The Puffer Forum

Other than one very sick Puff?

Water Params:

Ammonia: 0
NitrIte: 0
NitrAte: <5
SG: 1.005

Did a %50 water change last night, and we woke up to this.

Only real change is we put a Phos-Zorb cartridge in the filter to replace the carbon because the carbon one tore.

Soon as we saw him we put some melafix in the tank.

His mouth is a bit scraped up as well.

The other eye is fine BTW.

Cloudy eye. Mine gets it whenever we do any major maintenance to his tank (scraping the glass, moving the decor, etc.). Usually goes away within a couple of days. Dunno about the mouth though, maybe he banged into something?

Oh the poor little thing!

I have no idea, but I'd probably pull out that filter pad asap since that's the only thing you changed! Maybe do several smaller water changes, try to not stress him more, keep lights off, etc..

Myaj wrote:Oh the poor little thing!

I have no idea, but I'd probably pull out that filter pad asap since that's the only thing you changed! Maybe do several smaller water changes, try to not stress him more, keep lights off, etc..

done.

hope he makes it thru the night

*srry, new baby, am nursing at keyboard*

Congradulations on the baby!

When did you have it? Boy, girl?

Myaj wrote:Congradulations on the baby!

When did you have it? Boy, girl?

announcement in the lounge

He's feeling a bit better now.

When I walked up to the tank, Bubbles swam up to the front and started to greet me, but he's obviously tired and wore out...

He was trying so hard....You swear I'm that little fishies world....I love that fish and I hope he makes it....

Never thought I'd acctually love a fish lol.

If he makes it thru the night I think it'll be smooth sailing. Give him another dose of Melafix and try to offer him some shrimp tomorrow. He didn't want to eat today...

I am going through a similar ordeal...I have been told same as you..keep the water pristine, and it should clear...I have also been told, one can add epsom salts to the water to help with any swelling around the eye (make it go down), 1tsbl spoon/5gal...and dose with melafix and/or primafix to prevent any secondary infection

Gave him another dose of melafix.

We tried to feed him, he showed intrest, but couldn't open his mouth.

We have lockjaw....



any suggestions?

Anything different in the water you used for the water change? Where do you get your water from? If it's tap water, it is possible the water supplier changed a critic parameter. If it is reverse osmosis water is your system in good condition?

Second idea is: something was possibly not working with the Phos-Zorb or interacting with it in a unexpected way. Did you have high phosphate before?
Removing it was good.

If the source of the bad condition remains unclear I'd suggest slowly increasing the salinity with daily water changes.

Good luck.

Corvus wrote:Anything different in the water you used for the water change? Where do you get your water from? If it's tap water, it is possible the water supplier changed a critic parameter. If it is reverse osmosis water is your system in good condition?

Second idea is: something was possibly not working with the Phos-Zorb or interacting with it in a unexpected way. Did you have high phosphate before?
Removing it was good.

If the source of the bad condition remains unclear I'd suggest slowly increasing the salinity with daily water changes.

Good luck.

Salinity is already at 1.005, where we want it to be. We aren't ready to go full marine just yet.

For water changes we use tap water + Aqua Plus dechlorinator + Instant Ocean marine salt.

Hubby put the phos-zorb in because he tore the charcoal filter while rinsing it. He did remove it and put in some filter floss to take it's place. The other two foam media pads have not been touched. The params are still perfect.

We had a boil water order a few weeks ago. But it's been rescinded and we check with the town whenever we do a big water change to see if there is another. We get our water from a local river, it gets treated ect ect...

Pandora, you can try manually feeding him with an eye dropper or syringe kind of thing, not sure how big the fella is. Its my understanding from admittedly limited research that lockjaw isn't often reverseable though.

dechlorinator is ok for chlorine and chloramines, but heavy metals like copper, lead etc. cannot be made completely harmless, as well as some organic substances. Heavy metals are only immobilized to a certain extent. contents harmless for humans can harm fish. So, the tap water remains a possible source.

If the pads were the source of the problem, since you removed them, the condition of the puffer should improve.

The puffer is a T. nigroviridis ?! A friend had a sick one (think it was a fungus at his eyes and uncomfort signs like black belly, no eating) at 1.005, we increased it to 1.01 (won't tell here how fast) and he became well again. 1.01 is not full marine, yet.

And..he's gone

I'm so sad...

*sigh*

Gonna start over I guess. Gonna do a full drain, replace the substrate with gravel instead of Sand (coulda been an anerobic reaction despite stirring) and order another from the fish store down in Naniamo after a few weeks fallow/recycling.

That's sad. I am sorry.