Male And Female Bettas Living Together

[turtle10]

SOOO a while back I posted a thread about combining my sorority with my community tank. My community tank has a male betta, so I have to get a tank larger than would typically be required for that amount of fish. I have recently contacted someone on craiglist about a 77 gallon aquarium. It comes with tank, custom stand, filter, and lights for about $250 dollars. I really hope it is still available, to say the least. Either way, I am getting an aquarium 70-75 gallons at least. Once combined, in the tank there would be:

1 Male Betta
10 Female Bettas
8 Female Guppies
2 Male Guppies
7 Albino Cories
1 Tiger Pleco (NOT the big kind lol)

Plus the shrimp and snails, though I don't think they will make that much of a difference in such a large tank. Also, I expect the guppy population to increase, it is inevitable. They're guppies lol :)

I would really like to hear experienced fish keepers' opinions and experiences when keeping male and female bettas together. Do they spawn in a community tank? If so, do the fry typically survive? Do female bettas get jealous of each other? Etc, etc….

One more question…. I have a dwarf pea puffer solo in a 5 gallon. I know that they are aggressive and do best in species-only tanks, but since the 77 is so big would it be okay to add the pea? If not, that is totally fine. It would just make less tanks to clean.


I would really only like experienced fish keepers' opinions on the matter.

Thanks :)

[DarkMoon17]

That's sounds amazing. I'm sure everyone would love to see pics if you can get it.

I've kept a male with 5-8 females in a 55 gallon with mollies, cories, and some smaller tetras. I find that as long as the tank is well plants, everything works out. I also haven't really had trouble with keeping bettas and guppies together but I have heard that other people have had issues with them fighting.

I've never had bettas breed in a community tank, there's just too much activity. Since the only other inhabitants are guppies (which don't completely devour fry) it is possible that there would be some survivors if they were able to find food... I'm not sure. In the wild male bettas do protect their fry for much longer than we allow them to in breeding set ups. They are a bit like cichlids.

Pea Puffers are pretty vicious, if you value your male guppies and bettas, I'd keep him far away from their tank! They're fast little buggers too.
Happy Betta Keeping!
-DM17

[turtle10]

Yeah I thought the activity might deter them from mating. My guppies are always zooming all over the place.

LOL haha I will keep the pea away then, I love my betta and guppies :)

[PewPewPew]

I think OFL has done this, but it might be two males. Bughhh cant remember.

I wish Id kept the site's address, but I was reading a journal of a keeper who kept a male in a large (not unlike yours) community tank with a large group of females. I believe he noted they stayed together, and almost kept the male at bay when he approached them. He noted the same behavior in another species with an intensely weighted ratio of females to males.

If I can dig up that site, Ill give it to you. It ended up working well, without issue. (It was hilarious, Id check on it to make sure things were alright- like some saga or some weird kind of drama movie, haha.) No comments on fry, though. Id imagine many would die since you might not see them right off the bat or be able to tend to them, unless you removed them from the tank. But if they lived, you'd have a bunch of multiple spawns, which would be sort of interesting ;)

If/when you get this up, Im demanding pictures. (Of course.)

[turtle10]

Definitely will post pictures :)

I wanted to also add in three other males so I would be interested to see how it went for OFL, but I don't know if I want to risk it. I would probably have to go larger any ways.

[kathstew]

Sorry for posting as I have no experience with any of this. I was just wondering how you were making in progress in this? It sounds really cool, I would never try this, but I am curious how this will turn out.

[shinybetta]

Originally Posted by turtle10

SOOO a while back I posted a thread about combining my sorority with my community tank. My community tank has a male betta, so I have to get a tank larger than would typically be required for that amount of fish. I have recently contacted someone on craiglist about a 77 gallon aquarium. It comes with tank, custom stand, filter, and lights for about $250 dollars. I really hope it is still available, to say the least. Either way, I am getting an aquarium 70-75 gallons at least. Once combined, in the tank there would be:

1 Male Betta
10 Female Bettas
8 Female Guppies
2 Male Guppies
7 Albino Cories
1 Tiger Pleco (NOT the big kind lol)

Plus the shrimp and snails, though I don't think they will make that much of a difference in such a large tank. Also, I expect the guppy population to increase, it is inevitable. They're guppies lol :)

I would really like to hear experienced fish keepers' opinions and experiences when keeping male and female bettas together. Do they spawn in a community tank? If so, do the fry typically survive? Do female bettas get jealous of each other? Etc, etc….

One more question…. I have a dwarf pea puffer solo in a 5 gallon. I know that they are aggressive and do best in species-only tanks, but since the 77 is so big would it be okay to add the pea? If not, that is totally fine. It would just make less tanks to clean.


I would really only like experienced fish keepers' opinions on the matter.

Thanks :)

They may spawn, but most of the time they don't. If they do spawn, you will have trouble because the male will attack every fish that gets near him to protect his nest. If they do spawn, I would remove the nest and dispose of it (or keep it in a smaller tank with the male betta, if you wan't babies).

[Oldfishlady]

You may or may not get spawning and if you do the odds of live fry would be slim due to the other fish and filtration

I would not recommend keeping adult unrelated multi males together even in a 100g heavy planted tank...this would not end well........adult males that have been kept isolated all their life and introduced together would result is fights......my multi male tanks are successful because they have always been kept this way and most are related with younger males added that are not related along with multi females and other species of fish and inverts in a large heavy planted tank.....they swim and feed together without fighting or fin nipping with an occasional flare in passing....I did introduce a spawn brother that had been kept isolated and used for breeding without incident....they ignore each other on the most part....rather interesting to watch......this was not successful in the beginning-this took two generation before I was able to do this...they are fighting fish...the biggest downfall I have seen with keeping Bettas like this....the fins don't grow out as fast....I think this may be due to all the hormones as well as a survival instinct......still a work in progress.......

I DO NOT recommend keeping multi males and females together......I have been keeping fish for a very long time and it has taken me 10 years to get them to this point.......

[turtle10]

Okay, so just one male. It ended up that I can only get a 55, so the multiple males probably wouldn't fit anyways lol.

[dramaqueen]

Originally Posted by Oldfishlady

You may or may not get spawning and if you do the odds of live fry would be slim due to the other fish and filtration

I would not recommend keeping adult unrelated multi males together even in a 100g heavy planted tank...this would not end well........adult males that have been kept isolated all their life and introduced together would result is fights......my multi male tanks are successful because they have always been kept this way and most are related with younger males added that are not related along with multi females and other species of fish and inverts in a large heavy planted tank.....they swim and feed together without fighting or fin nipping with an occasional flare in passing....I did introduce a spawn brother that had been kept isolated and used for breeding without incident....they ignore each other on the most part....rather interesting to watch......this was not successful in the beginning-this took two generation before I was able to do this...they are fighting fish...the biggest downfall I have seen with keeping Bettas like this....the fins don't grow out as fast....I think this may be due to all the hormones as well as a survival instinct......still a work in progress.......

I DO NOT recommend keeping multi males and females together......I have been keeping fish for a very long time and it has taken me 10 years to get them to this point.......

Do NOT try this at home. lol