Betta With Shredded Tail - Have I Done All I Can For Now?

After advising other people what to do when their bettas have damaged fins/tails I now find myself in the very same position.
He looked perfectly fine before I did his water change earlier today and I'm sure I would have noticed if it didn't look ok after but I honestly can't recall noticing anything til about ½hr ago when I saw that he was completely in his little cave. This is something I';ve never noticed before. I went in for a closer look and he came out and his poor tail was shredded, not split or bitten, but well and truly shredded!! He was obviously hiding in there feeling sorry for himself.
I've removed his artificial tree stump, put a new uncleaned stocking over the filter in case something's happened there. He does have a tendency to loll against it let the inflow "massage" his tail, but nothing like this has ever occurred as a result before.
I've added 5ml Catappa X to soothe things and turned the light out as he seemed to be hiding in the dark of his cave and has since been swimming in the ambient room light, but no tank light.
He has a Zoomed betta leaf hammock which I have never seen his lie on and a ping-pong ball which he totally ignores.
He is just about an adult now as his fins and tail seem to have stopped growing. Could it be anything to do with that?
 
He's in a 30L Aqua One with 3 amano shrimp and an assassin snail so unless one of them has suddenly turned atypically aggressive I don't think it's down to tank-mates.
Water params:
ammonia 0
nitrite 0
pH 7.8
temperature 26.1°C which is 80°F according to the digital thermometer.
25w deltatherm heater
Interpet PF mini filter
 
I'll do more frequent water changes and add the Catappa X daily (been adding it weekly and doing fortnightly water changes)
Won't be feeding him til the morning so don't know if he's eating or not til then.
Have been adding NPK ferts every other day and easy carbo daily at half strength for 2-3 weeks now
 
Am reluctant to try the salt route as I haven't a clue what to do and I've also read advice against it.
Is there anything I've missed doing or should be doing?
 

I had the same, bad experience before..

Sad to say, mine's never seems to grow back his fins..

He loves to stick himself to the filter inlet too..

Hopefully someone with the same xperience but with a different luck may just come to your rescue..

Hang in there...

So sorry to hear this news Mamashack.      Do you happen to have any pics of his tail?

That's so awful! Hopefully you can figure out what caused the damage and be able to avoid it in the future but it sounds to me that you're doing everything thing you're suppose to do in a time like this. Hope he gets better.

Thanks everyone - I have to say I felt quite sick when I saw his tail and panicked for a few minutes feeling like I must have done it when I did the water change - I'd just changed the batteries in the syphon so maybe it was more powerful than it has been of late tho I didn't see him anywhere near the end of the syphon tbh. Just a few things I forgot to mention yesterday - I did quite a large water change - about 65% as I'd pulled a muscle in my back and had to postpone his W/C for almost a week so it was almost 3 weeks since the last one.
Also for the last couple of days he's been chasing the shrimp quite aggressively which he's never done before except in a half-hearted way if they got too close.
His tank looks so bare without the tree stump - I've yet to test it with a stocking
Here are a few pictures I managed to get - they are not the best but he's still quite active thankfully.
 
                         
Just managed to get this one it's not as a good quality but it shows the damage better:

There looks to be a hole in the anal fin on this one but I've checked and there isn't one (phew!)
He seems to be behaving normally this morning and has eaten his food.
Right I'm off to do the stocking test on that tree stump!

Poor guy, he's such a handsome chap too!

Vader has only ever bitten his tail, not shredded like this, but I just upped his water changes with warmish water. Can't really advise on shredded tails though.

Maybe look to replace that ceramic/resin (whatever it's made of ) tree stump with a nice piece of bogwood? I <3 bogwood, plus it gives you an excuse to peruse the lfs again

Thanks Shel!
I used to have some mopani wood in there until a few weeks ago when I noticed his tail was spilt in just one place and assumed it was the wood as they are never perfectly smooth are they? There was no further splitting til yesterday and then it's like mangled! Maybe I moved the wrong thing!
I also wondered if it was the stump when he's been chasing the shrimps and he's not been swimming as carefully when he's in hot pursuit? Who knows? I've put a ruined temple in there and just realised that the "grass" on it is plastic so maybe that wasn't a good idea after all.
Anyway he seems to be back to his usual self (apart from the tatty tail )
I'll continue adding the Catappa X daily. Not sure how frequently to do the water changes now - would 25% on alternate days be ok? (My back is still a bit sore and those buckets are quite heavy when they're full of water!)

When you talked about splitting fins because of the wood, I am now so worried about my betta at home......
*Worried Sick*

I thought it was the wood doing it Aquapit but I'm not so sure now. May have been the resin tree stump which didn't feel bad to me but did snag the stockings ever so slightly when I tested it.
He's still behaving normally so I'm hoping that it's going to be ok.

Well I hope it's not my imagination, but it looks like the tatty splits in Cobalt's tail are healing back together!
He's been resting under the "grass" on the ruined temple and - touch wood - no further harm has occurred.
I think I might take the stocking off the filter and see how things go. There's all sorts of waste gathering on it that would normally go into the filter and the stocking may be stopping it from doing its job properly.
The more I think about the more I think that he might have got his tail in the end of the syphon for a split second - short enough for me not to notice, but long enough to do some serious damage! I don't suppose I'll ever know for sure, just never want it to happen again!

Good news, well done Cobalt on healing that lovely tail

So far so good! I suppose I'm tempting fate by saying he seems to be making  a good recovery.
Have been doing alternate day 25% W/C using the manual syphon to take out tank water and the battery one to get fresh back in. Am adding Catappa X daily. I'm not doing his fast day this week as I reckon he needs the nutrients to heal.
The end of his tail looks in one piece now tho not yet growing. It does look red at the end but he has some red in there anyway. It looks quite healthy however I have no idea what finrot looks like tbh. I'd better go do some research!

He's got his full colour back now, bless him! I still feel bad that I probably caused it in the first place .
It's the top back quarter of his whole tail that's missing so it more than likely was the battery syphon. I think if it had been decor it would have been his fins that were damaged rather than the tail tho not entirely sure about that.
Have looked up tail/finrot and thankfully there are no signs.
Will keep on adding the Catappa X daily - Easy Life say you can't overdose with it so I'll keep that going.
 
[They don't learn do they? I was using the manual syphon yesterday and he actually swam into the collection chamber at the end! Thank goodness it wasn't the battery one!!!]

Good to know he is getting better!

Thanks Aquapit - he seems to be going in the right direction.
Have got some Antifungus and Finrot treatment just in case he shows any signs of fungal or bacterial infection down the line. You can guarantee these things happen when you can't get to a supplier!
He was totally hiding in his cave again about an hour ago and I thought uhoh! What's he done now? Managed to coax him out eventually and he's as in tact as he was this morning. Maybe he just got fed up of the tank lights. They're off now so hopefully he can chill (metaphorically speaking) overnight.