intestinal blockage for porcupine puffer

[BabyB]

I have a Porcupine Puffer that I have taken care for about 4 years now. A few weeks ago I walked in to the living room and did my morning checks and he was laying in a cave not moving, pretty normal behavior for these puffers when the lights are off or pouting, but what wasnt normal was he didnt come see me when he say me at the tank. Finally he came more into view and I could see he had about 1.5-2" of intestines hanging out of his butt. I had noticed that for about 3 days prior his belly was much larger than normal but figured he had been snacking on snails and clams that I have in there for him.

The only thing I had on hand was Melafix and I dosed that and after a few hours it was gone. I continued to dose just in case. He did not swim for 3 days after it first happened.

my concern is every time I feed him, the next day his intestines hang out like that. He obviously has a blockage but I have no idea how to help him out. For freshwater fish you just throw a little salt in the tank and problem solved. I cannot feel around to see whats going on because every time I even get near touching him he puffs and I dont want to stress him out more.
I have googled and cannot find anything about what to do.

Tank specs are:
100 gallon
1- 6" porcupine puffer
1- yellow fuzzy dwarf lion
1- 10" engineer goby
1- 3" aiptasia eating filefish

Am-0
Ni-0
NA-30
sg-1.204

Tank has been up and running for over 2 years.

I feed jumbo shrimp and or scallops 2 times a week and occasionally shrimp pellets , i offer nori to him but he will not touch it. i have live clams and snails for him to chew on as he pleases.

There has been nothing new in the tank for at least 4 or 5 months.

If you guys need any extra info let me know. thanks for the help

 

[b0bab0ey]

This is gonna sound like a shot in the dark, but I have a PB Tang with some sort of intestinal problems and when she gets all bloated this is what I do to relieve her symptoms:

Take a frozen pea, boil it, peel it, feed it. If he'll eat it and it seems to be helping, rinse & repeat. Might take a couple of days of feeding many peas to clear him out. I realize it won't be easy to get a puffer to eat anything green.

 

[BabyB]

ugh i feel silly for not thinking of this! i have done it for years for goldfish. They have terrible problems with their swim bladder. i will absolutely try it and see.

Despite his issues he is still very driven by food, I'm sure I can trick him into getting some down

 

[AGYDAL]

IMO- If you're giving him treats of clams and snails, what you are seeing probably isn't an intestinal prolapse...you're probably looking at some sort of intestinal worm that is pushed out when he poops and it takes a bit for the parasite to retract back in...Intestinal worms could also be why he's so hungry, the parasite is stealing his nutrition...if it were a blockage he would probably stop eating due to the discomfort.

HTH

I've used the pea trick on goldfish too, but in this case, I'd start researching parasite meds.

 

[BabyB]

it is clearly his intestines and not a worm. He might have a parasite though. Its worthing medicating for just in case.