The Puffer Forum

My new puffer is not looking as bright green as he was a few days ago. He almost looks like he has a film on him. Is this ich? What should I do. The place I bought him from sold him to me as a freshwater fish. And from what I have read I need to start slowly with marine salt to get brackish water. Could the film on him be caused by fw? Help!!

Hi there, if yau answer all the question at the top of this page that are in red then we can offer more help

Hello, welcome to TPF.

Please start by telling us what type of puffer you have, then answer the questions listed at the top of this forum. Without this information we cannot properly assist you.

I have a green spotted puffer. I have only used freshwater, do not know the water parameters. The tank is a 5 gallon tank, There is one other puffer (same kind) and and algae eater in the tank with him. The fish that is sick is approximately 2" and the other is 1 1/2". Have been feeding shrimp once a day. (freezed dried shrimp) Have not made any changes to the tank. The tank had gouramis and guppies in it 3 weeks before removing them and adding the puffers. As you can tell I am very new to all of this. We have had the puffers 4 days and my family has already grown very attached to them. There names are Football (the bigger one) and Jaws (the smaller). Please, your help would be greatly appreciated I don't want to have to tell my 10 year old and 6 year old that they have passed.

Please read the GSP article in our library & go out & shop for a much larger tank, ASAP. You'll see why, in that article.

Pufferpunk wrote:Please read the GSP article in our library & go out & shop for a much larger tank, ASAP. You'll see why, in that article.

Just got back from purchasing a larger tank.

I agree with Pufferpunk, read the GSP article in the library.

The biggest problem I see if the fact that these two puffers are being kept in a tank that is WAY too small for them and they're being kept in fresh water. GSP's need low end brackish water when they're young, which should be increased to full salt water as they mature.

The combination of being kept in such a small, fresh water tank has probably lowered their immune systems significantly, they probably won't live much longer in the current conditions.

If you want to keep these fish alive I would do a HUGE water change asap (probably 75%), read up on how to care for them, then move them into a bigger tank with the proper conditions ASAP.

You should also invest in some water test kits. Knowing whats going on with the water chemistry is vital to treating any potential illness.

rphillips wrote: Just got back from purchasing a larger tank.

Good, it sounds like you care about the health of these fish. Unfortunately most fish stores either don't know how a puffer should be cared for, or they simply don't care. Now that they've been kept in fresh water, you'll want to slowly increase the salinity (I would shoot to raise it by a specific gravity of 0.002 per week) with an ultimate goal of 1.008 for now (fresh water should read 1.000). Make sure you use marine salt (the same stuff used for salt water aquariums), not aquarium salt (this is something different, generally used with cichlids or to treat illness). You'll need something to measure the salinity of the water, you can pickup a hydrometer pretty cheap ($10-$15), this will give you a rough idea of the salinity levels. A more expensive, but more accurate device would be a refractometer (about $60 online).

Once you have the fish in the bigger tank with some salt, check back and let us know how things are going. You're not out of the woods yet, the new tank will have to cycle. You're probably looking at daily water changes of 50% for at least the next couple weeks. You can also read the article on cycling in the article. We would generally recommend cycle a tank by adding ammonia, without fish in the tank, but you don't have that option right now. Just keep in mind that puffers are VERY sensitive to toxins such as ammonia and nitrite in the water (toxins naturally produced by their waste).

I wouldn't worry about adding salt until you have the water parameters stable. You need ammonia, nitrite, & nitrate test kits. If you can find it, purchase Bio-Spira to instant cycle that tank (add directly to the filter). DO NOT LET THE SHOP SELL YOU ANYTHING ELSE! Nothing else works like B-S & any other product can actuallly be harmful to your tank. It would help to move all the substrate, decor & filter from the smaller tank to the larger one.

Good points Pufferpunk. I'm always hesitant to recommend Bio-spira because people tend to buy something else instead which just makes things worse.