Betta Fish Hanging Out at Bottom of Tank & Breathing Heavy

[FishGuest5123]

If you can locate Furan-2 then get it.

 

[SpotiKona]

I wanted to post a happy update: I began treatment of the water with Furan-2 yesterday. It has worked wonders! I am pleased to report that my betta is once again swimming around his tank! It caught me completely off guard this afternoon when I noticed that he was swimming He even gobbled up a few pellets without any hesitation! Fin rot is still present, but I'm hoping that will get better throughout the remainder of the treatment. I can't thank you guys enough for all of your advice. I will keep up with the water changes to be sure that nothing like this happens again. I'm also super excited to be moving him to his new tank once it's ready.

One last thing, I read on the Furan-2 package that it causes the tank to crash, which makes sense since it instructed me to remove filter media during the treatment. Should I be doing anything special to get the cycle going again once I've finished treating the water? The Furan-2 package recommends API Quick Start, but I figured I'd better get your guys' opinions first. I will be moving him to the new tank soon; however, it's not fully cycled yet.

PS: Is it a bad idea to put the tank near a window? Will the sunlight bother my fish?

Another PS: Any recommendations on good fish to keep with a betta?

 

[Ch4rlie]

I wanted to post a happy update: I began treatment of the water with Furan-2 yesterday. It has worked wonders! I am pleased to report that my betta is once again swimming around his tank! It caught me completely off guard this afternoon when I noticed that he was swimming He even gobbled up a few pellets without any hesitation! Fin rot is still present, but I'm hoping that will get better throughout the remainder of the treatment. I can't thank you guys enough for all of your advice. I will keep up with the water changes to be sure that nothing like this happens again. I'm also super excited to be moving him to his new tank once it's ready.

One last thing, I read on the Furan-2 package that it causes the tank to crash, which makes sense since it instructed me to remove filter media during the treatment. Should I be doing anything special to get the cycle going again once I've finished treating the water? The Furan-2 package recommends API Quick Start, but I figured I'd better get your guys' opinions first. I will be moving him to the new tank soon; however, it's not fully cycled yet.

PS: Is it a bad idea to put the tank near a window? Will the sunlight bother my fish?

Another PS: Any recommendations on good fish to keep with a betta?

That’s excellent news, a good appetite in your betta is a good sign, so glad to hear this.

Taking the media out of filter is a good idea during this treatment, it will save the bb. Keep the media in dechlorinator water or old tank water, do not let it dry out.
The media will be fine for a wee while like this.

Or you can transfer this media straight to new tank and that will cycle that tank much faster, almost a instant cycle.

Then once betta has had his treatment transfer him into the new tank as long as it’s been successfully cycled.

The old tank, not sure if you’re keeping this running or not as it’s only a 2 gal tank, maybe for a planted shrimp and snails only set up would be fine but not really suitable for any other kind of fish or livestock tbh.

If you’re keeping this 2 gal tank running for a shrimp set up then you could keep some of the old media and put it back in this, shrimps and snails have a very low bioload so don’t need as much bb.

The addition of API Quick Start won’t do any harm, not sure if it will do much.
A better alternative imho is Tetra Safe Start or Dr Tim’s One and Only Nitrfying Bacteria as both these products have proven to have the correct bacterias needed but it’s not essential as long as the old media is fine and kept immersed in water.

And lastly, bettas are solidarity creatures, meaning they do best without any other fish in the tank.

 

[SpotiKona]

Thanks for the tip about using old tank water to preserve beneficial bacteria! I have no plans to keep the old tank running at the moment, but if I were to keep it running, I wouldn't use it for any fish. The shrimp setup does sound kind of cool, though; I may have to look at that!

I also took a look at SafeStart. The only bottle I can locate is 3.38 FL OZ. Should I pour the entire bottle into my 5.5-gallon aquarium?

PS: His fins are looking better now too!