The giant PK girl i brought home last week still has the stress stripe from when i got her. She seems pretty happy, doesn't dart or hide other than to intimidate one of her tank mates, she's not clamped, eats too well (i try and give her pellets and her tankmates flakes but either will eat the other's food, even when treated to blood or glass worms) she's in my 20 gallon community/ sorority/ naturally planted tank so there's lots of places to hide. Is something wrong or will she just stay like that?
Sorry, she tends to only swim in front of the lights so i can't get a better pic
Housing
What size is your tank? 20g
What temperature is your tank? 80
Does your tank have a filter? yes
Does your tank have an air stone or other type of aeration? Filter is a bio-wheel type
Is your tank heated? yup
What tank mates does your betta fish live with? 5 Rasboras, 2 snails 8 or so ghost shrimp, 1 Pleco
Food
What type of food do you feed your betta fish? Pellets as a staple, glassworms and bloodworms as treats, and she snags some flakes from her tankmates but they're 50% protien
How often do you feed your betta fish? twice a day
Maintenance
How often do you perform a water change? weekly or sooner
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? was whatever betta water conditioner was on clearance, now it's prime
Water Parameters:
Have you tested your water? If so, what are the following parameters?
Symptoms and Treatment
How has your betta fish's appearance changed? She had this strip since i got her
How has your betta fish's behavior changed? n/a
When did you start noticing the symptoms? n/a
Have you started treating your fish? If so, how? no action taken other than making sure she's fed and and an earlier-than-scheduled 50% water change
Does your fish have any history of being ill? other than the stripe, no
How old is your fish (approximately)? had her just over a week
she could just be easily stressed. she looks alot like my Lulu, and ol' Lu stresses real easy anymore. if Lu don't have the stress stripes, she has submission bars. i just shrug and make sure she's happy and healthy.
ah... well she has darkened a little since i got her, but never had submission bars. maybe i'll drop some water from one of the boy's tanks and see if that sets it off.
The only thing is, when i bought her, she was in a communtity tank labeled "female bettas" that was actually stocked with both male and female bettas (all giant PK's like her - most likely siblings... same colors)
She unclamps when she's not swimming about i caught her moving cause she hardly ever holds still.
I have a giant spade tail that will stress stripe whenever I change water, tap on her tank, or even move her. She stress stripes so easy but the rest of the time she's vibrant blue. I also have a female in my sorority who will bar up any time she's challenged. She's just really submissive and doesn't want to argue with the other girls. Might take her a while to adjust, a week isn't all that long. A lot of my girls stayed striped up or would stripe up any time there was a conflict. Now there's only that one who's also very light blue (easy to see when she's stripes up).
Stripes don't always mean stress.....stripes and color changes are forms of communication and camouflage and in some cases...part of the normal coloration.....usually with stress you will have other signs too....like hiding, clamp fins, lethargic, going off food...etc.....
found her today resting facedown on the bottom, i put my hand near her and she perked up and started searching the surface for food. All my bettas think I = food lol. Just to be safe i put her in QT, with a tsp of Ep. salt. Going to fast her too, as she may have been overeating, stealing food from her tank mates.
As an experiment, I put the QT tank next to my male CT's tank, and gave her a few drops of his water. Stress stripe vanished in like an hour. They seem to like each other as they're trying to fond a way to get through the plastic at each other, plus the flaring and dancing my boy's doing.
Might make them my breeding pair come January when i'm ready... but she's sooo big compared to him.
Check out the eBook Betta Fish Care Made Easy
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