Happy Thanksgiving!

I'm going to catch some minnows for my fish's Thanksgiving dinner. ;)

Myths about Bettas III

When their fish is sick and suffering, a lot of people go about ending their suffering the wrong ways. Like flushing them down the toilet. The fish won't die quickly and painlessly; it will wallow in chemicals for hours, days, or even weeks!

Another unacceptable method is when some people plunge a fish into freezing cold, or boiling water to kill it. How would you like it if that happened to you? The fish may take up to five minutes to die, and those five minutes will be agony. Be kind!

You can find humane methods of euthanization here.

Myths about Bettas, II

A lot of people think that bettas are very happy and will stay healthier in small containers than they would in larger ones. This is not true. Though they can live in small cups, bigger is better in this instance because bettas need space to get excercise. Also, less space means the cup gets dirty quicker. This excerpt from my previous May post explains why bettas can live in small containers and not die:

Bettas are anabantoids, also sometimes incorrectly labeled anabantids. An anabantoid is a fish with a labyrinth organ, which is a is an organ which lets fish breath surface air, and live in very small spaces. (Wild bettas live/lived in shallow bodies of water, like flooded rice paddies.)

And on the other side of the spectrum, some people think that it is a horrible cruelty to keep bettas in cups, that they are unhappy, and will die. These people buy many cups of bettas from Walmart and Petsmart in the hopes of stopping the cruelty and giving the bettas a better life. Well, obviously we can't tell whether a betta is unhappy in the human sense of the word; and they won't die in small containers. And buying cups and cups of bettas will only make the store owners stock more of them. ;) But as I have said, it is better for them in larger containers and tanks.

Myths about Bettas

There is a myth going around in pet stores and stuff that you can create an ecostystem for your betta. You take a peace lily plant and put it in with the fish, and he is supposed to live off its roots, while the plant lives off the fish's poo, and you never have to clean the tank.

This is NOT true! The fish may nibble the roots from extreme hunger, but they will eventually die. Plus, even if the plant did survive on fish poo, Betta fish produce high quantities of ammonia, and if the water is not changed regularly, the fish will get sick or die. So don't do the peace lily thing! ><>

A note of advice.

If you have a betta, and the water level of the tank is less than three or so inches from the rim of the tank, I would really suggest you put a lid or something on the tank. I cannot tell you how many times I have neglected this, and my betta has jumped out. I've even lost a betta because of this. *R.I.P. Sunny.* So be kind!

Sea Monkeys vs. Brine Shrimp

I didn't say this before, but in addition to feeding my fish live minnows, I also feed them Sea Monkeys, see picture above. (Sea monkeys are actually a little less than a centimeter long at adult length.)

You might be thinking, "Sea monkeys versus brine shrimp? What the heck is she talking about?" So I'll explain. The real picture is a brine shrimp. The one above is an illustration of a brine shrimp, fancifully called a Sea Monkey. Sea Monkeys are sold as pets with cute little tanks with castles in them and those whimsical drawings and stuff. Brine shrimp are sold as food for fish, with no tank and mercilessly real photos. I myself raise Sea Monkeys, not Brine Shrimp, because a friend of mine told me that sea monkeys work better. I have no confirmation on this, but Sea Monkeys are what I'm using at the time, and they're working great. So Sea Monkeys work better than Brine Shrimp, even though they're the same thing. Does that make sense? It doesn't to me either. ;)'

So what are brine shrimp? Well, they're these cool little crustaceans in the genus Artemia. I have no clue what the signifigance of that is, but I'll put it up there anyway. Anyway, the thing that makes them so cool is that the brine shrimp eggs aren't like normal eggs, where they hatch over a certain period of time. Brine shrimp eggs can stay in suspended animation for really long periods of time before hatching in the right conditions. And I'm talking decades. I think that's just amazing.
Raising them is just so easy! You just get a kit (sea monkey) and Take out the tank. Then you put *bottled* water in the tank, and add the contents of the first packet, which purifies the water. Then after 24 hours you add the second packet, which has the eggs! After a while you can see these little dots moving around in erratic patterns. Sea Monkey Babies! :)' After about five days, I add a small scoopful of the green packet, (containing food), and a large scoop of the purple/blue packet labeled "Sea Monkey Plasma". This is supposed to make more of the sea monkeys hatch and thrive. Then you add a large scoop of plasma every other week, and a small scoop of the food every couple days. You also squeeze the pump in the kit in the water frequently to oxygenate the sea monkeys. That's about it so far as I know, and for more a detailed version of this, you can just read the instructions. I don't know what exactly is in those packets, but I'm glad it works!

(You may have heard that thing in the Transformers theme song, where they say "Transformers: more than meets the eye! Transformers_ Robots in disguise", well my siblings and I say, "Sea Monkeys: more than meets the eye! Sea monkeys, brine shrimp in disguise!")

Update

Quite a few things have happened since I've last posted... :(

Sunny hopped out of her tank. It was a while until I found her, and she was way far away from the tank. I put her back in, but she only lived one more day. :( Also, I gave away the juvenile to a friend, but it contracted severe fin rot and died. :(

These little emoticons look indifferent; I didn't know how to make them look more sad. '^o^'

Also, Ollie's swim bladder disorder doesn't seem to have completely gone away. At times she gets all tipsy and floats weird. But she's a kicker, and as long as she keeps eating regularly, she'll be fine. :I

Other than that, my fish are quite healthy.