Red cherries might get threatened, picked at, eaten by a hungry/bored betta. My combtail used to love chasing my 2 largest RCS (which I temporarily added- one got eaten so I removed the other). You can try them but you better get them for cheap if you want to put them in with a betta ---just in case.
I have more than 20 RCS in a 2.5g tank. It's not an NPT but it has lots of live mosses. They're fine in there for now, it's a bit cramped I think. Most of them are babies though.
lol That's okay. So, RCS are very shy and I noticed as soon as I added the 2 largest females I had to my betta tank, I simply did not see them for weeks if not the whole 2 months I kept them in there. I would occasionally see one shoot under the driftwod at any tank movement. I felt they were too fearful and went to move them back to the shrimp tank only to find one was already eaten.
Amano shrimp are not as pretty as the reds but they're bigger and can hold their own against bettas.
My amanos are about as big as my bettas are. They're huge. Echo likes to chase them, but they are too fast for him. Also, there is plenty of plant cover for them to hide in. As soon as they break line of sight, Echo loses interest. Chronos could care less about the shrimp in his tank. I do have a 2.5g RCS tank, but I think I'd be too scared to put them in with bettas. They are much smaller than the Amanos and they are bright red. I'm not sure how well bettas distinguish color, but if they can, I would imagine RCS are like neon-flashing signs for them saying, "EAT ME!"
The only problem for me is that I can't find amanos anywhere. Do you think that perhaps blue velvets would be harder to see? I know they are a lot smaller though, aren't they?
Google gave me the prettiest pictures of blue velvet shrimp. They're amazing!
I wouldn't put expensive dwarf shrimp of any color in with bettas again. I would only put amano's. I think Blue velvets are a dwarf species but I have never seen the likes of them in person. Only RCS, amano, ghosts and yabbies (which are actually bright blue crayfish)
Has anyone tried bamboo shrimp??? They are pretty large, and I know that my local petco has them. They are filter feeders so they aren't able to hurt the betta.
Edit: Nevermind on the bamboo shrimp, I forgot that that tank wasn't filtered and wouldn't have flowing water for the shrimp to feed.
Currently out but shoot Rachel an email to see when she'll have more Amanos.
Bettas and dwarf shrimp (RCS and BVS are both Neocaridina) compatibility depend on the individual Betta. Si is fine with them but Willie ate them when the lights went out.
I have sponge filters in both of my 5 gallon npts. Haven't put one in the RCS tank yet.
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