Puffer fish help!

[axbrown]

Hey all, recently my pufferfish started getting really skinny, but would still eat up a storm, and the guys at the store said it could be internal parasites. I looked online and double checked, and followed up by buying metronidazole, and started soaking his food and feeding him. He's been doing better, and last night looked pretty good, but I think I may have over Medicated him, because today he looks like he is gasping for air, and is wedging himself against things. When he gets loose, he spins in circles ridiculously fast and twitches until he gets a firm hold somewhere else and then continues to gasp for air. I have done a 25% water change and put the carbon back into his filter. Is there anything else I can do? Do you think it's too late to save him? Please get back to me and let me know!

 

[Guppygulp]

Check the salt levels in your water. Puffer fish are brackish and need marine salt in their water. If its a green puffer fish, they need a brackish tank as babies then a full on salt water tank as adults. It's a kiss of death to keep puffers in fresh water.

 

[Terrance]

Nothing more you can do except to observe and check your ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate levels. More water changes are nice as well to remove medication from the water.

 

[dragonfisher33]

i have the same thing happened to me. the puffers are notoriously bad when it comes to internal parasites. most of the puffers are caught in the wild with at least 50% of them suffer from some sort of IP problem. my puffers were in the same situation as yours. swimming aimlessly and then a few days later gave up eating and then slowly died. I treated them with HCL and parasite clear by Tetra