A Few Breeding Questions

[Thomasdog]

Hello everyone!
I am planning on breeding two halfmoon bettas, (male) a blue one, and (female) and red/gold one.

Questions:
- I really don't understand the whole 'conditioning' thing. Please explain in very much detail with step by step instructions.
- How will I be able to tell when the female has eggs and is ready to go in with the boy?
- Will I need two tanks?
- What kind?
- What supplies?
- Can the babies be together or will they eat eachother?

Thanks

[Amphibianite]

Originally Posted by Thomasdog

Hello everyone!
I am planning on breeding two halfmoon bettas, (male) a blue one, and (female) and red/gold one.

Questions:
- I really don't understand the whole 'conditioning' thing. Please explain in very much detail with step by step instructions.
- How will I be able to tell when the female has eggs and is ready to go in with the boy?
- Will I need two tanks?
- What kind?
- What supplies?
- Can the babies be together or will they eat eachother?

Thanks

Hi there Thomas, welcome to the breeding section. Not lets see what I can do for you.
Conditioning - in short you are feeding them more and better food stuffs. Such as frozen blood worms, betta pellets, etc. Feeding them at least twice a day makes them believe it has become a better season and they will start getting ready. This also helps them store up a lot of energy and fat reserves, they will need this. The reason is when you put them in the breeding tank you usually wont be feeding them, because the disturbance can ruin the breeding, or cause them to eat the eggs(the male usually). While you take the female out as soon as they finish spawning, the male stays with the fry and eggs until they fry are free swimming. Some people leave the male in to help cull the spawn as well.

Okay the female will begin to swell and get eggy which is a great sign of maturity and readiness to mate. They will flare at each other move in an S pattern this shows they are wanting to mate. The male will build a bubblenest, and lead the female to it. She may decide to mate then or run away from the nest saying she is not ready. There will be chasing and fin nipping this is normal.

As for the two tanks, it depends on the size of the tank. You can breed in a 5 gal, and let the fry get a bit bigger but they will need to be transferred to a min of a 10 gal for a grow out. Most say a 20 gal is ideal. So if you just start in a 10-20 gal you shouldn't have to transfer or need two tanks.

you will need the following. A heater so the water stays approximately 84 degrees if I remember right. A sponge filter so that the water can stay clean and the fry don't get sucked up. A bunch of live plants would be ideal. You don't need snails, but many find they help and create microorganisms the fry will feed on. You will need a way of keeping the air in the tank very humid, as this is ideal for the fry(you can plastic wrap it if needed)
You will need fry food in advance. Microworms and Baby Brine Shrimp are ideal but you can use egg yolk too.

The fry can stay together until about 3 months when the males begin getting aggressive. At this point you will need to jar the fry.

Be prepared to spent lots of time looking after your fry. They need to be feed several times a day. You will be spending an enormous amount of time and yes money on this under taking. Be prepared for the possible hundreds of fry you could be getting. Do they have homes to go to?

[EvilVOG]

82 degrees.

best advice I can give is go through some of the spawn logs. Lots of us, myself included, have asked and had answered most of the questions you now have, and ones you haven't thought of yet. It also will give you a feel for how it works.

[indjo]

Read the stickies for general info.

Don't worry about whether the female carry eggs or not. Whether thin or fat, females always carry eggs. When she gets into breeding mode, these eggs will sort of "ripen" and will be released during each embrace.

What's more important is that both male and female are flirt swimming when they see each other - indicating that they're ready to be bred..

You will need 3 or more tanks; 1 for spawning, 1 for the male, and 1 for the female. If your breeding tank is 20g+ you may not need another tank. But under that, you will need grow out tanks.

[Roxy]

I wouldn't recommend breeding your betta's... since I read in one of your previous posts that you cannot keep anything bigger than a 5 gallon tank. ( space restrictions? )

Breeding betta's take A LOT of responsibility.

Eventually, you'll need many containers to put the babies in once they grow older...

Not to mention many other things that you need... such as proper heating ( which you currently don't provide your betta with ) and such...