What's Wrong With Barney The Betta?

This has been goign on for some weeks now. Barney the veiltail keeps swelling up to huge proportions, and spending most of the time lying on the floor of his 30 litre tank. I don't think its dropsy because he's not pine-coning but I have suspected an internal infection so have been repeatedly treating the tank with Interpret no.9 Anti-Internal Meds.

Everytime I think i'm going to lose him he bounces back and the swelling seems to go down slightly. Then a week later its back. Right now, I think he's as bloated as I've ever seen him and more lethargic. He still has an appetite but is struggling to swim for any length of time. I feed him mostly BioGold pellets together with the occasional frozen bloodworm.

All water stats appear to be normal.

Does anyone know what this could be and a better way to treat it as I don't think these meds are working anymore (if they did in the first place.) Really want to save him if I can.

TT.

possibly constipation, can you get any pics?

Here's the poor little fella.

TT.

Oh dear poor thing, worth trying fasting him and giving him a mushed up cooked deshelled pea.

Oh my goodness.. looks like the poor guy ate a marble!
How much are you feeding him? You could be overfeeding which is causing constipation to an extreme.

Would adding aquarium salt help him? He has a whiptail catfish as a tankmate and I was worried that he may not like salt being added as other catfish. (Or am I wrong on that score?)

TT

In terms of feed he has about 5-6 biogold pellets a day. I occasionally skip a day too. He likes his bloodworms but he only gets them 1-2 times a week. I've lways fed him the same (i've had him over a year) but this is a fairly recent problem.

Try an epson salt bath.

hiya! i just noticed the picture!
it could be that the fish has a bladder problem!
most tropical fish sink when having this problem!
does he try to swim to the top of the tank at all? when smimming does he seem to bob at all? or evern be ok for a min then go back down? they struggle to keep swimmin around and spen most time sinking to the bottom of the tank and in some cases bobbin at the top of the tank depending on the type of infection!

Yes I would definitely try an epson salt bath to rid him of whatever is inside, if anything. Poor little guy sure is adorable though!

Thanks for the advice. Can someone just explain the process for the Epson salt bath. or point me to a relevant post? Want to make sure i do this right.


Thanks.

Sorry forgot I replyed to this thread.
That a good link the fish junkies one on epson salt.

OK. On Saturday, I gave Barney a 20 min Epson Salt bath and also followed the instructions to add a low dose to his tank water. So far there's been no change. he's still very swollen. Should I have seen a change by now and if so, would it be safe to do another high concentration bath or wait a bit longer?


Thanks,

Neil

Try another bath, is the fish still going to the toilet.

Poor boy, yes try another epsom salt bath! There's a couple things that may be going on there. Firstly you need to realize that dropsy doesn't ALWAYS cause raised scales. Dropsy is caused by kidney failure which causes the abdomen to swell, the swelling of the abdomen is usually what causes the raised scales, but that boy is as swollen as they come and if his scales aren't raised it could mean that he just has good strong scales. The other option is a very severe bacterial infection which would also cause swelling. My suggestions would be to treat him with epsom salt baths, salt in his water, and a broad spectrum antibiotic such as tetracycline