How to you keep your Bettas?

[webster]

Hey Everyone,

I have been wondering how all of you keep your Bettas housed.

For breeders, how do you make room for all of your fry when they need separating?

I guess my main question is, do you keep heaps of small tanks where you try and maintain the temp and water conditions, or have you made your own Betta barracks or bought a pre made one so that water temp and conditions are maintained? (taking into account that disease can spread between tanks).

I have read that it is ok to keep the little guys in smaller tanks (like a barracks) but not for extended periods of time. What do you do if you plan on keeping a fair few of them permanently? (Do you keep them in a bigger tank each and just keep your fry in smaller tanks until they grow out and you can sell/ give them away?

I would like to set something up soon and have been thinking if it is best to have a system set out before hand so i don't have jars of Bettas sitting around my house. (Unless that is a legitimate tactic! Haha)

[lodo]

We put our fry growing out in beanie boxes. Yes they are small, but with fry water quality is a major thing sow e water change every day or two, meaning water quality is at its highest.

We also run reptile heat cord underneath the beanie boxes to keep the temperature up.

For our adults we have a filtered barracks system which can house 24 fish.

When we spawn/grow out we have them in standard 2 ft tanks.

[JayM]

Hi

We have a 9 bay changed into a 3 bay which holds our 3 male breeders atm. Each bay holds approx 10L.

We have a 210L which we can move some females into, also a 135L which houses our 2 current females.

I have been wondering how all of you keep your Bettas housed.

For breeders, how do you make room for all of your fry when they need separating?

This is our first big spawn so not sure atm. They are only 3wks old so have a bit of time till we come to that. In our last spawn (around 20), I moved the more aggressive ones out of the spawn tank into another tank. Used soft drink bottles in the spawn tank (held about 6 x 2L) & also had one in the tank. Changed the water daily. They were big enough & sexable at around 8wks so sold them at 10-12 wks.

Will be using a couple of tanks to do the same thing as above with this spawn.

I guess my main question is, do you keep heaps of small tanks where you try and maintain the temp and water conditions, or have you made your own Betta barracks or bought a pre made one so that water temp and conditions are maintained? (taking into account that disease can spread between tanks).

As above. Going to be cutting some holes in the soft drink bottles this time so I'm not changing water as often. Also have a few separable tanks which can go into our bigger tanks if needed.

I have read that it is ok to keep the little guys in smaller tanks (like a barracks) but not for extended periods of time. What do you do if you plan on keeping a fair few of them permanently? (Do you keep them in a bigger tank each and just keep your fry in smaller tanks until they grow out and you can sell/ give them away?

I only plan on keeping a male & 2 females from this spawn.

[webster]

Thanks for the quick responses everyone

Another quick question, when doing water changes do you have water ready to go and conditioned ahead of time or do you just get it straight out of the tap and condition it for use straight away?

[lodo]

I'm ashamed to admit my lazyness (hard not to be lazy when you run 33 tanks plus a lot of beanies.

We just condition straight from tap.

When we build our fish room plan is to get a large wheelie bin with a powerhead abd heater so we can have constant warm water for our tanks

[JayM]

Same as James, condition straight from the tap plus I can use warm water.

[Brenton]

I have been wondering how all of you keep your Bettas housed.

For breeders, how do you make room for all of your fry when they need separating?

DIY holding tank Or jars/takeaway containers bain-marie style. But the real secret is to cull as required.

I guess my main question is, do you keep heaps of small tanks where you try and maintain the temp and water conditions, or have you made your own Betta barracks or bought a pre made one so that water temp and conditions are maintained? (taking into account that disease can spread between tanks).

Barracks - all my breeding stock is in barracks - I just keep a very close eye on them and if I see anything out of the ordinary, they are immediately separated and treated.

I have read that it is ok to keep the little guys in smaller tanks (like a barracks) but not for extended periods of time. What do you do if you plan on keeping a fair few of them permanently? (Do you keep them in a bigger tank each and just keep your fry in smaller tanks until they grow out and you can sell/ give them away?

Depends on a lot of factors. Large volumes of water give you more stable parameters, but shared water can lead to sharing disease - pros and cons. As I said, all my breeding stock are in barracks, but my fry are in 20L spawn tanks until they are 10-12 weeks old and then moved to bigger growout tanks, until they get separated out due to aggression or size. There is no right or wrong way, but what you find works best for you

[webster]

Cool, well that makes my life easier until i can get something better sorted out.

I have got onto someone about an Aqua One barracks so i think i'll give it a go. I'm mostly concerned about them not having enough room but it sound like they will be ok for a while. Cheers everyone!

Also if anyone can point me in the direction of breeders that have Bettas for sale, i sent an email to someone a while ago but no response.

Also i can't post it the classifieds yet for some reason. (Not enough posts maybe)

[JayM]

Thumbs up to Lodo Betta Aquatics, David Lo & LFS.

I will have some in a few months too.

[webster]

^Thanks, just got onto the Lodo website!

[lodo]

If you want anything off the website send us an email as the checkout plays up on us sometimes, and means we can probably give a cheaper shipping price