The Puffer Forum

purplecandle wrote:LOL..

Imagine pufferpunk as a woman ..who is saying....

"Huh, <insert scratching head here> I am not sure what to make of those diagrams. Most pet stores don't have a brackish water section. Maybe the one he is talking about does or the pet store could be lying. I am not sure which "

We see pet stores lie a lot about their salinity..

lol, I see what you mean now. I am not sure if he lie or not, but I am sure of there is salt in there. I guess it could be marine, which I think is better than no salt at all. maybe

purplecandle wrote:

peterw wrote:I have a question. Is it wrong for me to assume that the puffer fish are doing good if they come to greet me when I come near the tank (even though they are probably hungry, lol) and all the fin and tails are spread. Because before the water change this morning there tail fins are clamped and they are not swimming around as much. Now there fins are spread and swimming like crazy, what they usually do. I really want to feed them too, but I cannot at the moment. sad face

They curl into a ball and get dark when they are sleeping...trying to hide from predators

But that was after I fed them, I did not notice anything weird before I fed them because once I get near the tank they swim up to me and wanted food. lol

Oh ok..probably just startled..the water change or something else scared them..

Sometimes I think it is an involuntary reaction.

purplecandle wrote:Oh ok..probably just startled..the water change or something else scared them..

Sometimes I think it is an involuntary reaction.

That was even before the water change, lol, the reason I did the test was because of their hiding behavior. Then when I saw those ammonia and nitrite I started the water change. Usually they swim around after they are fed, this time they hided and tail curls. During the water change they run around like crazy to avoid my syphon. lol. After the new water are added, they swim around more normally like they usually do.

Sorry for the miscommunication and thank you very much for all your replies.

You have stated that you are seeing 2 very toxic properties in your water: ammonia & nitrite. You say the cycle was complete. After completing a fishless cycle, you need to do at least an 80% WC to remove the nitrite spiked at the end. Then the fish are added directly after the WC, so as not to have any die off of the bacteria. If cycled properly, you should be able to fully stock a tank with fish, without seeing any ammonia or nitrite.

As far as mixing the salt: until you know exactly how much salt is needed for the SG you wish to achieve, you must premix all your salt overnight with a powerhead. I have seen way too many mistakes concerning this & crashing a tank. Your bacteria is already being taxed & you are going to have to do a lot of large water changes to keep these puffers from poisoning themselves, trying your best to match the SG the tank was cycled at.

These puffer species can both live into their teens. We know for a fact that F8 puffers can live close to 20 years. So you want to start them our right with as little stress to their tiny, delicate systems as possible, so as not to do permanent damage to them.

Pufferpunk wrote:You have stated that you are seeing 2 very toxic properties in your water: ammonia & nitrite. You say the cycle was complete. After completing a fishless cycle, you need to do at least an 80% WC to remove the nitrite spiked at the end. Then the fish are added directly after the WC, so as not to have any die off of the bacteria. If cycled properly, you should be able to fully stock a tank with fish, without seeing any ammonia or nitrite.

As far as mixing the salt: until you know exactly how much salt is needed for the SG you wish to achieve, you must premix all your salt overnight with a powerhead. I have seen way too many mistakes concerning this & crashing a tank. Your bacteria is already being taxed & you are going to have to do a lot of large water changes to keep these puffers from poisoning themselves, trying your best to match the SG the tank was cycled at.

These puffer species can both live into their teens. We know for a fact that F8 puffers can live close to 20 years. So you want to start them our right with as little stress to their tiny, delicate systems as possible, so as not to do permanent damage to them.

Hello again pufferpunk. Thank you again for your responses, I will do daily test and do 50% water change and I always try to match the SG. I am just looking into does it really increase the SG if I do not leave it over night, I will be more careful when comes to water changes. So when my tank have finally cycle I remove the shrimp and try to stringy remain that it emits when decomposing. And I only did a 50 percent water change (mistake 1). Then I did the water change the same way I have mention earlier (mistake 2, I am not trying to debunk anything bigfatfish said (still want to thank him for the response) I just want to be really careful at the moment sense I am not sure what is going on) Then after about 24 hour later I went and got the puffer fish (mistake 3). I think that is about all the mistakes I can think of in tank maintenance. Pufferpunk I just have one question/comment, I understand that a cycled tank can handle a fully stocked tank. Let just say for the moment that I was doing everything correctly, ignoring the three mistakes I listed, do you think me feeding the two puffers twice a day until they cannot eat anymore contributed this this rise in ammonia and nitrite? I do believe that it might have contribute to the rise in those two chemicals as purplecandle have explain that I should really be feeding them every other day.

Thank again.

It is very well possible that the system wasn't cycled properly, so when overfeeding the puffers like that, there was excess waste the systen couldn't handle.

For what it is worth - some of us (perhaps the most neurotic) never use any, repeat any, water fresh from the tap. All my water is aged, whether fresh, brackish, or marine. I do not and would not ever add freshly mixed BW or SW to an inhabited tank. It does make a difference. If you want your fish to be the healthiest possible specimens, you will age the water. Some folks cannot or will not do routine aging, but there are stresses involved with doing that, and if you avoid it, your fish will do better.

The tank under discussion is not fully cycled. whether from density changes or from over-feeding is hard to tell - it may be both.

Any immature tank showing positive ammonia or nitrite should be partialed at least 50% It can also be protected by adding Prime, there may still be positive ammonia readings after using Prime, but it will be locked into the ammonium ion form and this rendered harmless.

Cut the feeding to once a day maximum. If you continue to get positive ammonia or nitrite, cut back to every other day feeding with no increase in the quantity fed per meal. You will not starve the fish.

HTH

Hello RTR and pufferpunk. I am going to agree with you guys that without aging the water is okay but not the healthiest way to go, so I am going to change my ways. But my major concern row now is that if my tank is not cycled properly and I am going to be doing 50 % water change everyday, will the cycle ever be complete? Using the prime it can change ammonia to ammonium, but from what I read it will be ammonia again in 24 hours (just want to verify because this way prime will keep the fish safe).

And to purplecandle, the SG of my tank still remain the same at 1.007 SG with my method so all my salt have melted, but I will age my water from now on to my fish can be healthier.

Doing water changes will not affect your cycling process at all, as the bacteria you need to establish will be living on surfaces, not in the water column. It will, however, prevent your fish from suffering the affects of toxic ammonia/nitrite.

Thank you all from your replies and all your help everyone. I have went out and bought the prime and added into the tank to keep the fish safe while the new water ages for 24 hours. Thanks Again!

Even though I have say my thank yous, two last question. I am currently breeding snails for the puffers. Temporarily can I use raw shrimp we humans eat to help the puffers grind down their teeth? because I am not really sure if the shrimp shell is hard enough. And when feeding the shrimp should I use ones that have head attached so they have to get through the shell in order to get to the meat?

This link will give you lots of idea's on feeding.

library/feeding/feeding-your-puffers/

Yes, Prime is a short-term fix for ammonia. Any day with positive ammonia readings you should add prime to ensure that the ammonia is locked into the safe ammonium ion form.

The biofilter function and development is not hindered at all by the Prime. Someday we will have better test kits to really read ammonium ion versus dissolved ammonia gas, but the existing ones are not very user-friendly and I do not recommend them for most hobbyists.

trekenk wrote:This link will give you lots of idea's on feeding.

library/feeding/feeding-your-puffers/

Hi, trekenk thanks for the link. But when click on the link for raw shrimp it didn't work.
My question: does raw shrimp shell grind down puffer teeth?