Hey so I'm trying to figure out the best way to transport my betta back up to school with me. I've had him with a friend the past 10 months and I'm getting him back in a couple of days after my tank is cycled again. He'll be in there for around two weeks before I have to go back and I'm worried if that's too short of a time and it would add to the stress of him moving. Also when I do move him it will be a 4.5 hour trip and I'm not sure how to go about that safely. Thanks.
@notdaredvl Hey there :)Two weeks is a pretty long time (my bettas made an 8-10 hr car ride and were without tanks for around 24-36 hours when I moved) and they seemed to settle in after a day or two, so I don’t see any big problems with you having him for a few weeks before moving with him~A 4.5 hour trip isn’t that long and your betta should be okay :) There are a few ways to transport them. I used gallon jars (I found them at goodwill, I liked them because they were more square and weren’t tall/skinny) to move my fish. They stayed pretty warm behind my driver’s seat, wedged between some boxes and the bench seat of my truck (so they wouldn’t get tossed around). Some people use insulated thermoses to keep their fish warm. Some people will transport them in coolers w/ dividers too.tips:- Transport them in a bag, if you can. Sometimes an LFS/LPS will bag your fish for you, and if they know it’s for a car trip they should leave more air than water in the bag and make sure it’s sealed up good and tight. In a jar or cup, the water tends to slosh around quite a bit, but in a bag the sloshing is less so. I actually put the fish in gallon baggies, and then the baggies went inside the jars (partially to protect the fish from any substances that might be on the inside of the jars since I got them from good will and partially to keep sloshing to a minimum). I didn’t close the baggies, though, since the car trip was going to be so long.- keep a thermometer handy. If you’re gonna make a few stops, you’ll probably want to check on your wiggles. You can put a thermometer in each transport tank/cup/bag or keep one out so you can check the temps once you stop. There’s not much you can do about the water temp without a heater, but just knowing the temp gave me peace of mind~- If you start out with warm water and keep the transport device insulated/wrapped then the heat won’t escape so fast. You can also use styrofoam sheets + box (with your bag or cup or jar inside) to insulate.
- Keep your filter media wet! If it dries out, you might lose your cycle :/ I put my sponges and ceramic media in baggies full of water and then put them inside the empty tanks, in case any of the bags leaked. You can also double bag them or ask your LFS/LPS for some bags! :p
-Take some old tank water or water from where you are with you (if you can, like in a 5 gallon bucket or something). A pH swing can be really harmful to your fish! I moved from a place where the pH is closer to 8.0+ (I used a pH buffer) to a place where the pH is around 7.0-7.2. Being able to slowly acclimate them to a different pH helped! If you can’t transport water, you can drip acclimate your bettas if the pH is drastically different from where you were before.This post might also be helpful! :p
If anyone has any other helpful tips, tricks, info, corrections, suggestions, etc. feel free to leave a comment or reblog or let me know! :)
