assumed Kidney Failure (dropsy) (parasite?) Betta and Gourami

[Grant]

Hi all,

Just over two weeks ago, my female koi betta started showing signs of illness: low energy, swollen gills, pine coning on right side with a slightly swollen eye on the left side.

during these past two weeks... She's still interested in food. we treated her with Maracyn (the full recommended dose) and Paracleanse (also the recommended dose) at the first sign of symptoms. She became more active, but the pineconing extended to her whole body. So we moved to daily aquarium salt baths at 1 tsp per gallon and 25% water changes every other day. no signs of improvement. Then a week ago, we moved on to trying ich-x with no signs of improvement.

Then last Saturday, the 3rd, we moved her into quarantine and threw the med trio at her all at once and we are letting it sit for a week.

her pineconing has encompassed her body now and she is distended on her right side. her left eye is still a bit swollen. she maintains an appetite and swims around still. the distention appears to be where her kidneys ought to be. her buoyancy is fine, so I don't think it is her swim bladder.

What's odd about this is our dwarf gourami of 3 years suffered from the same symptoms a few months ago and his illness slowly progressed over the course of 2 months before he passed. We thought it was mostly age and his genetics as a mass produced fish, but with our betta getting sick with the same symptoms, it seems a bit odd. Our betta lived with some bronze corydoras, and they show no sign of illness, just their same wiggly selves.

before all this we dewormed the fish twice and nitrates never crept past 40ppm. no ammonia or nitrites ever. We feed bug bites tropical and spirulina formula small amounts daily.

GH: ~150

KH: ~120

Ph:~6.8-7.2

Temp: ~80F

Could this in fact be age/genetic fragility, and ornamental Anabantoidei just lose kidney function over time? Can Ich become internal or hide under scales and develop symptoms like dropsy? Thank you for your time and any replies.

Best,

G

 

Edited October 6, 2020 by Grant
added temperature

[Mridul Singh]

The betta could be just constipated/bloated. Have you tried feeding peas?

 

Dropsy in general is hard to cure, and usually the fish unfortunately dies in the end. I would give it as good water parameters as you can, and add some salt, along with raised temperatures.

 

Hopefully that helps.

[Grant]

Thank you for the reply

We've fasted her on and off and supply spirulina based flake in between feedings of meatier "tropical" flake as a way to get some plant based foods into her.

Her belly isn't swollen. the swelling seems like it's behind her digestive track by her swim bladder/kidneys, but I will try to get her some extra roughage and see if epsom salts could help her pass anything.

I certainly fear the worse as our Gourami didn't get through a similar mystery. we got him to eat pea and garlic, but it didn't help in the end. My father kept koi and Dropsy was usually a quick sentence in those instances, but in both our Betta and Gourami, it seemed to come on slowly and carry on for a while before the end. Since we lost our Gourami, I figured I should reach out in case anyone has had similar experience with something resembling this.

Update, she is still swimming her laps as she usually does and responds when I approach the tank. no change in appearance though. Her now separated corydora tank mates are fine as day.

[A Moore]

How is your Betta? My betta is currently suffering a similar ailment 😞

[Grant]

Betty is still hanging in there. Her pineconing dropped down after the round of med trio (single dose that sat for a week) followed by multiple 20% water changes about every other day for another week. as the meds passed out of the tank she got a bit better, but then we noticed inflamed gills and more lethargy. Food has been cut back due to her difficulty seeing. we tried a maracyn - ich-x combo (1 dose each and watched for 5 days) to try and rule out ich. nothing really happened and then we noticed clamped fins. Her symptoms pointed to bacterial infection even more.

NOW: We're mid week of the pro-active maracyn (1 packet everyday for 5 days) with fingers crossed...

additionally, the cories that were tankmates with betty are perfectly fine. and the cherry barbs they were moved into with are completely fine as well.

Betty is over a year old now and we kept her fairly warm - 80F (speeds up metabolism). Although bettas are supposed to live 3 years, this may be end of life hospice care for Betty.

If we were to turn back time, I think we would have full dosed maracyn the moment we brought her home. Her sight was not the best when we got her and we think that's why she made so many laps around the tank. she also did a bit of glass surfing and that was probably a red flag we should have paid attention to. hindsight is 20/20 and we are thinking of moving on to colonies of fish rather than a centerpiece pet. it's just too heartbreaking when your boy/girl fish who always emotes "good morning" starts to suffer like this.

[A Moore]

Aw I’m totally with you on colonies. It is heartbreaking to watch them suffer. My Betta  is currently on his second round of Maracyn and ich x but looks terrible. I stopped salt treatment to give him a break. He sits at the bottom and is struggling, swollen and losing color.  I’ve been doing daily 50% water changes and testing due to my hospital tank not being set up previously so it’s not cycled.  I keep the temp at 80 and cover the tank at night to calm him. Every morning I dread looking at him but he’s stayed the same for several days.  
Thanks for the update on Betty and what methods you’ve tried.  It really helps. 

[Grant]

Yeah, Betty is still hanging in there. she's moderately better and we may do another active round of Maracyn. In her case, we decided that bacterial infection seemed most likely, perhaps caused by some sort of parasitic/fungal attack that we subdued with paracleanse and ich-x. But we're really just working with our best guess at this point. but I still feel like bacteria should have offed her off quicker than this.

At this point. her gills are swollen. she'll take food when she can see it, but man, it's an uphill battle. we're going to rest her for a few days before looking at another round of treatments.

Of note, our tap water comes out pretty good for general fish keeping. nothing is particularly out of whack (not crazy hard/soft). we started mixing RO water from a LFS with our tap for Betty, and that seemed to have helped. it softened the water a little bit. My girlfriend informed me that we started with tap in the tank and have just changed it out for RO with the 20% water changes. the Ph was getting pretty low, so we dropped a few crushed oyster shell tablets in there to help buffer the water a little.

We didn't really have a hospital tank running and cycled either. We moved her sponge filter with her, so luckily we had some cycling of sorts. We also siphon up uneaten food and the snails pick up what we miss. I now intend to just pot some amazon swords and keep this tank cycled with low light running after we find resolution with betty.

We're also using very dim aquarium lights (the 6 LEDs from a starter kit lid.) throughout the day, but we switch to higher light when we feed so she has an easier time seeing food. lights are off at night.