Vardaman's Fin Problem

[fgradowski]

Vardaman has always had problems with his fins. He had the gimpy fin when I bought him, and it is slowly growing back. He has torn up his fins numerous times and I have had to remove all fake plants from the tank. He has bit his fins. He was starting to recover from his latest injury (Caused by squeezing in between the back of the tank and the mug that is in his tank), but now his fins look all tattered again! Algernon has never had this issue of tearing fins. Vardaman is ALWAYS hurting his fins. What can I do to prevent this from continuing happening? I'm about ready to just give up on him. My next step is to take out the mug...currently in his tank is one feathery fake plant, anubias, and wisteria, along with the betta leaf hammock and mug.

[fgradowski]

I've been using AQ salt and stress coat. AQ only when the tips of his tail are bloody. Should I QT him until his fins start to look less ratty?

[aemaki09]

Have you done the pantyhose test on all of his decorations? (rubbing pantyhose along everything in every possible direction, if it snags the pantyhose it'll likely tear you boys fins -- just in case you didnt know)

Other than the panty hose test, you just need to make sure that all of his decorations are far enough from the tank walls so that he has enough to get inbetween without touching his fins to anything.

You could also remove anything fake, and heavily plant the tank instead. He'd still have plenty of places to hide (in between and behind the live plants) but there wouldnt be anything rough in there for him to snag his fins on.

Some betta's are just more fragile than others. My new HM boy has been tearing his fins on absolutely everything too, I moved him to a live plant only tank and havent noticed anymore tears since then.


Also, if you want to keep the decorations in there and some might be rough, you can sand them down!

-hope this helps!

[fgradowski]

His decorations aren't rough. The feathery plant is up against the side of the tank. He really likes to wiggle his way in between there. Even though it's a feathery plant could he still be hurting himself by doing that? He really enjoys it.
But I do think that he has a tail biting problem because it's gone in a matter of hours.

[fgradowski]

Here are some photos

His plant that he loves to squeeze himself into:



In the act of being between the plant and tank wall:



And sometimes he will try to swim through the middle of that plant.

His fins before:



His fins now:



It's difficult to get a non-blurry picture of his fins because he is so active!

[aemaki09]

Yeah, I'd just move everything so he can squeeze through without having to touch the plant just in case.

But it does look like it could be tail biting

[fgradowski]

Still have a tail biter on my hands. Bad, bad little fishy!



This damage happened last week while I was cleaning his tank and he was in the holding cup. Yesterday when I cleaned the tanks he didn't repeat this process.
My pretty, pretty boy likes to be ugly.

[cheb01]

shame...still a pretty fish though - They will grow back