The Puffer Forum

Hi everyone

I'm sorry i'm french

I have 6 carinotetraodons travancoricus in 60 L with fourties shrimps (neocaridina sp green) since december 2008
I have no nitrits and nitrats, and the pH is 7,2 (my water is soft), i change a part of the water every week.
One of my tetraodon had a white fade and smooth spot at the top of his head.


I have separated him from the other and cured with punctol but the spot became as a hole and the fish died this afternoon




Two other fish present today a spot on the head
I'm worry about them and don't know what to do.
No one french forum gave me an answer.

Can you help me ?

Thanks a lot

Marie

The 2nd picture looks really skinny.I dont know about the hole thingy. It could be a fungus. I would treat the fish for internal paristies

The second picture represent my dead fish
He became very skinny since he get ill

I've just taken some picture, the others fishs are not skinny

Can you get pimafix where you live? If it's a fungus pimafix should help.

Did you just feed them?
Can you answer all the questions in red? What is your ammonia level and your levels for nitrates/nitrites?

Clean, clean water. How much are you changing each week? Consider doing more. Clean water heals skin problems, and Melafix and Pimafix are good products to use if you can find them. I'm not sure what would cause a skin issue like that, other than dirty water, but you say you have 0 nitrates?

You probably want to deworm them, they are all very skinny, even the one's who look like they've just eaten.. big potbellies but skinny/bony bodies. What are you feeding them?

These are fat and healthy dwarf puffers, do you see the difference?

I have just feed them
My level of nitrites is 0, nitrates 1 (drop test JBL). I have no test for ammonia but my water have no odor.
I don't know pimafix but it seems to be possible to buy it in France... But tomorrow it's sunday
I change approximatly 20-30% of water each week
I feed them with bloodworms (congelate) and snails

and i don't know what "potbellies" means

A pot belly is a belly (stomach) that sticks out more than it should. Usually you see a pot belly on malnurished children.. food makes it swell out but they don't have any extra fat on the rest of their body.

On a healthy person or fish, the belly should blend in... not stick out. Your puffers look like they swallowed a round ball, but their bodies are very thin. That usually means for some reason, they are not getting the nutrients from the food to keep their bodies healthy, the usual reason is internal parasites. Basically, the parasites eat the food and the fish starves.

I don't know what you could get in France to help you (medication/products), I don't know that we've ever had a french member before, hmmm...

Thanks for the explication ! I understand what you mean. Indeed my fishes have potbelly since i've bought them

I never had this type of probleme so i don't know the french products
Can you give me the name of active principle ? I work in pharmacy

Pimafix has extracts from the West Indian Bay Tree (Pimenta racemosa), and Melafix has tea tree oil (Melaleuca). I got that info from petmountain.com, with product descriptions that I think were written by API, the manufacturer.

But pimafix and melafix don't heal intestinal worms ?

Hello Chlorophylle

My South American Puffer recently had a small round ball of fungus and 3 little holes appear on his back, it then turn into a kind of white sore which had crack marks on it. I've been treating the water with pimafix and melafix for 4 days and it's now starting to look a lot better.

Pimafix treats external and internal bacterial infections

Myaj wrote:Clean, clean water. How much are you changing each week? Consider doing more. Clean water heals skin problems, and Melafix and Pimafix are good products to use if you can find them. I'm not sure what would cause a skin issue like that, other than dirty water, but you say you have 0 nitrates?

You probably want to deworm them, they are all very skinny, even the one's who look like they've just eaten.. big potbellies but skinny/bony bodies. What are you feeding them?

These are fat and healthy dwarf puffers, do you see the difference?

Hey Myaj

Sorry this is a bit off topic but are these 2 pictures of a Male and a Female Dwarf Puffers?

If so which is which?

I would like to get some and just wanted to know for when I go to the lfs

Thanks

Tomorrow morning i'll clean water and monday i'll search pimafix and melafix.
Thanks a lot for all your tips

It's midnight so good night !

Female is the top photo, male the bottom (and there's an article with these and more photos in the library).

Chlorophylle, Pimafix and Melafix would be for the skin, not the parasites.

For parasites, there are different medications that can work, but they probably will have different names if you are working with medications for people, not animals.

Maybe find an animal doctor and ask them if they have anything.. I have used a pig/swine dewormer in the past on my fish, levamisole hydrochloride. Other good deworming medications are Praziquantel or Flubenol. Any of these works better when mixed with an antibiotic such as Metronidazole.

If you have any specialty fish stores, good ones with healthy fish, see if they carry anything or know where to get it. The key is you need to soak the fish's food in some water mixed with the medication, and convince them to eat it. The medications taste bad, so sometimes this can be very hard.

Over here in the US, many of us are using this product with good results: http://www.petmountain.com/product/fish ... -4-oz.html

But since it works so well and everyone's buying it, it can be hard to find.


Is your hair green in real life?