The Puffer Forum

Can you get a picture of the spots? Puffers have spines and sometimes people mistake the spines for ich.

I would highly recommend against using any more chemicals in your tank aside from Prime. The more you keep throwing random chemicals in the tank, the worse its going to get for him. That includes the Aquasafe and anything else other than Prime and Biospira.

And people saying Biospira killed their fish is bull, its perfectly safe and as long as its kept refrigerated before use, it works wonderfully. A LOT of people on this site, including myself, have used it with great success many times.

I set up the 30 gal with 5lbs live sand and the gravel i've been using for him whcih isn't much now that it's in the 30 gal but i didn't add any marine salt so does that mean the live sand died and now this is more bad bacteria??
the master test kit tested everything okay but my ammonia is at about 1.0, is that where cycling is suppose to come in?
can't i add more prime to get rid of the ammonia?
i've seen people talking about putting gravel in a sock in the tank for bacteria??? what is that about?

Boxermom wrote: I would highly recommend against using any more chemicals in your tank aside from Prime. The more you keep throwing random chemicals in the tank, the worse its going to get for him. That includes the Aquasafe and anything else other than Prime and Biospira.

And people saying Biospira killed their fish is bull, its perfectly safe and as long as its kept refrigerated before use, it works wonderfully. A LOT of people on this site, including myself, have used it with great success many times.

You need to get that ammonia down, keep up with large daily water changes and keep testing the water. Even if the Ammonia readings dont change immediately still keep up with the changes and it should start to settle down as the bacteria colony establishes itself. Then once your tank parameters are settled to 0 nitrite and ammonia and you only get nitrate readings start adding the marine salt. you could add marine salt with every water change but that might over complicate things while the bacteria colony tries to establish itself.

thank you so much for helping me!!
i have at this time few more important questions.
i have three tanks setup; two 10 gal and one 30 gal,
last night at about 2 am i put 5lbs live sand, his old gravel, and old cave in the 30 gal.
With the live sand came a packet named bio something that cleared the water? (because it's foggy from the sand, still at 4 pm today)
it said not to add fish untill 24 hours but, this tanks test levels were the best aside from ammonia ofcourse which is at 1.0 in every tank and i can't get it down with extra prime ( i did a experiment in the extra 10 gal)

the aquasafe with bioextract he seems to like more, i'm assuming because it has a lil of the bacteria he needs?

can i put him in the 30 gal now insted of waiting till 2 am since it was only for 5lbs of live sand in a 30 gal??
i ask this because i keep cycling a tank he won't be living in and i want to start cycling the tank he will be living in (used his old water last night to help cycle the 30 gal. so he's in complete fresh new water again.)
i need to return a 10 gal for $$$ so i can get him something to get rid of possible parasites from the other fish that died with supposed parasites.

his black stress lines are on and off i read that might be normal?

sorry and thank you! when i have a chance, i will donate, you guys deserve it.

Hilly wrote:You need to get that ammonia down, keep up with large daily water changes and keep testing the water. Even if the Ammonia readings dont change immediately still keep up with the changes and it should start to settle down as the bacteria colony establishes itself. Then once your tank parameters are settled to 0 nitrite and ammonia and you only get nitrate readings start adding the marine salt. you could add marine salt with every water change but that might over complicate things while the bacteria colony tries to establish itself.

I would move him over to the new tank. water doesnt hold a lot of bacteria, but gravel/sand, decor etc does. If you can shift over as much stuff from tanks you have had set up for a while then this would be good as they should have bacteria to help cycle the tank. Then you are only concentrating water changes on one tank.

If you've got some other tanks and you're still showing ammonia readings I would invest in a new liquid ammonia test kit and see if you get the same readings. (Apologies if this bit has been covered I havent read the previous pages.)

Once you have as much stuff shifted over from established tanks and if you can rob some substrate and decor from others the more the better this should also help the cycling. Then keep up with daily big water changes. See what the new test kit says it should start to go down eventually but while the tank is cycling it will help keep the water healthy for the fish. Dosing water when you change with prime daily will also help. it's a bit of a pain but necessary.

Moving him over and over is only gonna stress him out better to get him in his final home so he can settle and concentrate on that rather than wiping yourself out and giving yourself more stress by upkeeping 2 homes for him at once. it'll make you a bag of nerves.

that's for sure!!! i put him in the new tank so now i'm just watching him to make sure he's okay. he looks a little funny but i'm assuming this is because he's in a whole big new place, with marine salt that he's never had. though the hydrometer is still reading at almost below 1.000, it was lower to begin with though. it is 1:12 am maybe he's sleeping. hah.
Thank you again

Hilly wrote: Moving him over and over is only gonna stress him out better to get him in his final home so he can settle and concentrate on that rather than wiping yourself out and giving yourself more stress by upkeeping 2 homes for him at once. it'll make you a bag of nerves.

Ok, now that he is in the 30gal, I would just leave everything alone. Except for water changes and testing the water. Prime, does not actually remove the ammonia it just converts it to a non toxic form. So it still reads on the Ammonia test kit. Keep the water changes to about 10-15% a couple times a day. Matching the salinity of the tanks water if you have added marine salt. If you cant do a couples times a day do 20-30% once a day. Add half a capful of prime to the the tank after each waterchange (this will keep the ammonia from burning his gills. If raising the Salinity from 1.000, add some salt to the water your going to pour in after the water change i like to have it read .002 higher then the tank its minute but over a period of water changes it increases it nice and slowly. Then test the tanks salinity after the water change to make sure it did not jump super high.

Other then that just observe and monitor. Find some small aquatic snails to feed him (ramshorns are good) I never seen a puffer pass up a snail! And dont freak out if his belly turns a little bit black, unless its black for an hour or two. Sometimes they scare themselves i know mine does if hes chasing a snail and hits one of decorations wrong lol.

Ok our tap water has ammonia in it. It reads 1 also. I have to boil my water to kill it, let it cool and set for a day with the prime. Some tap water is cleaned with chloramines which is chlorine and ammonia mixed. I know it's a big pain but it's worth it.

okay boiling's a good idea.
but why can't i just go get water out of the ocean?
is it safe to use shells etc off of the beach with proper cleaning? i have this huge sand dollar that's been sitting around for quite a while but would look good inside the tank, i'm pretty sure it's real because it has "doves" inside of it.
should i not add it though because of oils or dirt that's been absorbed in it after the years?

helpmypuffer wrote:okay boiling's a good idea.
but why can't i just go get water out of the ocean?
is it safe to use shells etc off of the beach with proper cleaning? i have this huge sand dollar that's been sitting around for quite a while but would look good inside the tank, i'm pretty sure it's real because it has "doves" inside of it.
should i not add it though because of oils or dirt that's been absorbed in it after the years?

It's not safe to use pure ocean water because of pollutants and parasite cysts.

okay i figured there was a reason. Thank You!

If you use prime you should not need to boil the ammonia out of your tap water, it will neutralize chloramines as well as just chlorine.

Probably but I'm really paranoid and would rather err on the side of caution.

I just pointed it out because people with large tanks would have to spend days just boiling the water, not to mention the cost of running a stove for days.

I hate to go against what everyone here is telling you but many, many people that live near oceans, use ocean water for their tanks/water changes.