New Betta seems sick with dropsy

Hi, I’ve recently got into the fish hobby and I got a fish shipped to me from out the country for the first time and he seemed ok the first 2 days. He was swimming around chasing the other fish, but afterwards he would just float at the top or lay at the bottom, not moving.

My last betta fish died from dropsy and ever since then I’ve been doing mainyanance more regularly. I do 25% water changes every 2 weeks. I have 2 swordtale fish and 3 neon tetras. I also have plants in my aquarium and a hang on the back filter. The current was strong so I put filter floss to lower it.

I also tested my water and nitrite and ammonia are 0 while nitrate is 20 ppm. When I look at him now it seems like he’s beginning to pinecone, but I’m not sure. I just don’t want him to die like my last fish, which died about a month and a half ago. I learned dropsy isn’t contagious and takes a while before it kills so I don’t know.
He eats though and he moves every once in a while to get air, but then slowly drifts to the bottom like he’s sinking. He also looks a lot paler than before.

Update:

It’s gotten worse. He breathes heavily while laying on his side and as he swims he twirls. I don’t know if I did anything wrong cause he just came last week.

Bloat and pineconing are common signs of dropsy.

I’m not going to go into your stocking, but it is not adequate.

He looks pretty healthy from the photos, but sometimes photos are accurate.

When he is at the bottom, does it look like he is just resting? Or is he sort of sideways?

PheonixKingZ said:

Bloat and pineconing are common signs of dropsy.

I’m not going to go into your stocking, but it is not adequate.

He looks pretty healthy from the photos, but sometimes photos are accurate.

When he is at the bottom, does it look like he is just resting? Or is he sort of sideways?

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He looks like he’s resting. He’s not on his side. I had all my fish in a 20 gallon, but I moved him to the quart tank to keep an eye on him. I tried to feed him earlier but he didn’t seem eager to get the food. He looks like he’s pineconing a bit but my camera just can’t get a good focus on him.