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Bettas and Oxygen


Puggle

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I went to the Canberra & District Aquarium Society meeting last night and one of the guys gave a talk on labyrinth fish. He said that you should bag bettas with regular air and NEVER use oxygen because it hurts their labyrinth organ. It can also over-oxygenate the water and cause problems for other fish too. Has anyone heard this before? Is it true?

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I've heard of it, but my skill in bagging is such that I'd likely loose most of the O2 anyway. :tongue: When bagged, would the betta be more likely to use surface air or water? over-gassing the water could be a problem, but I have not heard of it happening. I mean, i've heard of it, but never heard an actual account, its always "be careful because..." and I have often wondered if it is actually possible to end up with GBD or similar from replacing some of the air gasses with O2.

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I've only ever seen this cause a problem with a dwarf gourami. It was in a largish bag by itself (taken to a show). OD'd on the O2! I ship all my fish - including the wild bettas in O2. I have had wild bettas sent from O/S without O2 and they did poorly. Fighters seem to suffer no ill effects. I use O2 even for a short trip - it's easier to inflate the bag! Another "myth" which I question is bettas "drowning" when held under water. I had a male trapped for at least half a day, and besides the score marks around his head - he was fine. Gouramis on the other hand really freak out if they can't reach the surface. Try overfilling a tank and watch them stress when they reach the glass lid. They will charge around until they find an air bubble. (and no - I did not do this deliberately) Cheers, J

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I've confirmed that bettas can stay under water for a quite a long period of time without a need to go to surface to breath, unless there is no oxygen in the water. I accidentally overflood my barracks a couple of times and some of the bettas cant get out of the lid, trapped there for awhile until i realize it, and they look ok. Longer period of time will kill them though :(

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When i bought my last ct from a shop, they had him in a bag and floated it inside of a small globe tank and unfortunatly the bag made a seal over the top of the entire globe and the betta below died. I gathered that it died because it couldnt reach the surface, but with the top sealed, all the oxygen in the water may of been used up. I should of complained, but im not that sort of person :(

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