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Betta fish with dropsy - got a lot of questions!

1K views 1 reply 2 participants last post by  GwenInNM 
#1 ·
Hello everyone!

I'm brand new to this forum and hope someone(s) can give me a bit of advice! I'm not new to the freshwater aquarium scene, but after doing extensive research yesterday, I realized that all of my techniques were all of the 'do not do this' techniques. :-/ That said, I'm trying to do things right now!

Here's a bit of background info y'all prolly need to help answer my question: 5gal tank (I'm getting a bigger one soon), 1 female betta and 1 upside down catfish (s. nigriventris) - sex unknown, but probably a female. water quality = great...just tested.

Problem: my betta developed dropsy rather quickly 4 days ago. I thought she was just constipated, waited a day and then realized it was legitimately dropsy. Bought Maracyn 2 and have been medicating accordingly (I'm currently on medicating day 4 of 5). I did not remove her from the tank as I do not have a medicating tank available. She has not gotten any better - as I feared. I'm fairly confident she won't make it thru today. I've noticed she's got one white, stringy patches on her - probably another aspect of the bacterial infection she originally got. My tank, which needs to be cleaned, is also developing fuzzy stuff - algae maybe? My catfish seems totally fine! She/he has been a great trooper surviving everything for the past 5 years!

Questions: When my betta dies, should I continue to medicate the tank? How should I go about cleaning it (it needs a full-clean)? The carbon filter needs to be changed but I'd like to keep some of that beneficial bacteria alive somehow so when should I change that? How often should you change the substrate - rocks in this case? I have another female betta that someone bought me that I'm waiting to add to the tank until it is deemed ok but she's living in those stupid little containers you buy them in and I hate to see her in it but bettas are sensitive and I don't want her getting sick.

Help!!
 
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#2 ·
Sounds like a possible fungus problem. The more clean you keep your water, the less chance of disease. Catfish should be kept in groups of at least 3, ideally 5. You can rinse your filter (with non-chlorinated water) to keep bacteria alive. You can put it back in your filter. I'm not sure if your filter material can carry the disease, but I'm not thinking so. Someone else may say different. Do more regular water changes, and use a syphon to clean your gravel, you don't need to physically take it out and clean it.

Gwen
 
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