anna0219
Aquarium Advice Apprentice
Hello all -
My name is Anna and I'm brand-new to this site. Here goes my story -
I hope nobody yells at me for this - I know it wasn't ideal, but I am a college student with a very limited space and budget and I wanted a pet fish. So I got a male betta and put him in a 1-gallon fish bowl. I researched extensively the best way to possibly care for him, and followed all the directions. I changed all of the water and treated it carefully once a week, I only fed him a small pinch of food per day, and I kept him out of sunlight, things like that.
I bought him at the beginning of November or so, and lately he had been acting sluggish and his colors seemed duller. I knew his water wasn't as warm as it should have been, so I marched to the pet store this weekend and bought a 5.5 gallon tank. My dad, a bit of an ex-aquarium keeper himself, gave me a great water-heater that we tested carefully and got it all ready to go for Louie, my beautiful blue and red crowntail betta. We got rocks, plants, and a thermometer all ready to go.
I eagerly headed back to my university - and found Louie dead at the bottom of my bowl.
What can I say? I cried about it. No joke.
But when I was buying the new tank at Petco, the girl working there gave me a great big lecture about how I was killing my fish by changing the water once a week because no "good" bacteria was growing. This of course, makes sense to me, but all the betta care websites I intently read all said to change it once a week, NO EXCEPTIONS. So I was very frustrated to hear such contradictory advice. She also told me the five-gallon was too big and he would just sit in the corner of it. I bought it anyway, determined to mediate between different advice-givers.
So now here I am, a beautiful new tank without a fish.
I'm sorry to make this post so long, but I wanted to really spell out my situation and get some help. I thoguht I was doing Louie good by buying him a bigger tank, making sure his water was warmer. What do you think - was I wrong to change the water? If so, that makes me nervous about other things I read.
So now I am thinking that I might like to have a handful of small fish in this tank since it's somewhat-big enough to be not just limited to one betta. I saw someone else post about having a betta with a couple of tetras - I didn't realize this was possible.
So after hearing my long sob-story, here is my slew of questions. Feel free to answer one or any!
What are the likelihoods of a betta getting along well with those fish? Could I possibly try a betta and three tetras in a tank like that? What other fish combinations would be ideal? What kind of filter would you best recommend (that is the new addition I hadn't made yet since everyone seemed to tell me I didn't need a filter for a betta)? DO I need a filter for a betta? Or a betta with small tetras?
Thanks so much. Be kind to my newbie-ness, please. I promise that I tried to be a great fish-mommy to Louie. Thank you for your help! Sorry this was somewhat of a novel.
My name is Anna and I'm brand-new to this site. Here goes my story -
I hope nobody yells at me for this - I know it wasn't ideal, but I am a college student with a very limited space and budget and I wanted a pet fish. So I got a male betta and put him in a 1-gallon fish bowl. I researched extensively the best way to possibly care for him, and followed all the directions. I changed all of the water and treated it carefully once a week, I only fed him a small pinch of food per day, and I kept him out of sunlight, things like that.
I bought him at the beginning of November or so, and lately he had been acting sluggish and his colors seemed duller. I knew his water wasn't as warm as it should have been, so I marched to the pet store this weekend and bought a 5.5 gallon tank. My dad, a bit of an ex-aquarium keeper himself, gave me a great water-heater that we tested carefully and got it all ready to go for Louie, my beautiful blue and red crowntail betta. We got rocks, plants, and a thermometer all ready to go.
I eagerly headed back to my university - and found Louie dead at the bottom of my bowl.
What can I say? I cried about it. No joke.
But when I was buying the new tank at Petco, the girl working there gave me a great big lecture about how I was killing my fish by changing the water once a week because no "good" bacteria was growing. This of course, makes sense to me, but all the betta care websites I intently read all said to change it once a week, NO EXCEPTIONS. So I was very frustrated to hear such contradictory advice. She also told me the five-gallon was too big and he would just sit in the corner of it. I bought it anyway, determined to mediate between different advice-givers.
So now here I am, a beautiful new tank without a fish.
I'm sorry to make this post so long, but I wanted to really spell out my situation and get some help. I thoguht I was doing Louie good by buying him a bigger tank, making sure his water was warmer. What do you think - was I wrong to change the water? If so, that makes me nervous about other things I read.
So now I am thinking that I might like to have a handful of small fish in this tank since it's somewhat-big enough to be not just limited to one betta. I saw someone else post about having a betta with a couple of tetras - I didn't realize this was possible.
So after hearing my long sob-story, here is my slew of questions. Feel free to answer one or any!
What are the likelihoods of a betta getting along well with those fish? Could I possibly try a betta and three tetras in a tank like that? What other fish combinations would be ideal? What kind of filter would you best recommend (that is the new addition I hadn't made yet since everyone seemed to tell me I didn't need a filter for a betta)? DO I need a filter for a betta? Or a betta with small tetras?
Thanks so much. Be kind to my newbie-ness, please. I promise that I tried to be a great fish-mommy to Louie. Thank you for your help! Sorry this was somewhat of a novel.