I have some concerns with my pea puffers

[JCrizz]

Hey guys! So I'm brand new to the puffer arena and had some concerns. I went in to check on my puffers today and noticed that one of then wasn't really moving. I thought he was a goner already, so I got out the net to see and he started moving a bunch. I looked at him in the water while still in the net and he looks really small. The other issue is he's super lethargic and just staying in the same place. My guess is die short of internal parasite, but figured I would poll the experts. So here he is:
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I also noticed that one of my other girls had some white on her. I couldn't get a great picture, so here are several. Am I being paranoid? Is it just her color or could there be something else going on?
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[morpheus]

the first one with the rock does look extremely thin. i cant really see the white very well as you said on the other. i know its hard to get a clear picture.

what are you feeding them and how often? does the very thin one make an effort to eat?

a good thing to use with these guys is vitachem....its a vitamin supplement you can pre-soak their food. helps a lot with their color and nutrition in general

[EpikMuffin]

can't see the white stuff, but it looks like it is starving. Mine have rounded bellies.

What are you feeding them?

[Beth777]

I strongly believed they had parasites when we got them because their stomachs were flat. The puffer people always say it's pretty much guaranteed that the puffers we buy will likely have IP's. I always treated my puffers for parasites within a few days of getting them.

[Beth777]

If they have parasites it won't matter how much you feed them, they will die if not treated. It will be common for the belly to look nice right after feeding and then go back to looking emaciated after awhile.

[morpheus]

If they have parasites it won't matter how much you feed them, they will die if not treated. It will be common for the belly to look nice right after feeding and then go back to looking emaciated after awhile.

i agree the parasites would need to be cleared first. the most common medications used are seachem ParaGuard or Tetra ParasiteGuard

i got mine from fish gallery, but never had any issues and never treated for IPs. took them a few days to start eating, but ever since they devour bloodworms. bellies get round after feeding and go back to a thinner streamline fish next day. i only feed every other day since they gorge themselves. almost an entire bloodworm cube between the 4 of them.

[EpikMuffin]

one of mine had internal parasites and still eat like pig till his last days. Mine had like a small lump on one side of the belly, but this one is pretty flat.

[JCrizz]

I got these at fish gallery too. The weirdest thing happened, I woke up today and the one that looks thin was swimming around and acting fine. I'm going to treat them for IP's though because I do think he is too thin and pea puffers seem predisposition to get IPs (as a tech person, I feel weird saying IP and NOT referring to technology lol). Two of the girls have big bellies and are eating well. The third girl isn't AS big, but seems to be eating and happy (the one I was thinking had some whiteness on her tail). One of the girls is a big time bully though and last time I fed them snails I noticed this male trying to get the snails, but she kept chasing him away. She also does this to the girls if I put most of the snails in the middle of the tank. I guess that's her "territory", so I started spreading them out more after that... but she's still mean! I thought maybe she wasn't letting the male eat and he wasn't being aggressive enough, but I put some snails in last night and 2 of the females were all about it and the other 2 didn't seem to care at all. That's when I got really concerned with the male not moving and just sitting on the sand. The other one was swimming around, but either didn't seem interested in eating or didn't see me drop the snails in.

I am "cultivating" snails in my main tank (let's pretend that this is on purpose), so I feed my puffers some snails from this tank every several days and then I feed freeze dried bloodworms. I've seen them eat the bloodworms before, but sometimes I think that they just wait for the snail days and snatch all of those up. What do you guys think? I know these fish can be picky eaters, so is there anything else I should try? I don't have enough snails to feed them every day so I still need to have something else to give them.

[EpikMuffin]

I fed them frozen bloodworm initially, but switched to grindal worms now. Bloodworms is too messy, and I heard they could carry bacteria or parasites. They only sucked the stuff out of the bloodworm and left the white skin all over the place. Same go for snails, you have to feed them small pond snails because they only suck out half of the adult snail and leave the rest inside the shell rotten. I only feed them snails as a treat, and grindals are their daily diet.

[morpheus]

he just may be weak and taking a rest.

i would switch to the frozen bloodworm cubes over the freeze dried personally. grindals and blackworms are also good if you have those.

both would work, but i think the freeze dried arent as good nutritionally. you also need to take the time to rehydrate the food (or else they can actually eat too much and bloat if they eat a lot of dried and it rehydrates/expands inside their belly). the frozen is also generally cheaper IMO. i just tend to think fresh is best. i would rather eat a steak off the grill than rehydrate a dry steak haha

the snails are a good supplement, when you have them. mine love them, but dont get them often like you are saying due to availability. its possible they just got hooked on the live food and are more so shunning the rest. just spread the bloodworms maybe 5-10 at a time and they pick them off as they sink and get stuck on plants. my shrimp clean up the scraps

you just have one more dominant than the rest. some people rescape the tank often, moving ornaments and plants around so the puffers dont get bored. also keeps them picking new spots. just have enough sight breaks so they dont continually chase.

[JCrizz]

Where do you get the fresh stuff? I'm on the southwest side of town and refuse to go to T&T for anything.

I have decent sight breaks right now, but will probably rescape soon. You can probably see in the pics, but my plants aren't doing very well in the sand, even with the root tabs. The Amazon Sword is doing okay (the one in the pic) but the wisteria is dying and the anubis is just too small to provide any cover or breaks right now.

I also have Otos in the tank, so I usually have some zucchini in there for them. Though, I found one of my otos dead this morning and his head was really red, so I was wondering if maybe he got attacked overnight. he was on the opposite side of the tank than where they had been hanging out. I'm just not sure

[EpikMuffin]

grindal worms culture! and you won't have to buy food for fish any more

[morpheus]

frozen cubes i just get at petsmart....you can get them in cubes or slabs. they also sell things like daphnia, different frozen shrimp, etc. for other fish

what kind of light do you use? that could be one thing. i am not a planted tank expert, but many things can cause withering. sand could be an issue. its harder for the roots to really establish themselves. swords do absorb a lot of nutrients, so root tabs def help. my planted tanks one has just gravel, and other was just set up with eco complete. this lets the roots have spaces to grow through and not push through sand. my wisteria started out as a rooted plant, now its mostly a floating version with hanging down roots. dont bury the anubias roots either.

last idea is just nutrients in the water too. some plants take in nutrients through their leaves/stem instead of their roots, so minerals in the water are essential. can maybe try using flourish.

its possible the oto got bit....or also possible things were picking at him after the fact. not sure there.

[morpheus]

grindal worms culture! and you won't have to buy food for fish any more

yeah if you get your hands on a culture thats nice....father in law has micro worms, grindals, blackworms, etc. that he collected. but he lives in PA so i cant nick any from him haha

[JCrizz]

frozen cubes i just get at petsmart....you can get them in cubes or slabs. they also sell things like daphnia, different frozen shrimp, etc. for other fish

what kind of light do you use? that could be one thing. i am not a planted tank expert, but many things can cause withering. sand could be an issue. its harder for the roots to really establish themselves. swords do absorb a lot of nutrients, so root tabs def help. my planted tanks one has just gravel, and other was just set up with eco complete. this lets the roots have spaces to grow through and not push through sand. my wisteria started out as a rooted plant, now its mostly a floating version with hanging down roots. dont bury the anubias roots either.

last idea is just nutrients in the water too. some plants take in nutrients through their leaves/stem instead of their roots, so minerals in the water are essential. can maybe try using flourish.

its possible the oto got bit....or also possible things were picking at him after the fact. not sure there.

This is my light: http://www.amazon.com/Marineland-ML9...dp/B00KL8TPC0/

It's also my first try at keeping plants, so I expect some bumps. All in all the amazon sword looks pretty good, but you can clearly see the leaves aren't as healthy as they could be.

I have the 24" and the lights are on about 12 hours a day. I don't use the night mode, but keep the day mode lights on a timer (about 8 AM to 8:30 PM)