Oldfishlady

heah oldfishlady how are you.Im new here and thought i would say hi

I'll try and cut back to every other or third day on the water changes and phase out the salt. Yes, Start Right is a dechlorinator. The babies are so fragile, but for the most part, they seem to be doing okay (for now). Things change quickly. But as of today, everyone is eating well and swimming happily. Thanks!

It sounds like the babies may have been in a weaken state to start and not a lot you could do, however, I would maybe cut back on the water changes-limit salt and I don't know what start right is...is that a dechlorinator?

Hello!

Little guy passed away late last night. I got the babies and the juveniles from Petco, so I'm not sure of their ages. The babies are about the size of the last bone in my pinky finger. The juveniles look to be about 3-4 weeks ahead of them. The babies are in 1/2 gallon tanks without filtration, since they can't fight the current yet. I had been doing water changes every day. My usual water routine is 1/2 rounded teaspoon AQ salt with 10 drops of Start Right to a gallon. Their temp is about 78-80 degrees set up in an unconventional way. I've purchased hermit crab heaters that go under the tanks and have turned the bathroom of my basement apartment into a "nursery". It's the warmest room in the place. I have set up an oil heater to then heat the room. The tanks all have lids that are vented and collect condensation on the inside. I have been feeding them the New Life small pellets about 3 pellets 3-4 times a day. Thanks so much for any further tips and suggestions!

I don't mind at all.....
About how old are they, tank size, temp, filter ,live plants, additives used...did you use anything over the tank to help retain the heat and humidity for the labyrinth organ-like plastic veggie wrap-if not, I would go a head and do that...what kind of food are you feeding-if you have any tannins add that to the premixed treatment water and increase the Epsom salt to 2tsp/gal-I would also decrease the water changes to 50% daily for 3 days then 100% on day 4-repeat this schedule for 10-14days- using the premixed treatment water-temp 77-78F

Hi!

I hope you don't mind that I'm contacting you. I was told you were the person to talk to about very young bettas. The baby betta bug has bitten me and I am currently trying to raise 4 tiny babies, 4 juveniles, and 5 adults. My littlest boy that I rescued about a week ago just today started showing the beginning signs of what could be SBD. This morning, he was up swimming around, eating normally and trying to get at his "sister" through the tank. By late this afternoon, he was laying on the bottom of the tank and having trouble swimming and even keeping his back end down. No pine cone yet. I did his daily 100% water change today and added some epsom salt mixture to his normal treated water. Epsom salt mixture was 1 teaspoon to 1 gallon. At this early in life, I'm assuming that's about all I can do, right? Any advice/tips would be SO welcome & appreciated. I really want this little guy to pull through.

Thanks so much!

Jenn

Thanks for all the feedback you've given with my problem. Don't know who's more stressed me or the fish, but now I have hope the problem can be beat and we will both survive the ordeal. They may end up with great homes, but doubt mine will NOT get much better :).

Your welcome....Microsword are a rosette plant and once they start to grow well and reproduce-spread they will help to keep the soil layer safe.....it can take about 3 months more or less for the soil to start its life under water...just watch for signs of it going bad.....other than the rotten egg smell you can have poor plant growth, stems/roots that rot and/or start to turn black, on the edges you can sometimes see the soil turning black-while this can be due to lack of oxygen it isn't always bad unless you have the rotten egg smell too.....

Ah, okay, makes sense ^.^ I've been poking and semi-stirring occasionally (wasn't sure about the stirring, but wasn't sure about the poking, either) and luckily I haven't been getting that rotten egg smell just yet- I was just worried, though.. Oh, and I'm sure this is kind of a silly question, but... microsword isn't a stem plant, is it? I wouldn't imagine it is, but I'm a noob so yeah >.>; but anyway, should I still poke at the substrate once the microsword takes over as a carpet? I'm not sure how deep the roots will go, they've got about 2-3 inches of substrate, so I'm assuming once they've matured and the substrate is at the recommended depth I won't have to worry about it, really(?) Thanks for the help, OFL. You're my NPT guru!! ^.^

Soil based tanks can go anaerobic and this is one of the reason for a lot of stem plants-their roots will bring oxygen into the soil to prevent this but they need time.... so the trumpet snails are generally used to do this for you and if you don't have them you can poke the soil a couple of times a week with a chopstick or something until the roots of the plants get going...I wouldn't recommend stirring the soil...just poke it.....you know your soil went anaerobic by a rotten eggs smell....