fish sunburn? white patches/bumps

[Plummedy]

I've attached two very detailed pictures of the problem below. This started months ago, but I just thought it was a natural part of his development maybe. It seems to be getting worse though and he's hiding under drift wood seemingly to get away from the light. I'm thinking the light my LFS sold me isn't right. They gave me a reptiglo light, which is a UV light usually for reptiles. It's fairly low wattage, maybe 14. I was worried it wouldn't work with fish, but she said it'd be better for my plants (live plants) and would be fine for the fish.

Thanks in advance.

Oh, here's the light - http://www.petworldshop.com/pictures...arium-lamp.jpg (lower wattage though)

[vaygirl]

That looks like fungus to me. But I've never personally dealt with it. Considering it's been around for a while, I wouldn't think columnaris because that kills pretty quickly but can be mistaken for fungus. For fungus, you want to lower his temp and get some kind of treatment, like fungus eliminator by Jungle labs. Here's a good disease link with a pic of fungus...

http://www.bettatalk.com/betta_diseases.htm

For your light, just look for a bulb that has a 6500k rating. That's all you really need. You can find CFL's like that on amazon and sometimes they have them at walmart.

Grab the Questions sticky up top and fill it out for us and we can help you more...

[Plummedy]

Okay sorry, here -

Housing
What size is your tank? 5 gal
What temperature is your tank? 80 degrees f
Does your tank have a filter? Yes, whisper pf10
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? Just a big snail that came with a rock I put in (grew over time)

Food
What type of food do you feed your betta fish? Pellets, freeze dried bloodworms, live bloodworms (not for months though)
How often do you feed your betta fish? I try to spread 8 pellets throughout the day and every few days give bloodworms. Otherwise 3-4 in morning and 3-4 at night.

Maintenance
How often do you perform a water change? I try once a week, but realistically it's 1.5-2 weeks very often.
What percentage of the water do you change when you perform a water change? 50%
What type of additives do you add to the water when you perform a water change? Prime

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

Ammonia:0ppm last I checked


Symptoms and Treatment
How has your betta fish's appearance changed? Just the white patches/spots in pictures above
How has your betta fish's behavior changed? Hiding under a log more often (this has been going on for several months though)
When did you start noticing the symptoms? Just a couple of white spots maybe 4-5 months ago, got worse over time.
Have you started treating your fish? If so, how? No
Does your fish have any history of being ill? No
How old is your fish (approximately)? No clue, 1 year maybe a bit older.

I should include that I have christmas moss, java moss, java fern, and used to have water wisteria before it died off.

[vaygirl]

Treat with Jungle fungus eliminator and try to get the water changes back up to 50% weekly. Set yourself a day and stick to it. Write it down. I have to or I misjudge. Lol.

I was wrong about temp I think. Leave it where it is. I get mixed up between columnaris and fungus which can look similar. I think you have fungus. You can find the Jungle Labs Fungus Eliminator at just about any fish store or if you have methylene blue or find it, you can use that instead. Just follow directions for treatment. Don't let the fish store sell you melafix, bettafix or pimafix. You want either of the other two I mentioned. Good luck. :)

[Plummedy]

I thought I'd bring more attention to this thread to double check. I thought it could be some sort of color change so I didn't want to treat unless necessary. Any other thoughts?

[iheartmybettas]

I would agree with fungus. It won't hurt him to treat with the Jungle fungus eliminator.