The Puffer Forum

Unfortunately, I have zero help with this website, so some of the great articles are not up to date (just a couple) & I have no idea how to get into the Library to fix them.

Hey PP,

Just following up with an update.

Temperature was lowered to 79F. Ich-X seems to have been effective over the weekend. I am no longer seeing any Ich on the puffer. I will continue dosing Ich-X for another 3/4 days as suggested on the bottle to make sure it's completely gone.

Unfortunately, both eyes are now cloudy instead of just one. The fish still seems incredibly stressed and struggling to breathe. I am currently running 2 airstones in the tank to help with oxygenation. I know the cloudy eye is generally a symptom of poor water quality but I have done so many WCs I am not sure how I could improve it anymore than it is now..

I suppose the best bet is to continue with daily 30% WC's and dosing with Ich-X and Melafix.

Second puffer is still doing great. Very active, eating lots of food and seems very healthy.

Hoping for a recovery but I am honestly surprised he's still pushing through.. It's been close to 2 weeks now that it's been visibly struggling :/

I assume he's not eating? Maybe try to wiggle a worm in front of him. Have you tried dropping Melafix directly in his eyes?

Yeah, not eating.. I've held some bloodworms in front with tweezers for about 4/5 minutes a few times with no success. Ended up just dropping them in front of him, the small one eventually finds them and eats them.

I haven't attempted that yet. How would you recommend I do it?

Just hold him in a net.

So I got him into a net and into a small container with tank water making sure it never was out of water. Dropped a bit of Melafix in and let him rest for about a minute.

When I lowered him back into the tank, I thought it had killed him. He immediately sunk to the bottom, and was motionless for about a minute or so. He woke back up and was visibly stressed, black belly and bumping into everything.

The cloudiness on his eyes is terrible, I'm sure it's blind or very close to it. As of today, half of it's face has turned white.

Here are photos of today. Warning, it's unpleasant so I understand if you don't want to view it. https://imgur.com/a/p6me3AV

It doesn't seem like anything is helping :/ not sure what else I should try at this point.

Unfortunately he passed about 30 minutes after posting.

I really appreciate all your help trying to bring him back to good health.

I am sad I was unable to help but I am glad he is no longer suffering. I wish I could walk away knowing what happened or what I could have done differently to help but the other little one will get the best care I can provide :/

I will finish out the Ich treatment for the next few days to make sure it's taken care of and the little one doesn't get sick as well.

Thanks again for everything PP. You've been a huge help over the past week or so.

I'm so sorry... I missed those last posts, especially the one with the pics. That's more than just cloudy eye, some serious bacterial infection.