my betta just died

Question
I don't understand why he died. When I first got him he seemed really healthy for the first few weeks. I think I only had him for about 2-3 months altogether.

Suddenly he started to slow down. Then he wouldn't eat, then he would hardly move. He had fin rot or whatever you called it and he had the fungus all over his head and back. The last three days he was breathing so fast and heavily I thought he would exhaust himself. I have changed the water in his 1/2 gallon bowl every week since I got him, and it seemed like that had something to do with him getting sick. Every time I would change it, he would get so upset and pale, and every time I changed the water, he seemed to get worse. I do use a lot of air freshener spray in my house. He didn't seem to be doing any better over the last few days after I got the betta fix stuff and so today I finally moved him back to the original bowl (it also seemed to me like he started getting sick when I moved him into the bigger bowl). He died only a few minutes later, after swimming as hard as he could to the top, then letting himself fall to the bottom. He did it over and over. I just don't understand why he died and why the treatment didn't help.

Answer
Dear Bonny,
I'm very sorry to hear about the loss of your pet betta. You have my sympathies here. Poor little thing.

It's hard to know exactly what happened because there could be so many factors that could have caused him to perish.
The first thing I want to make sure of is you mentioned that your betta would always get pale and act sick after every water change. This is certainly related to something that maybe you didn't know to do to the replacement water. Were you sure it was properly dechlorinated with a good water conditioner like Amquelplus or Prime? If not then chlorine and chloramine and even ammonia can be in your tap water and will make any fish very sick. The next thing is temperature. Any fish is stressed if during the water change, the replacement water is cooler in temperature than their bowl/aquarium water is. Cool water and temperature shocks can stress bettas in particular quite badly. The night before a water change, it is good to set out a 1gal pitcher of water that has been dechlorinated properly to allow it to settle down to the temperature your betta is living in. This is also known as 'aging' the water.

The next red flag is you mentioned you used air freshener a lot in your home. Any kind of airborne sprays of chemicals used near a aquarium or betta bowl can easily get into the water and cause your fish to be very sick. It is best to simply not use sprays or any chemicals near your betta's bowl at all.

Both Fungus and fin rot are primarily bacterial infections caused by dirty water conditions (clear water doesn't always guarantee clean water) and temperature shocks. The switching back and forth between bowls can also be hard on the betta's system as this can cause them great stress especially if the temperatures between the two bowls were different. Betta's must have a warm and quite stable temperature of at least 75-80F.

Lastly, because bettas like all little fish are such delicate creatures, it isn't always guaranteed that they will survive an illness everytime. Your betta had a very dangerous disease, two at that. What probably happened was he was just too weakened by the diseases, poor water quality and/or temperature flucuations to hold up any longer. I can assure you I know how you feel. It's very sad to lose a beloved fish.

The best thing I can say now is if you would like to get another betta to replace the one you lost. You might want to do some research about keeping your betta's water from becoming contaminated and about their ideal enviroment.
You might also want to upgrade to perhaps a 5-10 aquarium. This makes a wonderful home for a betta and he can have some peaceful tankmates in a aquarium of this size. There is nothing prettier than a simple planted aquarium of this size with a few small schools of sparkling little tetras or rasboras and a magnificent betta swimming amongst them.

Again, I am so sorry for your loss. But I do hope this helps!

Only my very best wishes,
Karen~
For lots more info on bettas, please visit-
"www.bettatalk.com"