Betta is a PIG!

[Tummy]

Greetings everyone!

I'm a newbie at this whole betta keeping thing (or fish keeping thing for that matter). So, forgive me if whatever detail I write here sounds wrong or dumb

Here's the story:
Saturday afternoon, I went out and got 6 Julii Corydoras for my 15 gallon tank that was already housing a male betta, Fryrish. By the time I finished acclimating them, it was already nightfall. At first, these little guys were quite spooked, but after 15 minutes or so they already began their foraging behavior. I turned off the tank lights and dropped half a sinking wafer in to the tank for them to munch on.

Unfortunately, Fryrish found the wafer as they were munching it, stole the wafer and devoured it I've never seen his belly so big.... it looked like a balloon. I caught him in the act, but by the time I could do anything about it, he already swallowed it. This was suppose to be his fasting day...

Next day, he was still balloon-like, maybe his bulge did shrink a little, but I couldn't tell. I gave him a small piece of pea, he devoured it and that's that. In the evening, I captured him in the cup he came in so I can feed the cories without worrying about Fryrish eating to death. However, he was soooooo upset. I've never seen him so stressed since the day I got him. He was freaking out in his cup, thrashing about, clearly wanting out After the cories had their meal, I let him out. He was upset, but fine nonetheless (except he was still a little bulgy). He will be fasting a little longer until his bulge disappears (I will not be feeding him anymore peas this week).

Bottom Line:
Can anyone suggest a way to feed the cories while keeping Fryrish distracted or occupied in the most stress-free manner? I'd really like to avoid the cup thing.

Feeding Details:
His feeding routine is simple. He eats 2-3 pellets in the morning and 2-3 flakes in the evening plus 1-2 FD critters for treats. Every 2 weeks, he will get a frozen critter instead of the flakes + FD critters. He's living on 7 different brands of betta pellets (I don't know why, it just ended up that way ), Omega brand betta flakes, Hikari brand FD critters of many types and San Fransisco brand frozen critters of several types. Once a week he fasts and he gets a piece of pea on the day after he fasts. He's never had a problem with constipation or whatnot. He's showing great color and finnage, not to mention he's quite active and spunky.

Since the cories are new, I haven't practiced a feeding routine for them yet. For now, I plan to feed them sinking wafers, shrimp pellets, algae wafers and FD/Frozen critters.

Misc Details:
Fryrish is 2-3 times the size of the cories, including fins and all (he's a halfmoon). I'm guessing the cories are a little intimidated by his presence whenever he's near them ('cause they zoom away from him if brushes his fins by them.... then he'll sulk probably wondering why they don't like him )

Apologies if this post is confusing, disorganized, and/or in the wrong place. I tend to blabber and not think very well when I'm sleepy

-Tummy

[Bettas are Betta]

Hi im still a little bit of a newbie at the betta thing too so bear with me (or should i say, fish with me) Sorry lol. First things first, you are feeding him waaay too much! Try feeding him just 2-3 pellets or 2 pellets and a FD critter once maybe in the evening and call it a day. and try fasting him for a couple days and then give him a squashed or cut up pea.

Hope this helps

[loppy656]

Originally Posted by Bettas are Betta

Hi im still a little bit of a newbie at the betta thing too so bear with me (or should i say, fish with me) Sorry lol. First things first, you are feeding him waaay too much! Try feeding him just 2-3 pellets or 2 pellets and a FD critter once maybe in the evening and call it a day. and try fasting him for a couple days and then give him a squashed or cut up pea.

Hope this helps

Hes right. Feeding him all that on the same day is a lot of food for 1 fish.
I usually only give my 2 fish 1 pellet a day but recantly I've been feeding them only 2 little blood worms a day.

[Maryrox247]

I agree with everyone. What i do for my feeding schedule is i feed 3-4 pellets a day (3 in morning 1 at night sometimes) fast 1 time a week and feed blood worms as a treat 1-2 times a week and when i give bloodworms i only feed 2 if the bloodworms are big and 3 if they are small. As for keeping him from eating the other fishes food the only solution that works 100% of the time is putting him in a net or breeders box or cup or something to separate him from the other fish while they eat their food. This is however very stressfull for the betta so when you do this try to male it quick and easy so your not chasing your betta around the tank with the net for 15 minutes. Hope this helps!

[Tummy]

I say 2-3 pellets in the morning because some brands make significantly larger pellets than others, but the average amount is 2.
In the evening, he basically gets a part of a flake, crushed into tiny pieces and gets the average 2-3 pieces or 3 if I decide to not give him a critter supplement.
He gets 1-2 types of critters each night as a supplement, depending on the size of the critter (Daphnia is very tiny, everything else he'll only get one).
For one day, every other week, instead of his normal feeding, he will get a frozen critter (bloodworms, brine shrimp or mysis shrimp), but never the whole cube (I throw away the rest since it turns out even if I refrigerate the leftovers for a day or two, he won't eat the leftovers...).
The dried stuff is always soaked for 10 minutes prior to feeding to make sure whatever he's eating does not exceed the size of his eye.
Once a week he fasts and the next day, he gets a tiny piece of pea.

Reason for his feeding routine:
-A lot of sources say don't feed him anything more than he can consume in 2 minutes. I definitely will not follow this 'cause he'd probably eat to death.
-I know some sources, say only feed him a 1-2 or 3 and call it a day. I tried this in the beginning when I got him for a few weeks and he ended up biting his tail (we all know how much of a pain that can be). This took quite a bit of trial and error to figure out why he was biting his tail.
-Anyway, I found other sources say 4-6 pellets/pieces a day, split to 2 servings and decided to follow that routine and find it to work for two months without problems (plus he stopped biting his tail and it healed well).
-I also kept reading that I should provide variety to meet his nutritional demands, hence the different types of foods per meal every day (and the pellets end up being a surprise 'cause I mixed a little bit of each so I have no idea what I'm giving him).

There's a lot of contradicting information about feeding that I resorted to trial and error on these methods to eventually find something that works.Like I said, he's never been bloated, constipated or had any digestive problems until he stole that piece of wafer.

Apologies for being defensive, I just find it hard to believe my feeding routine is wrong when it has been working without issue. He has never been sick (at least as far as I can tell), he's always been active, he's showing more color and finnage everyday. So, I thought whatever I was doing was fine.

Good news is, he no longer looks pregnant and his bulge has receded to a soft round belly. I will be fasting him another day and he'll probably be officially hungry tomorrow.

I'm still in the dilemma of trying to figure out how to make sure he doesn't eat those wafers again when I attempt to feed the cories. (This is the only reason why I started this thread) I got a breeding trap from Petco and will attempt to test it out when I figure out how to get him in there with the least amount of stress (I'd have to scoop him in there and I have a feeling it's not going to be fun).

What I'd really like to have is a trap with a door to lure him in and shut the door behind him.... is there something like that out there? I'm probably asking this 'cause when I had two cats, I had to put one of them in the carrier during feeding time. He too is a pig and would steal the other cat's serving. So, I was thinking about doing this with Fryrish, even though he's definitely less cooperative than my cat. However, he follows my finger where ever it goes and I'd be using this to my advantage if there are such traps.

[Bettas are Betta]

Pssst (im a girl)

[ANHEL123]

Originally Posted by loppy656

hes right. Feeding him all that on the same day is a lot of food for 1 fish.
I usually only give my 2 fish 1 pellet a day but recantly i've been feeding them only 2 little blood worms a day.

i feed my 5 bettas 2 pellets in the morning and 1 pellet at night or sometimes 2 at night. I giving them freeze dried blood worms 3 times a week between food.

I have 5 fishes at home and 3 in the office i working on saturday. 4 of them 2.5 y old. Rest about 9 mo old.in the office they feeding them 1 in the morning 1 at night and 3 times a wk blood worms. so i think 2 little blood worms a day not enough

[vaygirl]

The easiest way to manage things is to use a breeder's trap. I did this for almost the whole year and a half I kept Tango with the corys.

It's easy to manage if you get a clear plastic one that floats in your tank (like a little boat). I don't know which one you got, but I always recommend Lee's three way breeder because it's roomy and super clear, so they have a hard time seeing it, making it easier to scoop them. Feed him in the breeders cup and he'll go in voluntarily, I promise.

[Jupiter]

I had a similar problem with my sorority, where the most aggressive girl would eat everyone else's food! I either lured her away with food to a corner while I fed the other fish further away, or I put her in a breeder's trap while everyone else ate.

She didn't mind much, since breeder traps are bigger than cups and she eventually learned she would get food in there!