Betta updates

Titan is dead. He came here dealing with internal parasites, and about a week before his death on Monday he started showing the symptoms of dropsy as well. The poor little guy only had one or two days of happiness here before his illnesses drained his color and joy away. I'm very angry with the breeder for sending me a fish with parasites. They're what caused the dropsy -- apparently they damaged his organs before I could successfully kill them all (which is what convinces me that he had them before he even got here, along with the fact that one was sticking out of him when he was in his shipping bag), and finally his kidneys failed. I wanted to euthanize him by the third day with dropsy, but I couldn't find any clove oil. Luckily, once his labyrinth organ and gills started to fail, he died fairly peacefully.

I'm returning to school with only four fish. Amalthea and Hugo are the only two from the original summer bunch coming. Lir is staying with my mother, where he'll be upgraded from his temporary .5 gallon bowl to a nice hooded/lit 2 gallon aquarium. My new girls, Athena and Mystique, are also coming with. I have a 10 gallon tank that I was planning on bringing with me to split between three males, but that was when I had Titan, Lir, and Hugo to put in it. Now I think I'm going to leave the 10 gallon here, to save for when I live with Andrew and have more space. I'll take the 5.5 gallon that hasn't been used yet, split it between Hugo and a new boy (another veil, most likely, unless I can get a crowntail at the CNY Betta Club), and then buy a 5 or 6 gallon tank to put the girls in. Hopefully, since there will be three there will be little conflict. I'll plant it excessively to be sure that the girls have somewhere to hide if Amalthea decides to pick on them. I'll still have two one gallon tanks as well, so I'll probably pick up at least one male plakat from the Rochester breeder when I buy Andy his new baby plakat.

It's funny how my spontaneous betta purchase last October turned into this amazingly difficult yet rewarding hobby for me.