[danner]

My fairly-new female betta startled me today by starting to produce and eat eggs with no males around, which I did not realize was a possibility previously. She didn't act any differently for a couple hours, but within the past few she has become sluggish and is just swimming around slowly at the bottom of her tank, occasionally floating at the top and not showing much interest in food or really acknowledging my presence at all (this concerns me most).

This is such a stark difference from the way she was just earlier today that I'm extremely worried and I have no idea if this is related to the egg laying, or perhaps eating so many eggs? I really have no experience with this as my previous betta was male, so I figured it would be smart to ask people who may have more knowledge before panicking too much...
Any help would be fantastic!

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?
n/a

Food
What type of food do you feed your betta fish?
primarily tetrabetta pellets

How often do you feed your betta fish?
twice or three times a day

Maintenance
How often do you perform a water change?
weekly

What percentage of the water do you change when you perform a water change?
25 percent

What type of additives do you add to the water when you perform a water change?
bettasafe
pinch of aquarium salt

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

Symptoms and Treatment
How has your betta fish's appearance changed?
bloated appearance (persists after expelling eggs, but I've no idea if she will lay more)

How has your betta fish's behavior changed?
lethargic, floating around at top or bottom, loss of appetite

When did you start noticing the symptoms?
five hours ago

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 idea, but she was presumably very young when I bought her a month ago, so a couple months?

 

[lilnaugrim]

She's stuffed!!! Like when the Holiday's come around and you've just eaten waaay too much, what do you do? You just sit there and perhaps go to sleep! lol she's just stuffed so she's not going to eat much in the next few days, fast her for 3-4 day's or until she becomes relatively skinny again and by that point she will have digested all that extra protein she ate and hopefully metabolized it all. She may also poop white at this point, no cause for alarm as it's just her passing the egg material she digested. This is all normal so don't worry ^_^

One of my girls had never been around males before but she saw her reflection and took that as a male, she became eggy, produced eggs, built a bubblenest and actually put the eggs up in the bubblenest and began to eat them from there lol. She was such a good girl!

EDIT: as I reread your post, get rid of the aquarium salt. Do not use that unless you are specifically treating some illness. Using AQ salt on a daily basis for a long term can cause liver/kidney failure (Dropsy) and then death...sooooo yeah, nix that and you'll be fine

 

[danner]

She's stuffed!!! Like when the Holiday's come around and you've just eaten waaay too much, what do you do? You just sit there and perhaps go to sleep! lol she's just stuffed so she's not going to eat much in the next few days, fast her for 3-4 day's or until she becomes relatively skinny again and by that point she will have digested all that extra protein she ate and hopefully metabolized it all. She may also poop white at this point, no cause for alarm as it's just her passing the egg material she digested. This is all normal so don't worry ^_^

One of my girls had never been around males before but she saw her reflection and took that as a male, she became eggy, produced eggs, built a bubblenest and actually put the eggs up in the bubblenest and began to eat them from there lol. She was such a good girl!

EDIT: as I reread your post, get rid of the aquarium salt. Do not use that unless you are specifically treating some illness. Using AQ salt on a daily basis for a long term can cause liver/kidney failure (Dropsy) and then death...sooooo yeah, nix that and you'll be fine

Ohh great I thought that might be the case but you can never be too careful. Thanks so much! She's back to behaving normally today so I'm really relieved. Before I read this I tried to feed her and she spat it out, but of course it makes total sense that she'd still be super full.

And oh gosh okay. D: To clarify, I only use a bit of it weekly, not daily, but I'd imagine that's still not great so I will definitely use it sparingly from now on! I must've read that using it with water changes can help fend off illness so I guess I got overzealous. Thanks so much for letting me know!

 

[lilnaugrim]

Ohh great I thought that might be the case but you can never be too careful. Thanks so much! She's back to behaving normally today so I'm really relieved. Before I read this I tried to feed her and she spat it out, but of course it makes total sense that she'd still be super full.

And oh gosh okay. D: To clarify, I only use a bit of it weekly, not daily, but I'd imagine that's still not great so I will definitely use it sparingly from now on! I must've read that using it with water changes can help fend off illness so I guess I got overzealous. Thanks so much for letting me know!

Right, but if you put it in the water weekly, it stays there lol. But anyway, yes, only use it for illnesses. In a way, yes it can help prevent illness but you can do the same thing by keeping up on water changes; that will be much healthier for any fish since Freshwater fish don't usually like to be in Saltwater ;-) But no worries, you know now ^_^