BellaOnline Forums Home and Garden Fish sick betta

Oh, Jojo, i am sorry about your little dude - you and he did fight it out for as long as possible and you did a great job trying to save him. I think he may have been kind of sickly in general. I am glad your girl is doing better and I hope the new boy enjoys his clean tank. he sounds gorgeous. Give us a photo!

My little red fish has passed on. I can't figure out what was wrong with her. She was fine eating, swimming, and was so curious, came right up when you looked in the tank, but she started to sit on the plastic leaves at the top of the tank last night, gasping for air, and she died during the night. It was so sudden. I really liked her. She was really tiny and bright red and just so curious about everything. I still have my new male betta and one other female left. The seem to be okay. I have put them both on wardell pellot food but am not sure how much to feed them. the bottle says as much as they can in eat in 2 minutes a couple of times a day. They both attack the pellets when I put them in like they are starving but I don't want to overfeed them. Also I have a water conditioner which is salt so should I buy bottled water instead of tap. and is there any harm in putting betta fix in each water change or not. Any help would be appreciated.

Hi jojo! I'm really sorry to hear about your little girl betta. <img src="/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />
This is what I know about bettas (Don't worry it shouldn't be very long LOL)
As much food as they can eat in two minutes could be 20 pellets, my guy only gets 3 pellets twice a day. And it's totally normal for them to make you think they are starving!
Salt and water conditioner are different, IMHO the best conditioner has a slime coat and dechlorinator in it. As for the salt, some people choose to use salt and others don't find it necessary. Personally I didn't use it until my guy got a touch of fin rot, and then got a little hole in his tail from the darned plastic plant. The salt healed both alot quicker than without it. It is supposed to help if the fish is stressed out too.
About the water, alot of people have a bucket/container on hand with aged water. It's usually tap water that has been left to air out so that it can get to room temp/tank temp and the chlorine can evaporate. Lastly I'm not sure the exact reasoning, but you're not really supposed to add Bettafix with every water change. It's like a med, you only use it when you need it, not as a prevention. I hope this helps. FW <img src="/images/graemlins/fish.gif" alt="" />

I should clarify, it is a water softnor on my house taps, so should I use the tap water because it has rock salt in it, or bottled water with the conditioner. thanks

Tap water is fine, it's what most people use. Bottled water can be quite expensive!

The food companies would have you believe that you need to dump a bottle of food into the water for your fish (they want to sell lots, so why wouldn't they tell you that), and I used to even feed my first upwards of 10 pellets a day (!) but they really only need 2-4. You can give them in one feeding or spread throughout the day. I like to give mine one pellet at 11, 5, and 11 again to space them out and make him think he's not so hungry, hehe.

So I have these two betta's a male and female but I haven't come up with any names yet. The male has an orange face, white body, blue fins streaked with red, the female is black and her fins are blue. The male is shy and the female is very curious and friendly. Any suggestions fish lovers in the betta world.

Hi jojo. I heard a cute fish name recently. How about "Sushi"? Don't think I'm cruel, I just thought it was toungue in cheek.

Sorry, I kind of went backwards and just read eliseaboo's post. I should have clarified that it seems alot of people use Bio Bettagold food, and I have read the amount is 2-5 pellets a day for it. I use a different brand that has smaller pellets and so I give my betta about 6 of them. FW

That's my bella pet's name!!! lol! <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

I kinda like that, I am going to change the spelling though, sushe for the male and sushette for the female, talk about a play on word haha thanks