puffer died mysteriously

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Came home yesterday (Tuesday) to find my 7" porcupine puffer (Stewie, because his face was like the cartoon character baby on Family Guy) breathing hard on the bottom, and here at 2 a.m., he's dead.
Brought him home Saturday morning. and he seemed perfectly fine up through Tuesday morning. Did slow acclimation. Given all the other parameters, and the other fish seemingly ok, the only thing I can possibly link this to is his having eaten some shrimp -- he ate 2-3 2" shrimp, which came already cooked and peeled (I had asked for fresh). He gulped them down Monday night. He had been eating well before that, too.
Other fish, 6" queen angel, 6" spotted puffer, and 5" banana wrasse, and a few small damsels, seem ok. The other puffer does seem to retreat after he eats a lot, though. He had the same shrimp, as well, to a smaller degree, the others, too. No signs of nipping, etc.
This is a 150 gallon with All Glass sump, ASM G3 skimmer. Lots of live rock. Temp 77-78 degrees; SG 1.025; ammonia <.25; nitrites barely detectable; nitrate < 20; pH 8.4. I do weekly 20% water changes from RODI reconstituted water. Everything has been stable since he came home.
Any ideas here? Is there something wrong with cooked shrimp or the fact that he ate 2 or 3 of them at one time?
Thanks.

 

[beth]

Sorry this happened, but there is no way of knowing what happened. Fish should eat raw foods, but I don't really see an issue with him eating 1 cooked meal. Unless there was something actually wrong with the shrimp....how did they smell?

 

[fixed]

Originally Posted by Beth
Sorry this happened, but there is no way of knowing what happened. Fish should eat raw foods, but I don't really see an issue with him eating 1 cooked meal. Unless there was something actually wrong with the shrimp....how did they smell?
Thanks. The shrimp seemed perfectly fine. I would have eaten them. I just wonder if they might have used something in cooking them that is harmful, or just eating that much all at once could be harmful. Total mystery, but I guess you start by eliminating what you can.
Can fish get severely constipated maybe?

 

[beth]

If they were just boiled shrimp that you get at the seafood counter, it should not be a problem. But were they seasoned?

 

[stella]

I'm not an expert.....but shouldn't the ammonia and nitrites be at 0?
"ammonia <.25; nitrites barely detectable" ... I think that may be too. :thinking:

 

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Originally Posted by stella
I'm not an expert.....but shouldn't the ammonia and nitrites be at 0?
"ammonia <.25; nitrites barely detectable" ... I think that may be too. :thinking:

Both are "ok" in test ranges shown. I knwo zero is better but I don't see anything bad enough to cause overnight death, especially with other fish doing ok.

 

[beth]

Originally Posted by stella
I'm not an expert.....but shouldn't the ammonia and nitrites be at 0?
"ammonia <.25; nitrites barely detectable" ... I think that may be too. :thinking:
I missed that! Good catch, stella. There is no amt of ammonia and nitrite that is acceptable. It does and will kill fish.

 

[sleasia]

This may seem crazy. but I have begun to test the saltwater fish store water that my fish are packed in whenever I get a new fish. Mainly to know what salinity level the fish have been in prior to bringing them home. Because they do much better if they are being acclimated from a high salinity to a low salinity. if the store is 1.024 and my tank is lower they acclimate fine. If it is the other way around they are shocked because they may need a few days to adjust slowly to a higher salinity and most people only acclimate for a few hours at the most. This is another reason why I use a QT tank. I can quickly adjust the salinity of the QT to match whatever the fish store uses and then acclimate the new fish to my QT and then from there after hypo, bring the salinity up over a weeks time to whatever my main tank is. When I take the time to do this, the fish do fine. When I do not they usually do not do well.

 

[fixed]

Originally Posted by sleasia
This may seem crazy. but I have begun to test the saltwater fish store water that my fish are packed in whenever I get a new fish. Mainly to know what salinity level the fish have been in prior to bringing them home. Because they do much better if they are being acclimated from a high salinity to a low salinity. if the store is 1.024 and my tank is lower they acclimate fine. If it is the other way around they are shocked because they may need a few days to adjust slowly to a higher salinity and most people only acclimate for a few hours at the most. This is another reason why I use a QT tank. I can quickly adjust the salinity of the QT to match whatever the fish store uses and then acclimate the new fish to my QT and then from there after hypo, bring the salinity up over a weeks time to whatever my main tank is. When I take the time to do this, the fish do fine. When I do not they usually do not do well.
Hmm. My store, where this puffer came from, has a big marker board with its water conditions. It usually is around 1.020. I keep mine around 1.024-25. Could that cause the fish to die 3 days later? Also, I did not have problems with other fish coming from this same store.
Would it be better to keep my SG lower, in light of the LFS keeping its water around 1.020?

 

[beth]

Going from 1.020 to 1.025 in a few hours is way too much of a difference. Why does the lfs keep the sg so low?

 

[fixed]

Originally Posted by Beth
Going from 1.020 to 1.025 in a few hours is way too much of a difference. Why does the lfs keep the sg so low?
They keep their fish at 1.020 and their invert tanks at 1.025. I'll ask why. Today I went in and took a water sample. They said my water was "perfect," except by their measurement my SG was 1.026. My refractomer still says 1.025, even after calibrating with RO water.
Still, what I don't understand, is that other fish from this LFS have done fine in my tank, and the other fish in my tank are fine.
In any event, I'm going to lower my SG to around 1.023 and see what happens.

 

[seannmelly]

the lfs keeps there salinty low to keep diseases away. like ick.

 

[sleasia]

This is what I suspected because most stores leave salinity low to help control and discourage ich and other opportunistic diseases from thriving. Most of us have salinity at 1.024 because we like to keep some inverts in the tanks....If a fish has been in 1.020 for several days and then changes in a couple of hours to 1.024 or 1.025 it can definately die in a few days because it will be shocked and susceptible to diseases. I think this is a bigger problem than we are usually talking about, and probably responsible for why many fish do not acclimate properly or die within a few days of being introduced to the tanks.
You can see the advantage of using a small qt. salinity can be adjusted to the store's salinity quickly before fish are introduced. They can be acclimated more easily to saline which matches their store environment, then this can gradually be dropped to hypo for three weeks and then gradually, gradually raised to the salinity of your display tank with much less consequence to the fish....

 

[fixed]

Originally Posted by sleasia
This is what I suspected because most stores leave salinity low to help control and discourage ich and other opportunistic diseases from thriving. Most of us have salinity at 1.024 because we like to keep some inverts in the tanks....If a fish has been in 1.020 for several days and then changes in a couple of hours to 1.024 or 1.025 it can definately die in a few days because it will be shocked and susceptible to diseases. I think this is a bigger problem than we are usually talking about, and probably responsible for why many fish do not acclimate properly or die within a few days of being introduced to the tanks.
You can see the advantage of using a small qt. salinity can be adjusted to the store's salinity quickly before fish are introduced. They can be acclimated more easily to saline which matches their store environment, then this can gradually be dropped to hypo for three weeks and then gradually, gradually raised to the salinity of your display tank with much less consequence to the fish....
For an aggressive tank (where inverts are "food"), would it be better, then, to just keep it around 1.020?

 

[sleasia]

Well...I don't usually use inverts as food. I keep some starfish, shrimp, snails and hermits in the tank because I also like them. I only have one aggressive fish, a hawaiian spotted puffer, and its small. I feed everyone flake, algaes, and frozen mysis shrimp. But I know the puffer snacked on one of my small hermits at least once. If you are really keeping fish only, you can keep your salinity a bit low. Rainforest cafe does this. they keep both salinity and temp a bit low to help prevent diseases (1.022 and temp at 75 or 76). But they also quarantine each fish for at least a month before putting them in their display tanks.

 

[beth]

Originally Posted by seannmelly
the lfs keeps there salinty low to keep diseases away. like ick.
Except at that level, it is pointless. A lower salinity does not prevent diseases. Only 1.009 cure's ich. 1.020 does nothing. It does cause risk to the hobbyists who purchase fish from there, as hobbyist normally keep their tank between 1.023-5.

 

[sleasia]

What beth says is true...its no answer for ich. Also you can not do this if you have live rock. and I really don't know if over the long term, low salinity will have a detrimental effect on the fish. Like I say, I usually keep my tank at 1.024 since I have inverts. I qt the fish and if possible (depending on the fish's tolerance) leave them in hyposaline for 3-4 weeks, then gradually raise the salinity to match my display and then acclimate them to the display. What I also don't really get, is many stores have their tanks all connected to one large sump, which does usually have live rock somewhere in the system. So I don't get their thinking on this...how their live rock survives 1.020 salinity, it probably is dead rock. and sometimes they sell "cured" rock. So you need to be sure that this "cured" live rock is in its own system and not connected to the 1.020 salinity system.

 

[sleasia]

Also I should add, that practically everything I have learned, I have learned from BETH!!! and other members of swf.com And because I listened to them, my fish have now been living in the tank for over a year, no ich...Beth has made a great website...check it out.

 

[jktenpro]

I have always heard that the lower salt levels cut down on stress which can facilitate ich or other diseases but I'm sure the LFS does it for the decline in salt cost as well.
I agree with Sleasia, and practice the same thing with a quarantee. Lower the salt level in the quaranteen to match bag water unless bag water is higher easier to drop down and acclimate.
In regards to the puffer, I suppose it was the acclimation or the fact that your elevated ammonia and nitrite levels this fish couldn't tolerate where the fish in the tank have adjusted themselves somewhat. Have the other fish been acclimated into these conditions or is this a recent developement? Some ammonia test kits read .25 and are actually 0. I have 3 test kits and 1 does read .25 for ammonia with the other 2 reading 0 and I know I have 0 ammonia.

 

[sleasia]

Its definately true that alot of test kits read differently when you test the same water. I do not think the electronic or digital probes are very good either. I used them for ph and salinity at one point and dumped them when I found that they always gave me different results on the same water. I use the aquarium pharmaceuticals liquid test kits. I also have a refractometer for salinity.