Difficult house decision to make...

Hi all. The Betta Bug has well and truly bitten and we are beginning to make preperations for our first spawn. We also have a high likly hood of returning home next week to another male :Love: Eventualy however we are going to run out of space. At the moment our 2 males are housed in 30L tanks by themselves (approx 7.4 US gals) Not a bad sized Betta home I don't think! However if i'm serious about keeping breeding i'm going have to keep a male from each spawn and I definatly don't have money or room for more tanks. Is 15L an acceptable tank size? It is certainly smaller than I would ike to give them but I have heard of people housing them in smaller. I have another 30L that is my back up fry tank which will house the new male for the time being so all 3 boys would be enjoying their 30L tanks for a while yet. Thoughts? Opinions? What size tanks/sections do you all keep yours in?

I personally think that 3.7 gals is perfectly fine for boys as long as the water is heated and filtered so you keep it clean to prevent ammonia build up!

My only issue is have you got the room and the money to jar up the babies once they begin to get aggressive and boys make themselves known?? If you have then great but you need to remember about that stage before you breed them!! :lol!:

Ta Lexi Yup I have measured up and started collecting jars. I have room for plenty of jars just not tanks on a permanent basis. All my tanks are filtered and heated (I live in Scotland, unheated is not an option :P ) and I also have reptile heat mats kicking about from my old california king (I miss her :'( ) so the jars will be heated as well. The jars I have so far are 1.8L from Ikea, do you think thats enough for babies? With daily water changes of course.

I reckon that would be big enough for a temporary basis especially if you do the daily water changes! its about half a gal which isn't alot but is fine for Jarring IMO! (note: I dont think they are big enough for permenant living quarters just in case anyone gets the wrong idea there and starts shouting at me!!!) Are you getting excited about spawning??

Would be very very temporary don't worry Hehe you have no idea how excited I am! I'm sure I'l be kicking myself a couple of months down the line when I'm doing daily water changes on god knows how many jars but at the moment I'm daydreaming constantly about it! I actually had a nightmare last night about bettas somehow jumping out of tanks even though they had lids on :s I think I need help haha.

:rofl: I think most people on here need help!! especially when it comes to watching the tanks once they have spawned!! I can think of a few tanks that I am positive have nose prints on them from being stared at!! (Mentioning no names..........Netty!!) :rofl: I think its all part of breeding you become all maternal and cant help worrying!!!

My boys are in 4 gallons each, so I think you'll be fine with the 3.7 gallons. My filtering idea didn't work very well, so I'm constantly doing water changes now LOL. Such a large tank, really should be running an external on it - did try, and it exploded :lol!:

This is a little off topic from your original question, and I don't mean to pry, but.. do you have a 10g tank for spawning? Do you have a plan for feeding the fry? If your spawn is very successful, it's not uncommon to end up with a hundred or more fry that you'll have to jar and then find homes for. Crowntails are not in as high demand as other tail types.. it may be difficult to distribute them. Have you considered a method for culling undesirable fry? Unfortunately a lot of difficult decisions come with breeding.

Hello
Regarding Crowntails, I've seen CT's coming to my local shop along with VT's, and the CT's have all gone well before VT's. I think it depends where you are, and what your local market is, but i believe CT's will out sell VT's every time:)

Not prying, prudent questions I have a 10g (35L) tank that used to house my guppies (who are now in a bigger tank) which I will use for spawning. I Just bought off gumtree about a week ago another 90L tank for the fry to grow out in as well. If I do end up with hundreds I can split them up and put most in the larger tank and leave some in the others. I plan on trying to sell any stunners if I have them on ebay however I have an lfs i'm very friendly with who has agreed to pay for the crowntails. Believe me I am not entering into this lightly and I have tried to plan for every eventuality. Hence all of my annoying questions on here to try and research as much as I can I have micor worm cultures and a variety of prepared foods ready (and I plan on trying egg yoke in the first few days as well) In short my entire flat has been totally taken up with tanks and jars in preperation for the little darlings haha. It's ok.... It's not like I needed room to walk about anyway

cherrydanio wrote: It's not like I needed room to walk about anyway

:lol!: We've only got a 2up 2down, with all the bettas, marine tank, 10 snakes, 11 geckos, 1 beardie, 2 cats and 6 dogs, hence why some tanks are wall mounted :lol!:

Vandraco aka Bronzecat wrote:Hello
Regarding Crowntails, I've seen CT's coming to my local shop along with VT's, and the CT's have all gone well before VT's. I think it depends where you are, and what your local market is, but i believe CT's will out sell VT's every time:)

Well, over veil tails yes, but it seems to me that not as much work is being done with crowns as much as deltas, halfmoons, or even plakats, lol. Breeding veils has become rather taboo these days due to a questionable gene pool and the fact that the market is rather flooded with them.. after all, why would people pay to have a fish shipped to them when there are the same beautiful, inexpensive fish in stores that need homes?

I suppose selling them to an lfs is an option; however.. the idea of your babies joining the ranks of the cupped and shelved is kind of sad. I think we all know what sorts of things so often befall pet store bettas. But if you have a good relationship with your lfs maybe it will work out.

Wah, I sound like such a negative Nancy. Don't let the devil's advocate rain on your parade, k. It seems like your heart is in the right place and you've done a lot of your homework. Too many people breed bettas to satisfy their own ego rather than out of love for betta splendens as a species.

LOL, you dont sound like a negative Nancy:) I think there are differences between the practices used by U.S. stores over UK ones. It very rare to find bettas in those little cups in the UK, there are a few, but even Pets@Home (equivilent of petsmart) dont use cups:) Most places seem to employ the barrack systems of varying sizes, but nearly always centrally filtered or seperate sponge filters. I've found that the general fish keeper visiting their local fish shop, is more likely to pay £6-£8 for a crown tail, than £12-£18 for a HM. We tend to see that specialist people are more likely to spend a little bit more when buying on-line. The only downside to on-line selling is you dont tend to move as many as quick. We have a local shop that will take some if ever we needed:)

I've seen one shop with cups. But he does take very good care of them, and their cups are filled as much as he can to give them room to breathe. Don't agree with it still, but least it isn't as bad as the horror stories I've seen from US bettas!

Maybe i'm just lucky where I live but all the shops near me keep bettas in tanks! This particular one has them in those litte display divider things with supervised swimming time daily. Not ideal I know but better than what i've heard of from other places. If I didn't think they were going to be looked after by him I wouldn't even think of selling them to him. He also gives out very good advice. When I was hunting for my dwarf puffers he was the only shop that bothered to say 'I hope you have a species tank for them!'

Oh and maybe crowntails aren't as in vogue as others but I heart them anyway I should add though before anyone points out my avatar that Zeus was bought from a different shop... this one doesnt keep their bettas in with danios

Your original question was if housing was ok which it is, asking those questions show you are thinking about your breeding very seriously! Personally I think CT's are still in high demand because many people prefer them to others such as the Plakat (I know I'm one of them) so I Dont think you will have any trouble selling them as people will pay postage for a CT so you wouldn't just have to selll them to your LFS! And if you cannot bear to euthanise any deformed fry then you probally shouldn't breed, however most of us would rather euthanise than see a fish suffer so if you cant bear to do it you shouldn't really have fish!!! (it happens to us all eventually when we HAVE to do it)
When are you thinking of starting the spawn. It sounds like you've got it all set up pretty much to the letter of how you are meant to breed!!!

We've had quite a few enquiries for CTs but they're not something we're planning to breed, so I think they would sell quite well!!!

Thanks Lexi Unfortunatly we are going to have to euthanise an oranda this evening (poor litte guy has had swim bladder issues for 2 weeks. Meds aren't working and he is no longer able to feed ) I know it's difficult but as you have said it's part and parcel of fish keeping.Planning on starting to condition the lucky couple next Friday hehe

Netty - Hehe if all goes to plan in a few months you can direct those enquiries my way

I :Love: Crowntails