Betta Fish: I don’t think my betta fish is happy

i can tell you right now, those plants are not okay for bettas. also, fill the tank to the top. get live plants, even some floating duckweed is super beneficial for bettas. DO NOT!!!!!!!! clean or replace the filter cartridge. just leave it- that’s all your beneficial bacteria.

was your tank cycled fully before putting the fish in?

Look into real plants- disinfect them first. Look up how to do that. Floater plants are a great option. Add tannins- dried catalpa leaves or however theyre spelled are excellent. Should be in the aquarium aisle of your local pet store. Varied diets are also good for bettas. Look into dried blood worms. Live ones sometimes carry diseases. Introduce some beneficial bacteria. Should be sold in bottles at pet store. Lower your lights. Bright lights can cause stress. Give it rocks, wood, larger plants. Those plastic ones are bogus and will not provide a safe feeling hiding place. Maybe put a terracotta flower pot in there so it can use it like a cave. Make sure it’s not treated with any kind of glaze or paint. The more hiding spots the merrier. You could also replace your gravel with aquasoil. It has tannins in it I believe, and adjusts your tanks Ph to a more betta friendly level. Keep testing your parameters, and Good luck 👍

The easiest thing to help would be adding the extra gallon of water you’re missing lol

You need more water (Id say fill one inch under the top), at least 3 live plants, water circulation (judging on your tank filter position I believe it has a little waterfall), you need water conditioner and quick start, you can add a betta log and some other things so the betta can rest on the top.

One thing is please get rid of betta flakes as food, they are good but they will get your tank so dirty on the first 2 days so you will be constantly cleaning and changing the water I used that at first but yeah there was a lot of cleaning I change to little pellets.

I have the same tank that was given to me as a gift on my birthday, it’s not a 5 gal, but a 3 gal, invest in a air pump in air stones. Those tanks make it impossible to clean the filters. And WILL give out at some point, mine was making loud grinding noises and buzzed loudly, the light still works, just not the filter. And I’m now using it for plants or an emergency hospital tank. You can buy a 5 gal on Facebook market, for hella cheap, just be careful and make sure it holds water, and make sure you get a stand made for it, nothing wood unless you can put a few layers of waterproofing coats onto it. There’s all kinds of beginner plants, you can buy them at the pet stores. Getting a iorn rich liquid fertilizer helps them adjust faster, just don’t add too much or you’ll have to do a water change, what you currently have to decorninate the water is great, but have a separate container for storing decorninated water. I use a large red bucket since I have 4 tanks to maintain. Tap water can hurt the fish, so letting water decorninate for at least a day is good. But if you aren’t knowledgeable on the nitrite cycle, look it up, and I’d also recommend researching how to treat more common sicknesses, since bettas can be prone to them due to weak immune systems and poor breeding, but to help this, get some wood that’s safe, like oak or spider wood, spider wood leaches faster. But there’s also almond leaves and other things that leach tannins, which honestly looks sick as fuck if you know what your doing. Also getting your betta a healthy diet will improve their health, and activity, they LOVE exploring, or being curious, a lot like cats. So get creative with giving them enrichment, like use a cat lazer toy, or try to teach them tricks. Yes, you can teach fish tricks. But also occasionally changing their environment like maybe every six months is also good, also I’d suggest getting a finer gravel. Only if you wanna keep live plants, they need finer substrate to grow more roots. And I usually don’t trust substrate like that, especially most colorful ones, since a lot of them are prone to leaching chemicals. Just my opinion though, hope this helps you some

Don’t fret about cleaning the filter. Mine gets clogged and dirty so maybe every 2-3 weeks ill spray it out with the kitchen hose, then put the same one back in.