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Hello,

My wife and I were in a LFS this weekend and seen a Betta w/ no tail fin at all. We already have 10 here, and she has 2 at work. The back seems fine, but the tail is GONE. We had to pass it up due to NO room.

She went back today and saved it. I'll add the link to the pics at the end of this.

She bought some Betta - Fix to add to the water. We were told that it's better the Melafix. (which we also have). It can barely swim, and we're open to any suggestions on what to do to help him servive.

Here's the pics:

http://home.comcast.net/~rfpratt/Kt1.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~rfpratt/Kt.jpg

I hope that we can save this guy. She namd him, "KING TRITON".

My GF's Betta had bad finrot not long after we got him, not as bad as your's, but pretty bad. He only had about 15-20% of his fins left. Anyway, i did a course of tri-sulphur at half strength, and that seemed to kick it in the tail, so to speak He's now got about 70-80% of his tail back. The other thing to watch for is Nitrates. Nitrates are a sign of poor water quality (incase you didn't already know). When doing the treatment, i'd be doing 30-40% water changes every three days, atleast. If you want to do 10% changes every day, that would probably be better still. I wouldn't change to much of his water to quickly, as it might put the poor guy into shock and he will die. Follow the tri-sulphur treatment up with either a methyl-blue treatment or some multi cure with high methyl blue concentration. The methyl-blue will be fine on the Betta, as long as he's isolated from any other fish... especially scale less fish. Keep doing the water changes and keep dosing with alternating methyl-blue and tri-sulphur until you can see translucent tips on his tail, which indicates new growth.

You'll find things like melafix aren't very useful against fungal infections that normally cause fin rot. Melafix is anti-sceptic, not anti-bacterial. It wont hurt to use it, but it's very unlikely it will help.

Someone is leading you round the mulberry bush in regards to BettaFix, its just watered down melafix....

You probably wanted BETTAMAX (which you will have trouble getting as the manufacturer has gone out of business)

I quite like FungusAde (Wardley) for tough infections, but since you are in the US, go with Jungle Fungus Eliminator (JFE) as its got quite potent antibacterial agents in it



For animals, the entire universe has been neatly divided into things to (a) mate with, (b) eat, (c) run away from, and (d) rocks. - Terry Pratchett

I wish you all the best with the betta rescue, at least it looks like the tail has not disappeared all the way down to the division zone where the new tail is formed, so it should have at least a decent chance of recovery.

I second Calla's suggestion. JFE, is found at walmart and is a good med. for this.
I have found bettaMax on a few online shops. I stocked up
I would also suggest using 1/2 tsp of aqua salt with the JFE.

___________________________________________

If at first you DO succeed, try not to look astonished.

I can't find JFE. I did find ANTI-FUNGAL by AP-PLUS. It says to add 10 drops to 1 gallon (it was green drops).I took the fish out before I added the drops since I changed the water yesterday, then put him back in. Now they say wait 48 hours then repeat, and do a 25% water change and repeat.

I'm gonna do a 100% water change and repeat, since they talk about having a carbon filter, which we don't since it's a gallon tank which we don't have a filter running.

Then changing the water again, and waiting a few days before doing it again. We're new to this, and have kinda saved a few, but this guy's in real bad shape.

Wish Me Luck

If you plan on "saving" a lot of fish, you'll want to snag some broad spectrum antibiotics. Maracyn plus ( with biospheres) sounds a little corny, but I've used it and it works better for fin rot, etc than anything else I've used to date , including maracyn, maracyn2, melafix, etc. http://amazonmoosey.com/tek9.asp?pg=products&specific=jncpfmrqi is what it looks like.

Looks like a sweet little betta.

For info regarding advanced fin/tail rot go to:

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

Good luck to you and King Triton.

I read on Bettatalk that a new company has taken over production of BettaMax,

Good news!

Good luck with the little guy, he looks to be in alright shape, you will probably have a full recovery, but I doubt his fins will grow back fully.

He seems happy and has had a bubble nest the past few days. He gets around pretty quick w/ his lack of fins. I can see that the dorsal fin has started to grow back.

I heard that when fins grow back they are translucent. His dorsal is. I hope that the tail fin shows some growth soon. The pic that you see is how we got him.

All we can do is try and hope for the best.

And by the way:::: the wife brought home #12 today. This one is awesome. I think that he's a CT and looks green sometimes, and blue at other times in a different light.

Good luck with the little guy. Glad someone is happy just to do this, and not be put off with a not so prefect fish.
Keep us informed to how he goes. Your wife must have a heart of gold.
BTW if he is swimming around and building a bubble nest, sounds like he is happy and on the road to mending.

[span class="edited"][Edited by TigerAngel 2004-07-04 06:10][/span]