Carole

Hi,
I'm new as of 10 mins ago so forgive me if I am posting to the wrong place. I have a 2 gall betta bowl with a small heater set and maintaining 26 deg celcius. We haev a ceramic cave for him to hide in and a live plant in there. We have one beautiful betta named Eric. We have had him for one year without trouble. Until last week when he got sick and was lying sideways on the bottom of the bowl. I had been changing all the water weekly and washing away all the bubble nests thinking it was polluted water. (ahhh, ignorance!!) Now after doing some reading I am confused about the proper routine for water changing. I had not heard anything about the nitrite/ammonia cycle....Please can someone advise how to change Erics water so he will be happy and heathly for years to come. (He is OK now, I removed him and put him into fresh water for a couple of days and he seems to be fine again. I think he was polluted.) He eats bloodworms only and is very fussy. He is dark red and very elegant.
Regards,
Carole

FishKing

I think you should get a test kit for the water and post the aquariums parameters.

Lucy

Hi Carole,
Welcome to FishLore.
It could have been your water was out of whack, I don't know.

I agree with FishKing about getting a test kit, most here recommend the API master test kit, it is very accurate. The strips are not.
Had you done anything differently a couple days prior to him getting ill?

It seems to me that since you've had him for a year with no problems, whatever your routine is, is working for you.

Water changes can be stressful, 20-30% weekly is recommended for a cycled tank. You can use a turkey baster to get rid of waste on the bottom.

Does your tank have a filter?

The goal is to allow beneficial bacteria to grown on the plants, decorations, gravel and in your filter.
The bacteria 'eats' the harmful ammonia from fish waste and left over food. So by cleaning and wiping everything down you could be wiping away the beneficial bacteria.

How is Eric doing today?.....Oh we love pics!

sirdarksol

Welcome to Fishlore!
Lucy and Fishking have some excellent advice.
It's excellent that you've got a heater. That's one of two pieces of equipment that most betta bowls are missing. The other is a filter.
If you can get a 5 or 10g tank (check craig's list and freecycle for your area. You can usually find a whole setup for really cheap), that would be a perfect home for a betta, and as I said, you can usually find a whole setup, which means the filter is included, often for less than a new filter by itself.

Carole

Hello again!
Thanks everyone for the tips. I have bought the test kits for nitrate and Ammonia (API brand). The readings for the Nitrate this morning was 5.0 PPM/litre and for the Ammonia 0.25 ppm/litre. So I changed half his water because everything I have read says No Ammonia is good. Levels are now reading zero on both cards.

I dont have a filter yet nor any air being pumped in. Just the heater and yes I had turned the heater up the day before Eric got sick - he was so cold at 23celius that I put it up to 29 overnight and when I came there in the morning his three friends (Mountain Clouds from our outdoor pond) had cooked and died and Eric was big time sick.....

All my fault - I thought I was trying to do the right thing by warming him up - how stupid intelligent humans can be!

The bowl is round and I will get a filter when I know what type will hang on the side properly or what type to buy, but first I would like to settle his water changing routine so he doesn't get sick again. Any advice on both these matters is welcome.

I am currently bidding on a new aquarium on ebay for Eric - bigger with light, heater and filter etc. Wish me luck!

He is building bubble nests every time I change the water. I am using Stress Coat water conditioner and use filtered tap water. The other thing is that I am in Australia, so I don't know if you think this will make a difference to anything (water contaminants may be different etc).

Please post more to me about what you think I should do and I will try to get a photo up so you can see how beautiful and red Eric is...
talk soon.
Carole

Angela_96

I am so glad to see a wonderful caring betta owner!!! Welcome!! Bettas are tropical, as you know having the heater for him. One thing already suggested is getting him a 2.5 to 5g tank that has the filter/heater already w/ it. The "minibows" are usually already in a kit w/ all the stuff together they are great for bettas. You might want to test your tap water before you use it in the tank to see if it has a high/low pH, nitrites/nitrates/ammonia/hardness sometimes our tapwater does have those parameters out of whack. My tap water has a natural high ph and is hard water (I have african cichlids and its perfect for them). Some people will find that their tap water contains ammonia, nitrites before putting it into the tank.
-I hope that helps some!

luna

Well, getting the bigger tank is always better, but there are a couple of things you can do for your bowl.

1. Heaters, even the best of them (the Visi-Therm Stealth), won't maintain the temperature they're set at in that little water, so you need a good thermometer so you can monitor the temperature closely and set the heater at whatever setting will maintain the temperature at 79-80F (26-27C). Any fluctuation in the temperature can stress out your fish and make him sick, so make sure when you do your water changes that the new water isn't more than a degree different from the water he's in.

2. As for filtration, you can't really do much to hang one on the side, but there are sponge filters that you just drop in and rest in the water. They hook up to an air pump, so you'd need one of them, too...but the air pump and sponge filter combined still don't cost very much. The added perk to the sponge filter is that you can hook it up to a battery-operated air pump and have filtration even when the power goes out.

3. You're doing well to be using the API liquid tests, but you'll also want the test for nitrites, so you can monitor your progress with the nitrogen cycle. You'll want to change the water daily, just enough to keep the ammonia under 0.5, nitrites under 1.0, and nitrates under 20, but if you cut the ammonia and nitrites down to zero with your water changes, the beneficial bacteria don't have any "food", and cycling will take longer.

The online shop we tend to use here for these things, Drs. Foster and Smith, probably doesn't ship to Australia, but these are the items I'm talking about. With the names and pictures, it should help you find them through merchants that work in your area.

Visi-Therm Stealth - http://www.drsfostersmith.com/produc...0&pcatid=12060
Sponge filter - http://www.drsfostersmith.com/produc...54&pcatid=3954
Air pump - http://www.drsfostersmith.com/produc...8&pcatid=12738
Battery-run air pump - http://www.drsfostersmith.com/produc...93&pcatid=3693

Now, the sponge filter will be good for a few reasons, mostly because it will actually fit in the bowl, but also because it doesn't have chemical filtration (carbon) which removes medications (and vitamins, we think) from the water, making filtration more difficult for sick fish who need filtration the most.