sad fish

Or, just me sad for a fish- I don't know how he feels. My little blue betta doesn't look well at all. His head has gradually been turning white- first it was just the gill plate on one side, then all that side of his face, now nearly his entire head.

His fins are ragged and loosing color.

I have checked his water parameters (nitrates regularly around 10 ppm), raised the temperature in his tank a few degrees, cleaned his filter and am trying to be more meticulous about siphoning the gravel on tank maintenance days. He's started refusing food- won't eat any kind of pellets anymore, only flake, frozen foods or bug bites. Spends most of the day hiding in the plants, just comes out when it's food time.

Sigh. I've had him six months, which means he's probably over a year old, and who knows how long someone else owned him before me, or what he went through before. I thought at first the white on his head was the marbled gene- the black on his fin edges has changed dramatically, after all. But it looks like he has fin rot and is loosing weight. He's been gradually deteriorating for a while, until even my kids noticed.

This will be my last betta. I'm not going to go through the difficulty- extra water changes, stress, worry over a diagnosis- to attempt treatment with medication. Clean, warm water and the best food I have, that's all I can do right now. I just have to decide how long to let him linger into suffering before I decide to euthanize. It's a decision I hate making and don't want to do anymore.

new betta

After such a long time. The lady I gave my last few guppies to three months ago, brought him to me. She rescues bettas, but this one wasn't a rescue- a friend of hers had and decided didn't want him, so then he came to me. Hopefully without any major health issues.

I just can't believe how very blue he is! With scattering of paler blue and darker scales.

He's settled in very well already, exploring everything. Really personable- will emerge from wherever he's resting in the plants when I walk near the tank. Eagerly eats what I've offered so far.

He seems to like this corner where the rotalas grow to the surface- either because he can hide in the plants, or because it's the warmest spot, maybe both reasons.

The tank looks so vibrant with his bold color in there! Short end:

No matter where he is, instantly visible

even hiding in the rotala corner:

As yet unnamed. Maybe my kids will help me think of one.

Ruby end

Two days ago he crashed. I quit putting food in the ring, he was always on the substrate. Would skitter away through the plants if startled, struggling to swim it looked like. I did not see any hope of recovery. I put him in this container to dose with clove oil- following the usual method- shaking three or four drops in a small jar, then adding slowly to the container with the fish, waiting for it to go immobile, then add more drops until stops breathing. Except, he didn't go to sleep and it wasn't gentle. It's not the first time this has happened- the fish thrashes around, tries to jump out, looks panicked. I can't stand to watch that. I got a damp paper towel, netted him out, stepped outside, lifted the edge of a flower pot, set the fish in towel under, dropped it. Over in a few seconds. I don't think I will use clove oil again, unless I can figure out why it's not going easy for them. Maybe I need to use a larger container for the waiting fish? perhaps the oil was too concentrated at first. I don't know.

Anyway, goodbye Ruby. His first photo from 4/19/18

and the best one, from 10/20/18

I had him almost a year and a half. No improvement on the record, how long my bettas stay alive and well. I'm feeling glum about that.

green plants under water

I sit in front of the betta tank for long periods now (half an hour twice a day at least) watching to see if Ruby eats, to siphon food out that misses his nylon net and actually goes to the tank floor, and to clean out the uneaten food (most of it) after he gives up, so it doesn't foul the water. So took some other pictures- here's the dimpled/scaly-looking horned nerite on a leaf, behind the baby anubias barteri.

My favorite buces isabella all look recovered-

More buces- 'green wavy', 'selena', more 'isabella' planted in the substrate, and 'blue belle'.

Crypt parva seems to be doing better in here than in any other tank spot I've had it:

I'm liking these rotala colorata stems got from a fish club member.

more treatment options-

I bought water-soluble fish vitamins (vitachem) on the recommendation of a forum member, dosed the tank with it because Ruby still isn't eating much. Can't tell if it's helping yet. Certainly he still has some energy and color, got a bit twitchy though. I thought for a moment from this photo that the ring around his eye was less swollen,

but another photo from slightly diff angle, he looks just as miserable

I made this thing. I stretched and sewed a piece of pantyhose over airline tubing bent in a circle, fastened it to the tank wall below Ruby's feeding ring. The idea was that when he misses his food, it will fall onto the nylon and he can find it again there- he always gives up if it falls to the tank floor.

It's not really working. Ruby definitely has some appetite, comes to his feeding spot and I put in way more than his normal food amount, in the hopes he would get some of it. He's been sitting there so close to surface his dorsal fin drags into the air, then striking hard at the food items- but always off to the side. It's as if he thinks more effort will make up for his lack of precision. I think I saw him get a few flakes, but when I fed soaked pellets, he didn't get any at all.

The nylon net does catch the food, but Ruby doesn't look for it there. I end up siphoning it off and feeding to my shrimps in the jar next door.

Ruby- no progress

He's just not doing any better.

Sadly, I'm able to get close camera shots now because he doesn't shy away from the lens as much. Doesn't see it I assume.

Color is still good as ever (backlit):

Even closer:

I'm still failing at getting him to eat from tweezers. He smells the food, sometimes hangs out just floating at surface in his feeding ring. But always lunges for a bite off to the side, misses more times than not now. I tried giving garlic-soaked pellets today, but once soaked they sink- too quickly for him to even notice and try to grab. I siphoned the food off the tank floor, tried to drop right in front of him, he just fled from the acrylic tube. I'm trying to figure out another method here.

Ruby's eye again-

I've started new treatment with erythromycin. Halfway through. Took this photo day of first dose, to try and track if there's any progress, but Ruby was very skittish, I couldn't get a picture that wasn't blurry:

I can't quite tell if the swelling has gone down or not-

But suddenly today, after the second dose, I feel like Ruby actually looks at me again. The eye is still swollen with that gross white ring, but the lens appears clear not hazy or cloudy anymore. Maybe there's hope. Also, in spite of the illness and stressors, Ruby has never once lost color or clamped his fins. I try to take that as a good sign. Had him just over a year now . . .

while I had the camera out, took a photo of these pieces of anubias rhizome in the corner. Starting to sprout a few leaves:

from jar to tank

Moved the pregnant female guppy in here today. I was starting to feel bad about keeping her in the shrimp jar. I wanted to treat her more gently than the others, which I had just dropped into the tank. I floated her in a baggie to acclimate gradually adding some tank water- but Laddie foiled the plan. Still ignoring the three guppies swimming around, he lunged to bite at this one trapped behind plastic. I chased Laddie away with aquascaping tweezers, but he kept circling back around. So I released the guppy, she immediately joined the others up top among the sweet potato roots, and Laddie promptly ignored her. My youngest is eagerly peering in the tank several times a day now, hoping to see the guppy give birth.

There's only four shrimp in the jar now. The one turned orange also quit moving around, not even when I dropped food in. This time I gave it to the angelfish. Who darted after it but I didn't see her eat it. I don't know if the shrimp is still crawling around in there hiding somewhere.

Ruby isn't eating well. I dropped in a few micropellets for him last night, looked in later and saw them gone, thought he'd eaten. Found them later floating around the tank growing fuzzy, had to remove it. I don't know if he's going to get better. It's the last day of kanaplex treatment and I see no improvement.

Ruby's eye

Ruby's left eye is very swollen, with the ominous white ring. I've started treatment with kanaplex.

He's a little more alert, though still having trouble eating- doesn't see well now.

It's nice that his plants are growing better though. And I've read that if a betta doesn't die from popeye within a week, it's probably not going to die from the infection anytime soon. I'm going through what meds I have that indicate can treat the condition, before I go buy something else.

tanks update

I haven't had time to take and upload photos, but here's a bit of update. My betta still has popeye, on one side only. I gave him several epsom salt baths, no change. I increased water changes on his tank, and was more careful about cleaning out food he didn't eat. His appetite has come back and he is not as lethargic, but still spends lots of time resting in a sheltered spot under edge of windelov driftwood, or hiding behind the anubias. I don't know if he will ever recover from the damage of going through the tank cycle, sigh.

I had two groups of black skirt tetras going through quarantine. It was almost two weeks, then up came a family vacation (bad timing on my part, I shouldn't have got new fish so close to a trip). One group of tetras looked great, I put them in the angelfish tank. Other group had signs of ich and fungus. I returned those to the store. Came home from trip and the tetras in the angel tank look well- good color, alert, super eager to eat. But on closer inspection a few of them had specks of ich on fins. Either they had it and my QT wasn't long enough, or I somehow cross-contaminated even though I use different siphon hose for each tank, and wash hands between. Dang. Angelfish doesn't show spots but yesterday was definitely looking irritated and flashing, scraping on stuff. Looks like it's in her gills. I have to order meds online- the stores don't carry much anymore. Meanwhile am raising the temperature- it's 82° now and so far all the fishes doing fine with that- and doing a 50% water change every other day- glad of the bare bottom, hoping I can physically remove a lot of it.

My shrimp bowl is fine. While I was gone, instead of eating some older anubias leaves mottled with algae I had clipped off and left drifting, the shrimps picked apart the elodea stems. I removed what was left of that. Buces and mermaid weed are doing great in here, the flame moss I tried tying onto a rock all turned yellow and looks dead.

Paradise fish is doing great. Tank is nice and green with summer. I replaced some of the older sweet potato vines on the back with new cuttings. For some reason smaller crypts on the left of the tank are doing poorly- had a lot of leaves turn white and melt. Also the crinum is looking sad (no new growth, tips dying off on older leaves), and salvinia minima floaters have a lot of dieoff. I don't know if all this is from only having one fish in the tank instead of two now- less food input so less plant nutrients? or something else. Flame moss died in here too, but the fissidens remaining on the mesh is looking great. I'm hoping to move some of that onto a rock soon. A lot of the vals have died off too, but the few left are finally growing taller and I hope they send out some runners.

betta tank cycled

The day before yesterday nitrites started to drop in here, and it finally completed cycling yesterday, I did a large water change this morning.

Relieved it's all leveled out now- I could tell right away things were improving because Ruby quit looking crashed all the time and started swimming around the tank again!

Plants are mostly looking ok-

and rotalas are starting to straighten out too

Not thrilled with how I arranged them, but I'll wait for some stuff to grow back before I move things around again.

Ruby's condition

My betta tank is still stuck in cycle, nitrites are not dropping.

Every time I cycle a tank, this happens, it takes forever for the nitrite stage to finish. I'm feeling terrible for Ruby, but there's nothing I can do but keep up the water changes (which stalls the cycle longer, I'm sure) because I simply have no other place to put him. Any other container I'd use, wouldn't be cycled either. I've dropped in more malaysian trumpet snails from the other tanks, I brought in new nerite snails, I'm feeding them as Ruby hardly eats.

He's definitely lethargic and I'm starting to wonder if he's starting to get popeye. I have replacement sponges coming for Laddie's tank soon- I'm going to swap out one new for old, cut the old in half, drop one piece in here, the other in my QT that's also stuck in cycle. Hope that gives them a boost.

Added some pieces of rotala colorata stem someone gave me, in this corner the other day:

betta upstairs

Ruby's tank was in the basement for over two months, all scattered plants and ignored. I did the water changes regularly, fed the plants and fish, peeked in there once in a while to make sure he was still alive. He swam around the tank looking curious about stuff like usual. The buces did really well. Other plants kind of languished, anubias started to get black spots of algae, windelov fern had some dieoff.

Spriodela polyrhiza floaters were thriving, but all the other plants floating became a jumble and grew in contorted ways- the stems turning on themselves, the echinodorus sprouting roots between the leaves. Ruby seemed to like the plant mass at surface.

Then last week I took the bulk of a morning and moved him upstairs, put the ten gallon tank on my now-empty stand where the 20H used to sit. Rinsed the old substrate four or five times, then replanted everything. Lots of the stems are all bent oddly, especially the rotalas but I hope they grow straight again soon. Will update with new photos soon as I can.

I thought the tank was doing well, I only saw a bit of ammonia on testing for the first few days, but then it went into a full cycle. Ammonia zeroed out quickly, but there's been high nitrites for a week now, it just can't seem to finish cycling. Probably doesn't help that I'm doing wc every morning- two or three gal- to save the fish from toxicity, and he's not eating well, so there's not a lot of nutrient input to make the waste to feed the bacteria. Sigh. Ruby now spends a lot of time lying on the tank floor, under plants or hidden in the skull cave. It distresses me to see that.

Unfortunately, I seem to have lost my bumblebee horned nerite snails. I took a photo of this one a week ago when the tank was still downstairs, it looked fine. I often saw one or the other crawling around so didn't worry about them. But now after the tank move, I've only found one empty nerite shell in here. I don't know what happened to them all- too much shock with change in water parameters? were they old and just succumbed to the small ammonia spike the day after the tank move? Did I accidentally bury one that was clinging to the underside of a hardscape piece? I don't know.

At the LFS next town over yesterday, I bought three new little horned nerites- one yellow and black like all the others I've had. Two are more golden brown with black stripes, and one has a neat stippling pattern that makes it look as if it has scales: