The Puffer Forum

SG. 1.023 (slowly lowering salt to 1.020)
Amm. 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 5-10 (colors are so close I cannot tell the difference)
Ph 8.4
tank 125 gallons
fish- 2 GSP (took out yesterday) 1- Porc puffer 1-Stars and stripes added yesterday from qt.
This morning when I got up to check on the puffers I noticed that the porcupine puffer has these large spots on her fins. She has had them before for a few days and they just went away on its own. Now she has about 4 spots on 3 different fins. I tried to get a picture of them but they are a shade darker than her fin. It really don't show up that well in the photos. Now the stars & stripe puffer has spots on two of his fins. You can see it better in his photo. Can anyone tell me what this is. Could it be saltwater ich? Never had it before but it don't look like freshwater ich which I have seen before.

Here are some photos
Porcupine Puffer:Where the darker shades are those are the spots




Here is the picture of the Stars & Stripe Puffer fin. Down towards the bottom is where the spot is.

It's hard to tell from those pictures. If it's just a couple of spots I would monitor the fish very closely to see if the spots start to multiply.

If it does end up being ich you'll need to remove all the fish and put them into QT. There's a good article in our library on treating SW ich (it's nothing like FW ich).

edmlfc1 wrote:SG. 1.023 (slowly lowering salt to 1.020)

fish- 2 GSP (took out yesterday) 1- Porc puffer 1-Stars and stripes added yesterday from qt.
This morning when I got up to check on the puffers I noticed that the porcupine puffer has these large spots on her fins. She has had them before for a few days and they just went away on its own. Now she has about 4 spots on 3 different fins. I tried to get a picture of them but they are a shade darker than her fin. It really don't show up that well in the photos. Now the stars & stripe puffer has spots on two of his fins. You can see it better in his photo. Can anyone tell me what this is. Could it be saltwater ich? Never had it before but it don't look like freshwater ich which I have seen before.

So they had the spots on them when they were in QT - did you treat them while they were in QT?

When you moved them to the 125, they had spots and now there are more??

GSP's-The 2-GSP's had no spots. One of the GSP's scratched his eye or something. I'm not sure what happened. The eye has cleared up after a day or so. I just moved them to another tank because I didn't know if they were bit or harrassed.

Porc & Stars- The porc & stars never showed spots in qt. The porc had spots (1-2) for a few days and then it disappeared. Then about 1 week later she got another 1-2 spots and they disappeared without any treatments. The Stars & Stripes was in QT but I needed the tank for the GSP with the cloudy eye so I swapped them out. The stars & stripes had no spots until the next evening after adding him to the 125 tank with the porcupine. The porcupine started showing spots the same day that morning. The stars & stripes had 1 spot when I got home from work and this morning he has two spots. Before I got the stars & stripes he was in a tank by himself with the sg at 1.011, after I brought him home I put him qt and slowly raised him to 1.024. It now looks like the porc's spots are slowly fading away.

Feeding-Also I soak their food in garlic for about 1 hour before feeding.
Have I confused you yet? I want to make sure I tell you everything I did in the last few days. I apologize for the long story.

The stars & stripes just fanned out his tail and he has about 5-6 on his tail fin. They are bigger than a grain of salt. They are about the size of a pin head some are larger. I tried to get a better picture but it's not showing up. I'll keep trying.

EDIT: If I have to put them in qt I have a 20 gallon high and a 10 gallon. I also have 2 hob filters on my 125 that I can put on these to tanks. I just moved the FW fish out this morning and put them in other tanks. Or could I pull out the lr and do hypo on the main tank? I don't have alot of lr only about 64lbs. Still working on getting more for the tank. The sand I have in the tank is not live sand. And I don't have protein skimmers for the qt tanks.

From the pictures, the dark spots on the porc's tail look more like a discoloration than a disease. Perhaps they just fade in and out with the changing moods of the fish.

A pin-head sized spot seems too large for ich. Once again, does it look like part of the tail or is there a little bump sticking out?

Also, I'm glad to hear the GSP is recovering.

It looks like a bump, like something stuck to their fins but not like a pimple more uneven maybe lumpy not perfect. Some of the spots are perfectly round with an uneven rough finish, some are not, some look flat. Some are like the size of a pin head some are larger like this o but uneven not perfectly round and some on the porc are blochy like some one might have dropped white out on her fin and tried to wiped it off. It's not bright white but more of a faded color almost the same color as her fin. The first few times I saw it on the porc I thought it was something off the live rock like dandruff or tree moss. I know that probally sounds weird but it disappeared after a few days. Could both the porc and the stars get these spots for no reason and then they just go away? This is my first experience with both fish and I really don't know what to expect as they age.The spots are no where on their bodies just on their fins. The GSP's have no sighs of the spots, I just checked on them again. Also the stars never had spots on his tail before but in pictures I have noticed that other stars & stripes do have spots. And the stars & stripes spots are more of a dull yellow color. Could it be a considence that the stars & stripes is just now developing spots on his fin & tail that maybe he should have had all along?

Ok you are going to probally think I am crazy but I managed to get some little better pictures of the porc. But you still can't see what I am trying to explain. I can see them perfectly when looking at her but when I take a picture I can't see it that good. You can see the darker shading on her fins, that's where the spots are. I'm still trying to get better pics of the stars. Hope these help. All the clear/black pimple looking things on her body are micro bubbles, I'm in the middle of cleaning tanks.

Ok I got better pictures of the stars tail. I can tell you he is not happy with me right now. But here is a good shot. The second pictures shows his left side of his tail fin the first picture is his right side. As you can see the spots are only on one side but when his tail is really flared out you can see it on both sides. The little lumps you see at the bottom of his tail are micro bubbles. I am in the middle of a water change. Hope these help.

Nothing in the pictures looks like SW Ich to me. I have no idea what it is though.

The way the white spots on the S&S's tail sort of fade out into the rest of the fin almost make it look like part of the tail.

I would continue to monitor the spots, along with the overall health/activity of the fish. Maybe someone else can chime in if they have any ideas about the spots.

Thanks mike, I apperiacte your help.

ah ah... i wondered who you were...

you Pm'd me then deleted it before I could read it.. not sure why....?

but anyway, maybe it is ich... from the going away and coming back that you mentioned sounds like ich in the way it becomes visable to the naked eye for a few days (spots) and then falls off and multiplies, becoming invisible, before re-attaching itself and becoming visable again...

the stress of moving and adding fish may have caused the fish to get another bout of it, as stress reduces their ability to fight off the ich.

What else do you have in the tank? Any inverts? Live rock?

If not, i'd start lowing the salinity to hypo (1.009) in your main tank.. unless you can take ALL the fish out and put them in a Q tank.. leaving the main tank fallow (fishless) for 6 weeks..

If it is Ich then your GPS's may well have it as well as they were in the main tank, either keep a very close eye on them, or get them into hypo as well, just incase..

PM Puffer queen with the new pics... see if she recognises it as anything else...





Ps... what are your parameters, possible ich as well as cloudy eye... something doesn't sound right... is your Ph ok? Why are you lowering and raising the SG?

I'd PM Puffer Queen to look at this.

t1gerbee, I pm'd you because I knew you have just went through ich with your stars and stripes. But then puffer queen had answered and I thought I might need more information so I deleted it. Did not mean to confuse you lol. The spots are really large not like salt and looks nothing like freshwater ich. Someone suggested it may be Lymphocystis, I looked it up on the internet and it does not look nothing like that it's more flat looking. To me it looks more like calcium deposit on the side of a tank. You know the white stuff stuck to the glass where the water line is when you drain the tank. That is about the best way I can describe it. The gsp's still have no signs of it. And the spots are still not anywhere on their bodies only on the fins. The porc's spots are getting smaller and starting to go away. The spot on the stars top fin looks like it got larger and the one on his bottom fin looks like it got smaller, the spots on his tail look the same. In my tank I have lr about 64 lbs. working on getting more, just need more $$$. I've been looking at pictures trying to get some idea of what it could be with no luck. I did mange to get some Maracyn-Two just in case I need it. I have not treated them with anything yet. Still waiting for an answer.

A picture of his fin today:


A picture of the same fin yesterday:

god knows,

I hope PQ can help you.