Breeding Stock:

My breeding stock comes from Thailand, and sometimes from other Canadian breeders. I began ordering from AquaBid once I had successfully spawned my first veiltails. I felt that if I was going to get into breeding bettas seriously then I had better get some good quality stock.

As a member of the International Betta Congress (IBC) I believe in promoting bettas of all types and spawning to better the breeds. The IBC no longer recognizes veiltails as a breed - they could be likened to the "mutts" of the betta world. Therefore I had to find some purebred stock to work with.

It's nearly impossible to work with all the colors and types of bettas that a person would want to. I started out with one pair of nearly every color that I liked, as well as several crowntail types and plakats. There were still so many colors that I wanted to buy, but could neither afford it nor provide the proper housing and care for all the fish. So I had to make a decision on what it was I hoped to accomplish.

At that point in time, the dragon coloration was just coming into popularity and I had ordered a lovely red dragon pair from Nicebettas in Thailand. When it arrived I was smitten. Since quality dragons were only available in halfmoon and plakat at that time, and since I had only had any real success with spawning my halfmoons, I decided to concentrate on dragon halfmoons.

My Sapphire Dragon Project:

There are red dragons, orange dragons, yellow dragons, black dragons, blue dragons, red/blue and red/green dragons. There are even mustard gas dragons. But nobody has managed to produce a true blue/silver dragon. It may not be possible, but it seems like a fun experiment. Since my loves are dragons and blues, I have embarked on the quest to produce the "sapphire dragon".

As of the end of 2011, I have decided to narrow my focus to the blue coloration, concentrating on blue dragons and full masking. Although I do have some platinum dragons from a previous spawn, I have decided that it would be better for me to work on one color only and maybe pick up working toward the sapphire dragon project in the future.