Very Bad Fin Rot, Help Please

[PeachLove]

I woke up at 4am because I couldn't sleep on tuesday morning.. I got up and when I glanced over half of my betta's tail was missing!!! He was fine before I went to bed so in just 5 hours half his tail was gone. I gave him fungus cure and triple sulfa. I changed his water completely tuesday nigh, washed everything in his tank, got rid of the rocks, and added more medicine. Today I woke up and he is a lot worse. He has a hole in his top fin and his tail's even shorter.

Here are pictures I just took. Please help I'm really afraid my fish is going to die

 

[monica]

He might be niipping himself. Are you sure it is finrot?

 

[PeachLove]

He might be niipping himself. Are you sure it is finrot?

Hmmm.. well I have never heard of bettas nipping themselves, but this is my first time having bettas. Is there anything I can do about it? Should I just kill him?

 

[QuotheRaven]

Fin rot is treatable, euthanising the fish isn't necessary at the moment. I honestly cannot see any finrot but my eyesight isn't great Good luck

 

[Amunet]

He might be niipping himself. Are you sure it is finrot?

Hmmm.. well I have never heard of bettas nipping themselves, but this is my first time having bettas. Is there anything I can do about it? Should I just kill him?

Geeze.... he has finrot! Not some incurable disease! I can't believe you just asked if you should just kill him... over finrot!

Anywho....

Is the tank he's in cycled? Bad water quality might be the cause of the finrot.
If he's a tail chewer... you could try figuring out what triggers him to do it. Something stressful may be causing him to chew up his tail. Hopefully some ppl who are more familiar with this occurance will come and give you more info on this.

Alot of people just try to keep the water as clean as possible with a little bit of aquarium salt added to help the healing process & that the tail grows back no prob.
If it keeps getting worse, you might want to try adding in an anti-bacterial med that treats finrot... but sounds like you already medicated and it still got worse? So yeah.. he might be chewing up his own tail for some reason.

 

[PeachLove]

Okay I caught him in the act of bitting it so I'm sure he's nipping his own tail. There are also pieces of his tail on the bottom of his tank now, easy to see now that I got rid of the gravel. I have no idea what could trigger it. I looked up all the possible reasons.. so.. I stopped using the lamp I turn on for heat over him, and I completely cut him off from my other betta. He is pretty aggressive though even without seeing the other betta, he flares when I walk into the room.. and when I put my finger up against the tank he flares at it too. I also put back his floating flower that I had forgotten to put back the day he started nipping. He's nipped a little more since I've done all this, but nothing too drastic. I know he's not unhappy because he keeps making bubble nests.. except for the day he started nipping, it was the day after I almost killed him changing his water. I'm not sure what it was but he fell over to his side on the bottom and started twitching and then stood still. I whacked him with the net trying to get him out of the water and he flipped back and started swimming around.

My 2nd fish however does have fin rot. The lining of his tail and top fin is clear with black edges. The medicine isn't doing anything for him and I've already been through 1/5 cycles of the antibiotic :c...

 

[monica]

For the fish that DOES have finrot, give him some meds, bettafix will probably do.
For the one who is tail nipping himself, How big is his tank? Some fish dont do well in small tanks or "bowls/cups"
So Maybe get hima bigger tanks, also give him some entertainment some do it when they are bored. Give him a buddy beside his tanks so he will have company, and lots of live/fake plants. Just give him some company, plus lots of light, considering bettas get panicky in the dark. And put him somewhere where you walk by or stay around most, so he will be able to see you.