Recent content by Loren

I had a perfectly healthy betta in a filtered 5g tank all by itself. My water parameters have always been fine. I think I added a pathogen :( ...I put in a piece of driftwood, and during a water change, noticed it had a rather foul odor and some soft patches. I tossed it out. But now my...

Hiya Vijay. I read your other post. Sounds like maybe you're more discouraged than lacking interest...you're still posting :wink: Fish, and pets in general, I've found, can be 'addictive'. Perhaps you just jumped into too much, too fast. You put alot of thought into your fish, and seem...

Thanks Allivymar, I'll try it. No, my betta is symetrically bloated. He's new...just got him a week ago...holes in fins, ich, hiding, not eating...poor critter. But I read Indrani987's post and you told her about the salts.

What's the 'recipe' for mixing epsom salts to help with constipation? And how long to I let the fish bathe in it?

Possible. I hadn't moved the wood to vacuum in a couple cleanings. No food, but the pleco hangs out there, and maybe waste built up. However, the gourami was acutely ill before the cleaning...hanging out at the surface by the filter and breathing quite heavily. The pleco, on the other hand...

Thank you Ally. Something there made me wonder....when I did my water change today, I took out the driftwood that my plant is attached to so I could thin it out, and it really smelled odd. I'm gonna check it again(sniff for rotten eggs), but I wondered about the hydrogen sulfide she mentions...

I just got him in October. Hard to say for sure...lfs stock.

This tank is over two years old. I use the Nutrafin test kits. My test results have been quite consistant, and I the only significant nitrate fluctuations are when I add new fish, and the last time was back in late November when I got my otos. The first two years with this tank were a...

He's dead. Didn't take long. He did a very sad loop-de-loop and smashed around the tank a bit (hard to watch), then settled to the bottom and expired. He was so weak the water flowing in from the filter tossed him like a leaf. NH3 was <.5ppm, and NO2/NO3 didn't even register. Everyone else...

Geez, it doesn't rain, it pours... In my 10 gal (it's cursed, I swear), my dwarf gourami is lying on the bottom gasping. I noticed he didn't eat at the pm feeding yesterday, or this am feeding. And he's been hanging around the surface where the HOB filter pours in. I had just done my weekly...

Thanks Allyvimar. That's what I'm doing...I've given a dose of Maracyn, and tomorrow will get Maracyn 2 as well...get both gram +/- that way. And I'll get some bettamax, also. Keep it handy, especially if the M's don't work. He's looking a little better now, too. I think I'll do a 10-25%...

Thanks for helping so quickly. I just did a 35 - 40% change. I have some Maracyn on hand (I've used it for fin rot before with success). Perhaps I should go with that now(?), and then add some bettamax once that's going. If I understand what I've read so far, bettamax helps heal, but it...

Water tested a little high for NH3 yesterday (between 0.5 and 1.0 ppm) so I did a 10% water change. I just tested and it's up again so I'll do another now. I'm giving him these little betta pellets, but he's not eating...I have to skim out. I'll try him with some frozen blood worms. What...

I just got a betta this past Monday, and put it in a brand new 5.5gal tank. He did fine the first few days, but he hasn't eaten much. I wasn't too worried until today, when he decided to hang out at the bottom of the tank under cover of a rock ornament, and only comes up for a surface gulp of...

I've got a limpet take-over going on in my tank. I think they came in on some java fern a few months back. My gourami is eating them, but they are getting way out of control. Anyone got any suggestions for pest-control? I've thought of getting a clown loach, but I have a snail that I don't...