Betta glass surfing

They didn't say BB grows in the water, they just said it could disturb it.

I think maybe this weekend I can buy gravel & a couple plants.
Could he bored? Would upgrading to an 8 or 10 gallon & buying a few tetras help?

Here is a picture of my tank. It's not as fancy as your's all's.

 

I only have 5 gallon tanks, and they are not really scaped much. I have a few plants ( pothos, anubia, java moss) along with plenty of Indian almond leaves and cholla wood. Not much to speak about, but my betta guy seems to like it.

A 8 or 10 gallon would be great if you want to make that investment. I would be very, very careful with tetras, as they can be fin nippers. If the people at your LFS tell you that they are ok, do a search on this site first. I have seen many threads on this site about bettas' fins suddenly being missing or messed up when certain tetras are added to the mix, especially neon tetras. Then the betta usually ends up having to be removed from the tank and put back into the smaller tank for their safty.

Betta tank mates are always an issue in that you never really know how things are going to play out. I know that nerite snails would be good. And if those are really smooth stones, maybe do some research about corys.

Bettas really are solitary creatures, and they have no need for other aquatic friends. They can be extremely aggressive, and they can also be bullied. Any live plants that you can add would be nice and add to the beauty of your tank and hopefully help your betta health wise. They are extremely curious and will check out every thing in the tank. Every betta that I have ever owned spent time after every water change checking things out. It's really cute!

I hope this helps!!!!

 

I did my weekly water change last night, but did only 1/2 tank water change. I'll monitor ammonia & nitrate for next couple days.

Sorry to say they are wrong. BB sticks to surfaces, there is hardly any free floating in the water column. It mainly grows on filter media, substrate, decor etc. As long as you aren't scrubbing decor and rinsing filter media every time you won't be getting rid of any BB.

The only way I would add or change substrate is if you can remove him because of how much you have to move around in the tank and the debris that might get kicked up. Imo it is too stressful to do that big of a change with him in the tank.

He seems to like water changes. He's always swimming around following my gravel vacuum & swimming to any of the decorations & stuff that get disturbed.
My concern w/ new gravel would be accidentally smushing him or something!

 

I did my weekly water change last night, but did only 1/2 tank water change. I'll monitor ammonia & nitrate for next couple days.

He seems to like water changes. He's always swimming around following my gravel vacuum & swimming to any of the decorations & stuff that get disturbed.
My concern w/ new gravel would be accidentally smushing him or something!

I'm not sure why you need to monitor ammonia if your tank is cycled. WCs won't disturb BB because it's not in the water column. As long as you have plenty of filter media your cycle should be fairly bullet proof. A while back I did a full substrate change and my cycle remained intact, no ammonia spikes whatsoever.

Mine does too. He likes to swim under my hand while I pour fresh water in. Yeah I wouldn't recommend leaving him in while adding gravel for a number of reasons. When I changed my substrate I just bought a little 0.5 gallon "tank" to use as a holding container for my betta.