Help with Velvet?

[coldpizzaonmondays]

I'm about 99.9% sure Fishy has velvet. He's pale, but looks like he has that gold dust sprinkled on him, and he's been a bit more twitchy than usual. I noticed him losing colour a few days ago, and yesterday realized the goldish tint on him. I've read about using aquarium salts to treat this, as well as using coppersafe. I have both, but am not sure which would be best. I could transfer him to his hospital tank (a .5 gal) but then I wouldn't be able to heat it as the heater in his tank is too big to put into the hospital tank. I don't want to risk having a long treatment time as I will be leaving the country in two weeks and leaving him in someone else's care (still looking for someone suitable) while I'm away. I'm just looking to suggestions on the best way to treat him. I'll be cleaning out his tank tomorrow and hopefully by then I'll have a definite answer on what would be best! Thanks!


Housing
What size is your tank? 2.5 gallon
What temperature is your tank? 79 degrees
Does your tank have a filter? Yes
Does your tank have an air stone or other type of aeration? No
Is your tank heated? Yes
What tank mates does your betta fish live with? Nada, except for a couple of plants

Food
What type of food do you feed your betta fish? Pellets
How often do you feed your betta fish? Once or twice a day 1 or 2 pellets, usually only 1... he's easily bloated... and a bit of a little piggy

Maintenance
How often do you perform a water change?
What percentage of the water do you change when you perform a water change?
What type of additives do you add to the water when you perform a water change?

Water Parameters:
Have you tested your water? If so, what are the following parameters?

Unfortunately I'm completely broke so I can't get a test kit, however, I did just clean the tank 2 days ago (50% water change, and cleaned all of the things in it... except Fishy of course!). I use API water conditioner every time I do a water change, and since I just recently moved, I've been putting a teeny bit of Stress Coat in as well.

Ammonia:
Nitrite:
Nitrate:
pH:
Hardness:
Alkalinity:

Symptoms and Treatment
How has your betta fish's appearance changed? He's much more pale, and looks like someone sprinkled him with a very fine goldish dust.
How has your betta fish's behavior changed? He's a bit more twitchy and skittish than usual. He also stopped flaring yesterday.
When did you start noticing the symptoms? A few days ago I noticed he was pale, and yesterday when I saw he stopped flaring, I noticed the gold and decided to look up the best treatments.
Have you started treating your fish? If so, how? Not yet! Will start tomorrow.
Does your fish have any history of being ill? Unfortunately a bit. He's easily bloated, but he's also had a run in with a bit of fungus. Luckily, everything was caught early and taken care of. This is all likely because I had him in too small of a tank without a heater or filter because I knew nothing about bettas when I got him.
How old is your fish (approximately)? I wish I knew. I bought him from Petco in early October of this year.

[Pataflafla]

You could try slowly bringing him up to 3 tsp/gal aquarium salt over two days. Just add another dissolved teaspoon every 12 hours. just be sure the salt is dissolved before adding to the tank.

Also, if you have live plants, you'll want to take them out since aquarium salt will melt them.

I'm unsure on the use of coppersafe, but it's supposed to be very strong, so use with extreme caution.

[Sakura8]

Velvet is a tough one. I recommend AQ salt because as Pata said, Coppersafe is powerful stuff and if you don't get it all out of the water, it can cause lasting damage.

As Pata said, work him up to 3 tsps of AQ salt per gallon. And at the same time, work him up to about 86 degrees F too. Change as much of the water and if you can, vacuum, the bottom of the tank, every day because you want to get out any of the parasites that fall off. Velvet is also light sensitive so keep his tank as dark as possible. Some people even put the tank in the closet!

A true case of velvet looks like this:

and this:


You hear that velvet looks like "gold dust" but you can actually see each individual parasite. In my opinion, it looks more like the betta was rolled in corn crumbs.