Sorry about this late post. I've been pretty busy–– ish. I mean, watching two Harry Potter movies, starting a new episode series, and doing a math camp at the same time is pretty busy if I do say so myself. Anyways, to the topic of this post: LuLu (my betta fish, if you remember) just died. An old post will remind you how much I fought for him (more like making a Google Slide show, but still).
Please have a moment of silence, loyal readers. He was a great fish. Comment a fish emoji in honor of him. His funeral will be on July 6th, 2021.
Luv
LuLu
A twin-tail half-moon betta fish
Oct 25th, 2020 ~ July 5th, 2021
May he rest in peace.
Recap of his life (with us):
Oct 25th, 2020: We brought LuLu home and he loved his new environment. I remember that he darted around in the little box we brought him home in when he first saw the sun. Sadly, that day, we had a power outage that lasted until midnight. Although LuLu's aquarium light, filter, and heater weren't on, he was still happy to be out of that little container we got him in.
After about two weeks, and a lot of research, I announced that I would start "betta school" in which I would teach LuLu tricks! That didn't last more than two weeks. But I succeeded in training LuLu to come up to my finger when I put it on the tank. That was progress.
Fast-forward to Thanksgiving break, we were going to New Orleans. Since LuLu was still pretty new we decided not to put an automatic feeder instead we were going to take him with us. We got a little tank and put in a familiar tank decoration. Then we moved LuLu in. It was an eight-hour drive so we had to put his tank in a little shoebox stuffed with tennis balls to keep his tank steady. We would stop every few hours to check on him. When we reached New Orleans, the first thing we did was carry LuLu inside. We put him upstairs and put in a water heater. Then while LuLu got used to his new tank we had dinner.
Unfortunately, LuLu got sick with swim bladder disease. Luckily it wasn't fatal and a few days of fasting fixed him right up.
The minute we put him back in his old tank, he started swimming around happily.
In winter break, however, we decided not to take a risk so we left him at home with an automatic feeder. And we called a family friend to come and check on him every couple of days. When we came back from our trip to New Jersey and Washington D.C., we found that he was bloated!! Though he was swimming enjoyably. So we gave the tank a scrub and fasted him for two days, and he was fine. Then we decided that we would not leave a living, breathing fish at the mercy of a piece of plastic.
So in our next New Orleans trip, we (1) made it short and (2) made the family friend check on LuLu and feed him every other day.
But then when mid-June came around, we all got busy and were unable to clean the tank for a while. Finally, on July 4th we started the process of cleaning the tank. We planned to do a full water change. We decided to put Lulu in a separate bowl with conditioned water.
So as soon as we put LuLu in a separate bowl, he stopped moving... His mouth was on the surface and he was frozen. I was certain it was from stress.
When the tank was clean, we put LuLu back but he refused to move. I did some research and every website said swim bladder disease. Which made sense because he has had problems with his swim bladder before. As the night wore on, Lulu was hooked to the surface. He started to turn pale. I didn't feed him that night and turned off the light early, even put on some relaxing music. That didn't seem to help. On the morning of July 5th, LuLu had sunk down to the bottom of the tank. That's when it dawned on me, the unbearable truth, that my first pet was dead.
I was too stunned to cry, too numb to make any expression. So I walked away.
My first pet, my first fish, my first LuLu will always be nestled inside my heart.
R.I.P LuLu
