[DEAD] F8 sucked by powerhead, now swimming lethargic

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Since this board has been up, we have found there are several questions that routinely get asked in order to help diagnose problems. If you can have that information to begin with in your post, we'll be able to help right away (if we can!) without having to wait for you to post the info we need.

1) Your water parameters - pH, Ammonia, Nitrite, Nitrates and salinity (if appropriate). This is by far the most important information you can provide! Do not answer this with "Fine" "Perfect" "ok", that tells us nothing. We need hard numbers.

2) Tank size and a list of ALL inhabitants. Include algae eaters, plecos, everything. We need to know what you have and how big the tank is.

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5) How long the aquarium has been set up, and how did you cycle it? If you don't know what cycling is read this: Fishless Cycling Article and familiarize yourself with all the information. Yes. All of it.

We want to help, and providing this information will go a LONG way to getting a diagnosis and hopeful cure that much faster.

While you wait for assistance:
One of the easiest and best ways to help your fish feel better is clean water! If you are already on a regular water change schedule (50% weekly is recommended) a good step to making your fish more comfortable while waiting for diagnosis/suggestions is to do a large water change immediately. Feel free to repeat daily or as often as you can, clean water is always a good thing! Use of Amquel or Prime as a dechlor may help with any ammonia or nitrite issues, and is highly recommended.

Note - if you do not normally do large water changes, doing a sudden, large water change could shock your fish by suddenly changing their established water chemistry. Clean water is still your first goal, so in this case, do several smaller (10%) water changes over the next day or two before starting any large ones.
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By_a_coo
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[DEAD] F8 sucked by powerhead, now swimming lethargic

Post by By_a_coo »

Hi...

This morning I got a bad surprise: I saw my F8 sucked by the powerhead. As a matter of fact, his tail was sucked, but his mouth was in contact with air, and he seemed to be dead! I thought I had missed my fish, but I took him and I massaged his belly and suddenly, he started to swim! He's swimming a little bit lethargic... He stopped to eat 4 days ago, when he began to pace up and down again. I don't know what's matter with him, can somebody help me please??? I'm desperate and anxious 'cause I'm working now out of home, and I don't know what I'm gonna find when I get home...:cry: :cry: :cry:

1) NH4 - zero
NO2 - zero
NO3 - ?
PH - 7.2
KH - 7
SG - 1.003

2) 20G tank - 1 Figure 8 Puffer

3) I give him once a day: shrimp or dried bloodworms or snails. WC - 50% once a week. I treated him with melafix and epsom salt couple of weeks ago, then I did a 90% WC in the end of the treatment.

4) I changed the SG, raising .001/week.

5) the tank is 2 months olg, full cyled (fishless cycle).

That's all...
Last edited by By_a_coo on Sun Dec 30, 2007 7:39 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Mareva
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Re: F8 sucked by powerhead, now swimming lethargic

Post by Mareva »

Does your fish seem to have any skin damages because of being sucked in? If so, melafix and pimafix might be required. Does he looks like he swallowed some air (seeming somewhat puffed?). Your massage might have helped getting some air out of it. But if you think there's still air in him there's an article about airfilled puffers in the library.
You might want to explain more about how your puffer came to no eating so we can help you better identify the cause.
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Re: F8 sucked by powerhead, now swimming lethargic

Post by By_a_coo »

Well, he doesn't have any injuries cause by the suction. He stopped to eat when I changed some things in the tank: my plants wasn't doing so good, so I added DIY CO2 injection and I increased the lightning, then he began to pace up and down the glass and stopped to eat even if I offer his favourite meal (shrimp). What could be happening with my little guy?
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Re: F8 sucked by powerhead, now swimming lethargic

Post by Mareva »

Well, I'm not an F8 expert, but pacing up and down the glass usualy means stressed fish. Does he have plenty of places to hide (plants, hideouts, caves, etc.)? How long have you had your fish?
We'll need someone else's opinion about how CO2 can affect fish because I've never used it.
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Re: F8 sucked by powerhead, now swimming lethargic

Post by By_a_coo »

Here's a link where I show a picture of my tank (the second one, 'cause I had to update that - as I mentioned, this is not the first time he paces up and down the glass), here's the link:http://www.thepufferforum.com/forum/vie ... 6&start=15

I bought him 25 days ago. When I get home tonight I'm gonna make some changes again, and pay more attention by the powerhead and stop the CO2 injection. Should I decrease the SG? Since I had raised it, he began to act strange... :?
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Re: F8 sucked by powerhead, now swimming lethargic

Post by Mareva »

Well, your tank looks great, I don't think you need to change things, especially since you said in the other post that your puffer seemed to like the new landscape. Your puffer is still adapting, some puffers will do more pacing when getting in a new tank than others.

The no eating worries me more than the pacing. You say you don't know how high are your nitrates. Do you have a test kit for nitrates? It would be good to know if the nitrates are way too high, this could affect your fish. How often do you do water changes?
Also, if your lighting is very strong and open for a long period each day he might not be liking it...
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Re: F8 sucked by powerhead, now swimming lethargic

Post by By_a_coo »

No eating is the most of my worries but the last pacing time he scratched one of his eyes... but he always ate well... About nitrate test kit, I'm gonna buy one tomorrow, but I was not worried about that 'cause I do 80% WC/week. I don't believe that I can thrive plants my F8 doesn't like strong light - 20W in a 20G tank is enough for him, but insuficient for plants... I really don't know what to do, I don't wanna lose my fish!!!!
Last edited by By_a_coo on Sun Dec 30, 2007 11:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: F8 sucked by powerhead, now swimming lethargic

Post by By_a_coo »

Well... I'm really sad.. I just had this wonderful fish for just 25 days. I don't know what I did but I killed him. Now he is dead. I'm really sorry and sad... tanks for helping. :( :( :(
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Re: [DEAD] F8 sucked by powerhead, now swimming lethargic

Post by crazedpuffer »

Sorry about your loss.
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Re: [DEAD] F8 sucked by powerhead, now swimming lethargic

Post by yunachin »

I am sorry about your little puffer. :(
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Re: [DEAD] F8 sucked by powerhead, now swimming lethargic

Post by Mareva »

Oh no! :(
So sorry about your little guy... Maybe it was sick to start with. From what you said in your different posts, you gave him good cares. I'm not a big expert, but to me it looks like you didn't do any major mistakes, so don't be too hard on yourself. You tried your best.
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Re: [DEAD] F8 sucked by powerhead, now swimming lethargic

Post by By_a_coo »

I thank YOU. I can't understand why he passed away. I read somebody saying that puffers could have days without eating, my puffer didn't eat for 4 days and got wasted. One more thing: First of all I had bright light because I had a lot of plants that I would try to thrive in BW, my puffer began to pace up and down the glass.. so I decreased the lightning. The plants was looking bad, then I increased some watts and DIY CO2 injection and that's the point where my puffer started over to pace and stopped to eat. And it tooks just 4 days for his death. Sorry people, but I'm really sad :( :( :(

Do you think that I should get another one and try again or would it be too much cruelty?
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Re: [DEAD] F8 sucked by powerhead, now swimming lethargic

Post by Myaj »

If he wasted away after only 4 days of not eating, he likely had a heavy load of internal parasites.. something very common in wild caught fish (which is what nearly all the common puffer species are).

If you do try to get another puffer, maybe get prepared a head of time to deworm. Your other guy might not have even made it with a deworming, if the parasite load was too large, but usually they can pull through.


Otherwise, a few things that might have happened. When you inject CO2, you really have to watch your pH. Its been a long time since I've read up on it, because I prefer to go low tech (when I do use CO2 I use Flourish Excel instead), but if you were injecting CO2 there could have been things going wrong if you used too much.. not enough oxygen for one, a pH crash, which is hard for any fish to handle and can also kill your biofilter for another. So that might have had something to do with it.
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Re: [DEAD] F8 sucked by powerhead, now swimming lethargic

Post by By_a_coo »

Yeah, it could be a lot of factors together, probably the crash of PH, the bright light and stress. I read the article in the library about deworming, and I think I'll do it the next time in a QT for a few days.

Thanks for your great advice! I'm thinking to get another buddy, and I promess I'll try to do every thing different...

Happy New Year for everyone in this forum! YOU are great!!
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