Sick or depressed? HELP!

[Caikirai]

I just bought my first CT betta fish yesterday. He assumingly young, since he is smaller then most betta fish I have seen. [ His name is Rain..Short for Rainbow. He is mostly Blue, green, but with a little bit of red and purple. ]

He swims around every so often, but he's slow.... He hides a lot. In different areas so I know he is exploring.. But I'm scared since he doesn't seem to be eating much. I've seen him eat once or twice.. But not as much as I know Bettas are known to eat.
He just kind of hangs out at the bottom most of the time. I find myself every so often running over to him to make sure he's even still alive. :(
I'm not sure if he's just resting or not.


Tank Info:
-5g tank.
-Heater [ at about 74degrees. ]
-Tap water conditioned.
- 2 fake plants
- 2 small/medium sized decorations.[ one of which he seems to of gotten very attached to. ]
- Currently has no AQ salt but I will be getting some soon!
- I haven't been able to test the water, I couldn't afford the testers when I went. :(
- Food : Freeze dried bloodworms[?, I believe that's what they are called.]
- I dropped in a small goldfish pellets..[soaked first.] Just to see if he would eat them, since he wouldn't eat the bloodworms. He actually ate a few. This suprised me since I heard they don't like pellets.....Plus they're for goldfish.

I ran the filter for a few days before getting him, and dropped food in; I read somewhere you can build up the good bacteria? Or something of that sort....

Right now the filter is not on. Doesn't seem to like it since it's a strong one, and he's small. It kinda just pushes him around..


I'm worried if he is stressed/depressed, or sick.
If he's just stressed, I'm not sure if it's just because of the major change from going from a small cup on a petstore shelf to the tank he has now.

I also wanted to test if he would even flare his tail....So I held the mirror up for a moment. He did not flare. He just looked for a moment then turned around. I didn't hold it up for long since I didn't want to put him in more stress.:( This was probably a bad idea but the outcome of the test just worries me further.

[CyerRyn]

The freeze-dried blood worms aren't good for a staple diet, though it should be okay as a once a week treat. I was told (and this happened to one of mine too) that they can cause bloat/make fishy fat so if you're going to treat him to blood worms, it's best to feed them the frozen ones. You can try feeding him Betta Pellets.. I use HBH Betta Bites. Its 42% Protein, but you want to try to find one that provides more around 48% and the first 3 ingredients being some sort of fish meal (ie. Mine reads: Fish Meal, Shrimp Meal, Soybean Meal for the first 3 ingredients). Now as for the filter, there is a great guide on making a baffle >Click Here< . The flaring, two of my boys stopped flaring at my mirrors after I put them in my 10gal, but if they see the others silhouette in the divider my red boy Sazzer will flare, but Bubbles just wont. Not sure why he stopped, he just doesn't flare anymore but he's still as happy as can be. I would definitely try warming your water up to around 78F it might improve his attitude. A heater is a must with Betta's since their tropical fish. For a 5gal I'd suggest a 25-50Watt adjustable heater. Hope he feels better soon. ;)

**Edit** Also, where your describing building up the good bacteria is called the Nitrogen Cycle (cycling your tank) which takes a minimum of 4 weeks to do. You should probably do 50% water changes in your 5gal tank I *think* it's once a week to keep the ammonia and nitrogen lvls down especially if you don't have a water tester. In order for it to cycle out you'll need to keep your filter on. There's more information floating around this forums about that. Just be careful and make sure to do the water changes.

[Caikirai]

Thank you. I was going to pick up some betta bites as well at my last visit, but didn't have enough cash on me. I'll definitly pick some up next time.

And thank you for the guide! My dad and I couldn't, for the life of us, figure out how to.


The heater I have is actually meant for a bigger tank, and should be at 78. [ it said it is programmed to heat to that temp.] Maybe I'm reading the temp wrong.

[CyerRyn]

Originally Posted by Caikirai

The heater I have is actually meant for a bigger tank, and should be at 78. [ it said it is programmed to heat to that temp.] Maybe I'm reading the temp wrong.

The heater could be off by those degrees. Mine is off about 3-4 degrees which is why I chose to buy an adjustable one. I have one of my boy's in a bowl that's about 73-74F and he seems to be fine (swims happily and actively and builds bubble nests), but it's preferred a minimum of 76F.

[Caikirai]

I took a few pictures. The coloring of them is a bit off. They're cell phone pictures. I couldn't find my camera.
http://i805.photobucket.com/albums/y...502_204311.jpg
http://i805.photobucket.com/albums/y...502_204207.jpg

[CyerRyn]

Originally Posted by Caikirai

I took a few pictures. The coloring of them is a bit off. They're cell phone pictures. I couldn't find my camera.
http://i805.photobucket.com/albums/y...502_204311.jpg
http://i805.photobucket.com/albums/y...502_204207.jpg

Aww he looks to be an adorable baby blue. I know you said the color is off, but he's gorgeous. Your cell phone takes better pictures than mine does. Mine wind up looking like black blobs floating in dirty water. :<

[Caikirai]

He's a real pretty teal colour in person. I swear it took me about an hour to pick him out.The store had about....35 different ones. I was back and forth between a dark blue one and a blue/purple one...When I found him in the back. I knew I wanted him when I first saw him. :c Even if he doesn't live long,I just hope I can give him a better home then the cup on the shelf did.

[Caikirai]

Oh my gosh! He flared! I'm not sure what at, but he did! His tail isn't drooping anymore!

[Caikirai]

He passed away while I was at school today....