Breeding Bettas, Siamese Fighting Fish,  Part 5 – Betta Conditioning

The importance of conditioning your Bettas for breeding cannot be downplayed. If you intend to breed your Bettas soon after you’ve purchased them then start this process straight away. In the meantime you can be setting up your breeding area and Betta breeding tank.

Therefore I suppose it’s safe to say that if you’re going to breed any type of animal, number 1 you want to select quality parents with desirable qualities and number 2 you want to ensure they’re in the very best physical condition before you put them together. So the first part you’ve now already got covered when you selected your Bettas. Therefore you now need to get them into shape and apart from the obvious this is why it’s important when breeding Bettas.

Firstly, the female needs to produce eggs and off course the quality and quantity will be dependent on the condition of the female. The courtship with the male can also get physical and involve quite a bit of evasive swimming and in some cases defending herself. Plus the female also does most of the initial work collecting and carrying eggs from the bottom of the tank to the bubble nest in between spawning which can last from 30 minutes to several hours.

Secondly, the male also needs to be in peak condition. He will have to be in the breeding tank for 4 or 5 days without being fed and will build a bubble nest, exert quite a bit of energy chasing the female, spawn with her and help carry eggs up to the bubble nest. Then after spawning is finished and the female is removed it is up to him to maintain the bubble nest, collect any falling eggs from the bottom of the tank and then look after the fry until they are free swimming. This whole process can involve several hundred trips between the bottom of the tank and the bubble nest.

Therefore you can see the importance of conditioning as it can be quite physically demanding on both the parents.

So the next question is, how to go about it and what I would suggest is to research this topic from as many credible sources as you can find, it’s that important. What I did though was feed both the parents twice a day, for about a week, a diet of dried Black Worm and live Grindal Worm. They need a high protein diet. What you use for food though, will probably have a lot to do with what you can source from your local area or online.

Therefore can I just say this, conditioning your Bettas and how you go about it is important and might just be the difference between the male surrendering to his need to eat and decimating the nest of fry or you having a good outcome and ending up with a breeding tank full of lots and lots of free swimming fry.

Breeding Bettas, Siamese Fighting Fish,  Part 6 – The Betta Courtship

Possibly Related Posts:

• Cleaning the Betta Fry Tank
• Breeding Crowntail Bettas
• Do Bettas Take Breaks While Spawning
• Breeding Bettas During the Cold Weather
• Microworms