I'm very distraught and upset. My poor betta, Mango, is suffering from something awful and I'm pretty sure it's fin rot but I'm not 100% positive. And sorry, I know this post is long, but I want to give as much information as possible.
Tank specs:
-2.5 Gallon, no heater or water filter
-No tank mates
-2 tall silk plants, 1 short silk plant
-1 tunnel toy decoration, 1 turtle decoration
-Ammonia, Nitrate, Nitrite levels stable.
-pH levels were always stable, except for a week and a half ago, where for a reason completely unknown to me, it spiked from 7.0 to 7.6, hovered there for a week (despite water changes), then came back down on it's own to 7.0 a few days ago.
Three days ago, I woke up to feed him in the morning and noticed a tear about 3/4" long in the middle of his tail fin. It was an 1/8" from the end of the fin, so I was pretty sure it would tear all the way through (It did). There was one teensy sharp edge on one of his silk plants, so I chalked it up to him catching his fin on that. I changed his water that evening (I change it every week anyway, but I changed it in the middle of the week just to keep down on infection possibilities). Over the past three days, I've seen impressive regrowth, so I didn't use any medication. The tear was down to about 1/4" last night!
Woke up this morning, and though that tear was healing, I noticed two new holes on the top of the same fin, also near the end. This made me a little nervous, so I crushed up a 1/4 tablet of Maricyn2 and put it in the tank. I came home this afternoon, and to my utter depression, found that the same tail fin looked like a tattered sail.
Within 8 hours, the tail fin went from solid to tattered. For the most part, the half of the fin near his body is mostly in tact, but the back half looks... well it looks stringy, it looks like it's just, dissapearing. Doesn't look like it's melting, no discoloration (his color is actually quite vibrant), no white or fuzzy stuff. The fin looks COMPLETELY normal... other than being ragged and dissipating
The other two fins seem unaffected (minus the bottom belly fin, which has always had minor tattering at the edges from the plant leaves and such).
What throws me off most is that he is acting completely normal. He eats normally (loves his food), swims around the tank normally, blows bubble nests ALL the time... I feel awful What is going on? How can I stop this? Can I even stop it at all? God forbid I wake up in the morning and his tail fin is missing completely, what should I do?
I feel so awful. He's always been a happy, healthy, swimmy, hungry fishy... then POOF, within 3 days his fins mysteriously start falling apart! Have I done something inadvertently to hurt my fishy? I am so upset with myself that something is wrong with him, when I've tried very hard to be a good fish mommy. :\ Any help would be greatttttttly appreciated.
-Brittany
Tank specs:
-2.5 Gallon, no heater or water filter
-No tank mates
-2 tall silk plants, 1 short silk plant
-1 tunnel toy decoration, 1 turtle decoration
-Ammonia, Nitrate, Nitrite levels stable.
-pH levels were always stable, except for a week and a half ago, where for a reason completely unknown to me, it spiked from 7.0 to 7.6, hovered there for a week (despite water changes), then came back down on it's own to 7.0 a few days ago.
Three days ago, I woke up to feed him in the morning and noticed a tear about 3/4" long in the middle of his tail fin. It was an 1/8" from the end of the fin, so I was pretty sure it would tear all the way through (It did). There was one teensy sharp edge on one of his silk plants, so I chalked it up to him catching his fin on that. I changed his water that evening (I change it every week anyway, but I changed it in the middle of the week just to keep down on infection possibilities). Over the past three days, I've seen impressive regrowth, so I didn't use any medication. The tear was down to about 1/4" last night!
Woke up this morning, and though that tear was healing, I noticed two new holes on the top of the same fin, also near the end. This made me a little nervous, so I crushed up a 1/4 tablet of Maricyn2 and put it in the tank. I came home this afternoon, and to my utter depression, found that the same tail fin looked like a tattered sail.
Within 8 hours, the tail fin went from solid to tattered. For the most part, the half of the fin near his body is mostly in tact, but the back half looks... well it looks stringy, it looks like it's just, dissapearing. Doesn't look like it's melting, no discoloration (his color is actually quite vibrant), no white or fuzzy stuff. The fin looks COMPLETELY normal... other than being ragged and dissipating
The other two fins seem unaffected (minus the bottom belly fin, which has always had minor tattering at the edges from the plant leaves and such).What throws me off most is that he is acting completely normal. He eats normally (loves his food), swims around the tank normally, blows bubble nests ALL the time... I feel awful
What is going on? How can I stop this? Can I even stop it at all? God forbid I wake up in the morning and his tail fin is missing completely, what should I do?I feel so awful. He's always been a happy, healthy, swimmy, hungry fishy... then POOF, within 3 days his fins mysteriously start falling apart! Have I done something inadvertently to hurt my fishy? I am so upset with myself that something is wrong with him, when I've tried very hard to be a good fish mommy. :\ Any help would be greatttttttly appreciated.
-Brittany
