hamfist
Fish Herder
We have an ongoing problem with one of our Bettas, "Andrew".
We've had him for about 4-5 months and he's just been sickly all the time. He seems happy and feeds very well, with an excellent varied diet, but he started off regularly getting bloated swimbladder due to constipation. We sorted that out, by working out that both frozen bloodworm and Hikari betta Bio gold both had this effect on him. Since cutting those out, no more swimbladder problems.
However, after that it was a bit of fin rot, which hasn't really come to anything but is annoying. But now, to cap it all, he is developing popeye in one eye.
Water stats are superb with ammonia and nitrite at zero and nitrate at only 5ppm. However the pH from our local water is 8.0 ! We have another Betta "Joe", who is living very happily and healthily in our local water, but Andrew is definately not.
Andrew lives in a filtered, heated 5 gallon tank on his own, with lots of interesting stuff to explore inside, and gets a weekly 50% water change. He is also well stimulated as his tank is in a high activity area of the house.
I don't know what else to do. I am suspicious that Andrew is simply cursed with bad genes, and is a victim of in-breeding, and probably nothing I will do could help. however, I also am suspicious that his immune system is struggling in pH8 water, and that this could possibly be the cause of his problems.
Being in the UK, getting antibiotics is virtually impossible.
Anyone have any ideas or thoughts on the matter ?
We've had him for about 4-5 months and he's just been sickly all the time. He seems happy and feeds very well, with an excellent varied diet, but he started off regularly getting bloated swimbladder due to constipation. We sorted that out, by working out that both frozen bloodworm and Hikari betta Bio gold both had this effect on him. Since cutting those out, no more swimbladder problems.
However, after that it was a bit of fin rot, which hasn't really come to anything but is annoying. But now, to cap it all, he is developing popeye in one eye.
Water stats are superb with ammonia and nitrite at zero and nitrate at only 5ppm. However the pH from our local water is 8.0 ! We have another Betta "Joe", who is living very happily and healthily in our local water, but Andrew is definately not.
Andrew lives in a filtered, heated 5 gallon tank on his own, with lots of interesting stuff to explore inside, and gets a weekly 50% water change. He is also well stimulated as his tank is in a high activity area of the house.
I don't know what else to do. I am suspicious that Andrew is simply cursed with bad genes, and is a victim of in-breeding, and probably nothing I will do could help. however, I also am suspicious that his immune system is struggling in pH8 water, and that this could possibly be the cause of his problems.
Being in the UK, getting antibiotics is virtually impossible.
Anyone have any ideas or thoughts on the matter ?
