Puffer Probs

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OscarFan

Aquarium Advice Newbie
Joined
Nov 1, 2003
Messages
7
Location
Hazard Kentucky
I also have some fish with some brown on the bottom side. I just noticed it this morning and one of my puffers is almost completely covered on the bottom while the other shows just a little. Here are some picts and maybe someone can help.. Also I noticed a little Ich starting to form on both of the puffers. Thanks all this is a great site..
 
Hiya Oscarfan and welcome to Aquariumadvice.

I moved your post to its own thread; slightly different issues going on and I didn't want it to hijack the one you posted in, much less have people miss your questions.

As for your brown spots, I'm not 100% sure; my puffer knowledge is a bit limited, but I do know puffers will color change to some degree and I'm wondering if thats whats going on. Hopefully some of our puffer folk will pop in to comment.

As for ich, I wrote an article about it and the what you can do. If you want to check it out you can find it here: http://www.aquariumadvice.com/showquestion.php?faq=2&fldAuto=32
 
Hey oscarfan, puffers tummies get like that from stress. Unfortunately like oscars these guys can whine, but do so through colors. It may be because they have just been put in a new tank, it could be the pH ( they like it around 8.0), it could be the salt level, feeding, who knows. If you think its Ich.. start adding some salt in there (increase it current salt level). I have also heard of using crushed garlic in their foods etc, which is also supposed to help them through disease. Also if its a disease, slight raise the temp in the tank to speed up the lifetime of Ich, also adding the salt in there.. once Ich becomes free swimming, they are very vunerable to environemental probs (like a dramatic change in slainity in the water) which kills them.
 
Thanks all for the very fast and professional responses. I had read somewhere earlier about not adding salt to the tank if you have scaleless species. Is this correct because I also have 4 clown loaches in this tank and I dont want to hurt them. The clown loaches are flashing at times so it is most likely ich with them. I will take your advice about the increase in temp and keep a close eye on all of them.

Thanks :D
 
The only scaleless fish I have found who cannot take the levels of salt needed to treat ich are corys. I've done the high salt tx with clown loaches and they were fine. Do read the ich article; it will answer a lot of your questions :)
 
These fish are funny... I dont know if it is stress or what but they will have the whitest color on the bottom one minute and be dark the next. They seem to be doing fine and are eating like pigs.
 
OscarFan said:
Thanks all for the very fast and professional responses. I had read somewhere earlier about not adding salt to the tank if you have scaleless species. Is this correct because I also have 4 clown loaches in this tank and I dont want to hurt them. The clown loaches are flashing at times so it is most likely ich with them. I will take your advice about the increase in temp and keep a close eye on all of them.

It sounds like from your post that you have these puffers in freshwater. Isn't that a green spotted puffer? I'm pretty sure those prefer brackish water. That could be why they're stressing out.

I believe the South American and Dwarf puffers are the only true freshwater puffers.
 
yeah, ^^^^ this guy si right, i had the same puffer and i put it in a FW tank and it died after 5 days. It did the same thing, it changed color and rested at the bottom of the tank for 2 days and it died. I believe the puffer is called Leopard puffer right?
 
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