The Puffer Forum

Yeah, well that puff is relying on you. He should be proud to have a nurturing, caring gf.

+1. Take good care fo him!

Thanks guys! I am trying my best. I might not know everything there is to puffer care right now, but I am sure learning and trying my best!

LoL at least I know that DPs are FW puffs. /Facepalm I wish I could have recorded my conversation with the one Petsmart employee today just so I could let you guys listen to it. I was told, in a nutshell, that my temp was too high, (even hinted that 80 D F was to high), DPs were BW, not FW, and that feeding frozen bws were the cause of IPs in my little DP, and that they shouldn't get IPs, and that having ammonia and nitrates (?, I think she meant this one) meant that my tank wasn't fully cycled. I told her "I did a fishless cycle (Library) and that my numbers were fine" and she said that there was no such thing as a fishless cycle, you have to use fish to get a tank completely cycled, and that my numbers were wrong and that is why my puff had clamped fins....

You should have 0 ammonia
0 NitrIte
And <20 Nitrate.
Everything else they said is surlaW, but if you have ANY ammonia and/or nitrIte, your fish will suffer from that, and it's not cycled fully.
Add Prime and do water huge changes daily until the 2 parameters are 0

sevenyearnight wrote:You should have 0 ammonia
0 NitrIte
And <20 Nitrate.
Everything else they said is surlaW, but if you have ANY ammonia and/or nitrIte, your fish will suffer from that, and it's not cycled fully.
Add Prime and do water huge changes daily until the 2 parameters are 0

Thank you Seven. That is exactly what I thought. I had to get my water test kit out, test the water in the cycling tank (for the future F8) just to double check and read up on it. At least there was one person that I talked to yesterday that had an idea of what he was doing with puffer fish (sort of) it may not have been exactly correct information, but still LoL.

Sounds like you had an interesting conversation. There is absolutely such thing as a fishless cycle lol. You just have to add your own ammonia. IMO and IME it is faster to establish a proper bacteria bed that way, and prevents unnecessary stress on fish otherwise used to cycle.

Yeah it was pretty bad. All I could think of was "this is their Petcare Manager????" LoL I will have to mention something to my friend about it, she works there as a Petcare upper manager. This coincidentally was the person who told me it was ok to put an african dwarf frog, a guppy, and ghost shrimp in with my betta. I honestly think my betta got a bacterial infection from the frog being in there, since the darn thing was so messy. Freddy killed them all as well = / But I didn't know any better. Now I do

You can tell them that dwarf puffers are caught in the wild in a freshwater river in India that does not lead or come from any ocean or other saltwater body of water.
Tell them if they are so certain there is no such thing as fishless cycling, let them know that there is this new thing called the internet that hosts countless articles and scientific publications updated continuously. And that their so called training was wrong and out of date over 10 years ago, and it has never been updated or corrected once. It's aimed toward sales, and they are naive to trust what a sales corporation paying them minimum wage has told them.

I hate Petsmart.

Thank you for realizing petsmart employees are bozos.
Your fish will thank you with jazz fins for years to come!

sevenyearnight wrote:Thank you for realizing petsmart employees are bozos.
Your fish will thank you with jazz fins for years to come!

I used to work for them as a Salon Manager. Even with my limited knowledge of fishkeeping at the time, I still knew better than they did. Thank you though =)

I can't get over at how much and how invaluable this forum is. I have learned more here in the last month or so, than I have in my entire life. All you people here are awesome!

sevenyearnight wrote:Thank you for realizing petsmart employees are bozos.
Your fish will thank you with jazz fins for years to come!

<-
Jazz fins....Lmao

Look at your first few posts compared to now. You have learned very quickly!

Yep, I was hoping you would see that bertie lol

Reaperpilot2014 wrote:Look at your first few posts compared to now. You have learned very quickly!

Thanks! Sure doesn't feel like it though lmao, I am still learning more new stuff every day (probably a never ending cycle..but a good one)!!!! It's also cause I'm totally into this, and can't wait to get my F8. What I was looking for in a betta, I have found in puffers. I wanted something to interact with me, and not just be there. Freddy was the first fish I have ever owned that actually recognized me and interacted with me through the glass. He wasn't just a goldfish that was pretty. =( I miss that little booger. But that is why I was so excited to learn about puffs-- it's nice to have something in a tank that is excited to see you every day.

Even people with many many years experience hit walls and think what am i doing wrong. Then go back to square 1 and bingo, the answer was staring you in the face. We are all learning.
Seven i can smell a jazz fins post a mile off lol