Crowntails especially have to be housed alone as they do have a
nasty temper

Hehe, remember Anemone...All Bettas are indivduals.
I'm looking at my Crowntail male right now. He's in his 3g Eclipse tank
along with about 8 Molly fry. They rage in size from barely an inch
long, to would fit nicely into his mouth.
He doesn't mind them a bit, and nore does he ttry to eat them.
Just today I was cracking up and the tiniest of the fry. At feeding
time the Betta was checking out the piece of Algae wafer I drop in for
the Mollies to snack on and that mini Molly nipped at the Betta as if
to say "Hey man, that's my food." = )~
My daughter's Betta will kill anything you put into his tank.....NO
MATTER the size. He doesn't care. He's about 4 yrs old now and just as
spunky as the day we bought him.
He's killed:
2 African Dwarf Frogs
2 Otocinclus cats (different times).
Countless fry
2 Ghost Shrimp.
Poor things turned into expensive snacks.

Its a good thing you specifies that you didn't put the fancy ones in....i
mean if you told a begginer to put guppies in a tank wih a betta...what are
the chances of them buying the fancy ones, putting them in with the betta
and then coming back here to yell at you? hehehe!
"mike" wrote in message
...
i always put the feeder guppies in with them never the fancy ones... Just
plain grey guppies...


"anemone" wrote in message
...
IMHO...i wouldnt put male bettas with guppies (esp. the fancy ones)
because
of thier tails and similarity to the male betta
"mike" wrote in message
...
Ive had mine in with neon tetras... You can also put in some guppies or
other types of tetras that are as small as the neon... basicly anything
that
wont bother the betta, or nip at its fins....

My Fish Site
http://www.mikesfishsite.com


"sb" wrote in message
...
Hi all,

Sorry if this is not the correct forum for posting.

I currently have a male betta in a tank on his own. Can anyone
suggest
fish
he *might* like as I'm worried he might get lonely or bored. I know
they
are
quite sociable and that 2 bettas together tend to fight so obviously
wasnt
thinking about another betta.

Any suggestions appreciated.

Thanks!

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In article .com,
Tynk wrote:
What colors are you working with? Got any butterflys or yellows?
I haven't bred any for the past 4 yrs.
I like working with Cambodians - Multi's, pastels, and my fav White
Opaques. (I couldn't get the opaques to spawn though, so they don't
count).
When I do start up again, I will for sure be doing Crowntails. I'm
still trying to convince a local shop that gets good stock from a
breeder, to bring in some Halfmoons.
I would love to bring Halfmoons to the general hobbyist at normal Betta
prices.
I'm a bit against the outrageous prices some of these breeders charge
for Bettas. I can almost see it if these fish lived long lives, like
Oscar's, etc....but they don't. I could see it if these fish were
extremely hard to breed, or only bred every so many years...etc...but
they're not. I cannot justify the prices these breeders are charging,
so I keep bugging them to bring on the Halfmoon's, hehe. = )


Oh I dunno, the prices aren't too bad if you look aorund. There's
lots of good HM fish in the 5-10-20-50 range. You can get nice
fish for $20/pr.

Neevr did like crowntails though, they look a bit ragged to me. I
think it's gone too far; Ididn't mind the famout Eduard Schmidt Folke
picture of the red betta on the old TFH looseleaf binder cover;
that's about as much of a crowntain as I can take.

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In article .com,
Tynk wrote:
And in my house its 72F and if you got your
room temps about right you wont need a heater...

And temp is your Betta's tank at??
It's too cold for Bettas. 72*f is much too cold for Bettas, and room
temp water will be less than that.
You need a heater.
Please research the proper care of Bettas if you won't listen to anyone
here...especially a breeder. Sheesh.


If the fish is happy at 70 it's hard to argue with that. Bettas
are all individuals rememebr?

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In article ,
Elaine T wrote:
Richard Sexton wrote:
In article ,
Elaine T wrote:

mike wrote:

i always put the feeder guppies in with them never the fancy ones... Just
plain grey guppies...


Makes sense, but aren't you afraid of the diseases feeders carry? I
wonder how Endler's would do with bettas. *ponder*


As Innes said "the best food for fish is fish" and Endlers are
jsut the right size!

ROFL. I haven't seen Endler's in the flesh (or in the fins) to visualize
how small they are. Well, you just saved some Endler's or disappointed
my betta.

They can be pretty small. Occasionally the ones I have throw a "giant"
that's almost as big as a fancy guppy, but figure on average about helf
the size of the big monster fancy guppies. Famales are much bigger
of course.

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Tynk wrote:
Crowntails especially have to be housed alone as they do have a
nasty temper

Hehe, remember Anemone...All Bettas are indivduals.
I'm looking at my Crowntail male right now. He's in his 3g Eclipse tank
along with about 8 Molly fry. They rage in size from barely an inch
long, to would fit nicely into his mouth.
He doesn't mind them a bit, and nore does he ttry to eat them.
Just today I was cracking up and the tiniest of the fry. At feeding
time the Betta was checking out the piece of Algae wafer I drop in for
the Mollies to snack on and that mini Molly nipped at the Betta as if
to say "Hey man, that's my food." = )~
My daughter's Betta will kill anything you put into his tank.....NO
MATTER the size. He doesn't care. He's about 4 yrs old now and just as
spunky as the day we bought him.
He's killed:
2 African Dwarf Frogs
2 Otocinclus cats (different times).
Countless fry
2 Ghost Shrimp.
Poor things turned into expensive snacks.

4 years old? Wow. The longest I've managed in a heated, filtered tank
is 2.5 years, and I've read 2-3 years on breeder websites. Is that
right, or should bettas live longer?

--
__ Elaine T __
__' http://eethomp.com/fish.html '__

Tynk wrote:
Tynk wrote:

Elaine,
Bettas are sociable to a point.
Within the Betta society, there is a hierarchy. If this didn't

happen,

then they wouldn't be sociable.
Just not the same type of sociable that comes to mind.



Ah. You mean sort of like cichlid sociable? Can they set up colonies
in large enough tanks? I know females will live together with a
cichlid-like heirarchy but what happens with the males?

Yeah, Elaine..I think it's probably like a Cichlid society. Not always
peaceful, but with purpose..rules, a big boss, and always the pne that
gets picked on...
Now in the wild the males all stake out territories. Remember, they
only have small amounts of water during the dry season, and otherwise
their water is usually 12-18" deep.
Each male has an area and defends it against other males....usually
with a show of fins, flaring and a nip or chase and the intruder flees.
No fight to the death in the wild....that's just for shows where
they're in small jars being fought and there's no where for the loser
to flee to. Therefore the wounds are inflicted that otherwise would not
be and the fish usually dies from it's injuries, not the actual winner.
Now, depending on the individual males..some may be able to stake out
territories in something like a 55g, 75g or larger and the pair of
males tolerates each other without too much hostility.
Usually this is VERY rare, and mostly only with spawn siblings that
have never been separated...evenfor water changes.
This is something I don't advise, as you never know when a squabble
would turn nasty and you may not be home to catch it in time.
I will say that I once had spawn brothers occupy a 29g together. Then
one day...I'm talking years later, they decided to go at it and I
returned into the room to find one of them in shreds.
After that, no matter if I had peaceful brothers that seemed not to
spar long after all the others needed to be separated, I sitll would
not try it. It's just not worth it. In the wild they always have some
place to flee to. Not in a tank.

Interesting stuff. Thanks! I didn't realize males don't fight as
violently in the wild as they do even in large tanks. I guess wild
bettas can always get away even if it means jumping out of the water and
wriggling through mud to another pool of water. No wonder they're such
jumpers and escape artists.

--
__ Elaine T __
__' http://eethomp.com/fish.html '__

"Tynk" wrote in message
oups.com...
Yeah, Elaine..I think it's probably like a Cichlid society. Not always
peaceful, but with purpose..rules, a big boss, and always the pne that
gets picked on...
snip Now, depending on the individual males..some may be able to stake
out
territories in something like a 55g, 75g or larger and the pair of
males tolerates each other without too much hostility.
Usually this is VERY rare, and mostly only with spawn siblings that
have never been separated...evenfor water changes.

I discovered for myself that male bettas can sometimes tolerate quite close
quarters.

Long story, but basically I have a female-only tank which is usually
occupied by 4 or 5 females. Over time, 5 of my "females" have turned out to
be male plakats.

For various periods of time (I'm talking months), 3 of the 5 occupants of
the tank have been males. There were some fights, and the dominance order
changed from time to time. One of the 5 males had to be removed almost
immediately, but otherwise no-one was killed or even seriously injured --
nipped fins mainly. (The super-aggressive one is extremely aggressive all
the time, and has twice got over/through a divider and badly hurt the fish
next door).

I hasten to stress, though, that this happened by mistake -- the fish were
sold as juvie females. I separated them when I realised they were plakat
males. However, it was interesting that, apart from the one I mentioned,
these fish together showed little more aggression over time than a group of
all females. None of them were siblings, btw.

Also interesting to note that none showed any breeding behaviour, even when
they were sharing a tank with females. Once in separate quarters, they all
started making huge bubblenests. One that I gave away to a friend was bred
almost immediately, and has shown model male parenting behaviour.

Vicki PS

"Elaine T" wrote in message
om...
4 years old? Wow. The longest I've managed in a heated, filtered tank is
2.5 years, and I've read 2-3 years on breeder websites. Is that right, or
should bettas live longer?

It sounds like a happy old man to me ;)

Oz

--
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I know of bettas living over 5 years.