DAY 38: Lazarus Betta Fish?

We've had Greenie for over a month now, and I feel like I'm finally past the stage where I'm afraid he's going to turn up floating at the top of the bowl one day. I was reading some interesting stuff online, kind of Romeo-and-Juliet-like, or maybe it's like in Lost, in which people thought their betta fish was dead only to find it "come alive" again later. Turns out that unless they're downright "crispy," you can put a fish that's jumped out of its tank back in and maybe it will recover. I wonder how many people have flushed their bettas too soon? Greenie's little tank has a lid on it, but sometimes I've found it a little off-center and I wonder if he knocked it loose.

DAY 28: Betta Needs a New Tank

This is the tank Greenie currently has. It's cheap and small. I want to get him a bigger one very soon.

DAY 24: Greenie the Patient Betta

Whew! Greenie is a hardy, patient betta fish. We were out of town for three days, and the pet shop said he'd be fine for that amount of time. We fed him TetraMax and bloodworms before we left. And I took him out of the sometimes-sunny, sometimes-drafty area where we usually keep him. When we got home at almost 1 in the morning, I ran to check on Greenie. He was fine! Good little fish.

Day 19: Our Betta's No Scaredy Cat

I read in the aforementioned Betta book that if you place a mirror in front of your betta, he'll freak out, thinking it's a rival male betta, and flare his fins. I felt like this might be a little mean, but I did it anyway. I need not have worried. Greenie did not react at all. In fact, I fed him right after showing him the mirror and he chomped away like nothing had happened. I think Greenie must be a peace-loving betta. He's a lover, not a fighter.

DAY 18: I Cleaned the Betta Tank

Finally. It only took, what, two and a half weeks? I put Alec in drop-in day care because I didn't want him to be scarred for life if I ended up dropping Greenie on the floor. I'd already put the stuff in the water to take out the chlorine and let it reach room temperature. I filled a regular kitchen bowl half-full with some of the water and I went after Greenie with the net. It took me a long time to snare him, because I was all jumpy and so was he. He could have jumped right out if he wanted to (Betta fish can jump pretty high. Apparently, in the wild, they jump from puddle to puddle. This is why your tank needs a breathable lid.) I washed his tank really well, but did not use soap, because that can contaminate the water. I rinsed the gravel really well, too. When I put him back in (holding my hand over the net in case he made a jump for it) he seemed immediately happy and ate the bloodworms I put in for him.