The Puffer Forum

Just keep doing what my signature says & you might be able to save him. Sometimes though, there can be irrepairable damage from this.

It's not terribly close, but Preuss Pets in East Lansing has Bio-Spira for sure, it's where I get mine, and is an all-around amazing fish store.
It's probably ~ an hour drive from Mt. Pleasant.

Not to sound mean, but if you rinsed your tank out last night with hot water it makes me wonder if you understand the aquarium bacteria cycle. You should never take out all of the water or rinse things in hot water in a tank when it is housing fish, as it kills all the bacteria colonies and you have to start over.

The solution is simple: take the tank down to about 1.002 and put in freshwater Bio-Spira, either delivered overnight or picked up from Preuss. It's really the only safe way to correct the tank parameters right now, unless you want to be doing multiple large water changes every day for 6 weeks.
And as I mentioned before, to be healthy Dragon will need a considerably larger tank ASAP, at least a 29g, preferably larger.
At this point the best option may be to donate him to a reputable fish store (like Preuss) if you can't provide an adequate environment for him, and start over the right way with an appropriate fish.

This is Jenni again. I want to thank you for all your help. But my Dragon didn't make it. On the bright side we learned a lot from this, and Dragon will be greatly missed. But I don't think I will get another puffer in near future unless someone can't have one again. But I will tell everyone I know that has a puffer about this site because if they love their puffer as much as I love mine they should learn from the best. Thank you again, it meant a lot to me and my Dragon.

Best wishes.
Jenni

Sorry to hear that. Make sure you read up on how to properly cycle a tank before you get any other fish though, puffer or otherwise. All fish need their tanks fully cycled first, puffers are just more sensitive than most others.

Dear CoreyK-
I appreciate your help, I want to know that I took Dragon out of the kindness of my heart from someone else who could not afford to take care of him, and I have spent over $200 in the last 3 months on him. If I had to I would have spent $2000 on him. I followed what the pet stores told me to do and what I was reading off of websites to care for him. I love all of my pets as if they are my own kids and will do anything for them, I even tried calling into work to stay at home today and help my boyfriend find everything needed for him, and would have drove to Lansing and even would have paid $40 to ship B S to me overnight to make him better. Of course I didn't understand what cycling was until I read it otherwise I wouldn't have taken everything out of the tank. The reason I did things the way I did with them is because one of the new pet stores here in Mount Pleasant is from the group in Lansing. My heart has been broken from this and I would appreciate you not being rude to me or anyone else that does not know as much as you do about puffer fish.

Dear Pufferpunk-
Thank you so much for the time and the help you have given me, you are great person, and I am sure you do wonderful life for helping people in need the way you do. I can only hope that people are as nice to you as you were to me.

Thank you,
The Broken Hearted Jenni

You tried hard, and did everything you could think of to take care of Dragon, even though it's expensive and labor intensive. It isn't your fault that so much misinformation is handed out about puffers and fish in general. I know how it breaks the heart to lose a puffer, hopefully next time you have fish or puffers, it will go better for you.

Thank you for your kind words. I think generally I do get back what put out there.

I know Corey didn't mean any harm from what he told you. It just gets frustrating here sometimes, saying the same things over & over. I've been in this for 30 years & worked in the busiiness for around 8. I've seen how little folks really understand about the fish-keeping process.

Jenni -

I certainly didn't mean to come off as rude in what I said, I'm sorry if it came across that way.
It's just at this site, we're used to people asking for help (especially with GSP's) that don't really realize what they've gotten themselves into with a special-care fish.
Giving them the option of donating the fish is actually a godsend for some people, because it's good for them and good for the puffer, and relieves them of a financial and ethical obligation.
Had I known what lengths you were willing to go for Dragon, I wouldn't have suggested it.

And the only reason I mentioned the bit about the cycle is because it is absolutely crucial to understand for good fish-keeping, and I wanted to make sure that if you were going to be keeping a puffer that you know it. I had some good links I was going to post up for you.

Anyway, best of luck to you, if you decide to keep another puffer we will be glad to help you along!.