vegetable fish food
Posted by Bruce on Jul 05, 2010 · Member since Jun 2008 · 53 posts
My son's Betta is not doing well. He stays on the bottom of the tank a lot. Otherwise he is fine and eats - bites my finger if I hand feed him. The fish websites recommend feeding him peas, but I don't have the time to cut them into small enough pieces and the un-eaten pieces sink to the bottom of the tank.
So I was wondering, does anyone know of where to get vegetable based fish food that floats?
The peas are easy--microwave a few in water to defrost them, squeeze each one to pop out the center, and feed the centers to the fish. But honestly, your betta's behavior sounds perfectly normal for a betta. You may need a mini heater to warm the water. Cold water makes them sluggish. Go to the Petfish website and check out their betta forum for more advice. I wouldn't completely stop feeding "real" betta food, though.
Oh, also, the rationale behind the peas is to help with constipation, but it doesn't sound to me like this is your fish's problem. Bettas are often much less active than other fish. Also, they usually live only a couple of years, so consider how old this guy is.
PS: They like something to hide in, too--an old teacup on its side in the tank will please them, but of course that won't get him swimming!
I have to agree with the above poster. I have bettas and that is very normal for them, mine sit on the bottom a lot as well. I would also pick up some fake plants at the pet store and put them in the tank because they really like to hide in them.
Real plants are even better! They can nibble on them .
Thanks for the replies. I tried putting a fake plant in there for hiding... but he likes to look at me while I work and usually stays at the bottom of tank on the corner of the tank closest to me. So I took the plant out today. Sometimes he hangs out in a nook on the bottom though where he is hard to see.
He is a little over a year old. He seems to have lost his ability to float - like his ballasts aren't working. He used to float around and use his fins for direction. Now he sinks to the bottom and has to work pretty hard to get to the top.
I have been giving him peas - but they dirty the tank more than normal food. I think you are right about it not being constipation - because there is poop, and the peas have not helped. I was afraid I over fed him - I used to give him about 3 pellets/day, but now I give him 1 pellet/day.
Maybe it is the temperature fluctuations in my work area that made him sick, it's only a one gallon tank, and I have not been able to find a small enough water heater. It should be warm enough now that it is summer.... but I'll check it.
The water is 78 degrees F.
Mine never had a problem with water temp and they've been in some pretty cold water. Captain Watson likes to sit at the bottom and hang out there and sometimes sticks his face in the dip between the stones. Autumn likes to hide in his plant and when Ethereal was alive he liked to hang out on the bottom as well. A good way to see if they're okay is to either stick your face up to the tank or put a mirror up facing him and see if he gets pissed (making his face wider and/or swimming fast). They each have their own personality so you will need to know him pretty well. Autumn won't make his face bigger but he'll swim away really fast and hide in his plant while Captain Watson will swim right up to the tank and make his face bigger.
How often are you changing the water? Petfish.net has a good betta board where you can get more expert advice than here. I agree with you that he shouldn't have difficulty swimming. But i don't know the answer for that, myself.
I probably change it once every 2 weeks. It is a 1/2 gallon (my last post 1 gallon was a mistake) cube that hangs on the wall. I'll try petfish.net too, thanks.
I would think if you have only 1/2 gallon of water you'd have to do changes about every other day. Have you tested the water to see if nitrates and ammonia are building up? We had our betta in a 3 gallon tank, and I had to do 100% water changes about every 5 days. We treated the water with Seachem Prime and made sure the temp of the new water was the same as the old.
The water temp sounds ok, though you could go up to around 80. Generally, they are more sluggish when the water is cooler.
He's back to normal now... he can float around the tank without much effort. Your post gave me the idea to feed him more - so I bought some new food and started feeding him 3 pellets/day - sometimes 4 or 5 pellets/day. And within a week he perked up.
Generally I fed him 1 pellet/day and the water stayed very clean for weeks - because there was hardly any waste at the bottom. So I thought if other people's Bettas are generating more waste and needing more water changes - maybe I'm not feeding him enough. And that seems to have worked - although it wasn't completely scientific because I bought new food too. So it was one of the two things.
Thanks for your help. :fish:
Thank share