"They live in mud puddles" - Common Facts and Myths about Bettas

There are many very informative sites on the web covering proper betta care, so I won't get into it very deep. There are a few things that need to be considered before buying a quality betta in order to keep him in best health.

Bettas DON'T live in mud puddles in Thailand… they live in rice paddies which are actually quite large bodies of shallow water. A betta with a reasonably-sized territory of a cubed meter would live in well over 100 Gallons of water! Bettas have adapted a labyrinth organ (sort of a lung) to enable them to survive during the short drought seasons. During the drought, their water holes may dry up and they may need to survive long enough to find a larger body of water by flopping along the ground. But that is only during the drought season, AND those are wild-type bettas. The betta splendens that has been bred as pets have long finnage and bright colors and require somewhat better water conditions to prevent fin rot, dropsy and other diseases.

I mostly house my fish in divided 5 Gallon tanks - giving 2.5 gallons per fish. I house the breeding females in their own section, but fry females live in sorority tanks of 29 gallons. My jarred fry live in 1 liter Mason jars and I even use my 55 Gallon planted tank as a grow-out tank for one special male at a time. I recommend at least 2.5 gallons for bettas - preferably 3-10 gallons.

Bettas can be housed in a community tank with suitable tank mates. You CANNOT keep two males in the same tank without dividing them. You also cannot keep a male and a female in the same tank without dividing them unless it is for spawning purposes only. Females can be housed together in a large tank if necessary. They will often be nippy toward each other, and you may have to separate one or more overly aggressive female, but they will generally work out some living arrangement. A tank full of females is best made up of sibling females - I have tried a sorority tank for my unrelated breeding females and found that they pestered each other too much, leading to disease and death.

I keep my fish at approximately 74F. This means I have a heater in each tank - they are tropical fish! In Thailand, the ambient temperature is generally above 20C which is a warm summer day for us. When spawning, I have the temperature at about 86F and the fry are raised at about 80F until they are grown.

Bettas are carnivores. I feed my fish once a day. I try to feed my fry 2-3 times a day, but that's not always possible since I work long hours. My fish get a variety of food - something different each day. I usually feed frozen food - brine shrimp, mysis shrimp, bloodworms, glassworms, daphnia - and live food - white worms and mosquito larvae in the summer. When I'm lazy or just plain tired, they get betta pellets. I don't feed betta flakes because I find it fouls the water. Sometimes I give each fish a quarter of a spirulina algae tablet… if they eat it then it helps with their digestion (roughage).

I keep a cover on all my tanks - this not only helps keep evaporation down, but bettas are great jumpers. I've found more than one shriveled body on the floor when I've forgotten to replace a cover!

I provide live or silk plants. Plastic plants can tear their fins. Floating plants give them a fun place to sleep close to the top - I had one male who loved to pretend to be stuck in the plant and then come out with a "Gotcha!" when I started to get worried. I also provide caves for hiding. An easy and inexpensive cave can be made out of ABS pipe and the ABS pipe elbow joints. I place a solid "blocker" between two tanks so the males won't continually flare at each other. Some males will exhaust themselves or split their fins from flaring, while others will become bored. I try to "exercise" them daily to keep their fins full and keep their activity up.