Finally: A vet for fish!

I heard the most amazing interview on one of my podcasts today. It was an old episode of The Vetpodcast. Check out Dr. Gregor's work here:



Back up a moment. I have long been a fan of the Betta. You may be more familiar with the fish's common name: the Siamese Fighting Fish. I however dislike the dreadful practices associated with that name, so I call them by their scientific name. I digress. Betta are lovely fish, easy to care for surprisingly interactive. They are also fairly resilient. Until they're not. Often when I'd go in to the pet store to buy food, I'd see one or two little fishies that looked ill. I'd point it out to the clerks, but almost invariably the attitude was: "It's a fish. It'll get better on its own or we'll flush it." I found this indifference appalling. So I'd usually buy the fish and attempt to treat it on my own, with varying degrees of success.

What I found particularly irritating was that if I were to buy a fish destined for the porcelain sea at night and go back the following day and ask how to treat it, they would suggest all sorts of helpful treatments. Of course they didn't know the fish in question was the one I'd purchased from their apathetic establishment the previous night. It seemed rather a false dichotomy. I know much of this has to do with money. It occurs to me however that if more people knew fish vets existed, fewer fish would be flushed. I have yet to come across the American Equivalent, but check out this UK site: