Help Betta Sick

[Mauricia]

Ok so I'm posting this for my friend so I don't have all of the info, but her betta is quite bloated and she says his swim blatter looks swollen. I don't know the water stats but I do know he's in a 10 gallon filtered, cycled tank and he gets 25% water change twice a week, and he's in there alone. I will try to get more info from her asap, but any first thoughts?

 

[kelly528]

Usually you can clear it up by defrosting a pea, peeling it and feeding about half of it to the betta in bite-sized chunks. It's really good roughage and they love them as treats.

Usually bloating occurs because betta pellets and flakes soak up moisture inside the betta's stomach and expand. To prevent this you can reduce feeding (a betta's stomach is as big as his eye. Feed him accordingly), soak the pellets beforehand so that they can't take and more moisture in the betta's stomach, and refrain feeding freeze-dried food (its low in nutrition and has a huge capacity to swell). Throwing some frozen food into his diet will give his digestive tract a break, as will fasting him for one day per week and feeding him pea once a week.

 

[Mauricia]

Ok good, that's what I suggested to her, I just wanted to make sure that there wasn't a disease that I'm not thinking of. He's still eating and she said none of his scales are sticking out or anything so it's not definitely dropsy at this point.

 

[loraxchick]

very good advice above, just wanted to add perhaps to cut back feeding. a betta does well with only a few pellets a day. if your friend is feeding twice a day, suggest they cut it back to once a day. fish dont need as much food as us humans think they need. and bettas are terribly piglets and will eat until they are really stuffed (and that's when bad things can happen to them, like swimbladder disorders).
cheers