The Puffer Forum

I figured out what's wrong with Nemo, and now Pete's gills. They're holding them open. You'd think in all of my fish years that I would've dealt with this before but I haven't. The tank is now in treatment for parasites. I started yesterday. I swear I am completely amazed that Nemo is still alive. He looks worse but he's still pretty active. They didn't eat yesterday. I'm going to see if they will eat scallops today. They love that. I'm really trying hard not to have false hope but it's hard when I turn the light on every morning and there's Nemo. Of course I have Pete to be concerned about now. This morning I kept doing all kinds of little things in order to put off turning the tank light on. I just knew Nemo would be gone, but there he was looking at me.

I feel bad, guilty. I bet if they were still in their natural habitat they'd probably be healthy and fat.

Hugs, Beth

...but they wouldn't have someone who loved them so much! what do you mean by "holding them open"?

don't worry, I'm sure with the treatments things will start to look better.

yeah I'm not too sure what that means either. Do you have video or picture?

I swear I typed out a post to Jase explaining it. Now I wonder what the heck I did with it!

Anyhoo, the best way I can describe it is that their gills are being held open, like I can see in there and they're pumping hard and it's red inside. Pete's mouth is opening and closing real fast. Nemo's mouth was doing the same thing a few days ago.

I checked the water yesterday

30gal
nitrite 0
ammonia 0
nitrate low end of 10

I use liquid to test, no test strips.

manutius wrote:yeah I'm not too sure what that means either. Do you have video or picture?

No video. I don't know if my son could get a decent pic or not.

Hugs...

I know what you mean by it.
Whats the PH normally when I see that it's from a huge PH swing. Also check your sg. I'd do a water change too along with the treatment. It could be the meds are stressing him out.

Ugh, I bet it is the ph. I had been putting RO water in there. Some of it was salt and some was fresh since I was slowly raising the salinity. I only started doing that when I got the puffers. The last RO salt that I got from the fish store was so heavy with salt that as it was going in the tank you could see it. Ya know that salty swirling film? So after that I decided I would make my own ocean water. Did it with instant ocean. That was last week. I only used a 1/2 cup. This week I put a little plain water from the faucet in there. My water is hard, deep blue. Of course when I was using the RO the ph went down. So I probably did cause a big ph change. I killed him.

Pete's gills still look the same. Not as bad as Nemo's, but not good. He's still active. Pete ate well last night but it was the 2nd day that Nemo wouldn't eat.

Last night I knew Nemo was going to die. He seemed to be swimming aimlessly, as though he were blind.
I put my finger in the tank next to his face and he didn't care. I then put my hand in the tank and gently cuped it around him. Again he didn't care. I gently rubbed his tummy a few times and he didn't even flinch. His tummy was soooo soft. I never knew a fishes tummy was that soft. This morning I woke up to a little boy with big tears in his eyes saying "Nemo's dead, no more puffers." Nemo had a lot of character. He did such pufferish things that I've read about. It's just a darn shame.

IF, I can pull Pete through of course I won't put another puffer in there. I've got my "girl fish" as I call her in the 10gal so I won't take a chance on introducing new disease in either tank. Girl fish is 4-5yrs old so she's special.

My husband happened to go past a different fish store a few days ago. I called and they have the hydrometer that I need. Initially I bought the wrong one. The guy I talked to seemed to be knowledgable about the puffers and brackish water. I know that from hanging with you guys.

Oh, and the new fish store has meds that I can soak Pete's food in. So when I do the water change I won't need to treat the tank, right? Just soak Pete's food. I should've done what Jase said to begin with but I freaked when I saw Pete's gills were the same. But then again, should I even do that with Pete? He's all plump and doesn't get skinny after he eats like Nemo did.

I'm going to check the ph like you say and change water. Let me know if you have any more suggestions.

THank you for listening to me ramble. Thank you for your help.

Hugs, beth

crazedpuffer wrote:I know what you mean by it.
Whats the PH normally when I see that it's from a huge PH swing. Also check your sg. I'd do a water change too along with the treatment. It could be the meds are stressing him out.

sorry to hear that.
I hope Pete pulls through.

Sorry for your loss, I hope Pete is okay!

Thank you guys for the condolences. I really do miss that little one. I'll never forget the cute things he did and how hard he fought.

I checked the ph and it's about 8.4 on the light side. The new hydrometer read 1.008. I know that's high. Is that considered real high or a little high? Is it dangerous?

Pete is losing weight. He wouldn't eat last night. I'm not sure what to do. I didn't get to do a water change yesterday but I will this evening. I have the parasite guard in there. I was able to get gel-tek from the fish store my husband found. After the water change should I put some in the water?

I must've spent an hr or 2 at the new FS yesterday. I thought I'd died and gone to puffer heaven. I got to see puffers that I would have never thought I'd see in person. I saw Fakhas, Striped, Dwarf, Dogface, and 2 different ones that were not labeled. They had 2 big guys, a good bit bigger than my fist. They were all so sweet. One of the big ones stayed real close to the glass and watched me watch him. I slowly put my finger to the glass and he didn't even flinch, he just stayed real close. I wanted to kiss him.

I wish I had counted how many different tanks they had. Gosh there was so many. And out of all of those tanks I saw 2 sick little puffers and one dead fish. I was really impressed that the little sick guys were isolated, even from eachother. I'm kicking myself for not asking what kind they were. Ohmygosh they were adorable! I've looked and looked on the net for a puffer that looked like them and have found nothing so far. They were real dark, almost blk and I could see spines on their bellies. Their faces were much like the GSP's and F*'s. The Dwarfs were all so tiny. Little bitty babies. ALL of the puffers were friendly and real into saying hi to me. Out of all of the fish there it was the puffers that I wanted to bring home. ALL of them.

They had some reef tanks that took my breath away. They were beautiful. All of the tanks were so clean! The store was so well organised and the 2 brothers that run it were so nice and respectul towards me. It looks like they have everything I will ever need. What a HUGE difference from the store close to me. Hubby did good!

Thank for reading my rambling. I swear I was trying to act like a dignified person in there, but inside I felt like a kid getting their first WII.

If you've read this far let me know if I should gel-tek the tank after the cleaning. Especially if I can't get him to eat. The kids noticed that he's getting skinny so I know it's not just me being wiggy.

Big Hugs, Beth

that store sounds AWESOME!

What I would do is call the company that makes gel-tek and see if they can advise you or the FS. If the gills are red something is effecting them, I'm sorry I have no idea what. Another thing you can do is look up fish disease on-line and compare the symptoms. I had to do that with my guppies. I sort of found out what was wrong...mainly extream stress and did treat but they did not make it.

I wish your Pete well!

If a fish is having breathing problems, one test I have found for if it's the water or them is to prepare some freshly mixed water to match that tank temp and SG, then QT the fish in there for an hour or so. The transfer is a bit stressful to the fish, but if it's something in the tank causing the breathing problem, you should see improvement in the hour or so in totally "clean" water. I don't recommend much more than that because it won't be cycled and the quality will go down fast. Gel-tek is very dilute medicine made from a combination of 3 antiparasitics, and should never be added to the water. Not only would a whole bottle be an insufficient dose for the water, but it would foul the water in that quantity and exposing parasites to below-dangerous doses of medications makes them resistant: doing this with gel-tek would make them resistant to 3 major classes of antiparasitics all at once.

I kept wanting to email you guys this past weekend and tell you how wonderful Pete was doing. Buys, Busy, Busy. Pete's gills went back to normal and he got his first taste of shell on shrimp. He was so cute ripping and tearing at the shrimp. He reminded me of a puppy slinging a toy around. He has also swam to the front of the tank when he sees me now.

Yesterday I noticed the weird gills again. Pumping hard and the gill covers [ is that right?] opening and closing fast. He hasn't eaten in 2 days. Tonight he was laying beside the "ruins" that's in the tank. He practically had a ghost shrimp dancing on his head. I swear that shrimp has swam all around him. He picked at the shell on shrimp once and that was that. I've waved food in front of him and he just looks at it. I am at a loss as to what to do. I've done net searches and Pete just doesn't fit any of the lists of symptoms that goes along with the open gills. There's a piece of wood in there on a stand, it came with the tank. Could that be it? I think at this point someone would have to do a skin scraping and look under a microscope. I just don't know what to do but give up.


I've been checking the water every 2-3 days and it's fine. I checked it tonight. I've never had problems with water quality once I got past the newbie stage with the FW tanks.

I feel awful. I want him to live so bad!

30gal
ammonia 0
nitrite 0
nitrate 10
ph 8.4
hydrometer 1.007

your going to have to do daily water changes until you can figure out what's going on. Match the temp, Ph, and salinity and change up the water..

If he has no visable signs of illness, ich, fin rot or anything then heavy breathing is usually associated with high nitrates, (are your test kits in date? can you take a sample to LFS to get a second test) or low oxygen.. can you airate the tank better?

other than that, you are making sure you ahve nothing like washing up suds or anything else on your hands when you put them in the tank? your little boy isn't getting anything into the tank is he?

also temperature... what is it? Is the heater working? Is it too hot where you are?

He's gone.

I just bought some new liquid test kits. I added extra airation to the tank. I'm nuts when it comes to cleaning my hands and arms before putting them in the tank. I probably clean and rinse beyond what is reasonable. I was thinking that maybe I'd start soaking my hands and arms in vinegar then rinsing before messing around in the tank. I thought that might be less toxic, just in case.

I know the little one isn't doing anything to the tank. He's real responsible and asks me before he even lets a dog out to potty. He's so sensitive I know he wouldn't do anything to hurt Pete and make me sad. The first thing he did when he got up was to go check on Pete and tell me what he was doing. Where he was in the tank and so on.

I was constantly checking temp. Everytime I checked it was 82. I work in that room, spending hrs in there a day. I was watching Pete A LOT, checking, checking, checking. All I had to do was look up from my papers and there he was.

If you think of anymore questions please ask. It could stop me from making the same mistake. I just don't know that I can go back to FW after having a puffer. I don't know what to do now. I'm going to change water again. From there, what??

I believe that whatever Nemo had Pete got. Pete and Nemo along with all of the other F8 puffers were in a little 10gal tank at the store. Must've been 20 for sure, maybe more. I'd still like to know if I did something wrong though.

Thanks Alot, Beth

t1gerbee wrote:your going to have to do daily water changes until you can figure out what's going on. Match the temp, Ph, and salinity and change up the water.


If he has no visable signs of illness, ich, fin rot or anything then heavy breathing is usually associated with high nitrates, (are your test kits in date? can you take a sample to LFS to get a second test) or low oxygen.. can you airate the tank better?

other than that, you are making sure you ahve nothing like washing up suds or anything else on your hands when you put them in the tank? your little boy isn't getting anything into the tank is he?

also temperature... what is it? Is the heater working? Is it too hot where you are?