# Fish sinking - seems weighted from the tail



## BettaRed (Dec 14, 2010)

Hello,

I have cleaned the filter - kept up water changes, done everything properly maintenance wise yet my fish hasn't gotten better. He has been like this for about a month now.

He swims to the surface in a seemingly desperate way to breathe and struggles to eat food like he used to - as you can see in the video I put quite a few bloodworms and pellets in the tank so he's got a better chance of eating whatever he can get before he sinks and sits on the bottom of the tank.

Any suggestions are welcome and hopefully he can return to his former glory! I've had him for a year and a half so far.

The only thing that has changed recently is a lack of sunlight since I've moved rooms - will this affect anything?

Just for the record, the stick on leaf has no metal inside, it's just plastic.

EDIT: Forgot to attach video, here it is: http://youtu.be/k3SjWBBRc_k


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## Starfish1 (Dec 9, 2012)

Hi, 

It looks to me like he's getting a bit older and his swim bladder isn't working anymore. A fish's swim bladder is an organ that fills up with air and enables the fish to float up to the top, and then then go back down. Right now he looks like he's having difficulty floating up to the top. 

It would be a really good idea to lower his water to a level where it's easy for him to come up for air. He looks like he's really struggling right now and this will make it easier for him to breathe and get his food. You can see him breathing really fast, he needs to come up for a breath. 

This is pretty common from what I've seen, a few of my bettas when they got older started doing the exact same thing that your fish is doing, I just lowered the water for them and they had a much easier time after that and lived for a few months after that. And don't forget to move your heater down also so it's covered by water 

When you lower his water you'll also need to do more frequent water changes to keep the water clean so too much ammonia doesn't build up


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## Canis (Apr 15, 2013)

My betta does the same thing, he is about 2 years old. +1 on what Starfish said, a lower water level would benefit him a lot. With mine being in a .5 gal, he gets daily w/c.


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## shellieca (Jul 12, 2012)

Do you fast him at all? He looked a little bloated to me but I don't know how much he had eaten before the video. What size tank is he in? I would do either as the others have suggest, lower the water level or move him to a smaller tank. I would fast him for a couple of days & see if that helps at all. I hope he improves.


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## BettaRed (Dec 14, 2010)

shellieca said:


> Do you fast him at all? He looked a little bloated to me but I don't know how much he had eaten before the video. What size tank is he in? I would do either as the others have suggest, lower the water level or move him to a smaller tank. I would fast him for a couple of days & see if that helps at all. I hope he improves.


I have fasted him for 1-2 days on numerous occasions hoping it was bloating, sadly it isn't!

Just like to add I got my dates wrong - I've had him since December 2010. He's in a 20L tank with a heater on 79-81.


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## logisticsguy (Sep 7, 2012)

It looks like his bladder gets pressure from his tummy and isn't working well right now. In adult betta it could be caused by a parasites or possibly bacteria. You could try Epson salt treatments if that doesn't work maybe look at a med treatment like Seachem Paraguard.


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