The Puffer Forum

That's right my puffer that i owned for 3 days, died. I came home from work to find him all puffed out and floating on the water.
He was alone in the aquarium, i have no other pets

I am sorry to hear that. I hope this does not turn you away from puffers... I lost 3 GSPs before I got one that made it more than 24 hours. Try again!
Jessica

I am so sorry to hear that, They are such great fish. How are your water parameters? Could anything have been sprayed around the tank, hairspray, air fresheners, etc? Anything out of the ordiary?

When I got my 3 puffers, one died the first night. I went on to get another and all three have done well so far. Sometimes it's just the puffer and not you. Make sure the water was okay and try again!

How do you acclimate them?

something major wrong with your tank.
Did you get the same bad aqaurium salt idea for raising salinity?
I lost 4 gsp's over that one...

Because one puffer died something is "major wrong" with the tank? How do you figure that?

Well, usually a fish doesn't keel over dead overnight.

Usually when you buy a fish, put it in a tank and it dies within a few days its due to one of a few things, though there are exceptions.

The #1 cause.. an uncycled tank. Puffers are very susceptable to ammonia, nitrites and nitrates, more than most other fish. Putting one in an uncycled tank can often mean its death within a few days, if steps are not taken to fix the water quality. Setting a tank out for a few days does not "cycle" it, the bacteria needs to be fed and established to cycle it.

Otherwise, there are a few things such as rough handling when it was caught that resulted in stress or internal injuries... disease or parasite that was already present before the fish was purchases and the stress of the purchase/move to new home let them overcome the fish... Something got sprayed in the tank.. filter died... temperature was off (too hot or too cold).. lots of little things.

But usually when they die after a few days its because ammonia, etc levels built up to the point that they killed the fish.

I agree that it's possible the there is something not right with the tank, but I don't think that just because a fish dies shortly after being introduced into a new tank that we should assume that there is a problem. As I stated above, 1 of my 3 dp's died the first night. The water was fine and I bought a new dp that next day and all continue to do well. It wasn't the tank... it was the fish.

When I got my Gsps, I had that tank established for about six months. They just did not make it, it was nothing I did or could have changed. There was definately something wrong with the fish, not my tank! Definately check and double check your tank (just in case) but sometimes the fish just doesn't want to make it. Nothing you could do. Again, try, try again!
Jessica

Did you test the water? The only way you'll know for sure it was "the fish" and not "the water" is if you tested it. And if you put a fish into a "new" tank that wasn't cycled and the fish died that IS a problem, one that could be avoided rather easily. Not the fish's fault, and its really discouraging to see people plop a fish in a tank and just wait to see if it survives or dies.

Puffers are 90% wild caught, so most have parasites, etc that you'll need to treat for or risk loosing them. Some have better immune systems than others and can survive bad conditions, a cycling tank, etc, and others won't.. but either way, its not the fishes' fault that it wasn't handled correctly (either by the store or the person who purchased it).

If you get another, please fishless cycle the tank first and have actual test results on your water quality so if something does start to go wrong, you can fix it before the fish dies. If you did all this and the fish still died, then you did all you could, but I haven't seen you post any ammonia, nitrite, nitrate readings, etc so I'm assuming you didn't.

When you purchased your puffers did you get them to give you the water parameters too of there tanks...? I always ask...