whats the quickest easiest and safest way to prepare bowl of water for my new betta or siamese fighting fish?

Question

whats the quickest easiest and safest way to prepare bowl of water for my new betta or siamese fighting fish? I have him in a little cup and i have a cute little goldfish bowl for him but i am not sure how to treat the water and i am not able to leave and buy tablets at the moment..please help

Answer 1

If you do not have drops to remove chlorine then use distilled water or else you will have to let the water sit out for 48 hours for the chlorine to evaporate. Check out bettatalk.com for lots of good betta info.

Answer 2

Throw out and get a 5 gal tank. A bowl is a torture machine. Still, if you are really stuborn, wash it out, add rinsed gravel or any decoration, fill only at max 3/4 with tap water ( bowls have low surface area for oxygen exchange) treat with a dechlorinator, then go look for bio-spira, only that refrigrerated and for freshwater only product will work. After that, add betta. If your tank has a filter, (which i doubt) get one, or do like daily water changes of around 50%. If your water only has chlorine, ( check your water supply company) you can aerate it for 24 hours to get it out. But as your betta is in a cup (god thats a bit sad) you have no choice but to get tablets. Then again, as you have purchaced a bowl, even out of ignorance, you should have no problem plonking the poor critter into heavy chlorine.

Anyone who says bettas live in mud puddles, try living in a closet for 2 weeks. No bathroom, just a ton of food. Oh and shove shampoo or somthing into your eyes and nose. Thats represents the chlorine. Then sniff a bottle of cleaning ammonia. Thats the stuff that the betta waste is made of. Finally, let only a small small amount of fresh air come in, that represents the lack of oxygen. If you are comforatable doing this, keep your betta in the bowl. Otherwise, get a real tank.

Answer 3

My recommendation....wait till tomorrow morning and go buy some stress coat. There is chlorine and chloramines in tap water that are highly toxic to all fish. To be honest, he would probably be much better off in the little cup he is in at the moment than if you were to just put him in the bowl with straight tap or even bottled water.
As for adding aquarium salt? No. Bettas don't do well with salt.
And salt does not keep the bowl clean.

Answer 4

really if it's a betta they don't need their bowl prepared, I've had a betta for 3 years, "when it's only suppose to live for 2" and I have never added anything to the water, and I've used tap water every time i change it's water.

Answer 5

ooh, i've had a betta fish once

um just use tap water, and it works, i dont think it needs anything specail, mine didnt at least. and for the quickest way to transfer it, put a bag over your hand and pick it up into the other bowl. But yea tap water should do you just fine.

Answer 6

If you add a pinch of sea salt every once in awhile, it will brighten their colors. Also, use the stress coat, I love that stuff. Be careful with the temp changes, I have had betas die on me b/c the water temp changed too fast. I have never been able to keep a beta alive long if I have other fish in the aquarium (except for the algae eater I have now) b/c other fish tend to hog the food and the beta seems to get weak, and as we all know in nature they tend to pick on the poor lil weak guys. I have had betas for 16 yrs now, and I traveled with them when I was in college and he survived 4 years. I have one now in a 5 gallon aquirium, spoiled rotten...

Answer 7

My brother is crazy about fish and he has a 2 beta fish. They like vases and aquariams. You don't have to treat the water cuz they are basically very easy to take care of. Just change the water once every 2 weeks and it should probably be fine

Answer 8

Get stress coat it creates an ick in the water for the bettas, and keeps them alive longer i strongly reccomend this i have five bettas and i swear by this stuff use it every time you change the water its called stress coat you can find it at petsmart

Answer 9

Tap water is generally fine other than the chlorine. You can get rid of chlorine by using a water treatment, or just leave it out for a couple of days. Please read up on taking care of you betta. See link.

Answer 10

In the wild they eat mainly insects and insect larvae. In the home they are normally fed pellets or flakes, and often supplemented with blood worms (which are larva), daphnia, or other types of fresh, frozen, or freeze-dried foods. My own betta's live off of small pellets and bloodworms.

Answer 11

these fish surive and live in little dirty puddles of water in japan and in asian countries, so dont stress. about the clean water thing, they dont care! but make sure u dont buy 2 and put them in the same bowl, or esle u will be in trouble, by the morning there might be one or none! lol