How to Breed Fighting Fish

Bettas, or Siamese fighting fish, are wonderful fish and are known to be the easiest fish to breed, next to livebearers. It's easy to breed them, but raising the fry is a challenge, it is within reach of most hobbyists. Make sure you really want to do this, since a single spawn can easily have a few hundred fry and every male will need to be put in his own container.

Difficulty: Moderately Challenging

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• 2-10 gallon tank
• Small corner or sponge filter
• Styrofoam cup
• plastic wrap
• submersible heater (5 watts per gallon)
• plants, preferably live
• water conditioner
• 75-100 jars (at least 1 quart in size)
• Microworms culture
• extra jar (to hatch shrimp in)
• Baby brine shrimp eggs
• airline tubing
• 1 gallon jug
• Methylene blue
• aquarium salt
• Two, one gallon jars for your adult bettas
• 20+ gallon fish tank
• nets for young males
• small brine shrimp net
• gang valve
• airpump
• airstone
• more airline tubing (to make a vacuum for the tank)
• Maroxy
• Ampicillin (for fish)
• thermometer
• homes for new bettas

1. Choose the betta fish you like, you can order from a betta breeder or get some from your local petstore. If your going to choose from a petstore pick males that are larger than the female, but not to much bigger!

2. Setup your tank, use a 2-10 gallon tank for breeding. If you use a small tank, 2-5 gallons, fill it all the way with water. For larger tanks, 5-10 gallons, fill them halfway. Add your heater and raise the temperature to 82 degrees Fahrenheit. Cut your airline tubing in half, place one on the filter, attach that one to the gang valve, and attach the gang valve to the airpump. Adjust the flow so the filter is barely bubbling. Cut the styrofoam cup in half lengthwise and put it on one side of the tank. Put 1 teaspoon of aquarium salt per gallon to the tank. Add your plants to the opposite side of the tank from the cup, these will provide the female and fry a place for hiding. Add water conditioner and let your tank sit for about a week.

3. Get your pair ready, this is called conditioning, place your male and females jar next to eachother, feed them good food, when the male starts blowing bubbles and the female's getting fatter, they are ready.

4. Put the male in the breeding tank and the female in a plastic cup floating in the tank, if the male spreads his gills out at her, and she swims with her down, release her into the tank. Keep a close eye on them, if he gets to aggressive with her remove her and try again later.

5. How bettas spawn, bettas spawn by pushing each others side, then the female turns upside down and the male is wrapped around her body, the eggs gently fall and the male goes down to pick the eggs up and put them in the bubbles, the female will float to the top and appear dead, she will slowly return to normal and continue spawning, they will spawn for 2-10 hours. Once the female goes back into hiding remove her and add 1 drop of methylene blue to her jar.

6. The male should be left in the tank until the fry can swim on their own, about 3 days after hatching, when they start to swim remove him and add 1 drop of methylene blue to his jar. Now you should start feeding the baby fish (fry), microworms are the best first food, feed a small serving of worms. Feed twice daily, if there are microworms still alive on the bottom skip the next feeding. Cover 80% of the tank in plastic wrap, this will keep the air humid and warm for the fry.

7. Continue feeding microworms for two weeks, then slowly start adding brine shrimp to the tank. To hatch brine shrimp fill a jar with treated tap water, aquarium salt, and brine shrimp eggs. Add some airline tubing. Use the gang valve to make the air flow very powerful. After 20 minuets stop the airflow. When the eggs hatch the shrimp will be towards the bottom and the eggs will float. Feed them with a turkey baster to control how much you feed, since they have been linked to swim bladder disorder, which can kill fry.

8. Start cleaning the tank, use an airline tubing with an airstone attached to the end, you wont hurt the fry this way, replace the water with water of the same temperature, pH etc. Change about 50% every day.

9. At week 3 fry spawned in 2-5 gallon tanks should be moved to a larger the tank, of at least 20 gallons. Make sure the tanks temperature is the same temperature as the spawning tanks. Start doing weekly 50% water changes. For tanks 5-10 gallons fill the tank up and move the fry at 5 weeks of age.

10. At around 8 weeks of age the males will have longer fins and begin to fight, remove them and place them in seperate jars, keep the jars clean and start feeding freeze dried/frozen food. The females can live together for their whole lives.

11. Give/sell your fish to friends and family, try to make sure they have an appropriate home.

Tips & Warnings

• Use a larger spawning tanks for best results
• Younger, healthy bettas make the best breeders
• Your female and male are at risk
• Dirty water encourages velvet, a disease you don't want to encounter.

[scooter181]

on 5/16/2009 now this is a good one, cuz I wrote it and I'm a breeder :P