Blood worms and more.

[fishwife]

I would appreciate any help you can give me. As a new betta owner, I relied on the recommendations of Petsmart whee we bought our male.

He was a beautiful, wonderful, personality laded fish. He was healthy for about 2 months. Then one day, he seemed lethargic with droopy fins.
The next day, he wouldn't move and a helf a day later he died.

We fed him pellets and now I come to my question. We purchased Aqueon Betta Treat upon the recommendation of the sales person. This product was filled with chaff like substance and we were careful to pick out what looked like whole dried worms. He loved them. But, could they have killed him. He was in a very large tank and everything seemed good.

Our female seemed to go into depression and became mopey when he disappeared from her view. Adjoining tanks. Then we thought she was going to die too. Not wanting to see her suffer, I thought about putting her down, but lo and behold she rallied a bit, then ate a pellet and is now fully recovered. She came from a different source and was never in the water with the male. Reading that a tiny bit of pea would help. We tried that after she rallyed. We've been feeding her pellets and an occasional pea. Is it OK to feed her an occasional dried blood worm?

Last question: Do these fish ever play? Tonight she caught the pea bit on the end of her nose and she would swim, drop it, chase it, pick it up and go all over her tank doing that. It really looked like she was playng. Is that possible? Thanks for any help you can give to a new betta owner. Nan

[babystarz]

First off, peas aren't really recommended for bettas because they are obligate carnivores. If you ever want to help a betta's digestion, go with frozen daphnia instead :)

I don't think the bloodworms could have killed your boy unless you accidentally overfed him. Bettas have very small stomachs. How many were you feeding per day?

Giving your female a bloodworm or two as a treat once a week instead of her usual pellets is fine, I do the same thing with my bettas.

And finally, yes I do believe bettas can play :) They seem to do lots of funny things to amuse themselves. They also have some interesting sleeping positions, lol! If you think your betta could use more stimulation, you can give her a ping pong ball to play with, or add to/change around the decor.

[fishwife]

I hope I didn't overfeed but perhaps I did. Both the male and female eat from our hands and it is a hoot to watch. I'm glad to know the dried worms didn't kill him. Thanks and I smile when I say this, but I think I may try the ping pong ball trick :)