 x Figure 8 Puffers
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Location: surrey, uk

puffer struggling to eat?

Post by indie »

basically, i got a second puffer for our tank, same size puffer as my current one, at only 1 and a half " max.
he seems to have settled in fine, but he doesnt seem to be eating. i put a frozen bloodworm cube in in the mornings and all the fish have a feast. I even rattle it around a bit so the bloodworm gets spread about a bit so theres no risk of competition. well, this new puffer grabs some bloodworm and u can see him trying to chew it, and he spits it out, tried to chew, spits it out and doesnt end up swallowing it. ive tried him on snails, and again he doesnt eat them. ive put cockel in there and he doesnt eat that either.

my first puffer has a huge belly today where hes obv gone round taking more than his fair share, so i cant put more food in for the second puffer.


is there something wrong with him? his belly is always flat, so hes deff not eating. whereas with the first puffer u can tell when hes had somethin to eat cos his belly goes all potbellied, altho its extra huge today :shock:

im not sure what to do, even if i manage to sneak the second puffer something when the other is on the other side of the tank, he doesnt seem to be able to eat it
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Amoore311
Puffer Fry
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Joined: Wed Aug 30, 2006 9:58 am
Location: Orange County, NY

Post by Amoore311 »

How long has the puffer been in the tank?

What kind of puffer's are they?

What kind of tank mates are there?

What size tank do you have them in?

This will all greatly help to answer your questions accurately.
29 Gallon

Penguin HOB, Tahitian Moon Sand, Lace Rock, Salinity 1.023.

Looking for stocking Ideas
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indie
Figure 8 Puffer
Posts: 227
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My Puffers: 4 x 1.25" Green Spotted Puffers
1 x Suvatti Puffer
2 x Figure 8 Puffers
Location (country): UK
Location: surrey, uk

Post by indie »

they are figure 8 puffers.
hes been in the tank since tuesday.
they are living in a community tank at the moment, with 4 baby angelfish, 3 dwarf gouramis, 5 danios, 2 rams and 2 plecos. its a jewel rio 125.

they will be shortly moved to their own 30 gallon tank.
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kass
Green Spotted Puffer
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Gender: Male
Location (country): Canada
Location: Guelph, Canada

Post by kass »

It can take puffers a while to settle in and get used to their new home before eating. I would wait a while before getting too worried. You can try soaking the food in garlic guard to attract him to the food.
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Amoore311
Puffer Fry
Posts: 43
Joined: Wed Aug 30, 2006 9:58 am
Location: Orange County, NY

Post by Amoore311 »

Yup at this point I would wait it out.

Also with the snails you're tossing in there.

Make sure the snail is about the size of the puffer's eye. Any larger I usually crush the shell befor I toss it in there.

Smaller snails work sometimes, but try and drop it right in front of them so they don't miss it.

When I drop in a snail of appropriate size it usually doesn't make it to the bottom of the tank haha.
29 Gallon

Penguin HOB, Tahitian Moon Sand, Lace Rock, Salinity 1.023.

Looking for stocking Ideas
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Boxermom
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Post by Boxermom »

What I would recommend is catching the one that isn't getting as much food in a net, but don't remove the net from the water, and try feeding him inside the net so the others can't get at the food or him.
Tina

Puffers: Auriglobus silus x1, Tetraodon travancoricus x1, Tetraodon turgidus x1, Tetraodon miurus x1, Tetraodon nigroviridis x2, Tetraodon baileyi x2, Tetraodon lineatus x1, Tetraodon palembangensis x1
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indie
Figure 8 Puffer
Posts: 227
Joined: Wed Nov 01, 2006 6:57 am
My Puffers: 4 x 1.25" Green Spotted Puffers
1 x Suvatti Puffer
2 x Figure 8 Puffers
Location (country): UK
Location: surrey, uk

Post by indie »

good advice about snails. i have on occasion put bigger ones in and theyve struggled. i do also find if i dont drop it infront of their nose they dont see it!

i will try catching him in a net , thats a good idea.
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Dinsdale
Figure 8 Puffer
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My Puffers: Bak Mei, ~4" Auriglobus Modestus. In a 55g tank (since '06) w/ some guppies he pays no attention to.
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Location: N. Illinois

Post by Dinsdale »

I hope you quarantined the new puffer before putting it in the tank, but it doesn't sound like you did. If there was something wrong with it, it could easily infect all of your other fish.

You really shouldn't have bought another brackish puffer when you only have a freshwater community tank setup.

If you had a quarantine setup, it would be very simple to make sure the new puffer got its fair share of food.
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indie
Figure 8 Puffer
Posts: 227
Joined: Wed Nov 01, 2006 6:57 am
My Puffers: 4 x 1.25" Green Spotted Puffers
1 x Suvatti Puffer
2 x Figure 8 Puffers
Location (country): UK
Location: surrey, uk

Post by indie »

the catching it in a net didnt work. he didnt seem interested in eating at all. im hoping he will start eating soon. it doesnt seem like hes not getting a chance to get food, theres not much competition, cept for the other puffer, but its fairly easy to keep the other occupied.
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Woland
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My Puffers: 1 X Tetraodon nigroviridis, 1 X Monotrete palembangensis.
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Location: Oslo, NORWAY

Post by Woland »

I strongly advice against netting a puffer in order to get it to eat.
This is completely unnecessary and also very stressful for an already obviously uncomfortable fish.

My advice would be to starve the colony (all inhabitants) for a week or so, thus making everyone work up an apetite...

Your new (brackish) puffer should also have been quarantined before it was introduced to a community tank.
Wild caught specimens, totally stressed out of their wits by the usual havoc involved in being caught, transported in LARGE groups in limited space and subjected to a wide variety of water chemistry, more often than not carry disease and parasites which might infect the other inhabitants of the tank.

Do the right thing.
Establish a brackish system in the 30 gallon you mentioned ASAP.
Regards

Woland
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Boxermom
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Post by Boxermom »

No, its not an idea solution, but for those who insist on keeping them in a community tank, feeding in a net can be the only means of preventing starvation. I'd rather not hear that it wasted away to nothing because it couldn't get anything to eat, not if its as simple a solution as feeding it in isolation.
Tina

Puffers: Auriglobus silus x1, Tetraodon travancoricus x1, Tetraodon turgidus x1, Tetraodon miurus x1, Tetraodon nigroviridis x2, Tetraodon baileyi x2, Tetraodon lineatus x1, Tetraodon palembangensis x1
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indie
Figure 8 Puffer
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My Puffers: 4 x 1.25" Green Spotted Puffers
1 x Suvatti Puffer
2 x Figure 8 Puffers
Location (country): UK
Location: surrey, uk

Post by indie »

Woland wrote:I strongly advice against netting a puffer in order to get it to eat.
This is completely unnecessary and also very stressful for an already obviously uncomfortable fish.

My advice would be to starve the colony (all inhabitants) for a week or so, thus making everyone work up an apetite...

Your new (brackish) puffer should also have been quarantined before it was introduced to a community tank.
Wild caught specimens, totally stressed out of their wits by the usual havoc involved in being caught, transported in LARGE groups in limited space and subjected to a wide variety of water chemistry, more often than not carry disease and parasites which might infect the other inhabitants of the tank.

Do the right thing.
Establish a brackish system in the 30 gallon you mentioned ASAP.

yes it did seem to stress him out more than anything else. so i wont be doing that again. are puffers wild caught? i always thought they were from breeders? i apologise if im being naiive :?

im getting the brackish tank setup ASAP
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Woland
Former Staff Member
Posts: 376
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My Puffers: 1 X Tetraodon nigroviridis, 1 X Monotrete palembangensis.
Location (country): Norway
Location: Oslo, NORWAY

Post by Woland »

Hey, no problem
Very few puffers reproduce in captivity.
And brackish & marine puffers least of all.

I think there was a guy in Germany who managed to breed GSP and actually raise fry, but that is the only success I have heard of.
So; our little ones are wildcaught and often in a sorry state when we buy them.

Give them proper care.
Regards

Woland
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Rocker
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Post by Rocker »

cough cough. I believe there is a guy in the UK breeding puffers at the moment. lol.
Image Some call it a product of a mis-spent youth, I call it Rock n Roll ! Image
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Woland
Former Staff Member
Posts: 376
Joined: Sat Jun 04, 2005 3:12 am
My Puffers: 1 X Tetraodon nigroviridis, 1 X Monotrete palembangensis.
Location (country): Norway
Location: Oslo, NORWAY

Post by Woland »

The exeption that confirmes the rule, dear Rocker!

:roll:
Regards

Woland
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