Beta acting strange

Question
I have a beta, whom I have had for almost a year. I had him in a normal sized glass circle tank for a while and quite a while ago, transferred him to a small triangle sized filtered system. He seemed to adjust just fine.

I live at college and I went home for Thanksgiving. I only expected to stay home for 2 days so I didn't bother giving my fish a weekend feeder or anything. I ended up staying home for 4-5 days. When I came home, my beta -who is normally a dark blue colour- was a faded pink colour. I fed him right away & he ate just as normal. By the morning, he had turned back to his normal colour.

Ever since then, he has been acting strange. He is normally a very friendly fish. But for the past 4-5 days, he has been been staying near the back of the tank, either floating at the top or sitting near the bottom. Normally he hangs out in a plastic plant; but he hasn't at all lately. His tail has also been kinda fidgity and he seems very paranoid. If I come near the tank, he starts darting around and sometimes puffs out his fins as if he were threatened. He also has developed these 2 vertical pale lines right behind his fins. And lastly, he won't eat.

Help me, please!  

Answer
Hi Nicole;

He needs to be warmed up I think. I am getting lots of questions from Betta owners who have had the same problem since Thanksgiving. The house gets too cold when we go out of town so long and the fish have a hard time recovering sometimes. See if you can get the temperature up to 80 or 82 with a lamp or a heating pad laid up against it. Just please be careful and don't let the heat source get wet.

Followups welcome

At Your Service;
Chris Robbins

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