Please help my Betta fish =[

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XboxBetta

Aquarium Advice Apprentice
Joined
May 1, 2017
Messages
10
I really dropped the ball with my little guy after having him for 3 years with a slew of mistakes & ignorance ��


I quit my last job which ended my free supply of fresh RO water.


I foolishly thought I read that it only takes an hour or so to dechlorinate tap water by just letting it sit & went with it. Weekly 25% water changes & he's in a 6.5 gallon tank with running filter & media & heater.


I notice he got a couple small white bumps on his side which have continued to grow over time as well as erratic swimming behavior. I foolishly just chalked it up to age & that he was always pretty lively ugh.
I then put BettaFix in the tank & proceeded to miss a water change, which left that stuff in his main tank for 2 weeks which is almost double the recommended time length.


I threw the BioMax filter & all live plants away & did two 50% water changes over 2 days.


THEN I noticed that he was sinking rapidly to the bottom of the tank AND also that there were like a thousand microscopic "mites" if you will living in the gravel bed.


With all that info I decided 3 things. That he had swim bladder disease from overfeeding/not presoaking food, and that he might have parasites.
And also that I'm horrible & let him down big time.


I fasted him for 3 days, hit the gravel bed really good with a vaccum, & then treated the water with Cupramine.


FINALLY after the Cupramine recommended 2 weeks... I pulled it out of the water with carbon & a partial water change.. replenished Beneficial Bacteria & added new BioMax. All sign of microscopic "mite" life gone.


My poor little guy has been through a lot =[
He still makes it a point to swim up & greet me but he's still sick. Still has bumps. Still sinks to the bottom. He actually wasn't eating but then started again, but is now missing his food entirely when he goes to eat it ugh. Laying on bottom of tank mostly.



If you read all this I really appreciate your time!! & would greatly appreciate any insight as I am stumped at this point. Thank you everyone
 
Hardly the first betta to show incredible resilience to our beginners fumbles! The point is you know now so good for you for reaching out for advice!

So to summarize he’s had some rough treatment and maybe some chlorine damage over time and is currently in a (potentially re-cycling) tank post cupramine. Any other meds recently? Betta fix is a controversial med and some people say it does more harm than good but the risk is usually with overdosing the dosage not the time. Might have lowered oxygen levels in the tank a bit but I doubt it did any damage if he was acting fine during treatment.

Do you have a test kit? You’ll need to test to make sure you don’t have any ammonia or nitrites in the water. Bottled bacteria can be hit or miss and clean water goes a long long way helping recovery.
 
Thank you so much for taking the time to reply! I read your message a few days ago & am very appreciative so plz don't think otherwise bc of the response time!
I'm such a joke not having a test kit! I just figured having clean water, & adding beneficial bacteria with every weekly partial WC in tandem with the filter would ensure the quality. But yeah I don't really know for sure without one.
Will keep up the water changes & hope for the best. Thanks again for the reply & compassion for my little guy =]
 
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