I Think He's Dying

[stargirly1208]

i recently lost a crowntail betta a couple of months ago and now my new one looks very very sad. sometimes he lays on his side in his tank and when i tap to see if he's alive, he is. he's housed in a 2 gallon and it has a sponge filter. i recently changed the filter and he seemed very bad at that point, so i took him out and cleaned the tank. i put him back in but he still looks horrible. i tried to remember correctly but i think my last betta died suddenly soon after i changed the filter. i can't possibly be able to keep the same gross filter in there forever! i wait a couple months before changing it as to not disturb the bacteria growing on it. i have no idea what could be the cause of this. i checked the water and everything is fine, no nitrates or nitrites, pH is around 6.5 but all my tanks seem to be this. i don't wanna lose another!

 

[for_my_fish]

what is your amonia?

could be you are cleanin the water and filter too thoroughly and getting rid of too much good bacteria. This may be causing an amonia spike and wiping out your fish

 

[Amunet]

Yeah... no nitrates is pretty rare in a cycled tank so reading no nitrates isn't a good thing really.
How long has the tank been set up for? It could still be cycling.
Or you could be removing too much of the beneficial bacteria so it's causing the tank to cycle all over again.
How often are you doing water changes?
What's the ammonia at?

 

[liz2]

I would put your fish in clean water with tap conditioner in, the same temp. as the tank and see if he perks up!

 

[stargirly1208]

thanks for the advice! the tank has been established for more than a year now and it used to house my baby guppies. there's nothing i can do about replacing the whole filter because it is a sponge filter that has cartriges with both sponge and carbon in it so i have to replace the whole thing. i only clean the tank out fully once a month if not 2 months.
he seems to be doing better now though. my nitrates were in the safe range and nothing higher so i have no idea what went wrong! good news is that he's ok. must've been the nice healthy water from my 30 gallon i put him in for a day in his poor little cup he came in from the petstore. i don't know if some gross stuff came off my old filter or what, but i guess i should take him out in the future to prevent this scare from happening again.