Dark porc color, is this normal?
Posted: Tue Mar 03, 2009 10:59 pm
Ph 8.0, Am 0, nitrite 0, sg 1.021
55 gal
60 lbs live rock
CC substrate
1 porc puffer, 2 black stripe damsels, 2 blue and yellow damsels, 3 blue leg hermits
Feed puffer once every other day, diet is scallops, mussels, shrimp, sparingly a few flakes for the damsels. They usually get the scraps from what the puffer eats. I feed the porc just enough to give him a rounded belly. W/C 15-20 gallons once a week using tap water and prime. Have 100ml bag of purigen in a fluval 205 currently running on the tank. Octopus BH300 skimmer, just set this up last week. 2 maxijet 1200 ph's, one at each end pointing down toward the middle of the tank.
Recent changes are adding the skimmer.
Aquarium has been setup since early october. I used live rock from an established tank.
My question is what color should he be? When we first bought him he was much lighter in color. Kind of a light tan with brown spots. Now he is the darker color you see in the picture. I'm just wondering if anything with my tank stands out as bad (besides the small tank) to cause him to have the darker colors. I know the 55 is small for him but he's only 3" right now. At the end of this year we will be upgrading to a 210 gallon tank. He is currently suffering from ICH i believe. You can see it in the picture. I used kordon ich attach a few weeks ago and the spots seemed to go away. Now I realize it didn't work and they are back. Would the ich be causing the darker color? I'm assuming he's stressed but he doesn't act like it. He has a great appetite, comes out of hiding when we go up to the tank and seems happy. When we aren't by the tank he goes to his favorite spot to rest. Another thing I noticed is that he seems to have labored breathing at times. Will the parasite get so thick to block his gills? I want to use the hyposalinity treatment but I'm not sure if it will stress him out more. Sorry for so many rambling thoughts. What do you all think about the way he looks?
55 gal
60 lbs live rock
CC substrate
1 porc puffer, 2 black stripe damsels, 2 blue and yellow damsels, 3 blue leg hermits
Feed puffer once every other day, diet is scallops, mussels, shrimp, sparingly a few flakes for the damsels. They usually get the scraps from what the puffer eats. I feed the porc just enough to give him a rounded belly. W/C 15-20 gallons once a week using tap water and prime. Have 100ml bag of purigen in a fluval 205 currently running on the tank. Octopus BH300 skimmer, just set this up last week. 2 maxijet 1200 ph's, one at each end pointing down toward the middle of the tank.
Recent changes are adding the skimmer.
Aquarium has been setup since early october. I used live rock from an established tank.
My question is what color should he be? When we first bought him he was much lighter in color. Kind of a light tan with brown spots. Now he is the darker color you see in the picture. I'm just wondering if anything with my tank stands out as bad (besides the small tank) to cause him to have the darker colors. I know the 55 is small for him but he's only 3" right now. At the end of this year we will be upgrading to a 210 gallon tank. He is currently suffering from ICH i believe. You can see it in the picture. I used kordon ich attach a few weeks ago and the spots seemed to go away. Now I realize it didn't work and they are back. Would the ich be causing the darker color? I'm assuming he's stressed but he doesn't act like it. He has a great appetite, comes out of hiding when we go up to the tank and seems happy. When we aren't by the tank he goes to his favorite spot to rest. Another thing I noticed is that he seems to have labored breathing at times. Will the parasite get so thick to block his gills? I want to use the hyposalinity treatment but I'm not sure if it will stress him out more. Sorry for so many rambling thoughts. What do you all think about the way he looks?