Proper Care & Treatment of Betta Splendens "bettas"

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This topic has 18sd replies, 11 voices, and was last updated 16 years, 9 months ago by Lion_Lop_Lover.

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- 07/27/2008 at 9:49 AM
  Lion_Lop_Lover
  Participant
  971 posts
  Bettas are absolutely incredible fish. They have personalities galore, are relatively easy to maintain (in most cases) and can be terrific companions for up to six years. However, bettas are also one of the most abused and misused of fish, because many myths exist about their care and behaviour.
  
  Often, one will find bettas stuffed into small cups in pet stores, lined up with no heater, no maintenance, and no cup lids. These cups do not get changed regularly, if at all, and many times you will find a sick, lifeless betta hanging in inches of feces and mess. Other times, you will find 2 males in the same tank, having been dumped together by some sick teenagers or children, purposely placed together so they will have no other choice but to fight. These cups are often so small the betta cannot turn properly, it is in a constant state of arousal by being so close to its neighbours (this can easily fatigue them and stress them), and the care they receive is so substandard.
  
  The next horrible thing one will occur is the complete lack of knowledge about these fish from employees. “It can live in a cup, feed it once a week, you’ll never need to change the tank, they don’t need heaters, etc” that sort of advice. All of this information is incorrect. Bettas originate in Thailand, where they live in rice paddies…not mud puddles. These rice paddies are very shallow, yes but they are enormous; up to one acre sometimes. Thus, bettas can live in unoxygenated shallow water, but shallow does not mean small.
  
  The proper size tank for a betta is 2.5 gallons. This gives the betta enough room to swim happily, guard a territory, and means that you will only be doing tank maintenance once per week. Minimum tank size is 1 gallon. Not these 1/4 gallon or 8 oz “betta tanks” that you see in stores, bursting with “Keep your betta happy here! Low maintenance! Feed once a week!” These myths have been the death of thousands and thousands of bettas who perish only weeks after being placed in these type of enclosures.
  
  Bettas, additionally, are tropical fish. They need a stable temperature between 74-78 degrees fahrenheit. Bettas in store cups will often appear lifeless and colourless. This is because they are cold. With no heater, bettas in stores often live in 70 degree water, which is too cold. A proper heater should be used to maintain a stable temperature. Bettas are incredibly susceptible to temperature fluctuations.
  
  The great thing about bettas is that they do not need filtration, necessarily. Bettas have a labyrinth organ, which means they go up to the surface and breathe air. Unfortunately, this means that pet stores CAN get away with keeping them in cups…because the betta, when lacking sufficient oxygen, will take a breath of air. Bettas, therefore CAN be kept without filtration. Most times, male bettas despise filters because their delicate fins act as sails and the water current causes them to get flung around.
  
  Proper tank maintenance means cleaning the ENTIRE tank out…getting rid of the poop stuck in the gravel, cleaning plants, and then putting in fresh water that is around the same temp as the previous water. A 1/2 gallon tank would need to be cleaned every 3 days, a 1 gallon every 5, and a 2.5 gallon once per week. A 5 gallon tank can be vacuumed 25% of its water once a week.
  
  Betta diet is also very important. They are carnivores, and demand food every day. Pelleted foods are often easiest for them, feeding 3 pellets twice a day is sufficient. Many of you may have seen the dreaded “betta vase” where a betta is kept in a minute amount of water with a lilly plant, and the instructions say never to feed the fish and never to clean its tank, because it creates an ‘ecosystem’. This cannot be further from the truth. Bettas eat insects and meat, and should be fed a protein rich diet. This includes pellets, blood worms, daphnia, chicken meat, etc.
  
  A betta, properly cared for, can live up to six years. They have incredible individual personalities that make them very appealing.
  
  An amazing site which I am a moderator at is http://www.ultimatebettas.com
  
  Bettas are terrific fish, but they do require more time and care than the pet store makes it seem they do.
- 07/27/2008 at 10:00 AM
  kimberleyanddarren
  Participant
  2520 posts
  interesting, do u have any betta fish? personally (and this may be because im in the UK) i have never heard or seen one until i just clicked that website link and i certainly have never seen a fish in a cup.. but we all need to learn about different animals so thanks for the info!
- 07/27/2008 at 10:09 AM
  LittlePuffyTail
  Moderator
  18092 posts
  I had a Betta Fish named Leonard. He was “rescued” from the typical, pet store cup. He was a very beautiful fish. I just loved to watch him. I eventually had to give him to my Mother to live because my kitten was totally obssessed with him and actually knocked his tank off the dresser several times, luckily we were in the house at the time. He is now 4 years old and Mom just loves him.
  
  It’s great you are trying to inform people about these pets. They are similar to rabbits in the way people and stupid petstores think they are “low maintenance”.
- 07/27/2008 at 11:54 AM
  Beka27
  Participant
  16016 posts
  i forwarded this info to one of my friends. she had a betta fish for about a year, bought one of those double-sided tanks and got a second one. the first died within a week. i now wonder if that was b/c of the increased arousal thing. i admit i never gave them a lot of thought, altho i knew they should not be in very small cups or bowls. my friend kept hers in a tiny cup for months, and i told her every week that she had to get a bigger tank. i finally went and bought one myself b/c i was so tired of the poor little fish having no room. we had some growing up, they each had one of those hexagonal 1 gallon plastic tanks with the little bubbler thing. we never used heaters, but we didn’t know it was necessary.
- 07/27/2008 at 1:28 PM
  BuntBun
  Participant
  46 posts
  How sad that they are mistreated… I have a betta fish named Pie, who lives in a big fish tank on my desk… (well its not that big… but its bigger than those cheep tanks all those bad stores sell…) I only clean mine like every three weeks though… only cuz the gravel i got is this special kind that like… does something to the water so its like… okay i really don’t know what it exactly does… but it does SOMETHING with the poo and pee of my fishy… anyways, my fish is quite happy!
- 07/27/2008 at 3:27 PM
  MooBunnay
  Participant
  3087 posts
  what good information! I want to go get one right now…. I don’t suppose there is a betta rescue shelter is there ? I just typed “fish” into petfinder but the closest place was Kentucky…darn…
- 07/27/2008 at 6:51 PM
  Scarlet_Rose
  Participant
  4293 posts
  Lion_Lop, thank you so much for sharing the information on Betta’s. I had one for about 5 years in a larger tank and the strange thing is, he loved the bubbler. He would swim into the stream and “go with the flow.” I wonder if that really was because he liked it or not now. This is all so very interesting and I have thought recently of purchasing one again. I’ll have to think very carefully about it and buy a big tank for him.
  
  Also, are the males the only ones with the big colorful trailing fins? How come females are not sold in the stores?
- 07/28/2008 at 5:17 AM
  Lion_Lop_Lover
  Participant
  971 posts
  Thank you all.
  
  Yes, I did have bettas at one point ; I owned 50 at my maximum, am now down to one because it became very demanding. I also imported $400 worth of Thai quality bettas from Thailand (approximately 20 fish). I also have bred Thai Quality bettas (not pet store ones, they should never be bred).
  
  Males usually are the ones sporting the magnificient colours and finnage, but there are different types of betta; tail types – halfmoon, doubletail, plakat, crowntail, etc. Females of these different finnages are often very colourful (but these are usually the ones that are specially bred). Pet store bettas are so overbred that they can lack what veiltails should be sporting.
  
  Females are sold in pet stores, but they are very territorial as well and often you can find them crammed into tanks together nipping and biting each other. You can keep females together, but you have to have a really big tank, a lot of females, and a lot of hiding places.
- 07/28/2008 at 6:24 AM
  bigsis7
  Participant
  732 posts
  Thanks for posting this! Many people should know how to take care of a betta! I am trying to get some half moon bettas to breed as I’ve been researching it a couple years. I have bred guppies, but you don’t need to much work for that. I am looking into getting one of the mustard (?) bettas. They are so pretty!!
- 07/28/2008 at 7:42 AM
  BeeElleEss
  Participant
  19 posts
  Thank you so much for posting this! Poor betas suffer so dearly from people who just don’t take the time to research, and I know this because I was one of them. Just like bunnies, I had assumptions about them because of what pet stores led on to, but after doing research on them (because many of mine continued to pass away), I found the truth. I’ve been wanting to get a six gallon tank and house three females, but after rescuing my latest bunny, my mother has drawn the line for any more pets (or at least that is what she thinks, ha ha). So anyway, I appreciated this and have bookmarked the forum that you moderate on for use should I decide to rescue betas.
- 07/28/2008 at 12:05 PM
  kimberleyanddarren
  Participant
  2520 posts
  wow i have never heard of a betta fish before until this post, is it a common thing in america? the only fish we really have here are goldfish unless you go to a tropical specialist and they are mainly those large fish for those wall tanks? anyway inice to know you have to look up information on every animal before you buy!
- 07/28/2008 at 1:01 PM
  Kokaneeandkahlua
  Participant
  12067 posts
  Thanks for sharing that-too many times I’ve seen them so terribly kept in those little cups in the store… So sad. We had a beta once (we call them siameze fighting fish) we had him with a group of other fish, mostly guppies and he lived happily for years in a large tank with other fish.
  
  K&D I’m sooo happy to hear that this doesn’t go on in the UK!!!
- 07/28/2008 at 2:18 PM
  Beka27
  Participant
  16016 posts
  Lion Lop. have you ever heard of a “Jack Dempsey” chichlid fish? my friend who has the betta just got one of those from her brother. i looked it up online but couldn’t get much info…
- 07/28/2008 at 4:46 PM
  Lion_Lop_Lover
  Participant
  971 posts
  Jack Dempsey’s are a very very aggressive cichlid, need a big tank and need rough tankmates because they are mean (names after the boxer I believe).
  
  http://www.fishprofiles.com should have a good profile on them.
  
  bigsis – breeding bettas is seven thousand times more difficult than breeding guppies. It takes a lot of research, a lot of patience, and a lot of juvenile male tanks (up to 500) to house the individual babies once they reach 5 weeks old.
- 07/28/2008 at 6:44 PM
  bigsis7
  Participant
  732 posts
  Yep! Got all the supplies just need fish……..
- 07/29/2008 at 1:46 AM
  kimberleyanddarren
  Participant
  2520 posts
  i cant believe anyone would keep a fish in a cup? how weird! and i always thought those large 2.5 gallon tanks which the pet stores always use are too small!
- 07/29/2008 at 3:48 AM
  Lion_Lop_Lover
  Participant
  971 posts
  Go to http://www.aquabid.com to order them; amazing place, it’s where I got my expensive ones.
- 07/29/2008 at 11:34 AM
  Lightchick
  Participant
  1017 posts
  Hi, Lion Lop & All1
  
  LL, thank you so much for starting this thread! I’ve been out of town for several days (Lizzy came with me to San Diego! She thinks it’s great fun to terrorize my boyfriend and run rampant in HIS apartment!), and just got back to this site.
  
  I will definitely look into getting larger tanks. Like I said, the ones I have were the largest ones in the “Betta” section, but it sounds like I should look outside that section..
  
  A couple questions…
  
  In the books I’ve read, they say NOT to clean out the entire tank on a cleaning, because it dumps out all the helpful bacteria (I may be wrong..maybe it was algae? I don’t have the book in front of me…). So once a week I use a siphon to vacuum out all the junk on the bottom of the tank , and if the tank starts to look cloudy or anything starts visibly growing on the walls/plant, THEN I scoop up the fish and dump the entire tank. But you’re saying I should be doing the full dumping out and scrubbing of the tank every 3 days?
  
  Also, I would love some help with my sickly fish. I have now had 2 fish (Wasabi and Ebi…yes there’s a theme!) die after seeming to get locked/fused fins. I tried 2 different kinds of “Betta fix”, and several kinds of medication that I found from a Betta site (I will now definitely check out the one you mentioned!). Again, I’m sorry, the medicines are at home and I’m still in San Diego, so I can’t look up the medications right now. And now, only a couple days after Ebi’s death, Teriyaki is sick with seemingly the same thing. Have you seen anything like this? It’s as though their fins stiffen up, and they prop themselves up in the tree so they can reach the surface to get air, and don’t move. Is the small tank causing this? I wash off the siphon with scalding hot water between cleaning the fish tanks to try to avoid cross-contamination, so I don’t know what I’m doing wrong.
  
  Uni is my oldest fish, and I’ve had him a year. The others are getting sick after 5 or 6 months. I would love it if I could keep my poor sweet fish for 6 years!
  
  Also, I started feeding my fish when I got them with the flakes that came with the tank. The books I’ve found say I should try to give them a variety of food, but they won’t eat pellets or anything but the flakes. Is that okay?
  
  I didn’t know Bettas were such an American thing until reading your guys’ posts! Yes, they are everywhere in US petstores. When you first walk in to most petstores, there are bettas in individual little plastic tumblers stacked 2 high and 4 deep, with no room in the container for the poor fish to move. The reason I had 5 was because everytime I went in the petstore, I found some poor beautiful fish, and couldn’t stand leaving him to certain death in that awful little cup… Except for now they’re getting sick under my care and I feel terrible…
- 07/29/2008 at 3:17 PM
  Lion_Lop_Lover
  Participant
  971 posts
  Your tank is a 1/2 gallon, it needs to be dumped fully and cleaned every 3 days. Bigger tanks that have filtration have good bacteria in the gravel and filter media, but a small tank will not. Anything under 10 G without a filter will not have beneficial bacteria.
  
  You need to (1) scoop up the fish and put him in a cup of the old tank water. (2) Dump out the entire tank of water, thoroughly cleanse the gravel and scrub the sides of the tank and any plants. (3) Put in new tank water, same temp, add dechlorinator, and if it’s around the same degrees you can just dump him back in.
  
  Repeat every 3 days. Yes, it’s necessary. If you put it off, he will get sick, which is what is sounds like is happening.
  
  Bettafix is a crap medication, it does nothing. If they have clamped fins (1) what is the temp of the water? (2) they may have ick or columnaris, which can be treated with Maracyn 2 or QuickCure. If you make a post on ultimatebettas the whole lot of us can help, and pictures are really helpful. But it sounds like velvet or ick or columnaris.
  
  The flakes that come with those tanks are horrible. Like I said, pellets are the way to go. I feed mine Omega One Betta Buffet Pellets; they are incredibly good for the fish and bettas can eat pellets much easier than flakes. He’ll eat the pellets eventually, just starve him for a few days (yes, this is fine) and he’ll eat them.
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