Sick betta laying at bottom, fins greying

[bonefish]

i’m not very experienced in fish keeping and have never had to deal with a sick fish so i need some help. we have a betta who we’ve had for like 2 years. he’s been fine up until like a week ago. he sat at the bottom of the tank upside down and couldn’t swim normally. i did some research and thought it was swim bladder disease from over feeding so we didn’t feed him for a couple days to see if he would get better. while we were doing that, i started to notice some of his fins were turning gray (he’s usually red). it looked like fin rot so we got him in a smaller tank (from 30gal to 10gal) so we could treat him with betta fix. we’ve been doing this for 5 days now and he still isn’t able to swim. he’s eating just fine when i put his food on some tweezers and hold it in front of him. i am not sure what else could be wrong with him. any help would be really appreciated. i’ll attach some pictures as well.

 

[bcfishtanks]

Do you have the water parameters of this tank and the 30g?

Losing color is usually a sign of stress or illness, but he doesn't seem ill, especially since he's still eating (which, in my experience, most very sick bettas will not do). It's possible that he's old (bettas usually live from 2-5 years), but it's strange to me that he's lying on the bottom of the tank. Old bettas rest more, but a fish laying on its side is never a particularly normal behavior.

How long was the 30g running? How often did you do water changes, and how much water do you change?

 

[bonefish]

Do you have the water parameters of this tank and the 30g?

Losing color is usually a sign of stress or illness, but he doesn't seem ill, especially since he's still eating (which, in my experience, most very sick bettas will not do). It's possible that he's old (bettas usually live from 2-5 years), but it's strange to me that he's lying on the bottom of the tank. Old bettas rest more, but a fish laying on its side is never a particularly normal behavior.

How long was the 30g running? How often did you do water changes, and how much water do you change?

the 30 has been running for like 5 months or so and we cycled it for a month before putting him in it. the temperature is at 80F and we do 15% water changes once a week. he was in there with some plants and a couple ghost shrimp and a mystery snail. ammonia and nitrate are all at 0 as well.

 

[bcfishtanks]

Definitely wasn't an issue with the tank then. The only thing I can think is that he's just old. Does he have enough places to rest near the surface in the 10g? Or can he not swim well anymore?

 

[bonefish]

Definitely wasn't an issue with the tank then. The only thing I can think is that he's just old. Does he have enough places to rest near the surface in the 10g? Or can he not swim well anymore?

he can’t really swim that well, he just kinda slithers around the bottom. he likes to sit in the corner under the heater.

 

[bcfishtanks]

Do you have a hide you could put in there for him?

 

[bonefish]

Do you have a hide you could put in there for him?

yup! he has 2 different ones in there right now he just doesn’t seem to be too interested in going in them haha.

 

[bcfishtanks]

That's good. Then I'd say just keep him as comfy as possible.