Betta Fish Forum banner
Status
Not open for further replies.

Mythbuster: Do bettas really live in "tiny" puddles?

224K views 144 replies 90 participants last post by  mjfa 
#1 ·
Mythbuster: Do bettas really live in "tiny" puddle

Okay, folks, after a research breakthrough and reminiscing of memories on how I often see people suggest to use vases and bowls for bettas considering "they live in tiny mud puddles", I decided to crash this myth in an effort to put a stop on what we call betta abuse simply by placing them in a container with no heater, no filter, etc at all. I've read plenty of books and discovered there is a lot more than what you see on a betta. It has always been a misconception that bettas live in mud puddles. Everytime I see people saying this, I keep thinking to myself "Is this possible?" Even the mud puddles dug by animal hooves would be quite horrible for a betta.:shake: What were those labyrinths for?

Before I go further, please note there are several betta species more than you can think of distributed around Asia, however, the human developments have seriously depleted their habitats with some species already lost and feared extinct.

While roaming around on forums for possible summaries, I discovered this paragraph (I don't own a lot of books however I do spend plenty of time in bookstores but I cannot copy every important bit without purchasing the said books which are expensive.)

Information is taken from Labyrinth Fish: The Bubble Nest Builders written by Horst Link and published by Tetra in 1991.

"In my opinion, the natural distribution range is very much smaller than had been supposed until now and is, in fact, restricted to central, western, and northern Thailand...Betta splendens lives in paddy fields and associated ditches, in marshes and flooded grass pits and in the klongs (canals) of the residential parts of towns and villages. At different times of the year, they may be very numerous."

A very important advice...
The view that fighting fish often live in mudholes and therefore can be kept in such conditions is not really tenable. The fish will exhibit their full finery in a well-established, balanced aquarium and it is only under such conditions that their keeper will be able to appreciate their beauty at its best

So the questions now are..
What exactly is a klong?
A picture is worth a hundred words.
Klong of Thailand


What paddy field are we talking anyway?
Is this really a mud puddle? Is it really small?


What is your conclusion on the whole?
Going to back to the above, I've shared to you my thoughts. Now to answer the question, What were those labyrinths for?, this doesn't mean all anabantids can live in mud puddles as previously suggested by several people but this means it allows them to survive in warm, shallow, slow moving waters with very low oxygen levels.

So like other fish, we should treat the bettas with great care. Efficient filter, heater, etc just like what other tropical fish deserve.

~End of lecture.~

I will sticky this so people won't have a difficult time searching for answers like this.

This site provides excellent information as well.
http://betta.tasarin.net/aquarium.php
An important thing to know when housing a Betta Splendens is that most metals are lethal, and never should metal decorations be used unless they are marked for this purpose. Copper is especially dangerous. Nonetheless, to keep an individual B. splendens, a minimum tank size of 3 U.S. gallons at least is recommended, if it will be kept in a warm room. Decorations can provide hiding places, especially important when two males are housed in a divided tank, or when the betta is living in a community tank. Every decoration must be free of rough areas or sharp points which can damage the delicate fins of the betta. For this reason, silk rather than plastic plants are recommended. Live plants will improve the water quality. Also, since the betta obtains oxygen from the air, the tank must not be covered with an air-tight lid and the betta must be able to easily reach the surface. (Note that some bettas enjoy leaping out of tanks, so a breathable lid is highly recommended.) If the betta has no access to air, it will suffocate.

In Canada and the United States, the Betta is sometimes sold in a vase with a plant, with the erroneous claim that the fish can feed on the roots of the plant and that it can survive without changing the water. This is dangerous for the betta in two ways. First, the betta has a labyrinth organ which allows it to take in oxygen from the surface air, similar to the human lung. If the betta can not reach the surface of the water, which can be the case if a plant's roots are covering the surface, the betta will suffocate in a matter of hours. Secondly, Betta species are carnivorous and an appropriate food must be provided, such as dry "betta pellets" or live or frozen bloodworms or brine shrimp. However, most aquarium-bred specimens will accept dried flaked food suitable for tropical fish. When kept in a small container such as a vase, the fish need frequent water changes, and the container must be kept in a warm room. A larger tank with a heater will provide better living conditions. Wherever the fish is kept, water must be treated with an appropriate water conditioner before use.

There is a stereotype that in the wild, bettas live in tiny muddy pools, and therefore that it is acceptable to keep them in small tanks, but bowls are usually too small. In reality, bettas live in vast paddies, the puddle myth originating from the fact that during the dry season, the paddies can dry out into small patches of water. It is not a natural state of affairs by any means, and in the wild, fish trapped in such puddles are likely to die in a short period of time when they dry out.

To maximize the lifespan of the fish and ensure their well being, they should always be kept in appropriate sized tanks. As a rule of thumb, for each inch of fish there must be at least one gallon of water in its tank. Bettas idealy should be kept in a filtered tank 10 gallons or more and treated like any other freshwater tank fish. Although these conditions are ideal, with proper care and filtration a betta can be happily kept in a smaller tank. I, personally, keep my Betta in a tank holding 2 gallons of water and it is perfectly happy and healthy.


Other good links:
http://www.ikanpemburu.com/html/field/pontian.htm

http://www.ikanpemburu.com/html/field/Ayer_Hitam_last1.htm

http://www.ikanpemburu.com/html/field/Thailand2.htm
 
See less See more
2
#126 · (Edited)
Still looks to be at least a few gallons there, and at least 20 inches in length.

I think people get a false sense of how much water is there, even in the dry season. There's certainly way more than a half a gallon of water there. Not that I think you were advocating 0.5 gallon tanks, but when people say "tiny puddle" I have to wonder if what they envision is anything like reality. Looking at that pic I don't think it supports the notion of keeping them in tiny containers. I don't think people appreciate how small a volume that really is.
 
#127 ·
Thats just one puddle though, theres going to be puddles way smaller than that and ones that dry out all together, killing the fish. Infact thats probably why people claim they live in elephant footprints, the paddy would have dried out completely except for the deeper imprints of the footprint which was the last to dry up.

Im not saying these fish love living in tiny puddles, in fear of drying up or starving, infact I bet they hate it. Im just pointing that its not entirely true to say bettas dont live in tiny puddles, they do it for half a year. The survivors just get rewarded with a wet season complete with massive flooded rice paddies for the other half of the year

In fact thinking about it, that might be why my bettas blow nests more after a water change because they think the rainy season has begun and its time to start breeding/claiming territories again...
Might also be why you need to condition the fish with good quality food before breeding.. because during the dry season they wont have as much access to good food, and the presence of quality food might signals good times are ahead eg the wet season

I dunno those are just theories that popped into my head just then, would be interesting to find out what effect the dry season has on bettas though
 
#128 ·
Water changes are well known for triggering breeding behavior, mimicking the rainy season with a shift in temp and/or chemistry.
 
#129 ·
The biggest myth is that wild bettas are exactly like betta splendens :p
I think a lot of people honestly think you can go to these mud puddles and catch some betta with long flowing fins that look just like what we buy in stores.
I don't think the fish I own would last very long there.
 
  • Like
Reactions: jaysee
#130 ·
I think you're absolutely right.
 
#132 ·
Apparently we have quite a population explosion of feral bettas up in the NT. Just thought it was interesting with the current discussion on domesticated bettas being compared to their wild counterparts. There is also a very big problem in their native homes with hybridisation because domesticated fish are being turned loose and interbreeding with splendens complex species. Of course all the ones I've seen have been plakats and quite plain coloured.

https://fbcdn-sphotos-b-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-prn1/t1/1012289_562579493831428_841159417_n.jpg
 
#133 ·
Personally i'm not a fan of the super heavily planted tanks... it's just not my thing. I think the fish needs at least some open room to view all of it's surroundings. But I could be wrong... from my understanding their natural environment is almost completely planted, obviously, being in ponds with plants everywhere.
 
#135 · (Edited)
No matter how far removed from their natural state and artificially-evolved into forms visually diverse and divergent from their progenitors (and Betta aren't that many generations removed as compared to, say, dogs), there remains a fundamental, intrinsic, biological hegemony derived from hundreds of thousands of years of evolution.

Like their wild ancestors, store Betta still like softer water with pH in the high sixes, protein-rich food, low current, stable water temperatures in the high seventies and a generally crowded or closed in physical environment regardless of cpacity. Until these characteristics are modified by breeders, they will remain central to Betta biology.

Wild B. slendens come from paddies and bongs. Many captive bred individuals are released into the wild, much to the consternation of pure-species breeders. So many second-rate fighters have been released that it is conjectured the general wild Betta population is more aggressive than it has ever been.

I'm sure my feisty, copper plakat would survive quite easily were I to turn him loose in a rice paddy in Thailand.
 
#136 ·
Captive vs wild bettas

He might for a short while, but take into consideration all of the parasites and bacterial infections that are in the wild. Most captive bred bettas do not have the inmmunities that their wild counterparts do. He would probably live a short miserable life.
 
#137 ·
A few posts up I'd mentioned that Betta splendens were becoming a problem in some of the waterways in the Northern Territory. At least that was reported (with photos) from the Australian and New Guinea Fishes Association.

I think for many fish in the wild life is short. Admittedly, many tank bred bettas would die if let loose (certain colours and tail types probably more so than others). However, there would be others that would certainly survive. This is why as Hallyx has mentioned, hybridisation has wreaked havoc on wild populations of betta.
 
#138 ·
Wild bettas and betta splendans in SE Asia

I got to see wild bettas and betta splendans in Cambodia, Indonesia and Malaysia while I was in those countries. They were in rice paddy, and irrigation canals and lotus ponds and in large cement jars that a lot of people keep in their couryards. The paddies and canals and ponds are a couple feet deep in the dry season--like up to your knees--and deeper in monsoon season--waist high. The jars are about 2 feet deep and about 2 to 3 feet across.

From what I could see, the fish stay near the surface under lotus leaves or whatever plants are growing at the surface and eat mosquito larvae.
The air temps are between mid 80-s to 90's during the day and maybe as low as mid-70's at night. I didn't have a themometer, so I neer took the temperture of the water, but it was probably somewhat graduated--warmer at the surface and cooler down at the bottom in the daytime and vice versa at night?

One really clever thing around some buildings in Cambodia is a rectangular canal that is about a foot wide and a foot and a half to two feet deep and filled with water plants and bettas. It totally surrounds the buildings which are built on pilings that go into the water. This keeps ants out of the building. People just step over the canal.

Jan
 
#139 ·
This thread was a great read :) I tried to link someone to it earlier who pulled the "puddle" nonsense on me, but they just swore at me and refused to read it. *sigh* some people just can't be helped!

It would be nice to see an updated OP though, with fully working pictures and links.
 
#140 ·
Thanks for providing this info.
I have a Betta handbook and the photos of the natural environment for them shows a small stream like area, not a puddle. There are so many misconceptions about Betta fish. A woman at my work keeps hers in a bowl. It might be about 1 gallon. I feel sorry for the boy but I guess he's used to it too. I've tried to inform people about what the betta needs are without preaching but it's difficult.

The best way to get the most accurate info is to search different sources. It sounds like you've done that :)
 
#141 ·
Very few people provide evidence--it bothers me too. I think sometimes they are just repeating something they read on a forum.

I know nothing about killies. Here are some of my photos, however of rice paddy in Cambodia. I saw wild bettas in the paddy before the workers went it. You can see the water depth in these photos.

I'm also including a photo of the "canal" I described that surrounds some Cambodian buildings, to keep the ants out--it is about two feet deep with water plants and bettas in it.
 

Attachments

#143 ·
They also live in slow-moving streams, swamps, bongs (small ponds) and ditches all over SE Asia. A male Betta would love to have miles of territory. But in a healthy, productive paddy or pond, he may have to settle for only a few square yards with a depth of less than a foot to several feet.

Welcome to the forum, semitoon.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
You have insufficient privileges to reply here.
Top