The Puffer Forum

hey guys. I just lost my porc. puffer. hopefully someone might be able to help explain what may have happened or what i may have done wrong
with him. my ph level 8.2 and there is no ammonia present.salt is 1021 like it has always been. nitrate 160ppm but it has always been high in this tank. Nitrite 0 ppm. the rest of the tank mates are fine nothing has changed in their behavor at all. 1 dog face puffer 5 inches long. 1 clown trigger trigger about the sane size,1 drogon warrasse same size, and a snowflake eel 2 foot long. they all co inside a 100 gallon tank.

I have been feeding frozen raw shrimp in the shell and silversides. I done a water two days ago 20 gal worth like i have done every week.
this morning he met me at the tank side as he always has since i got him. fallowed me across the room and went back to his cave as normal.
a couple hours later he started to swim out of control running into thr rocks and the side of the tank hard enough to hear him. I tryed to stop
him but just could not catch him. he then layed on the bottom upside down exshaughted puffed up and died. all the other fish tryed to avoid him until his demise then they all gathered around him, the trigger atacked the net everytime i went to grab him out.

I havent changed the salt i use or the carbon, i havent done anything differnt at all. any explaination would be helpfull so that maybe it can be avioded later for myself and others.

thanks Clint

what is your Sg? 1021? 160 is really high for nitrate, but looks like you know that. and that 100 gallon is over stocked.
not trying to be rude or anything...

as to why he had such a dramatic freak out and death, I'm not sure...
could any of the others attacked him? gotten smashed? do you have kids that could have "helped" feed him? how big was he? how long has he had that diet?

where are you located in MT? just curious

Jase wrote:what is your Sg? 1021?

I believe he means 1.021 SG.



My only guess is that something happened internally (like an organ failure), and he was frantically trying to get attention. Were there any marks on him, or any discolourations that you know of?

Do you still have his body? If so, you could perform a necropsy and check some of his organs (a lot of puffers die from fatty liver disease).


I think your next step should be getting a larger tank or reducing some of your stock to help reduce your nitrates. I would also look into a few methods of reducing nitrate, such as dosing with Vitamin C (not the tablets you buy for humans - there's a post on our forums about using Vitamin C in marine tanks). There are other methods, but I'm not very familiar with them. Do you have a sump, by chance?

How much live rock do you have, what skimmer are you using, and are you using any extra filters? Extra filters can cause you have higher Nitrate count, as they promote bacterial growth to convert ammonia and nitrite (rather than housing the various organisms that come with live rock). It's not to say filters are bad by any means, but just that they can contribute to higher Nitrate levels (at least, that's how I've understood it).

nitrate of 160 will eventually kill all your stock, deal with it now or stop keeping marine fish...

harsh i know, but if you are not able to keep the fish in a decent conditions, please don't keep them.

There really is no excuse for having nitrates that high, water changes alone will bring that right down, you should be doing 20G water change a day until your nitrates are no higher than 20..

adding loads of live rock, running larger skimmers, massively reduce feeding, take stock back to LFS... get a bigger tank, all will reduce nitrates...

doing nothing is not an option now..

as for your porcs death, it could have been any number of things, sounds to me like nitrite poisoning, irratic, frantic swimming like that.. often a sign of nitrite...

but with nitrates that high, your fishes immune systems will be seriously compromised..... so they have no resistance to fight infections/parasites...

Wow, yes, I agree. Unfortunately, puffers are very, very sensitive to nitrates and 160 is way over the top for them. Mine usually show some distress at 20.

A 100 gallon tank isn't physically large enough for one full grown porc, much less a porc, a whole bunch of other inhabitants, and sky high nitrates. Death is going to happen, sooner rather than later.

Please, for the survivor's sakes, please lower the nitrates. Do water changes. Do anything to get them down. You're killing your animals.

hey everyone, ok so he needs to watch his numbers, so how about a little compassion. Sorry your bud died, but listen to the advice, remember we are only imitating a world that we know little about. Dont give up, just learn more and go bigger, Im heading for a 150 myself, am very excited. Good Luck

He needs to do a lot more than watch his numbers, he needs to do research and take care of the fish. Or more will die.

I'm sorry he lost his porc, but in that sort of a set up and conditions, it was inevitable, and he needs to know why it died before he throws another one in there and watches that one die too.

Hey everyone
I gave up on the puffers. I gave them back to the store in the hopes that they find a better home. Ill stay whit what i know more of. I sure hope that everyone has much better luck than i had with these guys. My only advice would be the bigger the better with the equipment when it comes to puffers. Do a lot of research before you buy one. I thought that i knew a lot about them but my tank wasnt near big enough for what i had living in there. If you dont have the time to spend caring for puffers or for any tank dont do it, all you are going to do is kill fish and waste your money. My other tank is now much happier now that i can spend more time on it. Dont overload your self with to many tanks, pick one style out and keep with it. if you decide that multiple tanks are for you good luck and give each one the same amount of care and time to be successful with them all.

I had a puffer tank 180 gal, it had one dog face puffer, one porc puffer (which died) one snow flake eel, a clown trigger (also died). I had a 75 gal sump tank with two skimmers, two filters for 300 gal tanks. 80 lbs of live rock and a sand filter for my 75 gal sump. the temp was at 78. deg. bounced around a couple deg. I thought this would be enough to control nitrate, nitrites in the tank. i cleaned my filters weekly and added nitrate control but i couldnt keep it under control after losing my trigger i gave up.

I now will be using the tank for a coral tank I have better luck with this type of tank.

thank you guys for being honest with me, and if no one can take the truth or refuses to admit there wrong with the advice givin here they should not have puffers in their home..........................


Again thanks everyone.
Clint

so sorry for your loss... In a reef tank, nitrate needs to be 0. More care, dosing, research needed for them too. Also, serious lighting.

I'm sorry for your loss. I need to give you a round of applause for giving the puffer back to the store and taking in the people's advices here so well. I hope you reconsider keeping puffers again when you have the right set up.

clint wrote:Hey everyone
I gave up on the puffers. I gave them back to the store in the hopes that they find a better home. Ill stay whit what i know more of. I sure hope that everyone has much better luck than i had with these guys.

thank you guys for being honest with me, and if no one can take the truth or refuses to admit there wrong with the advice givin here they should not have puffers in their home..........................


Again thanks everyone.
Clint

You get the slow clap/thunderous applause for that one.