Ill Betta, Please Help!!

So lastnight I transferred my male betta to his spawning tank (this is his first time) and this morning he was happy and swimming around he even made a bit of a bubble nest so this morning I put my female in a vase inside the aquarium before I left for town, I just got home earlier and he was on his side and his fins are ALL clamped, did I do something wrong? There is aeration in the spawning tank, what could have gone wrong?

Try adding some salt into the tank and boost the temp.
How long were you gone? did you leave the male and female together? is there a heater in the tank?

There is a heater, the temp is 80; there was already salt in the water but I can add alittle bit more, they are separated the female is in a vase inside the aquarium, I was gone six hours

And the ammonia and nitrate levels were very low, Maybe he's stressed from flaring at the female all day?

I would take the female out and see how he does.

I aleady have, Ill keep a close eye on him

BrookAshley wrote:And the ammonia and nitrate levels were very low

What do you mean by low? do you know what the measurements are? and what are you using to measure your levels?
Sorry for all the questions!!

Questions are ok lol
By "low" I meant safe levels; I'm using the standard drops,
The ammonia level was between 0.25 and 0.50.
The nitrate level was 0.

Could be the stress of moving to a new tank, stress of flaring, but it seems like something else... These things don't (usually) cause that much of a reaction

I hope its nothing else, but only time will tell.
At first I thought he had dropsy but he's not bloated and his scales aren't raised at all

A picture might help us figure it out

Before:

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After:

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Is that a white accumulation under the gills? Or was that there before?

That's just his normal pigmentation

whats the temp of the non spawning tank? Perhaps the 80 degrees was a jump in temperature?

The temp was 78
But he didn't start looking like this until atleast 18 hours of being in the spawning tank

With the ammonia being up a bit I would put a little Prime in the water and do a small partial water change or move him back to his main tank. Hope he recovers.

I have only set up a betta breeding tank once but I did it using a very small sponge filter that had been cycling in the main tank for about a month. I put the sponge filter way down on one end of the breeding tank (I was using a 6 gallon long) and had the tube cut so I could fill the tank 1/2 full. I turned the airflow way down so no surface agitation was created. I used bare bottom and I put some short fake plants around the sponge for the female to hide in. I created a nestbuilding/spawning area for the male at the other end of the tank using a cut styrofoam cup taped to the wall of the tank. I also placed the female in a hurricane tube.

It took a couple of days but my male exhausted himself also by all the flaring and nest building activity. I think that is one of the reasons you have to "condition" them really well before attempting the breedings because the males work so hard at making themselves so beautiful 24/7 when mating and the females get highly highly stressed during the actual spawning.

After about 4 days (with 2 days of the female being released and chased relentlessly - and the fake plants did help with being able to hide and rest some) I put both of them back to their main tanks. I haven't tried again but plan on it. This time I will condition the pair really well before my attempt. Everything else worked well as far as the tank setup. Good luck with your pair. He's a great looking male.

I plan to try again also, but with alot of tweaks to my spawning tank
Thankyou, good luck to you too

The after picture he looks really bloated! If you haven't already done it I would do a water change and add new salt.

I think thats just the way the pic was taken, he looks fine now and his fins have even unclamped alittle bit

*Betta Update*

He's fine now, he's eating normally and his fins are almost normal again

Nice! Glad to hear he came back!

Thankyou
So am I