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I was peering into my twenty gallon today, saying good morning to everyone when I noticed one of my betta girls hiding in the upper corner, just sort of hanging at the surface. When I looked up at her (I was sitting on the floor in front of the ten gallon that shares the same stand), I thought I saw something odd with her face. When I went to investigate, I found that one of her eyes is protuding a bit, with what seems like a thin white-ish circle around it. Not knowing what else to do, I added some melafix (which indicates it can help several different eye diseases) and departed for work.

Several days ago, I attempted to add another betta girl to my happy group. They weren't very happy when she left a wake of torn fins and ruffled tempers. Is this possibly an aftereffect of her rampage through my tank? She didn't seem that violent; there were some tattered fins, though not as bad as some I've seen. She was removed to solitary confinement.

When I left, one of the other girls seemed to be watching over my poor girl. She was fine yesterday at dinner... what could have happened?

Please tell me there's something I can do for my girl, or at least that she's going to be okay. I couldn't bear to lose one of my sweet bettas.

Tank specs:
20 gallon long
6 betta girls
6 black neons
5 cories
I'll test water tonight and give the results if you like. Please help!

~Meow. Thus spoke the cat.~

This sounds exactly like what I have with my Platy.

Almost like someone took a thick clear contact which covers the whole eye, and placed it over top.

Sounds like a simple infection.

the odd behaviour is probably caused by a thumping great headache caused by the swollen ocular area. (ever had a black eye? )

I would treat it as a simple infection and keep a close eye on 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

No... never had a black eye... So... is it likely she DID get the "black eye" from the Brat's rampage?

Phew... I was worried about her! Note to self: no more aggressive Brats that like to pick on my girls!

~Meow. Thus spoke the cat.~

what she probably got was a scratch, and that combined with the stress/lowered immune response could well have resulted in what you have now.

IF you can get some medicated food into her, you might want to do that for 2-3 days, just because an infection in the head could quite easily cause that eye to swell up and put too much pressure on the brain. Its unlikely, but its not that far fetched, so if you can just get the food to her (not the others) and medicate the water lightly with melafix or something (you judge, i think that should be enough) and see how you go.



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'll stop at the store on my lunch... any brand I'm looking for specifically? What medicine should the food contain?

~Meow. Thus spoke the cat.~

well, I dont know, i cant get medicated food ovber here, i have to make it up myself.

you want something antibiotic, a mycin or a cycline or something like that.

she will get more benefit from ingesting the meds than floating in them.

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

Mmm... never looked, actually, so I'm just assuming I can get it. If I can't find it, how does one go about medicating food? I do have tetracycline at home if that helps.

~Meow. Thus spoke the cat.~

standard betta pellets, roll them in egg white then in crushed TC. keep out of light

Diane has some other recipes too.

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

Jungle now makes a anti bacterial and an anti parasitic pellet food. Don't know how it works though.

Well, I went to a LFS on my lunch break and not only do they not understand what 12:00 means (they opened 10-15 minutes late), they don't carry medicated foods. I'll check another store on my way home, but if not, I guess I'm medicating food tonight.

We'll see how she looks when I get home. Hopefully the melafix helped a bit.

So, now... here's the question... how to get my nosey, pesky, curious betta girls away from her and let her eat her medicated food in peace! She doesn't eat betta bites (or, well, I don't feed them to her as it's a community tank and they enjoy just about every food I can get my hands on). I suppose I could scoop her out of the community to feed her, but I don't know how much she'd like that. *ponders*

~Meow. Thus spoke the cat.~

Oh... nonono! One of the other girls is showing the same symptoms. Either the Brat did more of a number on my girls than I thought, or something is very wrong.

On the upside, I was able to feed them the tetracycline. I dipped flake food in water, then into the powdered medicine. They ate some of that, then proceeded to eat the tetracycline by itself. I remember that when I used the meds before (for fin rot), the betta boys had insisted on eating the medicine... perhaps it tastes good?

You can see the swelling on the side of the head where the eye is protruding. Even though they are both red, you can even see what I'd call bruising or perhaps the redness of infection? I did add melafix after removing the Brat to solitary, to help with torn fins.

Right now, attributing this to the Brat makes sense, as these are two of my most dominant females. If this spreads more, especially to the girls that run at the first site of trouble... What on earth is going on?

~Meow. Thus spoke the cat.~