The Puffer Forum

Awwww... aren't they cute?! My Pudgie was about that size when I first got him, but he's grown some now, and my Yorkie, she's much bigger than Pudgie but she was bigger when I bought her (I really don't know that Yorkie is a girl, but the way she lets Pudgie take control makes me think it's a female).

awww theyre lovely!

Well, thanks for all the help and encouragement- and there's things on here that I'd not read before just for puffs, such as how to treat freshwater ich with aquarium salt not meds if in fw.

Tested for ammonia after doing the water change - none. Tested again this am before work - maybe a trace...

This am I only had time to do one test so I did ammonia, slightly worrying. The pH is higher in this tank than the Pacu's tank so maybe the bacteria didn't like the pH jump even though both are fw tanks at the mo. What I can do is swap the filter sponges from one of the puffs internals with two from the eight sponges (and three baskets of ceramic) in the pacu's external power filter. If I do that just after another big water change, there wont be as large a difference. It's higher because of the coral sand in the puffer tank.

I'd plonked another small internal power filter in as well last night.

I'm not having an immature tank with these two!

Any further ideas would be welcome...

They are cute, though

thanks for moving thread!

**A note -- you really don't need to worry about pH, as most puffers will adjust to it, it's ammonia, nitrite and nitrate that are the important ones. I used to test for pH, but then discovered that it was a waste of time because if your pH isn't what you think it should be, you will cause more harm than good by trying to adjust it. So I don't bother with pH testing anymore.
Just thought I would pass that on to you. Obviously, if you enjoy testing for pH, then by all means, go for it!

It was more the swing in values I was worried about rather than an absolute value, my tap water is lower in pH by 0.8 units than what i measured the puffer tank pH to be, so if I do a big water change, the pH will drop by nearly that - too much!

It's the coral sand pushing the pH up a bit over 24hrs.

Just realised this last night. Maybe I'll check the tap pH again - haven't measured it in maybe a year, just the tanks.

Could just store the water for 24hrs with coral sand in...

I'm probably just paranoid, most of my tanks do better if left alone for a week at a time but I don't think I can do that with the puffers if there's ammonia around, even a little. But big water changes can't help with things settling down - catch 22!

Haven't measured the nitrate yet - I'll do that later.

Thanks for the pointer, it's quite right!

Hi all,

when I measured the ammonia level this evening, I found 0.5ppm! Oops... you know what that means?! Ammonia=uncycled tank. @:{_*!£$^&.

Did feed them, they devoured a blood worm cube and a whole king prawn. The puff's bellies are now not concave and I can reduce feeding.

To reduce the water quality and filtration issues i.e. rubbish and none, I did an 80% change and syphoned out most of the substrate. There was a bacterial film growing on it - cyano, probably but swiftly going black. That's mostly been hoovered out. This 'film' has happened in two days flat. It did come from another tank...

Kept one internal power filter and swapped the fluval 3 for a much larger fluval 4 - from the pacu tank again. A very mature filter.

The F4's out flow is directed at the front glass of the tank, rather than down the length of it - the puffs moved house to the next cave down to get out of the extra turbulence but are helicoptering around when they wish. Seem better than they did but they were in darkness when I came in and fed.

Wish us luck!!!!

Of course we wish you luck .... I'm sure everything will be fine.

I seen the cutest Ceylons today when we went to get the Congo. They had some little ones, maybe 1.5 to 2" in size and then some others that were maybe 2" to 3" in size. They were so adorable and they were all at the glass saying, "take me, take me!" .... and if I could have afforded it, I would have gotten one or two. Then I had thoughts dancing in my head -- if I sell one of my Abei's, now that I have two, I could afford to buy some of those Ceylons -- and then reality struck me .... the external filter on my Ceylon tank has stopped working today, so I will need to buy another filter soon. That's where the money will need to go, unfortunately NOT on tiny Ceylon puffers! But they really were so cute. If they stayed that size I'd have had some anyway, but as it is, I already have 2 that are growing by leaps and bounds, so I don't need to worry about getting any more.

There is no cure to the puffer disease in humans is there?! Mines a-cute

The puffers looked pretty good this morning, up and buzzing about (didn't feed). Maybe the filter swap helped and I have a feeling that removing most of the substrate definitely did. I'll get another bag of aragonite but might leave it alone for now, they seem happy enough...

I'm out of ammonia test kit, be good to get a fresh one anyway the ammount of testing I'm doing! And dechlorinator, so I'll sort those this evening and see what's going on with the water.

Just curious, what do you use for a dechlorinator? If you're not using Prime, you might want to think about trying it out. I find that you only use a fraction of Prime compared to what other manufacturer's recommend. As I have many tanks, it was more cost-effective to get the Prime.

Prime is what I use when I can but my wife sometimes buys it for me - often Aquasafe (comes in a yellow bottle) because the shop has run out of Prime...!

Since you've only got a few tanks, maybe it won't make much of a difference to you, but next time you have a bottle of Prime, and a bottle of Aquasafe, compare how much you need to use with each of them. The Prime ends up being much more economical. Just trying to help ... but if you prefer the Aquasafe, then that's cool too. I never buy my Prime from any shops, always buy it off eBay because you will get a much better price!

Was thinking of a name for the puffs, or trying to. All of a sudden 'Bonnie' and 'Clyde' popped up - might fit, what do you think?!

"A few tanks" Coke splurt I'm running eleven tanks at the moment... !

Ok, Ok you have 20 was it?

Prime will make a difference when I'm running the vat at 1300l as it will for the other lot, so thanks

Sorry, I didn't realise you had THAT many, I couldn't remember to be honest. No, I only have 19 at the moment and hoping not to get any more really.

And yes, Bonnie & Clyde is very good!