Betta Fish Tank

 I've always had a love for animals, I recently started a new hobby with an aquarium.  I've had plenty of aquariums in the past but I wanted something for my office.  There has definitely been a learning curve when it came to this particular aquarium.  The new part of it is plants.

Here is Jaws, the great white.

So, I have a betta in the tank.  We have had 2 bettas in the past at home.  Scout and Benton both had betta fish that lived for a few years.  They had each of them in a 1 gallon tank with a filter.  What I've learned since then, is that betta's actually prefer warmer water, around 78-80 degrees.  I also discovered that a 1 gallon tank, although larger than the cups they're kept in at fish stores, is too small.

I'm going to share my fish tank journey.

I started out thinking an aquaponic tank would be cool.  I got this one on Amazon.  It started out with an anthurium on the top of the tank.  It would help if I would have researched a bit because anthurium's need full sunlight.  

So of course the plant began looking sad, so I repotted it and stuck it by a window.  The plant began growing new leaves and loved it's new potted home.  Then I tried lucky bamboo.  Well, it turned out Jaws didn't care for the big stems being in his home.  So the bamboo got put in a vase.

You can see in the above picture that I have a small plant planted in the rocks.  This plant is called an anubias and as it turns out, it isn't supposed to be planted.  I have since tied it onto a piece of wood with some thread so it's roots are exposed to the water.

In this photo you can see 2 new plants, these are called java ferns.  They were also planted originally but then I found out, these too should not be planted in substrate.  You really don't have to anchor these plants to anything and they will free float near the bottom of the tank, they really don't move around too much.  I would catch Jaws resting on the java ferns in the smaller tank (but I haven't seen him do it in the larger tank yet).

The more I looked at the aquaponic tank, the more I realized...with the sponge filter, the heater, and a couple of java ferns, the poor fish really had no room to swim.  Plus, the tank began looking dirty with the natural rocks on the bottom.  I think I was really looking for an excuse to upgrade the tank to a 5 gallon, since the aquaponic tank was only 1.4 gallons.

Since this new 5 gallon tank is plastic, it shows his reflection.  I never had a problem with Jaws seeing himself in the other tank, but when I moved him into this one he would flare all of the time.  He did it so often that it appeared he was truly scared.  I ended up buying some frosted window cling on Amazon and put it on the back and the sides of the tank.  That resolved the flaring issue and he doesn't do it anymore.

I ordered a bunch of aquatic plants from Modern Aquarium...turns out, too many.  After putting them all in there, and realizing I was back to the original problem....not enough room to swim, I decided to take about half of them out and give them to a friend.

Here are the plants I purchased from Modern Aquarium:

Update after taking half of the plants out.  I have to say I was honestly surprised with how many plants came from Modern Aquarium.  I ended up being 5 different plant species, 3 background plants, 

Now my problem is keeping the plants in the substrate.  I chose black sand, not only for it's eye appeal but also to try and make the tank look as clean as possible.  The issue is, the stemmed background plants don't want to stay in the sand.  I need to come up with a way to either weigh them down (fishing weights) or perhaps glue them to rocks or getting a different substrate.

The other thing I needed to mention is the fish health that I've learned about.  So Jaws decided to do a thing called fin nipping.  Sounds like there are various reasons for why they nip their own fins, I've read it could be because their tail is too heavy, they are stressed or even out of boredom.  I've slowed the filter down, thinking this could have been stressing him.  I added lots of hiding places with the new plants and a rock hide (which he never uses).  The water is always at 78 degrees.  I put the frosted glass up so he wouldn't flare anymore.  I added an Indian Almond leaf to use the tannins to perhaps heal his tail.  I'm thinking I may end up getting Kanaplex and seeing if that makes a difference.

Here are some photos of Jaws' fins...poor guy.

Here's a tank update, after rearranging some plants.

Well, I did end up moving Jaws to a hospital tank.  It has a sponge filter, a heater and a thermostat.  A betta hammock, a pink hide and an Indian almond leaf were also added to the hospital tank.  I added the KanaPlex as per the directions.  I decided to move him to the hospital tank after noticing 2 pinpoint sized holes in his dorsal fin.

I'm going to follow the instructions and try to do 3 doses of the treatment before returning him to his normal tank.  Wish us good luck.  He's been there a day so far and he appears to be really active (per usual).

He has since been moved back into his permanent tank.  He still has signs of fin nipping.  Overall still a really happy guy though.