The Puffer Forum

I am getting a larger one and I'm sure my husband dreads that time. He already thinks I'm crazy with the water boiling....

Im gonna experiment with the water boiling and prime a little bit, i'd like to see the results compared to unboiled with prime. i just remembered yesterday when i was a little girl my brother use to use ocean water, but his brain coral and other things ended up dieing i think eventually after a while he gave up so maybe that's why...

aside from that my puffer is still un happy
he just sits there at the bottom of the tank blacker than i've ever seen him. the pH went down to level 7.6 so i got grounded up coral and put in there today i hope it helps. i need to get the bio-spira i guess but now i cant even buy that till friday. i gave him snails he tried to eat them but it seemed like they were too hard and they were just lil snails from petsmart tanks. and i got him frozen marine cubes and it just rotted in the tank so i took it out.

everytime i approach to him to make him move he gets slightly less black though. the only thing i can think of is parasites and im afraid to stick him in a quarrantine tank when he's just getting use to everything in this tank. he's the only puffer in the tank... can't i treat him in his own tank or it will just mess up any cycle i have going?

i have a bubble wall up i heard they like to play in it and i've seen him play in it a little bit but still concered it may be the cause of his stress?

Stormylee wrote:I am getting a larger one and I'm sure my husband dreads that time. He already thinks I'm crazy with the water boiling....

I'd say he is responding to the uncycled tank. Don't add any meds right now. Just keep testing the water & keep up with water changes.

Yea, 50% plus water changes daily are the only thing that will make him feel better. If you are planning on biospira and have confirmed you can get it locally, you don't have to worry about letting ammonia build up a little to get the tank cycling, so you can do 90% plus water changes every day and that will make your puffer feel much better. Adding a cap full of prime at about the halfway point between water changes will make him more comfortable, too. You do not have to quarantine a fish when it's the only living thing in the tank, a single specimen tank is effectively the same thing as a quarantine.

so i take it marineland is the best place to buy bio-spira? do i need a bio-wheel or anything else to go with so it works right?

my pH is down to 7.4
i already have live sand in the tank but the hydrometer is only at 1.000 so is that part of the reason for the pH?
i added grounded coral substrate meant to raise pH, but it hasn't gone up. i didn't add the full bag though.

No Bio-Wheel necessary. It actually sprays the salt around & makes a mess.

Also if he's not eating you can try soaking the food in garlic, they like the smell.

i wasnt able to get buio spira so for two days i used bio zyme and seemed completly worthless so we bought cycle in a bottle and used it annmonia went away nitires went up to 2.0 and haven't moved in 3-4 days and the mitrates were between 20 and 40 but now a lil less than 20. i thought nitrates were good? what are my levels suppose to be once it is cycled?

For FW nitrates are generally between 20-40.
Nitrites and Ammonia should be at 0.

Cycle is useless, just a big waste of money like BioZyme. The only stuff that works is Biospira, there is no other. Everything else just has dead bacteria in it that will add to the bioload and not help cycle it.

he died. i tried so hard. i had him in a seperate tank with the ammonia at 0 nitrites and nitrates at 0 pH 7.6 i don't get it. i took him to a store yesterday cause he said he'd take him and put him in a cycled tank but when i took him there he said he looked good and just to put him back in the main tank where the nitrites were at the highest levels, and nitrates between 20 and 40 because he gave me a seeded sponge filter. i thought that would be too much of a shock going from 0 to over the top levels. i don't understand why he died in the other tank i guess he just couldn't handle it anymore. he was tough!! its almost been a month since i had him if i had just did it the right way to begin with he'd still be here BOO he was so cool. the biggest one i've seen in person.
http://s156.photobucket.com/albums/t18/ ... 007192.jpg
that was him in the other tank. and my husband was the one that wanted this haha

thanks for all your help and advice everyone. once my tank is cycled and ready, i'll save a gsp from wal-mart insted of kill one.

Sorry to hear that. It was very unlikely that he died because of going from an uncycled tank to a cycled tank. Unfortunately, after being in an uncycled tank for so long, the damage was already done and he didn't get a chance to recover. The most damage that is done is internal, so they can look fine on the outside but be very ill on the inside. When there is zero ammonia, nitrites and nitrates, that usually indicates its an uncycled tank.

Do not support Walmart's horrible fishkeeping by "rescuing" a puffer from them! Because they are loosing $$$ from all their fish dying, they are starting to close up many of their fish depts. This is what we want. Nevermind, you have a very small chance of getting a healthy one. Go to a mom & pop store & support them.

Our Wal-Mart had another tank with Puffers in it that looked like they were starving so I opened up a can of the dried meel worms and gave them plenty. They only feed them ever so often and even then it's flake food.