It has been a while since I posted. Where to even begin!
The cycle crashed after I moved the tank back to my dorm. That was a ton of fun to deal with. Managed to get it stable again.
The ammonia burned a couple of his fin tips so he developed a very mild case of fin rot. Completely treatable and I took care of it. 50% changes every day did the trick.
Then I made a mistake. I bought a ghost shrimp for the tank. I figured that Vincent would probably turn the shrimp into a snack. What I didn't realize is that Vincent would end up being terrified of the shrimp. I had never heard of a betta being afraid of a little ghost shrimp.
The shrimp stressed him out so much that he ended up biting off most of his tail. It wasn't pretty, and I will spare you the rather graphic pictures. He did the damage in the course of an hour while I was away on an errand, and at that point it was already starting to turn black on the edges.
Fin rot treatment started immediately in a floating hospital tank. The shrimp was removed to a separate quarantine. I dosed Vincent at 1/2 teaspoon of AQ salt per gallon, and gradually the fin rot started getting better. I wasn't in the mood to take chances, so I decided from the beginning to do the full 10 day course of AQ salt.
At this point, I was just thinking, "Yeah, things couldn't get worse."
They did.
Vincent developed velvet 3 days into the salt treatment plan. I upped the dosage of AQ salt to a teaspoon per gallon, covered the tank, and prepared to say my goodbyes. Things were not looking good. For 4 days he just kept getting worse. He still had some fin rot and was covered in velvet. I just kept dosing the salt and hoping for the best.
Yesterday he ended his salt treatment, and thankfully is looking a lot better. I believe I have successfully eradicated the velvet. His fins are starting to grow back as well. (My phone is currently dead, otherwise I would upload a pic.) When I checked on him this morning he was busy creating a bubble nest, which he has actually never done before. He wasn't too thrilled when I removed him from the hospital tank and dumped the water and his bubble nest out. I'm doing this for your own good, buddy!
I'm hoping he keeps getting better. I learned my lesson. No tank mates for Vincent.
The ghost shrimp is going to go into the other tank I'm setting up in a couple of weeks with some cherry shrimp and neon tetras.
I'm rescaping Vincent's tank too, so look forward to pictures of that!
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