I would stay away form the Ammo Lock, it could do more harm than good, keep up with massive daily water changes and hopefully he'll pull through.
Honestly I dont know what the white splotches are, perhaps some of the skin has been irritated and this is the result.
Anyone else any ideas?
Sick Figure Eights
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.
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Pufferpunk
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burrfish
T niphobles - Location (country): USA, Greenville, SC
- Location: Greenville, SC
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Ammo-lock will prevent the tank from cycling. Please read my signature. Poor water conditions will stress the fish, causing lowered immune systems & sick fish. I can't remember the last time I saw a sick fish in my tanks. Discus breeders do 100% WC daily. You can never do too many WC or replace too much water (as long as your tanks are used to it), unless your tank is suffering from "old tank syndrome" (where the water hasn't been changed in a long time) & then many smaller WC throught the day will let the fish catch up to the healthier water, as they have adjusted to the old (usually highly acidic) water.
The only thing you can do for these fish is large, daily WC, while you get a much larger tank ready for these fish. I'd add Melafix & Pimafix with each WC. I would have suggested returning 2 of them but they are sick now. You can instant cycle the larger tank with Bio-Spira (NOTHING else will work).
The bacteria isn't in the water column, its on surfaces
The higher bioload you have, the harder it is for there to be sufficient bacteria to handle the conversions. Puffers are poop factories and are messy eaters, so yes, they have a higher bioload than many other fish.
If the tank is so overstocked that there is just not enough surface area to house the proper amounts of bacteria needed to break down the fish's waste. At that point, large daily water changes are necessary to prevent the puffers from killing themselves with their own waste. It's like they're living in a toilet bowl.why does have too many puffers in a tank keep it from cycling?
The only thing you can do for these fish is large, daily WC, while you get a much larger tank ready for these fish. I'd add Melafix & Pimafix with each WC. I would have suggested returning 2 of them but they are sick now. You can instant cycle the larger tank with Bio-Spira (NOTHING else will work).
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!"
But changing water that much is impossible - maybe if it was freshwater, but using up $10 worth of Instant Ocean daily alone makes it an unfeasable solution. Really, my only option is to move the fish from my 29 gallon freshwater tank into my spare 20 long and make the 29 my brackish tank. What advice do you have for this major change?
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Pufferpunk
- Queen Admin
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- Joined: Tue May 31, 2005 11:06 am
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T lineatus
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A modestus
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C valentini
C coranata
C papuan
C lorteti
DPs
suvattii
burrfish
T niphobles - Location (country): USA, Greenville, SC
- Location: Greenville, SC
- Contact:
I don't get how 80% WC on a 15g tank would take $10 of IO. At one time, my 29g BW F8 tank had crashed & I couldn't figure out why. Ammonia & nitrites were thru the roof. I was doing 2x/day 80% WC. I actually had figured out how much salt I needed & just mixed it in a pitcher & poured it onto the filter, mixing it further. I had to do this for 2 weeks, until I found a rotting carcass of a goby inside a decoration. I wound up using close to 1/2 bucket of salt in all. I think I paid $40 for the bucket.
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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Nick
- Former Staff Member
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- Location: Middletown, CT
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If you make the 29 brackish, do not raise the SG above 1.002, or you will kill all the bacteria in that filter and start cycling from scratch again. You can increase it to 1.004 the next week and 1.006 the week after that, and I'd stop there for F8's.
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