The Puffer Forum

Hi all,

Was wondering if I could get some advise on treating white spot.

Our MBU (named Moobo) Puffer has 2 white spots on his back, one slightly bigger than the other. They are fairly small (pin head sized) and the bigger one is slightly raised. I believe it is white spot and am treating with "King British WS3 white spot terminator" which was recommended at the LFS where we bought Moobo. I have removed the charcoal from the filter and increased the temperature to 28 C before treating.

I have put the 7th treatment in tonight, the instructions state to do it every 48hrs and do a 10% water change after 5 doses which I have done. These spots aren't going at all though. How long roughtly do you think i normally takes, am I being inpatient? There are 8 Congo Tetra's in the tank with the Mbu and they are not affected at all. Moobo is very active as normal and eating healthily.

What is more the treatment I bought is almost run out, if I cannot buy the same brand of treatment am I safe to move onto another?

Note, have taken many pictures and videos but you just cannot see the spots on them

To be honest if there's only 2 spots i doubt its white spot, body ad fins would be covered. Could have caught himself on something and just punctured the skin in a couple of places or a skin problem. Ich can take weeks to be completely rid of depending on the life cycle and treatment.

If you still think its Ich you can treat with just heat and salt theres an article on it in the library. If its not ich it wont do him any harm.

I usually catch an outbreak before it becomes more than a couple spots. I highly recommend against using any chemical ich treatments, they cause more problems than they solve and quite often kill the fish. I'd recommend doing as big a water change as possible to remove as much chemical as you can, the read the ich article on treating with heat and salt. Nothing more is needed.

I agree with Hilly, probably not Ich. How large are the spots?

Add fresh charcoal to the filter to remove all the meds.

Thanks guys. Advise taken.

I will read the article too and pick up some salt today on the way home from work. Change the water tonight, put new charcoal in and then add the salt. Hopefully this will work.

The spots are small just 1-2 milimeters squared. I checked on him this morning and it looked as if there was a third but without the light on it was hard to tell.

Ich is pretty tiny, like grains of salt, if these spots are really as large as 2mm squared I would guess they are something else. Skin irritations, etc. Can you get a photo?

Sorry, no can do with the photo - have tried many times but you cannot see the spots on the image. Have read the article on treating with salt but what kind of salt do I need? Is it epsom salt?

Skin irritation is a possibly actually. When we got him from the LFS he'd wacked his back on the heater in the tank and it was only just begining to heal. After about 3 weeks at our place it was back to normal but has left a slight mark. I wonder if that part of him is just more sensitive as it has been damaged before?

I reckon its just the spines/pores in the skin nbeing irritated by something like a knock or graze. Clooney may get this once or twice in a year and it clears up with no treatment

Do they look like this with a white centre?

YES! That is exactly what it looks like.

Should I NOT use salt then and just put the charcoal back in the filter and do a 50% water change to remove the meds?

The more I think about it a knock is more a more likely. A few weeks back he made himself jump somehow (bad dream perhaps?! ) whilst going to sleep and all of a sudden shot up from the bottom of the tank and up and almost out of the water. Maybe he bashed himself then??

Cheers for all the help guys, makes me worry less!

Ed

yeah I would not worry too much. It would think that a big water change will help and then add charcoal/carbon to the tank to remove the meds

You can always add Melafix for skin irritations.

Yep good point

If you do decide to add some melafix to aid in the healing of the skin, it is also a good idea to add an airstone to increase aeration whilst treatment is carried out. If you already have plenty of aeration then there's no need.

Some people have found that their puffers seem to be gasping for air whilst treating with melafix and pimafix.

Not going to use the Melafix but thanks for the advise all the same. Have done the water change and put the carbon back in. All is well again and these white spots are slowly going and we have a much happier puffer and owner!

glad to hear it