destinyxrose
New Member
Hey Everyone. I'm new here and I could use some help. It seems as though my male betta may be sick.. I'm not sure, maybe I'm just paranoid. Anyways, here's some background info first. My boyfriends sister was the one who actually purchased him and bought him for a pet of her own. So with that, I don't know a whole lot about how he is suppose to look when he is healthy, nor do I even know where he was purchased and if he was healthy at purchase.
So my boyfriends sister kept him in a 1 gallon bowl with a couple decorations but nothing much. She kept him in the kitchen and living in colorado, I am surprised he didn't pass then. I noticed one day that his water was so filthy that you could hardly see him inside it and I asked if I could care for him since she was failing to do so. So that's when I started to care for him.
Now I haven't really had a fish as a pet accept when I was in like 1st grade and we made some ecosystem bio dome thing out of soda bottles, so I don't really have a lot of experience in caring for fish. I knew that his water needed to be cleaned at very least once a week and that the water needed to have cleaner/Aged. (I usually age it for about 48 hrs and then add cleaner as well) He seemed to get a lot more energy and being down in our bedroom it was much warmer then in the kitchen.
On christmas, My boyfriend and I purchased a 2 Gallon tank for him with an UGF and we moved him in. He was seeing his reflection a lot and flaring a lot. I was concerned about it but then read through this forum that he just needs to get use to it and to keep the light off and it should help. So he did start doing better about it just a couple days ago.
When we were reading on here about his flaring we noticed that water temperature was a very important factor in the bettas health, so we went and purchased an automatic water heater set to keep the temperature at 78 Degrees farenheit. We put in a temporary heater two nights ago before we purchased the automatic heater yeaterday so the water was at temperature two nights ago, but last night we put in the automatic one.
My concern is now today, he has been lying inside his little cave on the gravel only coming up for air. I thought his eating habits were a little weird the last few days but he seems to still eat just not much. I feed him Aqua culture Betta pellets and the other day got him a few blood worms but thats bran new, never fed him them before. We gave him a pea to make sure he's not just constipated just a few minutes ago but my other concern is that he is not very vibrant in color, he hasn't ever really been but I don't know if that's how he is or if he is still sick or what. I think he's probably getting over some fin rot not sure but his fins don't look worse but they do look a little rough but I think they are getting better daily. My other concern is he has a large white area I guess on his belly and he has been floating kinda vertical when going up for air.
I don't have the ph on his water but I did about a 30% water change yesterday, and I change it quite often. Until recently I did wash his gravel with hot water but I have read up on that so I know not to do that now but I haven't done that in about a week. He has a little bit of plant life but I bought bulbs so they haven't grown yet.
Anyways, I tried to cover pretty much everything, just let me know if I missed anything. Gonna try to post some pics. Thanks.
So my boyfriends sister kept him in a 1 gallon bowl with a couple decorations but nothing much. She kept him in the kitchen and living in colorado, I am surprised he didn't pass then. I noticed one day that his water was so filthy that you could hardly see him inside it and I asked if I could care for him since she was failing to do so. So that's when I started to care for him.
Now I haven't really had a fish as a pet accept when I was in like 1st grade and we made some ecosystem bio dome thing out of soda bottles, so I don't really have a lot of experience in caring for fish. I knew that his water needed to be cleaned at very least once a week and that the water needed to have cleaner/Aged. (I usually age it for about 48 hrs and then add cleaner as well) He seemed to get a lot more energy and being down in our bedroom it was much warmer then in the kitchen.
On christmas, My boyfriend and I purchased a 2 Gallon tank for him with an UGF and we moved him in. He was seeing his reflection a lot and flaring a lot. I was concerned about it but then read through this forum that he just needs to get use to it and to keep the light off and it should help. So he did start doing better about it just a couple days ago.
When we were reading on here about his flaring we noticed that water temperature was a very important factor in the bettas health, so we went and purchased an automatic water heater set to keep the temperature at 78 Degrees farenheit. We put in a temporary heater two nights ago before we purchased the automatic heater yeaterday so the water was at temperature two nights ago, but last night we put in the automatic one.
My concern is now today, he has been lying inside his little cave on the gravel only coming up for air. I thought his eating habits were a little weird the last few days but he seems to still eat just not much. I feed him Aqua culture Betta pellets and the other day got him a few blood worms but thats bran new, never fed him them before. We gave him a pea to make sure he's not just constipated just a few minutes ago but my other concern is that he is not very vibrant in color, he hasn't ever really been but I don't know if that's how he is or if he is still sick or what. I think he's probably getting over some fin rot not sure but his fins don't look worse but they do look a little rough but I think they are getting better daily. My other concern is he has a large white area I guess on his belly and he has been floating kinda vertical when going up for air.
I don't have the ph on his water but I did about a 30% water change yesterday, and I change it quite often. Until recently I did wash his gravel with hot water but I have read up on that so I know not to do that now but I haven't done that in about a week. He has a little bit of plant life but I bought bulbs so they haven't grown yet.
Anyways, I tried to cover pretty much everything, just let me know if I missed anything. Gonna try to post some pics. Thanks.