Betta Suddenly Developed Brown Patches On Gill Plates, Beard And Vetral Fins, What Could It Be?

Hi all,
I’ve just recently gotten into betta keeping, I have 3 at the moment, all are in cycled 5.5 gallon tanks. My blue vieltale (1st purchase) has developed strange brown spots/patches on his gill plates, possibly (hard to tell) on lower part of beard and just behind his ventral fins. The rest of his body looks fine, doesn’t look like velvet as it is not rust colored and only appears on areas mentioned above. Any ideas on what this could be? I do twice weekly pwc’s treated with prime, gravel vac twice weekly (snail is messy), current water parameters are 0 ppm ammonia, 0 ppm nitrites and between 10 & 20 ppm nitrites. Water is at 80 degrees. Not rubbing on any tank decorations, eating fine, acting normal, (maybe a bit more active than usual when i approch his tank lately since he has to share my attention with two other tanks, so i can’t stare lovingly into his eyes as much as he was accustomed to). Dumb question, but I am dealing with diatoms in all 3 tanks at the moment, could they be attaching to him? Any replies would be much appreciated.

 

Can you post a picture of the fish and your tank?

 

It could just be a color change, if nothing is seen weirdly in pictures. What type of betta is he? Mine has the marbling gene. He used to be red and white with blue eyes and he is now solid red and blue with black eyes. I do not believe that diatoms can leech onto fish.

 

It’s kind of hard to see, he doesn’t like me playing paparazzi, but if you zoom in you can kind of see a bit of the brownish yellow, I’ll keep trying to get better pictures of the gills, you can mostly only see the brown when he’s looking right at the camera. He’s a veiltail, I’ve had Spam since March, got a red veiltail (Katherin Betta Jones) in April and a delta tail (Splash Gordon) in May. Spam’s an older betta, do they continue to change colors? I noticed splash has started to get more color as he grows, he’s still very young and Betta Jones was an adolescent who has grown about 1/4 inch in the last two months and has gotten some iridescent scales but Spam hasn’t changed at all and he’s the oldest one, full grown when I got him

 

As they grow they can continue to change colors. Does the brown on Spam (cute name!) look like a growth, or is it apart of his scales? It looks like it’s apart of his scales and he has just experienced a color change but I may be wrong.

 

It looks more like something is growing on his scales, the tanks I have don’t have very good lighting, I just ordered new LED’s for each tank, will be here in 10 days, it literally appeared overnight, his face did get darker after I brought him home but that was a little over 3 months ago, he’s always been healthy, still acts like his normal self , but if it is a health issue I’d like to get ahead of it. Katherin betta Jones did have inflamed gills so I had to treat him but both spam and splash have been healthy. Also, if I do have to end up medicating, I would need to move the snails, when I treated betta Jones I took out his snail (Michael Slougless), and put him into spams tank, could I have maybe transferred something when I moved the snail that is just now showing up?
(Also, I can’t take credit for the names, my teenage kids get the honors, spamlela manderson and his snail Dyson, Katherin Betta Jones and his snail Michael sloughless, splash Gordon and a yet to be named zebra nerite).

 

I've been raising and befriending Bettas for about 5 years now. I've had 3. Ozzy, Zeppelin and currently Lars. I fell in love with blue vieltales from the beginning. I never thought one could have a relationship with a fish, boy was I wrong!! I've seen the red patches before and if it's a pretty color change, then it's normal. However, if they turn brownish a bacterial infection may be present. Also, in my experience, any change in behavior, energy or eating habits are red flags. In the Blues, purple is a common normal color change. With both of my prior ones, they developed red patches and shredded looking fins. I never knew until now you could obtain antibacterials for fish! I'm a nurse retired and often thought mine needed meds. Currently, it's starting again. But Lars is still active and eating. Could someone tell me how to get the gravel and tank clean if I'm supposed to do 1/2 tank cleanings daily? Where do I get these meds? I've never seen them in the fish section!! Confused and worried

 

I love every betta I come across, my hubby thinks I’ve lost my mind, seems I come home with a new betta every month! I do love the blue variations. Hubby doesn’t admit it but I’ve seen him bent over looking at all 3 of my tanks, talking to the fishies, he’a starting to see how they each have personalities all there own. I definitely saw brown earlier today, but it seems to be going away as quickly as it came on, all I can see now is the slight yellowing by his ventral and pectoral fins, I’m worrried it might be fungal as you suggest, and if so, I would really like to nip it in the bud. I’ve yet to come across anything about brown patches, it was definitely brown. As far as meds go, I was able to find the antibiotics for the gill inflammation at petsmart, I didn’t get good advice from them but I read posts on this site by all the kind people and was able to figure out what I needed and tracked it down. I have seen anti fungal meds there as well but I’m no expert so I would ask more experienced members what they recommend, I also have mystery snails and a nerite so I have to remove the snails when I medicate depending on what I’m using. (Love the names by the way, rock on!)