Help puffer swims face down!

[Fat Homer]

The only advise i can share would be to set him up in a quarantine tank and devote as much time and effort as you can for him...

In such a weak state, maybe do BB QT tank with a sponge filter and a cave or 2 with some small deco...

I also noticed you have cynobacteria and a few types of algae in your tank, so maybe there is other stuff in the water causing your puffer to not settle so well???

So my best guess would be keep him isolated and build up his strength through powerfeeding and cleaning up any leftover food within 30min to an hour after feeding.,,

I am also curious if you ever de-wormed your puffer when you got him??? Since Shouldenti are all wild caught as far as i know, and 99% of wild puffers will come with some form of IPs...

 

[xDestro]

The only advise i can share would be to set him up in a quarantine tank and devote as much time and effort as you can for him...

In such a weak state, maybe do BB QT tank with a sponge filter and a cave or 2 with some small deco...

I also noticed you have cynobacteria and a few types of algae in your tank, so maybe there is other stuff in the water causing your puffer to not settle so well???

So my best guess would be keep him isolated and build up his strength through powerfeeding and cleaning up any leftover food within 30min to an hour after feeding.,,

I am also curious if you ever de-wormed your puffer when you got him??? Since Shouldenti are all wild caught as far as i know, and 99% of wild puffers will come with some form of IPs...

Unfortunately I do not have a quarantine tank I can set him up in... I got him from Wes and he said he deworms them. Iv had algae for a while now I just think I got a to powerful light plus buying plants from my lfs already had algae on them but maybe their is some other stuff causeing it

 

[Fat Homer]

just curious what the puffer looked like when you first got it home, was it round and chubby, or already quite skinny???

Also, while im sure wes probably does de-worm his fish, it took me over a year to rid my old fahaka of all her IPs, since it would come back randomly, if treatment was continued long enough...

With that being said, i should have asked; have you noticed any stringy poop from your puffer, or are they coming out like pellets (based on your fishes size)???

If its stringy then you most likely need to deworm again, but might be hard on the puffer in his current state...

 

[xDestro]

just curious what the puffer looked like when you first got it home, was it round and chubby, or already quite skinny???

Also, while im sure wes probably does de-worm his fish, it took me over a year to rid my old fahaka of all her IPs, since it would come back randomly, if treatment was continued long enough...

With that being said, i should have asked; have you noticed any stringy poop from your puffer, or are they coming out like pellets (based on your fishes size)???

If its stringy then you most likely need to deworm again, but might be hard on the puffer in his current state...

Puffer looked fairly chubby. I don't notice any stringy poop but it's also hard to see with eco complete substrate. Iv had him for at least 3 months now and this is my first issue with him.

 

[Fat Homer]

This is just an educated guess here, but if he was quite happy and healthy originally and over the period of 3 months turned into what he is now, i would guess it could be due to one or more of the follwoing things:

1. Not getting enough nutrition from the bloodworm diet, since bloodworms and shrimp are basically just water... so if hes willing to eat meaty foods, maybe try stuffing some small pellets into the food item in hopes he'll get a more rounded diet...

2. Hes got another bout of IPs which is messing with him internally causing him to lose weight and get weaker...

3. Probably not as likely but still possible, somethings in the water causing him stress such as heavy metals / silicates or something else???

 

[xDestro]

I'll try and get some live earthworms as soon as I can

 

[Fat Homer]

One more thing, if you can find live earthworms, you can gut load them by setting up a small container with some dirt and placing some fish pellets on the top of the soil, this way, they eat the fish food which in turn gets eaten by your fish...

 

[xDestro]

I'll do that if he makes it through if not I think it might be time for me to get out of the hobby or at least go down to 1 low maintenance tank

 

[Fat Homer]

^ im sure no one can tell you what you should do regarding the hobby, but keep at it with the little guy and good luck!!!

 

[raja]

Try feeding some regular pond snails, they tend to increase the appetite of puffers in general.