The Puffer Forum

Hello again everyone,

we're having a problem with our ceylon's eye. its looked a bit strange for about 2 weeks, but he wouldnt let us really look at him, and it really didnt look that bad. all i can say about it is, it looked like it had a thin white ring around the eye, where it met the skin. usually that area turns almost black when he sleeps, so it just looked strange, but not really bad per se.

at any rate, i've been out of town for 2 days, and i went to feed him, and he looked a bit thin, and was swimming funny. so i decided to give him a treat of 1/2 small clam, he loves to pick at that. well, he didnt even go over by it, so i started to watch him closer, and he was running into things. thats when i noticed, his eye is flat. it has no raised area. what could cause this??

What are your water parameters?
If you have mela/pimafix on hand I dont think it would hurt to add those to the tank for now.

ok, still dont have the water parameters, but they have not changed in over a year (not really a good excuse i know) and the GSP we had in there is fine. I did the melafix for a few days, but i came home one day and he looked so bad, that i moved him into a seperate tank that had our sick knight goby (lodged himself under a rock for a length of time we dont know, hasnt been the same since). its only a 10g, but niether of them have done much swimming lately. i was already doing melafix in that tank, and have continued to do so with weekly water changes.

the day i moved him, both his eyes were deeply sunken into his head, and all i could find was "gill disease" or "malnutrition". my first thought was the malnutrition, since he refuses to eat anything with vitamins in it, so i give him slices of raw shrimp (wild caught if they have it, but usually farm raised) and i dont know how good that is for him. there is plenty of snails in the tank at all times, and we've seen him eat them also. the GSP eats almost the exact same foods tho, cept for the fact that he'll eat the blood worms/brine/home made food all with vitamins. then i recalled that in the year we've had him, he's stopped eating 3 different times, for no apparent reason, he wont even touch live black worms (one of his favorites).

so, basically, im still at a loss for what's wrong exactly. but after 2 weeks of melafix and feeding him cyclese (sp?) with a turkey baster, he is back to swimming around, and has been eating live black worms. both eyes are in their normal position, though he is still missing the lens over the left eye. i think its starting to grow back though, cause he seemed to be using that eye to pin point the worms.

any thought?

Vurphy.. "fine" is not an answer that will help you here. We need levels, actual levels.

As far as how it happened, maybe the GSP bit him, maybe he scratched it on a rock, maybe he got stuck somewhere and ripped it off trying to get loose.. No idea.

It would make sense that maybe the gsp is bullying him and he wasn't getting his fair share of food.

But definately, you need to know your ammonia/nitrite/nitrate levels to begin with. They tell you a lot.

ok, sorry for the delays, i've been sick and pretty out of commision myself.

nitrate - 40
nitrite - 0
harness - 300
alkalinity - 300
ph - 8.4
ammonia - 0
salinity 0.012

Salinity can't be 0 anything. Has to start w/a 1. Nitrate should be <20. Do 25% daily water changes till it is.