Before making that purchase from your local fish store or an online source, encourage responsible ownership by reading up as much as you can with regards to betta keeping to keep your fishes healthy and happy.
Here are some general rearing tips shared by fellow enthusiasts that would hopefully be of some help :)
Housing: The general rule in betta housing is the smaller the tank, the more frequent you have to conduct water changes to prevent waste produced from building up to toxic levels. A betta living in 2 litres of water should have its water changed approximately once every 3 days.
Water Conditions: Whenever providing your betta with fresh water, it is important to remove chlorine and chloramine beforehand as these are unfriendly chemicals to your fish. Ammonia produced by a betta's waste can be detrimental to its health when accumulated at higher concentrations. Therefore, it is necessary to provide regular water changes depending on the size of the tank. Some hobbyists make use of the extract from ketapang leaves for its soothing/medicinal properties and general maintenance as well as to help promote betta breeding.
Diet: Bettas enjoy live food such as bloodworms or tubifex worms. For the owner who prefers convenience, bettas are also able to be trained to take pellet food. A variety in diet is always the best for the well-being of your betta. Many hobbyists prefer feeding frozen bloodworms to juvenile/adult bettas over live tubifex worms as they are much cleaner and convenient to store. Feeding your betta at least twice a day would ensure better overall health.
Exercise: At the least, flaring your bettas a couple of minutes before each feeding session is a good way to work their appetite up and keep them in shape.
Illnesses & Medication: More often than not, a betta falls ill due to a sudden change in water parameter that causes its immune system to weaken and allows existing pathogens to invade and propagate internally or externally on the fish. Some of the more common and contagious external diseases that are seen in bettas include Velvet and White Spot (Ich). Internal problems include swim bladder problems and dropsy. The first step for betta longevity is to be able to spot the symptoms of these diseases early. Velvet is rather easy to detect by the appearance of gold dust speckled all across the surface of the fish. Similarly, white spots are so called for the appearance of white dots on any external surface of the betta but are less numerous and more pronounced than velvet. Swim bladder problems caused by disease usually indicate poor water conditions and with daily 100% water changes and tank cleaning, the fish should recover on its own. Dropsy is a condition whereby there is unusual fluid retention within the internal organs of the fish which makes its scales protrude out, giving the fish a "porcupine" appearance. Unfortunately, dropsy usually results in fish fatality. Nonetheless, treat all internal problems like swim bladder problems and dropsy with commercial fish medication specific to the illness. I use what is known as japanese yellow powder (Take care not to over medicate). Each type of disease has a corresponding medication which can be easily found online or simply by asking around at your local fish shop.
Breeding: When you have a healthy, disease-free male and female betta pair that are over 3 months of age, you can consider breeding them to achieve a desired trait in its offspring. The first step in this process is known as the conditioning period. Place the male in the intended spawn tank (approximately 1ft x 1ft x 1ft should be sufficient) with the female in a transparent housing within the same tank as the male. During this period, feed the pair slightly more than the usual to allow the female to store more eggs and the male to store energy to blow and maintain its bubblenest as well as to look after the fries for the next 3 days till they are free swimming. If the pair are seen to be actively flaring at each other, it is a sign of good chemistry between them. Usually after 24-48 hours of conditioning, the female would be introduced into the spawn tank with the male already inside. In order to reduce fin damage to both parties during the courtship ritual, be sure to place some water plants inside the spawn tank to allow the female some respite in the midst of the chase. When the pair begins to spawn, the male would be seen to perform a series of wrapping bouts around the female as eggs fall down to the bottom of the tank. The pair would then proceed to collect and place the eggs into the bubblenest the male should have blown by then. Once the male begins to aggressively chase the female away, such as when she is depleted of eggs, it signals the time to remove the female from the spawn tank. From this point forward, the male will look after the fries for up to 3 days till they are free swimming. At which point, the male may be removed from the spawn tank. Take good care of the parents and they will live to provide more than just the 1 spawn.
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| Conditioning the pair with female housed in transparent bottle. |
Breeding may sometimes fail due to several reasons:
1) Female is larger than the male, causing him to be too shy or get battered by the female. Remedy: Select a smaller female for the male or get a larger male for the female.
2) Male is an egg eater. Remedy: Only way to try to carry his genes on is to attempt artificial hatching immediately after the pair has finished spawning.
3) One of the parent is infertile. Remedy: None. Replace the infertile parent.
4) One of the parent is sick/undernourished/just not ready to spawn yet. Remedy: Allow that individual more time to recover and get pumped.
Fry Raising:
Food - After the parents have spawned, the eggs will take on average 36 hours to hatch and the fries would live off its yolk sac for the next 3 days after which it will become free swimming. At the free swimming stage, fries would feed on any microorganisms it can fit into its mouth be it infusoria or daphnia (in Singapore slang, daphnia is known as "boon"). Therefore, it is important to ensure there are live plants in the tank such as moss that provide these microorganisms. Some breeders have been known to use boiled chicken egg yolk in small quantities as under 1 week old fry food and to promote the growth of infusoria. Some breeders simply add daphnia once the fries are free swimming. Once the fries reach 2 weeks of age, they should be able to begin consuming small worms such as tubifex, grindal, black worms eventually weaning them off daphnia. At about 1.5months of age, fries can be trained to consume small sized pellet food as well. Variety in a fry's diet promotes healthy growth.
Housing - Depending on the size of a spawn, slowly upgrading the size of the fry grow-out tank will help speed their growth up.
Water - After the fries reach 2 weeks of age, it is important to siphon about half of the fry tank water out once every 2 days or more to boost fry health and growth rate.
Fry Sexing: In general, about 1mth+ of age and 1inch+ in body length, it should be possible to tell the gender of your individual fries based on the presence of an egg sac in females or none in males. It may be harder to tell in dark bodied specimens but minor trauma during water changes would cause some discolouration in your fries and make it easier to determine the presence of an egg sac.
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| Male is on the right. |