Betta Accident, Alive But Wounded

This poor betta is very accident-prone but has survived well thus far. He'd just recovered from an acara attack - my fault, I put him in there to stop him chasing down platies and didn't realise they were spawning. I got him out very fast, shaken and with frayed fins, but otherwise apparently fine. The following day he was just fine, chasing platies as usual.
A new tank was duly purchased a week ago, 54L, which I finished setting up etc yesterday, with hiding places and all.
Put him in last night and didn't see him at all before lights out. Didn't see him this morning either, so started hunting and found him thoroughly stuck in the bottom hole of a small clay flowerpot that I've often used for hiding places in tanks. He'd been struggling to get out and it was obvious I wouldn't be able to push him either way without doing him more damage. Breaking the pot with a hammer would probably mean death too. So I pulled the pot apart with pliers, crumbling it piece by piece until it fell away, and the betta slid to the bottom of the tank, lay on its side with gasping gills and a nasty white sore on its back behind the head. I was certain it would die and thought I would hurry the process but my daughter who owns the fish wouldn't have it. An hour later, he was lying the right way up and he has since actually swum about a couple of times. He's now resting a short space above the gravel. It's now about 9 hours since I got him loose.
If he survives this, he deserves to live in the best conditions a betta can have.
I now think that the likelihood of internal damage seems less, but the wound is a risk.

Can I do anything to help him heal? Should I dose the water with more conditioner than normal? Anything?

(Living conditions: newly set up 54 L tank with gravel, a few plants, a log, a rock and a now broken clay pot. Tank was set up with the same tank water he came from, about 50%, and fresh conditioned water 50%. Intended to bring over mature media from the other tank but haven't done it yet, used my trusty bottled bacteria instead (see previous thread). No testing yet, not likely to get any readings this early. Tank mates: two small betta females and a very small siamese algae eater.)

So the tank isn't cycled.
You can't keep female betta with male betta.
Also the algae eater is aggressive as they get older and need larger tanks

Salt good for stress but not with the algae eater in there.

Wilder said:

So the tank isn't cycled.
You can't keep female betta with male betta.
Also the algae eater is aggressive as they get older and need larger tanks

Salt good for stress but not with the algae eater in there.

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Will happily move the algae eater into another tank if salt is needed. At the moment it's the smallest algae eater and therefore in the smallest tank. The female betta are ok right now, the male is too ill to chase them, but they will also be moved when necessary.

Move the others out and add salt? Will ordinary salt without additives do? If so, what concentration?

No, the tank isn't cycled, but I'm keeping tabs and will move mature media in at the slightest indication of ammonia or nitrite, especially now that I have a sick fish in there. Until then, I want to try to repeat my previous findings on the bottled bacteria which seemed to work very well last time.

which bottled bacteria do u use

Household salt fine as lot as its not a large amount.
One tablespoon to 5 gallons.

rocknurworld2006 said:

which bottled bacteria do u use

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just on a random...i've found tetra aqua safestart has worked VERY well for me....personally it cycled my 55 litre tank in about 2-3 weeks....amazing!
I had fish in there on week 2.....this was before i joined here and found fishless cycle.....just glad it worked!

I suggest getting some prime to help with ammonia. If it was me I would move the male to a one gallon container with a heater. It can be anything like a ice cream pail, it doesn't have to be a tank. Do lots of water changes, and keep the water level low so he can get up to the surface easily and breath. Bettas are hardy fish he will most likely bounce back.

rocknurworld2006 said:

which bottled bacteria do u use

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Not sure if the brand names are the same everywhere, probably not. In Sweden, it's a Sera product called Nitrivec Biostarter (the text on the back is only Nordic languages and says it contains bacteria that break down ammonia and nitrite). So far I think it's definitely worth the investment. It's a ten-day treatment and seems to work a treat .

Wilder said:

Household salt fine as lot as its not a large amount.
One tablespoon to 5 gallons.

Click to expand...

Will do that as soon as I've found the gallons to liters conversion table.

Will now try to add a somewhat blurry picture - with four cameras in the house I should be able to do better than this!

Anyway, the betta seems to be getting better all the time. I added the salt as suggested. The picture shows the wound quite clearly, and as you can see the colour has faded noticably. But for a fish that was gasping on its side this morning, he's looking positively perky!

Ouch, that picture is awful! I need to find the manual focus settings of my camera as soon as possible - is there a photography class on this forum?

Ouch, that picture is awful! I need to find the manual focus settings of my camera as soon as possible - is there a photography class on this forum?

Or bless him.
If he's pale it's stress due to the incident earlier.

Thanks a lot, Wilder, you've been really helpful!