Zombie Fish...Or My Daughter's Divine Pet

[CU Tiger]

Ok my daughter has a small 1.5 gallon fish tank with a single Beta fish in her room. A nice simple easy to care for pet.

So Thursday afternoon my wife mentions said fish has died, only we do not get a chance to deal with it before my daughter gets home. That night my daughter feeds her fish like normal and goes to bed. We have just recently finished dealing with a family death and really didnt want to re open some of this with my daughter so we planned to swap the fish while she was at school (ok it is emotionally lazy, I get it but sue me...its a hectic time and easier on the kid) Well we have been gone all weekend tonight my daughter is getting ready for bed and comes into our room sobbing that her fish is dead.

D'Oh!

Ok so we have the talk, calm her down and then prepare to flush the fish and tell her we will get a replacement this week. We all agree and prepare to flush the fish down the toilet. So I go with her to scoop it out, when she yells, "Daddy pinky is swimming"...crud aerator is blowing the fish around now we have to grieve again. Nope I go in there and sure enough swimming like all is well.

A few hours later and its doing the belly up float again, I open the top to get it out and it immediately kicks to life and swims to the bottom.

This thing either is part cat and truly has 9 lives or it beats all I ever saw.

[EagleFan]

Preparation for zombie invasion 2012?

[Groundhog]

Hmmm... something very similar happened to a steak I was eating on the weekend. Intriguing.

[Abe Sargent]

Pix plz, k thx

[CU Tiger]

Originally Posted by Abe Sargent

Pix plz, k thx

Of the fish?

[DaddyTorgo]

that's pretty weird CU

[Abe Sargent]

Originally Posted by CU Tiger

Of the fish?

Yeah!

[Lorena]

I wonder if betas do that for the fun? When we first got Newberry, the thing would just lay there motionless and I thought it'd died for sure. I'd tap on the fish bowl and everything.. nothing. Nothing like what your fish did tho, that's nuts.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Apparently this isn't unsual

Swim bladder disorder and/or overfeeding
Do beta fish play dead????? - Yahoo! Answers
Playing Dead or Dying - New Betta Fish
Water too cold
Why is my BETA FISH PLAYING DEAD? - Yahoo! Answers

[AZSpeechCoach]

Bettas are tricky suckers. I killed "Alpha" a few times (cold water, unchanged water, etc.) and he kept coming back until he died of old age (18 months).

[Lorena]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Apparently this isn't unsual

Swim bladder disorder and/or overfeeding
Do beta fish play dead????? - Yahoo! Answers
Playing Dead or Dying - New Betta Fish
Water too cold
Why is my BETA FISH PLAYING DEAD? - Yahoo! Answers

Thanks Jon, what would we do w/out you

That makes sense, when we got Newberry the water wasn't clean and that's when we noticed it.

[CU Tiger]

Hmmm...well we have had this one a while (maybe a year and a half or so) we have 2 snails that keepm the tank clean and we change the water every 4-5 months....its been a month or so since it was changed, IOW no real changes recently...still strange.

[tarcone]

I had a beta that lived for about 3 years. Changed the water regularily using filtered water. Had a big rock in its bowl that it hung out in. Came to the top when it saw me. Great pet.

[AZSpeechCoach]

Originally Posted by tarcone

I had a beta that lived for about 3 years. Changed the water regularily using filtered water. Had a big rock in its bowl that it hung out in. Came to the top when it saw me. Great pet.

I would handfeed mine. I would stick some betta chow onto the tip of my finger, and he would jump (couple of millimeters, but still) out of the water and eat the food. Sometimes he would hang on my finger for a half second...good times.

[Lorena]

Originally Posted by tarcone

I had a beta that lived for about 3 years. Changed the water regularily using filtered water. Had a big rock in its bowl that it hung out in. Came to the top when it saw me. Great pet.

Ours does the same. He was a bit shy at first but now it's almost like he's glad to see us.

Originally Posted by AZSpeechCoach

I would handfeed mine. I would stick some betta chow onto the tip of my finger, and he would jump (couple of millimeters, but still) out of the water and eat the food. Sometimes he would hang on my finger for a half second...good times.

That's cool! Any tips?

We trained Newberry so when he hears us tap the fishbowl 3 times, it's feeding time and he swims towards us ready to eat. They really are great little pets.

[Glengoyne]

We have clown loaches that do the playing dead bit as well. They will just lie on their side on the bottom. Sometimes singly...sometimes stacked up like cord wood. Lying still on thier side, until you get close to the tank. One of them stepped it up a notch. He now regularly floats on his side at the surface, grotesquely curved into a semi-circle. He just hangs out there.