Bettas Becoming A Touchy Subject

Having anxiety, I find I hard sometimes to tell someone (especially someone I’m friends with) that they’re doing everything wrong with their fish. It took me about 10 tries before I convinced my friend’s mom to move her goldfish out of an unfiltered, 3-gallon tank with insane levels of ammonia. Luckily, now that I’ve gotten through to her she is taking interest in the whole “fish keeping” thing and has moved them temporarily into a 20-gallon and will be relocating them to my pond in the spring.

But I haven’t had the same luck with everyone. I’ve been dropping hints to my neighbor that she needs to move her betta out of the tiny, unheated, unfiltered tank he’s in now. He seems super depressed. They even think he’s dead sometimes, he’s so inactive. At this point I don’t think there’s much of a point to talking to her, the betta is reaching the end of his lifespan. If she tries to stick a new one in that tank I’m really going to try and talk her into a bigger tank, I might even buy her one because it makes me sad every time I walk into her house and see him.

I get what a lot of you guys are saying, that sometimes it’s just tiring and annoying to try and talk everyone you meet into giving their fish a better life. But I think I’m going to continue doing it, no matter who it is or what their relationship to me is, because even if I save one fish I’m going to feel accomplished.

I love that you are trying to educate the people around you about it, its something I wish I could do but am too scared to do lol. I'm slowly educating my immediate family since they sometimes ask questions about my tank and fish.
I'm so happy that your friends mom is slowly getting an interest in the hobby it seems your making a lot of progress, unfortunately sometimes you can't help everyone but your still making a difference

 

I just got home from my cousins house in Iowa and I ran into this same problem. He had a 1 gallon bowl half full of water with a vieltail betta. He also has a 10 gallon (half full) with 9 plaities 2 swordtails 2 jullI corys and an apple snail. I finally got him to ditch everything in the 10 and put the betta in it and it looked much happier now.

 

It kills me that I ended up with a pity-purchased almost dead Walmart Betta (I know, shame on me) that's lived for months and regrown fins, but my boss got healthy looking, active bettas from the same store and blamed the store when they died within a month. "Stupid Walmart fish"

 

She didn't want to hear anything from me about betta care. When I asked what she was keeping them in, she said tanks with heaters and filters, so I was relieved at first. But then I started talking about my betta care (not in an informative way, just a "they take so much of my time" way and she looked at me like I was stupid. Not only that but "changing the water that frequently is bad for your fish!" I was taken a little aback by that...but I started explaining what I do and why it's a good idea, and she changed the subject.

 

Ugh luckily I haven't been told to flush mine yet. I don't understand how anyone can say something like that to someone, it's drives me nuts lol. I've been told to get rid of mine and to get something else more interesting

People say some really dumb and thoughtless things sometimes. I don’t think they consider how it sounds from someone else’s perspective. I have celiac disease and worked at a catering company in college. One of the owners once said to me “I think I’d kill myself if I couldn’t eat bread”...gee...thanks.

Thank goodness no one ever said to flush my fish. I did have a heated debate recently with my family. My dad said something about my betta and how he’d be fine in a bowl, so I used the port-a-potty analogy I read here. How, sure, we could survive drinking water out of and living in a port-o-potty, but we’d be suffering, not thriving. I think I actually changed his mind, and that’s hard to do. He shrugged and nodded like “fair point”. Win.

 

My friend who I mentioned in the other post seems to have totally changed her mind about fish as well. She was telling me that she noticed her goldfish wiggling when she came to feed them, and described it like “wagging their tails”. She said up until now she’d thought of fish as being unintelligent, boring pets, but now that they’re in a decent-sized tank with proper food and water she’s realized that they can be very smart and interactive. She also recently celebrated the birth of her first baby guppy, and has been taking such good care of it and will be adding it back to the 20 gal as soon as it’s big enough. It’s nice when you can change a person’s outlook on an animal, especially when they really get interested in keeping them afterwards.

 

People say some really dumb and thoughtless things sometimes. I don’t think they consider how it sounds from someone else’s perspective. I have celiac disease and worked at a catering company in college. One of the owners once said to me “I think I’d kill myself if I couldn’t eat bread”...gee...thanks.

Thank goodness no one ever said to flush my fish. I did have a heated debate recently with my family. My dad said something about my betta and how he’d be fine in a bowl, so I used the port-a-potty analogy I read here. How, sure, we could survive drinking water out of and living in a port-o-potty, but we’d be suffering, not thriving. I think I actually changed his mind, and that’s hard to do. He shrugged and nodded like “fair point”. Win.

Yeah people don't always realize or think about what they say before they say it. Especially when they don't understand or feel differently about it then you do.
Wow I'm impressed you have changed his mind. My mom just gave up with telling me that my betta doesn't need a big tank or a filter/heater because she is really stubborn and hardheaded when it comes to her being wrong lol. So we just don't talk about it.

 

My parents are wildlife biologists, so I had it pretty easy on the convincing-parents-bettas-need-more-than-a-bowl front. The problem I have is that I think I make my mom a little guilty for keeping Bettas in bowls (though she did live in a tropical environment at that point so I always point out that they lived at good temperatures). My parents are always trying to convince people of different things (mostly habitat conditions) using science so they were pretty open-minded especially when I was using the natural habitat card.

 

Yeah people don't always realize or think about what they say before they say it. Especially when they don't understand or feel differently about it then you do.
Wow I'm impressed you have changed his mind. My mom just gave up with telling me that my betta doesn't need a big tank or a filter/heater because she is really stubborn and hardheaded when it comes to her being wrong lol. So we just don't talk about it.

Good news is she IS wrong and you have a happy and healthy betta

Mine started out in a 1 gallon tank, but it did have an under gravel filter, air pump, and hood with a light. When it started cooling down, I even stuck a heater in there. But, I wasn’t changing the water enough. I had noticed the anubias was dying and his fins were clamped, so I came here and learned a lot! Thankfully it was just a little .25ppm ammonia, but I even had the Tetra test strips and didn’t realize they didn’t test for ammonia! He was (surprisingly) pretty lively in the 1 gallon tank before I lapsed on the water changes, but he’s even livelier now that he’s in his own 5 gallon. He tends to spend most of his time super far away from the filter though. I just ordered a small HOB to try instead of the powerful internal one.

Yay for betta education!

 

Good news is she IS wrong and you have a happy and healthy betta

Mine started out in a 1 gallon tank, but it did have an under gravel filter, air pump, and hood with a light. When it started cooling down, I even stuck a heater in there. But, I wasn’t changing the water enough. I had noticed the anubias was dying and his fins were clamped, so I came here and learned a lot! Thankfully it was just a little .25ppm ammonia, but I even had the Tetra test strips and didn’t realize they didn’t test for ammonia! He was (surprisingly) pretty lively in the 1 gallon tank before I lapsed on the water changes, but he’s even livelier now that he’s in his own 5 gallon. He tends to spend most of his time super far away from the filter though. I just ordered a small HOB to try instead of the powerful internal one.

Yay for betta education!

Well yours started out better then mine. I kept them in bowl without any filter or heater plus rarely changed their water >.>. My betta is currently in a tall 5 gallon but I'm upgrading to a 5.5 long tank since I hate his current tank lol.
Haha yes yay for education

 

My parents are wildlife biologists, so I had it pretty easy on the convincing-parents-bettas-need-more-than-a-bowl front. The problem I have is that I think I make my mom a little guilty for keeping Bettas in bowls (though she did live in a tropical environment at that point so I always point out that they lived at good temperatures). My parents are always trying to convince people of different things (mostly habitat conditions) using science so they were pretty open-minded especially when I was using the natural habitat card.

Lucky that probably makes it easier for them to understand. She shouldn't feel guilty since at the time she probably didn't know.

 

Lucky that probably makes it easier for them to understand. She shouldn't feel guilty since at the time she probably didn't know.

She had no idea at the time, and yes it does make it so much easier. Though...they still happen to think I have too many...but that's a different battle completely lol.

 

I think it's a 'if you know better, then you should do better' thing. That's where it comes down to what kind of pet owner you are. If you know better and do nothing about it because you're lazy or it's easier .. then you are a bad pet owner. It's simple, really. If you kept them in bowls, found out it wasn't healthy, and changed, then you are a good pet owner that didn't have all the facts.

 

My boyfriend's sister got a betta fish shortly after I had gotten mine. She nagged on me for getting him a $100 tank and investing time and money into getting my diseased and parasite ridden betta fish healthy. She kept hers in a small fish bowl with no heater or filter, and a load of decor. He didn't move or swim around ever. He died shortly after. Mine however, lived for a year (I know they generally have longer life spans than that, but he was over bred, sick, and generally weak when I purchased him). If she knew I spent $30 on my current betta fish I would never hear the end of it. There's a coffe shop in our town that has a betta fish in a bowl. Luckily that one seems to have a heater and filter, and to me seemed happy. I've seen this kind of thing with goldfish though too. A shop that I frequent has what has to be a 100-120 gallon tank (I'm being generous), with 20 HUGE goldfish. They all swim on top of one another. I know the tank can't be cycled and they don't do regular water changes because when I went in the one day, all of them had been packed together in a corner of the tank - they were in shock after finally having a water change. I'm one to run my mouth and get myself in bad situations, especially when it comes to the care of animals, but I can't bring myself to say anything because people around here ridicule you for actually caring about lives that aren't human.

 

My boyfriend's sister got a betta fish shortly after I had gotten mine. She nagged on me for getting him a $100 tank and investing time and money into getting my diseased and parasite ridden betta fish healthy. She kept hers in a small fish bowl with no heater or filter, and a load of decor. He didn't move or swim around ever. He died shortly after. Mine however, lived for a year (I know they generally have longer life spans than that, but he was over bred, sick, and generally weak when I purchased him). If she knew I spent $30 on my current betta fish I would never hear the end of it. There's a coffe shop in our town that has a betta fish in a bowl. Luckily that one seems to have a heater and filter, and to me seemed happy. I've seen this kind of thing with goldfish though too. A shop that I frequent has what has to be a 100-120 gallon tank (I'm being generous), with 20 HUGE goldfish. They all swim on top of one another. I know the tank can't be cycled and they don't do regular water changes because when I went in the one day, all of them had been packed together in a corner of the tank - they were in shock after finally having a water change. I'm one to run my mouth and get myself in bad situations, especially when it comes to the care of animals, but I can't bring myself to say anything because people around here ridicule you for actually caring about lives that aren't human.

it annoys me when people tell me how to care for my animals when they barely know how to care for their own.
it breaks my heart whenever I see tanks like that in stores and restaurants, I leave as soon as I see something like that because I can't do anything for them.
yeah the people in my town are similar, they don't care for animals. they see animals as tools to use and get rid of whenever they want. then tell you how to treat and care for your own :/

 

it annoys me when people tell me how to care for my animals when they barely know how to care for their own.
it breaks my heart whenever I see tanks like that in stores and restaurants, I leave as soon as I see something like that because I can't do anything for them.
yeah the people in my town are similar, they don't care for animals. they see animals as tools to use and get rid of whenever they want. then tell you how to treat and care for your own :/

I want to give advice so badly, like when I saw the 20 large goldfish all packed in a corner from shock, I just wanted to tell them how to fix it so badly but I know they're not going to listen and I'm going to get "teased" for actually being educated in animal care. I have so many animals and it makes me so infuriated when people try and tell me how I should be caring for them and that I do "too much." I have tree frogs, geckos, sugar gliders, snakes, crabs, and fish (and the usual cat and dog), and I go above and beyond to make sure all of their needs are met daily. I just don't understand how people can purchase an animal, bring it into their home, and neglect it of it's needs simply because they believe they don't need it.