Help! Lethargic heavy breathing Betta

[Kristen]

Hello all,

Need some help with my Betta. I’ve had him for a year and a half, not sure how old he was when I got him. For the past week he has been lying on the bottom of the tank breathing heavy through his gills. His color looks good, no evidence of ick or fun rot. He comes up for food 1-3 times a day but immediately returns to the bottom of the tank.
Parameters
Ammonia: 0
Nitrate: 0
Nitrite: 0
KH: 0
GH: 120
pH: 7.0

Those have been the same stable numbers every 1-2x per week I do 40-50% water changes.

Nothing precipitated this behavior, just happened out of the blue. I’ve tried Bettafix, parasite remedy by imagination, Betta plus. I’ve done 30-50% water changes every other day with no improvement.

I’m out of ideas of what could be wrong, any suggestions??

 

[Colin_T]

Hi and welcome to the forum

Can you post a pic and short video clip of the fish?

Does the fish look fat and bloated or are its scales sticking out from the body?

 

[Kristen]

Hi and welcome to the forum

Can you post a pic and short video clip of the fish?

Does the fish look fat and bloated or are its scales sticking out from the body?

Unable to attach a video or photo, keeps reading error that the file is too large / but no bloating and no protruding scales either. Just heaving breathing and lethargic.

 

[Colin_T]

If you set the camera resolution to 2MB, the images will be smaller and should fit.

You can upload videos to youtube and then copy and paste the link here. We can then go to youtube to view it.

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Can the fish swim properly when he goes up for food, or does he just sink back to the bottom after eating?
If he does not remain buoyant in the water (neither sinking or floating) then he might have a swim bladder issue. eg: something has happened to his swim bladder and he is in pain (the heavy breathing).

If the fish remains buoyant but chooses to sit on the bottom then that could be something else.

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Have you added any new fish, plants or changed the food during the last few weeks?

Are you using tap water for the tank?
If yes, do you dechlorinate it before adding it to the tank?

Do you know if the water company has done any work on the water pipes in the area during the last few weeks?

If you have an external filter you could try adding some Activated Carbon to the filter and see if that helps. There might be a chemical in the water that is not something normally encountered and that is poisoning the fish.
If you get carbon, use activated or highly activated and rinse it before adding to the filter because it usually has a fine black dust in it.

Make sure nobody is using sprays (hair, deordorant, perfume, air fresheners, etc) or smokes or paints in the room. Make sure you don't have any soap, perfume, cream, oil, grease or anything else on your hands when feeding the fish or working in the tank.

Make sure you use fish only buckets/ containers when doing water changes and never use bucket that have been used for cleaning.

Make sure any sponges you use are free of soaps and chemicals and used purely for the fish.

 

[Kristen]

The video link is listed above, the only reason why there is some material floating by him is because I just cleaned the tank again.

I have a heater and a carbon filter already, always rinse it before inserting a new one.

He doesn’t look bloated and doesn’t have any trouble swimming, he’ll come up to the service and swim back down quickly.

I use tap water but always condition it prior to putting it back into the tank. I’ve done the same water changes weekly with the same water and same conditioner prior to him becoming so lethargic. Same food and decor too. The only thing that changed was we went on a short weekend trip and set up his light on a timer and set up his automatic food feeder. We’ve gone for much longer trips with the same set up and he’s always been fine.

I’m unsure about the water company changing anything, we’ve lived in the same condo for years so don’t think anything was changed necessarily.

Thank you again for your advice and input.

 

[Kristen]

If you set the camera resolution to 2MB, the images will be smaller and should fit.

You can upload videos to youtube and then copy and paste the link here. We can then go to youtube to view it.

---------------------
Can the fish swim properly when he goes up for food, or does he just sink back to the bottom after eating?
If he does not remain buoyant in the water (neither sinking or floating) then he might have a swim bladder issue. eg: something has happened to his swim bladder and he is in pain (the heavy breathing).

If the fish remains buoyant but chooses to sit on the bottom then that could be something else.

---------------------
Have you added any new fish, plants or changed the food during the last few weeks?

Are you using tap water for the tank?
If yes, do you dechlorinate it before adding it to the tank?

Do you know if the water company has done any work on the water pipes in the area during the last few weeks?

If you have an external filter you could try adding some Activated Carbon to the filter and see if that helps. There might be a chemical in the water that is not something normally encountered and that is poisoning the fish.
If you get carbon, use activated or highly activated and rinse it before adding to the filter because it usually has a fine black dust in it.

Make sure nobody is using sprays (hair, deordorant, perfume, air fresheners, etc) or smokes or paints in the room. Make sure you don't have any soap, perfume, cream, oil, grease or anything else on your hands when feeding the fish or working in the tank.

Make sure you use fish only buckets/ containers when doing water changes and never use bucket that have been used for cleaning.

Make sure any sponges you use are free of soaps and chemicals and used purely for the fish.

See post below with video, picture, and response. Sorry I forgot to hit reply the first time around.

 

[Colin_T]

If you go on holidays for a few days to 2 weeks you don't need to feed the fish.

Fish take their body temperature from the surrounding environment (water) and because of this they don't need to eat to keep warm, unlike us land mammals . Any food fish eat goes into growth and movement. This allows fish to go for weeks or even months without food and not die.

----------------------
Sometimes water companies do work on the pipes in the area and they add extra chlorine/ chloramine after doing this to make sure nothing is alive in the water. That extra chlorine/ chloramine can sometimes cause issues because it requires more dechlorinator to get it all out of the water.

I have posted some more info on the other thread you started about buckets, etc, before I saw this one. Generally we try to just have 1 thread per issue so it's less confusing

http://www.fishforums.net/threads/help-lethargic-heavily-breathing-betta.449163/#post-3796845

If one of the mods wants to merge these 2 links that would be cool