A little help can do!

[myster619]

Ok i bought this albino female betta 2months ago and since then i hav been feeding it largely. I only want to breed her right now. But she's not developing any eggs, her stomach is still the same.Is this anything related to internal disorder or just its just not the right age.believe me my female is bigger than my dt male and male can blow impressive bubblenests!

[Nick_Pavlovski]

I suppose the ultimate test is to put her in with a male for a couple of days.

[blu]

Have you conditioned her..if so what foods did you use?How long?

[myster619]

im feeding her flakes, arowana pellets, and bedbugs if i can find them. I hav put her with the male since i bought her.I'll post pics soon.

[blu]

Uh what are bedbugs lol..she really should have been fed more live and frozen food like bloodworms and brine shrimp. If she doesnt look like she has eggs (and she may not b/c of food) you shouldnt put her with the male. If shes not ready to spawn he may kill her.

[Buppy]

he may kill hr?

[blu]

Yes if shes not showing signs of being ready to spawn he probably wont tolerate her in his territory...and if she doesnt show him signs(barring, swimming nose down, inspecting nest) within a few days/hours of being introduced he will probably chase and nip her relentlesly.....Most males will not tolerate females unless they are in spawning condition.....that is why the female should not be introduced unless properly conditioned(male must be conditioned also)

If he does tolerate an unconditioned female she is one lucky fish.

[squirt_12]

also...the female can't be bigger than the male cause the male had to beable to wrap around the female....so i don't think that you can breed this pair. But can you post a pic of the size comparison???

Also you HAVE to condition them for atleast 2 weeks.
Feeding them, frozen or freeze dried blood worms, frozen or live brine shrimp, flakes, white worms, and stuff like that. Feed this stuff to them in little amount (change what you feed them everyday) about 2-3 times a day. The male and female should both be conditioned like this. Also for the 2 weeks that you are doing this you should seperate them do that they get sad so that when they see each other they will be happy to see each other....it just helps them breed.

Also what kind/size of tank do you have them in??? also when you breed them they should only have about...3-6 inches of water to swim in and the tank should be long and fairly wide.

YOu need to have a styrofoam cup cut in half taped to the tank with about 1/8th of th ecup submersed...this helps the male create his bubblenest. You need the water temp. at around 80 degrees. Good lid on the top of the tank as you DO NOT want a cold draft to hit the surface of the tank. need plants on the opposite side of the cup for the female to hide in if the male starts to hurt her. Glss chimney...or cup for the female to be in while you are introducing them.

When the 2 weeks are up of conditioning. Bring the females jar over to the breeding tank. Add the male first...and then set the females bowl beside the tank. Keep it like that for 1 day. Then you can see that the male should have a descent size bubblenest going. Then add the female to the container. Make sure the top of the container is OUT of the water so that the betta can't get out and so that your male doesn't get in. Then you leave the female in there for about 1-2 days. Wait until the bubblenest has got big and the female should be showing bars (|||||) if she is darker in colour. Also she sohould have a big belly and fins pulled close to her and her head down. All of these things are clues that tell you that the female is ready to breed.
After about 1-2 days (depends on how fast the male creates the nest) release the famale. Now the male will chase her around and flare at her and also nip at her fins. This is normal. (my betta lost all of her fins before then bred) so DON'T WORRY. it is ok.
Now if it is their first time they may not breed...but thats ok..this way they can get to know each other.

When they are together they will swim together and such. So the female will either be scared..or ready to breed. If she is ready she will approach the nest with her head down and with her bars (|||||) if the male accepts then they will start to wrap. This usually happens in the morning. The processes of them wrapping can take up to 4 hours. They can lay up to 400 eggs.

Now...when they wrap the male will wrap around the female and squeze...they usually will sink to the bottom of the tank and lay there for a minute...then the male will slowly let go of the female and you will see about 5-15 eggs the size of a grain of salt fall from the female. THose are the eggs. When they are coming out of the female the male fertilizes them right there. They will fall to the bottom (the eggs) where the male will go and pick them up with his mouth (don't worry...he is not eating them) and then he will spit them into the nest where they will stay. After the wrap is done the female will float to the top like she is 'dead'..this is normal. She will soon revive (in about 1 minute MAX.) and then she will help the male.
When the wrapping process is done the male will keep the female to the other side of the tank. WHen this happens then you take her out and the male does all of the work.

Leave the dad in there. If the eggs fall from the nest he will pick them up and spit them back nto the nest.

When you add the male and the female in the tank. DO NOT FEED THEM...this distracts them. WHen you take the female out of the tnak add her to a tank with belamex and some aquarium salt to help her wounds heal an dnot grow fungus.

Ok the eggs wil hatch in about 2-4 days. depending on the temp. If the eggs are fertile they will be clear...but if they are white they are infertile.
When the eggs hatch little fry will fal from the nest (very small). When the fry are born they are born with an egg sac. So they can't swim very well. It will take the fry about 2 days to eat their egg sac. When the fry hatch the male will still be trying to keep them in the nest. (if it is his first try he MAY eat the fry...thats what mine did) but they usually don't. Ok well after the 2 days and the fry are swimming normally...TAKE THE MALE OUT...his job is done.

Ok in the next post i will tell you about the fry and them growing up.

I hope what i told you helps.

[squirt_12]

ok well after 2 days and when the fry are swimming on their own you will REMOVE THE MALE. Now...the fry are on their own.
At this stage the only will eat LIVE FOODS. THey will eat:
-micro worms
-infurasia (sp?)
-hakars (SP?) first bites (not live food but i have heard of some people having good luck with it)
-BBS (at 1 wek old) the fry are too small when first born to eat it.
-you can take an egg..boil it..take the yellow part and mash it up...ad some water to it and take an eye dropper...get some in the dropper and squish it out...this looksl ike it is moving so it gets the fry's attention and it is small enough for the fry to eat.
YOu will need to feed the fry live foods for about 6-8 weeks. YOu could try non-live foods but i am not guarenteeing thay it will work.
They will grow a little bit all of the time.

Ok well i will give you another up date becuase my hands are sore from tying...and well you don't have fry yet.
I will post some more tonight or tomorrow.

Curtis

[squirt_12]

ok...i am ready agian...i lied....lol sorry.


http://www.bettatalk.com/fry_growth.htm

go to that link and it will show you the sizes at which the fry grow at.

Ok...so they eat live food until about 5-7 weeks. at about 5 you can try and see if they will take crushed flake food but they might not take it.

At week 5 they will start to get thir labrynths. This is where you need to have NO COLD DRAFTS going into the tank. If you do you will kill the fry. At this point you will prob. lose some becuase they have weak labrynth organs. But you shouldn't lose too many. At about 7 weeks they actually stary to look like bettas.

Ok well in the tnak...if you see some aggresiaon goiing on then you know that they are males. take them out and put them into their own tank.
if you don't know what i am saying...go to this website...best ever.http://www.bettatalk.com/
that webpage is the best and has helped me.

ok well i think that i gave you everything...as you can tell i don't know as much about the fry as i do about them mating. But that website gives you ALOT of GOOD info. about this topic.

Good luck....keep us posted.

Curtis

[blu]

WOW squirt you must love to type lol. Really detailed info though and you definately filled in my blanks. Somehow I knew you would come with lots of long paragraphs lol...good job

I didnt even think about the female being bigger than the male good catch.

[squirt_12]

WOW squirt you must love to type lol. Really detailed info though and you definately filled in my blanks. Somehow I knew you would come with lots of long paragraphs lol...good job

I didnt even think about the female being bigger than the male good catch.
yeaht hat took like 30 minutes to type. lol.
Yeah i love to type but i am not the fastest typer in the world.
I am thinking of making a thread about this subject so that people can just look at it. And i think that that would help ALOT of people.
Do you thinkt hat i should??

Also...yeah the female can't be bigger than the male or it wont work. Cause the female just like sits there and it is the male that HAS to wrap around the female. So you would have to get either a bigger male or a smaller female..

O i forgot something in my big paragrapg...the bettas can only be from 1-1.5 years old. any older and they are too. old. When you buy them at the pet store they are usually from 7-12 months old. just to give you a little heads up.

I hope that everything i said helped..

P.S.
Sorry about the BIG paragraph. I just couldn't stop myself. lol.

[blu]

You should make a whole thread with this information..it would be very helpful because all these questions about breeding are frequently asked.
Also gives you a good reason to share all of that good info you've got in your head. I know a lot of this information but dont have the pacients(sp?bad at it lol) to type it all out like you do...I say go for it.:thumb:

[squirt_12]

You should make a whole thread with this information..it would be very helpful because all these questions about breeding are frequently asked.
Also gives you a good reason to share all of that good info you've got in your head. I know a lot of this information but dont have the pacients(sp?bad at it lol) to type it all out like you do...I say go for it.:thumb:
well tonight i started to type one up on word perfect (just dso i don't have to do it all in one night on here) and i will work on it some more and TRY and get it done in a couple of days.

Also people around here know that i have bred them and they are always asking me how i do it....so i am going to give them one of my 'phamplets'(sp?) and say..here....follow this. lol.

[myster619]

thanks squirt for the long advice, i'll probably try them .I think maybe i should separate them after all.I heard light coloured bettas dont show vertical bars.Here are some pics of my bettas.The pink male is my new one . Their colour combination will be amazing .Cant wait to breed them!

[myster619]

Some more!

[squirt_12]

Yeah congrats on that....how old are the pair???
cause they need to be between 1-1.5 years old. So if they are older and or younger it is not a good idea to breed then.
When you but them at the store they are about 1 year old...maybe a little younger. So if you have had 1 of them for more than a year then it is not a good idea for you to breed them.

Good luck with the breed.

EDIT- very nice bettas you have there.

Also i think that you should lower the water line so that you only have like about 4-6 inches of water.

[myster619]

can any1 tell me how to get infusoria or make em????

[squirt_12]

ok...well the easiest way is this:
take some water out of your tank...and put it into a glass jar...but some java fern and then add that into the jar...place the jar in a sunny window and when the water sort of goes cloudy then you have infusuria (sp?)....so it is pretty simple to make.

If you can't get java fern then you can use lettuce but using lettuce you could get bacteria growing instead of infusuria.

I hope that this helps.

[myster619]

you're an amazing person. Where do i get ppl like you squirt. Thanx.

[squirt_12]

you're an amazing person. Where do i get ppl like you squirt. Thanx.
ahh....thanks......well i just did my research and now i know alot about bettas. lol.

Good luck with the breed. :thumb: