I was at pet smart today getting some prime for my other tanks and I saw this poor guy in a tiny little cup. He was barely moving and was gasping for air and I couldn’t help but try to save him. I had a spare 10 gal and a bubbler that has already been cycled in another tank so I quickly set it all up with a heater and acclimated him into it. He has been moving a bit but there’s a lot of things going on I’m worried about. He is breathing very fast, one of his gills seems a bit swollen (probably ammonia burn) and he mainly lays on the floor (like in the picture). Whenever he swims up to the surface tk breathe he does super erratically and often spins around a couple times while trying to get up. He has been pecking at some left over food on the bottom of the tank which is a good sign. I’m really hoping to save him as he has a beautiful dark blue color and red accents that would look so good when his color comes all the way through. If anyone has some advice and what else I can do please let me know! I plan on getting some almond leaves in there tomororw and will hopefully get some substrate and plants in it on Wednesday (when I get paid lol). I know this was super impulsive but he just looked so sad 😭.
https://v.redd.it/ukcjrjd54c0g1
Posted by HatConnect5546
3 Comments
Oh no : ( I did something similar recently, though my betta was in slightly better condition.
Make sure the water has beneficial bacteria, possibly add some water conditioner or a medication to the water if it seems appropriate, make sure the temperature is heated…that sort of thing.
I wish I had a better answer, hopefully someone else does.
He should be able to recover, keep up the good work, dose Prime and Stability just to be on the safe side for roughly another week, keep doing 1/3 water changes twice a week, and also some aquarium salt to help him breathing using gills (don’t over do it, be careful when calculating dose! Remember if you replace 1/3 of your tank water, you should only add 1/3 dose of salt or less!). And also, Methylene Blue baths help a lot
So definitely get the almond leaves, don’t do salt baths. The poor baby is already struggling to breathe so salt (even like aquarium salt) will make breathing harder. I’d honestly try some stress guard, live plants, substrate, and it looks like he may have some swim bladder issue, so I’d definitely look into that as well. I’m far from a professional so take my advice with a grain of salt, but treat it as you would any betta. Partial water changes, plenty of places to hide. His left gill is.. need for concern to say the least. I’d definitely try to fast him a little bit as he does look obese, granted it may be swelling. Maybe look into Kanaplex treatment, it can help with bloating possibly and if he does have swim bladder that will help, or start smaller with short small amounts of aquarium salt (I know I said not to, but if you do it enough to where the betta won’t pass out and keep a close eye they shoulddd be fine?) as far as everything else… he seems okay. Just breathing, potential swim bladder disease, fasting, and figuring out what’s going on with that left gill. I wish you the best of luck, also ask for more help in r/bettaclinic. Those people are extremely educated in betta care 🙂