# Betta Eggs Over-Easy!



## mudboots (Jun 24, 2009)

I have a shallow water habitat in an emmersed tank (water area is 48" long and about 5" deep in an old 55 gallon tank).

I tossed our betta crew (1 male and 4 females) in there recently and they seemed to dig it. One female ended up in my son's tank upstairs.

Anyway, Mr. White (the delta tail male, pink and irridescent body with irridescent blue and red fins) began blowing bubbles right away, but none of the females seemed interested in him. But Paige, a pink-bodied crown-tail with irridescent blue fins was really tolerant of him lately and wouldn't leave his territory. And wah-lah, we now have a nest of eggs.

Our camera is broken, so I took pics using old-school technology just shy of cave drawings. I'll post pics on my journal thread maybe Monday (Mudboots' 48" 10 gallon). They are hard to see, as the cover in this tank is extremely thick.

Any clues on what to do, if anything? The tank has a well established colony of just about everything a baby fish could eat, but also enough bad stuff that they may not even survive or hatch. We'll see...

But I'm still excited!


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## Gordonrichards (Apr 28, 2009)

I had a male/female build a nest and lay eggs. Male will guard the nest, and will probably shoo away the female from the area.

Provide plenty of cover for the fry, I'd say as much moss/guppy grass as you can in the tank, around the area. Pull out the other betas once the eggs hatch. Wiggling stage at or before day 3, free swimming shortly after that.

Mine stayed at the top of the tank, and rarely if ever ventured to the bottom.

Powdered fry food might be eaten by them in small amounts, wish you luck in raising the fry!

-Gordon


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## HeyPK (Jan 23, 2004)

Start five or six microworm cultures. Betta fry love them and can grow up to 1/3 to maybe even 1/2 inch size on them. Put wet paper strips on the sides of the cultures, just touching the culture surface. The microworms will climb up on the paper much more readily than they climb up the glass. Dip the paper strips into a cup of water, the worms fall off, and then return the strips to the culture. Add the worms to the tank. They all sink down to the bottom, and the fry will graze in them there. I reared 400 adults from one spawning using microworms as food. It was difficult getting rid of them all. I never bred bettas again after that!


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## mudboots (Jun 24, 2009)

Okay, microworms in the works. I'm not sure what I'll do with the little fellas if they survive the next few days, but at the very least this will be fun for the kids to watch.

It's like Summer School Science Class at The Manthei house!


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## mudboots (Jun 24, 2009)

After removing the male betta, who ate most of the fry, I forgot about hte Pygmy Banded Sunfish, who ate as much of the fry as they could.

All said, we endeed up with 9 surviving betta babies that are doing great. They have been re-housed into a 3 gallon Picotope with some thick hairgrass. They are still eating little critters, but I have started crushing Tetra Colorbits to begin transitioning them. They are beginning to get a little color, and the kids are excited about converting our 55 gallon (48 long or whatever the math works out to) to a large betta tank for them.

Melinda promised in return that she'll let me get a big tank again, but it'll have to be after the big move, which is good ways off still.


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## Tex Gal (Nov 1, 2007)

OK MISTER... where are the pxs of the little tykes? Either I missed them on your other threads or you are SLOW... I'm over here waiting, but not holding my breath. Will I recognize the fry in your cave drawing pxs?...


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## mudboots (Jun 24, 2009)

Hah! You got the SLOW part right! I jhave not taken any pics of these fellas, so i guess I'll do that today and then post them when I get back from out of town on Friday afternoon.

In the meantime, here is my Caveman Drawing!!!









*I got the scale wrong though; the segments are supposed to be 1/4" and then 1/2"...*


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## mudboots (Jun 24, 2009)

and here are some pics of the little guys. We will end up keeping 4 of them. 5 were very stunted and have become cichlid food (they just didn't look quite right). These pics were from Thursday night and they have grown and colored a little more, but you get the idea anyway. The four we kept are eating crushed up color-bits now.


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## Tex Gal (Nov 1, 2007)

Loved your cave man drawing! lol

They are so cute. You will have bettas in all your tanks at this rate! Have the girls named them yet?


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## mudboots (Jun 24, 2009)

No names yet that they can agree on. They want me to put them in with the other bettas, but that's also where the Mbuna's are at the moment, and those little guys wouldn't last 3 seconds.


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## mudboots (Jun 24, 2009)

The four fry we kept are growing and you can defintely tell which babies hatched from which mother. I am guessing we had 1 from Paige and 3 from Mrs. Jane, but who really knows. Here are some pics of Mother and child (Paige and hera are seperate since I couldn't get them together for a pic; they move non-stop).

*Jane and one of her babies (yes, that is a huge assumption and could very well be incorrect...)*









*Paige*









*Paige's baby? Too bad the irridescence doesn't show on the pic; it's a very bright-blue fish, just like the male, Mr. White*


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## Zapins (Jul 28, 2004)

Nice fish and fun to breed! 

I fed my baby Bettas with baby brine shrimp. They ate them up realllly fast.


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## mudboots (Jun 24, 2009)

The four bettas we kept are growing up fast. One is pastel-like and will probalby look like Baby Betta as it matures, one looks exactly like Paige, and the two others I'm not sure about. I think one is a male, as it's fins are getting longer than the others. And one is almost entire void of any color at all, just some tiny specs of irridescence on one fin. Here are some pics of those two:


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## FreedPenguin (Aug 2, 2011)

The cave drawings are my fave!  haha


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## Tex Gal (Nov 1, 2007)

So whatever happened to these. Did you keep them or have to give them up?


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