The Puffer Forum

So everyone says puffers need pristine water conditions. I was wondering what the usual nitrate level people do water changes at. I do a 50% change once a week when my nitrates hit 20. Is this ok? Should I do a water change sooner?

Any tips on how to successfully introduce new food? Juke( my porc) has a small variety of foods he will eat. Anything new, he spits right out. I've tried several times. I have to gut load ghost shrimp and hand feed them to him to get anything other than mysis and snails into him.

Sounds good.

Just always keep the nitrate below 20 and you're fine. To get him to eat new foods, just starve him for a couple of days (he won't die), then introduce the new food. It sometimes takes tough love to get puffers to like new stuff.

casc wrote:So everyone says puffers need pristine water conditions. I was wondering what the usual nitrate level people do water changes at. I do a 50% change once a week when my nitrates hit 20. Is this ok? Should I do a water change sooner?

you will hear that about any marine fish. The bad part is, puffers make more waste than any other fish ive seen. I do large water changes once a week of about 45 gallons in my 110 and my nitrates are still over 50. They are happy as can be.

If your nitrate is >50 after a WC, there's something wrong with your fishkeeping. Either you are leaving detritus in the substrate, don't have enough live rock or flow, your skimmer isn't working properly, the tank is overstocked or overfed.

OK folks - take a deep breath and then think for a minute. The above posts are basically starting halfway through the process. The first question is not what your tank nitrate is at the moment, the first question is what is your tap (or any other source) water nitrate level as measured by liquid test kit. Even in this country there are tap water systems with nitrate approaching 30 ppm. It the tap water is ~30 ppm, your tank water will always be higher than 30ppm. IMHO & IME, that is not the beest for your fish. If I had tank water at or above 50 ppm nitrate, I would investigate alternate water sources or treatments, such as RO or RODI. Such water needs or requires some supplements before it is used for fish. Those may be DIY or commercial, depending on what is to be kept in the tank. Then you will have a different baseline reading and will thus have different maximum nitrate readings. Mature tanks should be fairly stable and predictable - you should not have to measure the nitrate levels every week to see if you need a water change. FW planted tanks for instance rarely have high nitrate readings, but they get their 50% weekly partials anyway. There are plenty of of other bad/undesirable things in the water beside nitrate - it is just the most easily checked in unplanted tanks.

Assuming that you start with low or zero detectable nitrate immediately after a partial water change, after one week your water should increased nitrate reading of less than 20 ppm above the baseline reading. If the nitrate increases more than than that in a week, the tank is overstocked, or overfed or inappropriately fed. Correct the cause, not the nitrate reading. Many hobbyists have a hard time with that concept. Always try to correct the problem, not the symptom! This is basic and very, very important. Correcting the symptom rather than the underlying cause is the equivalent of a dog chasing its tail - it is not very productive. Puffers are sloppy feeders, they miss the small bits and those do increase nitrate readings. They will also gladly over-eat and poop undigested food (many to most tropicals do this if given the opportunity). Learning what to feed and how much to feed is important. Most captive fish are both overfed and inappropriately fed. This shortens their lives and pollutes their tanks. This is a fishkeeper problem, not a fish problem nor a water problem.

HTH

a 50% wc every week??? that seems excessive to me. i do a 10% every sunday and my levels are fine. I also agree with pufferpunk. i think you need to reevaluate your tank habits if your nitrates are over 50 after a weekly wc.

I had an undulated trigger in my 125 gal for the past year. Didn't do a water change for 8 months just topped up water and my nitrate was under 40. Don't judge me I hated that fish for killing off my whole tank over a year ago. Something's wrong I think you're over feeding and you don't have enough flow. I did a 20% two days ago and my levels are under 20. Finally removed my undulated trigger with a very cool trap made from a 2 litre pop bottle. Currently quarantining my puffer just over a week now. He will soon have my tank all to himself.

My tank is pretty spotless and I have lots of flow. I only have like 5 fish. My problem probably is the amount I feed my S&S. Ive cut it down tremendously to try and help the nitrates.

How big is the fish & the tank? Maybe he's under-housed? How much LR? flow? Sump? Protein skimmer?

Are u using a wet dry? Filter sock?