I Am Stumped - Female Betta

[alkemist]

Hi, I am new to these boards but have been a tropical fish keeper for many years. I was recently on vacation for a few weeks and when I came back, my female betta was puffed as can be. She appeared to have been starting to get bloated before I left. My first thought was that maybe she was gravid and constipated at the same time. She is kept in a 10 gallon community tank and is the only betta in the tank. Her tank mates consist of mainly bottom dwelling fish, cories, pleco, glass catfish, upside down catfish. Her main diet consists of broken down Tetramin tropical flakes since that is what I feed glass catfish. I also drop in omega one shrimp pellets for the rest and occasionally algae tablet or hikari bottom feeder tablet. Anyhow, she loves to eat and eat, including the pellets. I can't control her consumption since she is in a community tank.

Long story short, I took her out of the tank, and put her in a separate container. I fasted her for 2 days and she did release some poo but it was long, stringy and attached to her a good while. The second time she released, it was just a long string of nothing and clear. She has not poo'd since then. I gave her a 15 min epsom salt bath yesterday and fed her half a pea and she still has not released anything. I am completely stumped and don't know where to go from here.

This is a picture when I had her fasting.

 

[Loops]

I think long stringy pooh can also be a sign of a bacterial infection

 

[alkemist]

hmmm ok. I do have some melafix. I can try that and see.

 

[alkemist]

Looks like she just poo'd out some pea, so she must not be backed up. Does not appear to have any trouble swimming, loss of appetite or appear to be sick. Trying some melafix to see if it's a possible infection. She is a big girl, could it be she's just that gravid? It does look uncomfortable though.

 

[keithp]

It looks like she eats too much and the stringy poo is from constipation. If she is in a community tank I can see how she easily gets overfed without you meaning to. Besides peas, frozen daphnia also seems to make bettas go.

 

[loraxchick]

It looks like she eats too much and the stringy poo is from constipation. If she is in a community tank I can see how she easily gets overfed without you meaning to. Besides peas, frozen daphnia also seems to make bettas go.

yes yes and yes!
stringy poo and or mucousy poo is not only a sign of internal parasties but definately a sign of possible constipation. you are doing exactly the correct thing in feeding pea, fasting and epsom salt dips. keep up with those dips for another couple of days (even short ones of say 10-15 mins at a time once a day). keep her on peas/daphnia in the meantime.
likely she is both gravid AND constipated as you suspected initially. you should see improvement in a week to 10 days as she either releases her eggs or re-absorbs them.
it can be quite a challenge to not overfeed bettas in communities-they are PIGS and eat more than their share. personally, i think this is the biggest danger of bettas in communities-not aggression.
good luck with her. while she is pretty bloated/fat ive seen worse come back 100%.
all the best!
cheers

 

[fry_forever!]

I think long stringy pooh can also be a sign of a bacterial infection

Internal parasites, not bacterial infection.

Melafix will do more harm than good. I agree with loraxchick.

 

[alkemist]

I put her back in the tank as she was releasing the pea but she has not gone down in size at all. I did not want to keep her in the holding container for long. She was getting upset with me and I didn't want her getting sick being outside of the tank Should I take her out and continue to isolate? She's been acting normal otherwise.

 

[fry_forever!]

I say just don't feed her for a bit. That might help. If not, are you sure you're crushing the pea small enough for her to eat?

 

[loraxchick]

has her poo "normalized" at all? as in not stringy/mucousy any longer? if so id say not she's just eggy and will take a while for the eggs to reabsorb. if other wise acting normal no harm in putting her back in with the others. from the poo shots, id does seem like just mucousy (which generally accompanies constipation-white poo is something id question). just be sure to watch her intake of food.
best of luck!
Cheers