First scare! Need aquarium emergency room!

svaught

New member
We bought an established 125 gal aquarium 6 months ago and have had zero problems. The tank has a mix of fish and live rock. Everything has been great until I got home this afternoon to find my Puffer very lethargic with fast respirations! The water is slightly cloudy and my invertebrates are withdrawn, and the protein skimmer was pretty well full I normally never have to do anything to the tank as we have a local company clean and maintain the tank. They missed last week tank is slightly dirty nothing horrible. I ran and got a kit to test the levels. Ph is 8.4 Ammonia 0 Nitrates and Nitrites are 0 Salinity is 35. I have NO idea what to do and the local experts are not able to come help until "some time tomorrow" I cant just let my puffer die! any help is greatly appreciated!
 
Giving the limited info given, there is no way to know what is going on. The only thing I can think of....
What's the temp? Perhaps a heater is running hot.
 
Do you know if they add anything to the tank like vodka or do any carbon dosing? Are you able to do any water changes and/or add water movement? I ask because this sounds like something that recently happened to me and it ended up being a bacterial bloom. If you can I would set up a quick QT and move him into it until that company can come by.
 
Are you using a refractometer to measure salinity? Those hydrometers can be way way off... Off on the low side is not bad. Off on the high side can kill the fish pretty easily...
 
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