Betta sick Help!

[Smilecentaur]

I've had this betta for over 3 months now in a planted 20 gallon tank with 4 zebra danio, 3 cory cats and a couple snails. He recently started getting really lethargic and hanging around the bottom of the tank a lot. He has a white discoloration on his chin but doesnt seem to have it elsewhere on his body. Along with what seems to be like fraying of his tail. I recently did a partial water change on the tank in hopes of helping him. The filter I have in this tank has a carbon, sponge and biological filter in it. The readings I got for my PH and such are ph- 6.6, ammonia- 0-0.25ppm, nitrite- 0ppm and Nitrate is 0-5ppm. I'm using a beaker testing kit with color matching for the levels.

 

[Colin_T]

Hi and welcome to the forum

Can you post a picture of the fish?
If the pictures are too big for the website, set the camera's resolution to its lowest setting and take some more. The lower resolution will make the images smaller and they should fit on this website. Check the pictures on your pc and find a couple that are clear and show the problem, and post them here. Make sure you turn the camera's resolution back up after you have taken the pics otherwise all your pictures will be small.

How long ago did this start, a couple of days, a week, a month?

How often do you normally do water changes and how much water do you change?
Do you gravel clean the substrate when you do a water change?
Do you dechlorinate the new water before adding it to the tank?

How often do you clean the filter and how do you clean it?

Have you added anything new to the tank in the 2 weeks before the fish got sick?

 

[Smilecentaur]

Hi and welcome to the forum

Can you post a picture of the fish?
If the pictures are too big for the website, set the camera's resolution to its lowest setting and take some more. The lower resolution will make the images smaller and they should fit on this website. Check the pictures on your pc and find a couple that are clear and show the problem, and post them here. Make sure you turn the camera's resolution back up after you have taken the pics otherwise all your pictures will be small.

How long ago did this start, a couple of days, a week, a month?

How often do you normally do water changes and how much water do you change?
Do you gravel clean the substrate when you do a water change?
Do you dechlorinate the new water before adding it to the tank?

How often do you clean the filter and how do you clean it?

Have you added anything new to the tank in the 2 weeks before the fish got sick?

This started about a week or so ago and I've been looking around the internet for solutions to it.

I didn't do a water change before the most recent one for over 2 weeks because I saw no sign of algae growth. And when I did it I did a full water change and washed the substrate out.

I add a water conditioner to the water before I put it into the tank.

I clean the filter ever time I clean the tank, and what i did to i rinse out all the gunk the sponge filter caught and rinse the biological filter and carbon filter till the water runs clear.

And I hadn't added anything new to the tank before the fish got sick.

 

[Colin_T]

The fish has a fungal infection

You need to treat it with a broad spectrum medication that treats, fungus, bacteria and protozoan infections.

To work out the volume of water in the tank:
measure length x width x height in cm.
divide by 1000.
= volume in litres.

When you measure the height, measure from the top of the substrate to the top of the water level.

There is a calculator/ converter in the "How To Tips" at the top of this page that will let you convert litres to gallons if you need it.

Remove carbon from the filter before treating or it will adsorb the medication and stop it working.

Wipe the inside of the glass down with a clean fish sponge. Do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate. Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it is added to the tank.

Clean the filter if it hasn't been done in the last 2 weeks. However, if the filter is less than 6 weeks old, do not clean it.

Increase surface turbulence/ aeration when using medications because they reduce the dissolved oxygen in the water.

-------------------------
You should do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate every week. If you don't have a gravel cleaner, get a basic model like the one in the following link. It will let you clean the gunk out of the substrate without removing the gravel from the tank. You basically clean the gunk out while draining some water out of the tank. Your local pet shop can demonstrate how to use the gravel cleaner or look on YouTube. You leave the fish in the tank when doing this.
Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it's added to the tank.
https://www.about-goldfish.com/aquarium-cleaning.html

You do water changes for 2 main reasons.
1) to reduce nutrients like ammonia, nitrite & nitrate.
2) to dilute disease organisms in the water.

Fish live in a soup of microscopic organisms including bacteria, fungus, viruses, protozoans, worms, flukes and various other things that make your skin crawl. Doing a big water change and gravel cleaning the substrate on a regular basis will dilute these organisms and reduce their numbers in the water, thus making it a safer and healthier environment for the fish.

If you do a 25% water change each week you leave behind 75% of the bad stuff in the water.
If you do a 50% water change each week you leave behind 50% of the bad stuff in the water.
If you do a 75% water change each week you leave behind 25% of the bad stuff in the water.

Fish live in their own waste. Their tank and filter is full of fish poop. The water they breath is filtered through fish poop. Cleaning filters, gravel and doing big regular water changes, removes a lot of this poop and makes the environment cleaner and healthier for the fish.

-------------------------
You can clean the filter every 2 weeks. Get a bucket of water from the aquarium and squeeze the filter materials out in the bucket of tank water. When they are clean, put them in the aquarium. Rinse the filter case under tap water. If it's a power filter, rinse the impellor assembly under tap water. Then reassemble the filter, put the filter material back in and get it going.

 

[Smilecentaur]

The fish has a fungal infection

You need to treat it with a broad spectrum medication that treats, fungus, bacteria and protozoan infections.

To work out the volume of water in the tank:
measure length x width x height in cm.
divide by 1000.
= volume in litres.

When you measure the height, measure from the top of the substrate to the top of the water level.

There is a calculator/ converter in the "How To Tips" at the top of this page that will let you convert litres to gallons if you need it.

Remove carbon from the filter before treating or it will adsorb the medication and stop it working.

Wipe the inside of the glass down with a clean fish sponge. Do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate. Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it is added to the tank.

Clean the filter if it hasn't been done in the last 2 weeks. However, if the filter is less than 6 weeks old, do not clean it.

Increase surface turbulence/ aeration when using medications because they reduce the dissolved oxygen in the water.

-------------------------
You should do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate every week. If you don't have a gravel cleaner, get a basic model like the one in the following link. It will let you clean the gunk out of the substrate without removing the gravel from the tank. You basically clean the gunk out while draining some water out of the tank. Your local pet shop can demonstrate how to use the gravel cleaner or look on YouTube. You leave the fish in the tank when doing this.
Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it's added to the tank.
https://www.about-goldfish.com/aquarium-cleaning.html

You do water changes for 2 main reasons.
1) to reduce nutrients like ammonia, nitrite & nitrate.
2) to dilute disease organisms in the water.

Fish live in a soup of microscopic organisms including bacteria, fungus, viruses, protozoans, worms, flukes and various other things that make your skin crawl. Doing a big water change and gravel cleaning the substrate on a regular basis will dilute these organisms and reduce their numbers in the water, thus making it a safer and healthier environment for the fish.

If you do a 25% water change each week you leave behind 75% of the bad stuff in the water.
If you do a 50% water change each week you leave behind 50% of the bad stuff in the water.
If you do a 75% water change each week you leave behind 25% of the bad stuff in the water.

Fish live in their own waste. Their tank and filter is full of fish poop. The water they breath is filtered through fish poop. Cleaning filters, gravel and doing big regular water changes, removes a lot of this poop and makes the environment cleaner and healthier for the fish.

-------------------------
You can clean the filter every 2 weeks. Get a bucket of water from the aquarium and squeeze the filter materials out in the bucket of tank water. When they are clean, put them in the aquarium. Rinse the filter case under tap water. If it's a power filter, rinse the impellor assembly under tap water. Then reassemble the filter, put the filter material back in and get it going.

Thank you for the help

 

[michaelgn]

This started about a week or so ago and I've been looking around the internet for solutions to it.

I didn't do a water change before the most recent one for over 2 weeks because I saw no sign of algae growth. And when I did it I did a full water change and washed the substrate out.

I add a water conditioner to the water before I put it into the tank.

I clean the filter ever time I clean the tank, and what i did to i rinse out all the gunk the sponge filter caught and rinse the biological filter and carbon filter till the water runs clear.

And I hadn't added anything new to the tank before the fish got sick.

Move fast! I lost one when I found the fungus infection while I didn’t have any medication in hand... it didn’t make it even for 24hours.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Smilecentaur]

Move fast! I lost one when I found the fungus infection while I didn’t have any medication in hand... it didn’t make it even for 24hours.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I got the medication I needed but he passed a couple of hours ago before I could help him :c

 

[michaelgn]

I got the medication I needed but he passed a couple of hours ago before I could help him :c

Sorry to hear that. It could be very stressful if this is your only fish. Don’t give it up, sometimes it’s not your fault, Betta could be unhealthy if not being taken good care of at LFS and you never know. Move on to the next one and you will do it much better.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Colin_T]

sorry to hear about him dying

If the medication hasn't been opened, return it to the store and ask for a refund because you no longer need it.

Wait at least 2 weeks (preferably 4 weeks) before you get any more fish. And do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate every day for the next week. This will help dilute any disease organisms in the water and make the tank cleaner for when you do get a new fish.
Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it's added to the tank.