Betta turning white

[Cbass]

Hi all. Posting this on behalf of a coworker. She has a betta that she rescued from a big box pet store (i.e. it was dying). Poor thing was in bad shape, was seriously underfed, and likely had internal diseases. She spent a month recuperating it and recently battled dropsy. 

Thankfully, the fish made a full recovery. Eating well, swimming around happy etc. Expect now it's starting to lose pigmentation and turn white (see photo). I mentioned that it could have been all of the stress the fish had to endure when it was sick and with all of the medication. But she is saying that the color loss is getting faster. Other than that, the fish seems perfectly fine from the outside. 

Thoughts? I know that columnaris, can do this, but she is ruling it out.

[Colu]

It's common for Bettas to naturally change colour as they get older this could be what happening 

[Cbass]

I was thinking about that as well. I read about it, but I don't think that I've ever seen it happen in person. 

 

[Colu]

On 7/1/2022 at 3:28 PM, Cbass said:

I was thinking about that as well. I read about it, but I don't think that I've ever seen it happen in person. 

 

It's more than likely colour change but i can't be 100% sure that the cause at this point what i would do is monitor him closely for any odd behaviour if he goes of his food clamped fins rapid breathing laying on the bottom of the tank a lot for now 

Edited July 1, 2022 by Colu

[Cbass]

Agree. For now, he's acting perfectly normal. My friend is pretty experienced with fish disease but it's the first time she's seen this.