Topic: Fish swimming sideways

[sageandbridget]

Hi, I'm new here and didn't even know there was such a thing as a fish forum until I started looking up information on my fish. I have two female bettas (in separate tanks) that have been perfectly fine since I got them almost 7 months ago. One of them, Sage, just recently started swimming sideways. Other than that she seems active and healthy. Who has had this problem and what did you do to fix it?

[nicole07_99]

Hiya and welcome.  You're bound to get heaps of answers.  From reading what you have written it could be a few things.  First Ill ask a few questions...such as...is she bloated, is she eatting, have you noticed her have regular BM's?

I had a few bettas who had an issue known as Swim Bladder Disease. One in paticular would swim sideways and do little twirls in the water all the time.  He made me dizzy but he was happy as I could make him and he lived 5 years. 

Basically I would give her tiny pieces of thawed frozen peas.  See if she clears up if so it's constipation. (which can make them seem like they have swim bladder disease)  if this only helps for a while then I would suspect SBD. 

The only thing you can really do for that is never slosh them around. Also if you use a filter make sure its not got much current or none at all would be best.  Make sure when you do water changes that you baby them into a holding tank and not just toss them in and say enjoy the dive!  lol. 

Make sure they have pleanty of places to lay and rest all that twirling and swimming sideways is difficult and if you notice she has a hard time getting to the sufrace to breathe air you then may need to do more frequent water changes and use less water to make the trip up easier.

This is about all I can think of at the moment I hope you find useful informat and all clears up for your little girl.  Good luck!

[CatWomanDiana]

Make sure they have pleanty of places to lay and rest all that twirling and swimming sideways is difficult and if you notice she has a hard time getting to the sufrace to breathe air you then may need to do more frequent water changes and use less water to make the trip up easier.

BTW - a suggestion I "discovered" when I had Purple Haze and his massive swelling(s).  I wanted to give him a wider, shallower tank - and I got a 5 gallon - and realized I could *really* make the water shallow by putting the submersable heater suctioned to the *bottom* - so I only needed to fill it far enough to cover the heater - about 2-3 inches of water. 

I now have the heaters in two of the tanks on the bottom that way - it's especially useful for the King, who wants to jump out of the tank - he gets more water *and* it's down from the edge.

dg