my new betta, grimace, seems to be doing just fine. however, i noticed a rather disturbing thing about him yesterday. you know the "beard" that they have? it is the flap of loose membrane that hangs out of their gills. anyway, grimace only seems to have it on one side. i set-up a little mirror next to his tank to get some pics of him flaring and i was startled to find that when he flares, its a lopsided one. hes not sick or anything. he eats fine and is very active. i think that he may have been born that way (deformed?). upon closer inspection with a pen light (and a mirror to make him flare) i can see that he has one in there but its not anywhere near as big as the other one. it actually looks somewhat deformed.

has anybody seen or heard of this before?

also, im pretty positive that this is un-related but, have any of you ever had a betta that took a while to settle down? grimace seems to like to swim along the tank sides in a zig-zag pattern. kind of like hes looking for a way out and into the water that hes sure that is outside of his tank. in fact, it closely resembles the "feed me" dance that goldies do when its feeding time.

any thoughts on this?

thanks in advance for any input!

good morning probably it is a deformity if he is healthy and active..

regarding the movement, my betta Pharoah does the same thing, like he is looking for someone else. where did you get him? did he have other bettas all around him? maybe he is lonely..

Paul, My Chicken has a smaller "beard" on one side, (thanks I didn't know what it was called). I never gave any thought to it I just thought it was him. He also comes swimming around the front when I sit here. Sometimes in the evening I catch him doing the dance at the back of the tank, I guess I thought he just wanted out to play, he sees outside from that angle.

I hope nothing is wrong with Grimace. I'll be following along to see what others say if you don't mind.

Laurie

thanks laurie and slf.

im beginning to think that it is indeed genetic. or maybe he had some complications as a fry. who knows? either way, he seems to be very healthy and happy.