# Wild Betta Journal



## LittleBettaFish

I do have a blog already, but I thought this could be more for the day-to-day lives of my fish. 

To start with, here are some pictures of my B. burdigala juveniles out of captive bred parents. There are four of them. One is really small and I can't sex, but the others look like two females and a male. They have two older sisters, and all of them will be staying here with me rather than being sold on.





































Currently have no spawns going at the moment. I don't mind as I have at least 100 odd fry/juveniles growing out in my tanks. 

I have two tanks under treatment for velvet. One houses some juveniles (I think it is the slowest growing species in the world) and the other some juveniles and their parents. Hoping to get rid of this frustrating parasite over the next week to give my fish some relief. 

Going to be doing a big overhaul of my tanks in the next week. I am going to clean most of them out and get a proper headcount on how many fry/juveniles I have still in with their parents. 

Wish I could get my brownorum female to stop eating their eggs while they are spawning. The male is a very lousy father and whatever eggs survive he stops guarding and lets her get in with them. I think I am never going to get any surviving fry from this species! 

Hoping to get my hands on a pair of B. coccina before the year is out, but think my chances are slim. I wish wild bettas were as easy to source as splendens are. It seems I always like fish that are either horribly expensive or incredibly hard to find. 

If anyone has any questions about wild bettas feel free to post them here. I have kept over 15 species and bred many of them, so do have some personal experience.


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## Fenghuang

Those fish look really cool. Love the last picture especially, with the one fish just peeking out of the bit of vegetation.

How many species of wild species do you have currently?


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha yeah I really like these three. They are very friendly and don't act at all shy or scared when I am around. I am hoping the fourth one I rarely see is a female as well as then I could have two harems of burdigala going. 

I am only focused on one complex/group of wild bettas now. The coccina complex. I currently have seven species from that complex. I think there are only 11 species in total, but two are practically impossible for me to get my hands on. 

Ideally I want male/female pairs of B. tussyae (only have one that I bred myself) and B. coccina to finish my collection. If the other two species fell into my lap I would not complain, but it is very unlikely.


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## MattsBettas

*stalker post*


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha I think I need more photos to warrant stalker posts. Unfortunately, I have to wait until this afternoon when my tanks are cleaned and the afternoon light comes in so my flash stops blinding everyone.


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## MattsBettas

What's the air pump you use called? 

Looking forward to more pics!


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## LittleBettaFish

Um it is a Resun 9906. 

http://www.aquariumproducts.com.au/catalogue_products.php?prodID=5543&catID=8

I think that is it there. Does a good job and it is not extremely loud. I have it running in my bedroom.


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## LittleBettaFish

Got some photos of my B. persephone males sparring. I've been noticing a few torn fins so going to be adding in some more floating plants, caves and wood for the weaker males to hide in. Females are plump and have been chasing each other and the males around, but just don't have space at the moment to separate a pair out. 

Thinking of selling/giving away my strohi pair as I am not doing anything with them and I need the space now with all my fry growing out. 














































I don't think there is any betta that can touch the beauty of a fully coloured up B. persephone male. The blue is just unreal when the sunlight hits it. 

I do however, need to clean my glass.


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## Fenghuang

Those fins are the most gorgeous shade of green blue. Your setups bring out your fish's naturual colour so much.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah, they are not very aesthetically pleasing but the fish seem to like them and that is what is important. Did a bit of tank maintenance on a couple of the tanks yesterday so they are looking slightly better. 

Decided to sell my Betta strohi pair. I just no longer have the room for them with all my fry growing out and they have been fairly ignored where they are downstairs. Hoping someone local wants them as they are a full-sized breeding pair and they have spawned in the past (except male swallowed his eggs). I want to focus solely on the coccina complex now. 

My poor rutilans juveniles look like crap because they have been scratching themselves raw from the velvet. Going to put some Aquarium salt in as well, because based on prior experience these kind of wounds can cause nasty secondary infections. 

Just purchased two of these for my B. persephone tank. I am hoping that the weaker males who usually stay around the bottom of the tank will use them. Although they might be like their parents and decide to spawn in one of these (my male persephone used to nest in a piece of PVC pipe). 

http://www.thetechden.com.au/D_Shape_Catfish_Breeding_Log_p/d1.htm

I want my new fish racks (getting them once the renovations downstairs are finished) to look similar to this. I am sick of being able to see all the cords and equipment in my current set-up. 









(not my image obviously)

Going to boil up some more peat moss and sphagnum moss for my tanks. I have to go to my dad's this weekend and get some more oak leaves from the oak tree he has. They seem to last a surprising amount of time before disintegrating and my fish like the cover they provide.


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## LittleBettaFish

Okay I was bored and decided I would rather take photos than clean tanks. 

I did however clean my glass so the photos turned out nicer than usual. 

This is my wild-caught brownorum male. He is from East Borneo apparently. Beautiful little fish with a lot of personality. He is extremely tame and not at all shy. Unfortunately, him and his female are extremely pathetic spawners. She either eats the eggs during spawning, or he lets her into the film canister to eat the eggs before they hatch. I have what I think is a brownorum sub-adult from my previous mouthbrooding pair, but I am worried about adding it because those tanks run on separate buckets/siphons and I don't want to introduce any disease. 




























Here is his female. She is quite plump at the moment with a prominent egg spot so thinking they will spawn/snack again soon. 


















They were fighting over blackworms. 

Here is my wild-caught burdigala (supposedly but I am thinking he might be uberis) male. Only have one shot of him because he hates the flash. I have noticed he is quite fat now compared to the tiny little thing I got months ago. He has fathered many offspring with his female, but they have been very male heavy spawns. 



























Some juveniles/fry still living at home with the parents.


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## LittleBettaFish

Got a surprise today as my terracotta 'D' caves had arrived. The seller had even put some lollies in for me. 

Anyone from Australia reading this, I highly recommend TheTechDen for purchasing aquarium supplies online. Service has always been exceptional and a majority of the products are Australian made. 

I just plonked one of them in there to see if they would fit and it is more than big enough to hold my wilds. So far a couple of persephone and my tussyae male have been into it. 










Here's some more pictures of my rarely photographed tussyae male. He is the only tussyae I have and lives with the persephone but I am debating moving him out. He normally doesn't colour up like this, but he also doesn't sit still so the photos aren't exceptional. 




























I am pretty sure he was born in August of last year, so nearly a year old. 

I wish I had the money to purchase some more of these D caves because I think they would be great for shyer fish to retreat to in my group tanks.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my pair of captive bred burdigala spawned the other day. 









_"Don't mind us, we're just going to spawn right where your camera can't get a decent shot"_

The male has two adult daughters (one hides all the time so I rarely see her and one he has spawned with) and there are two or three bigger fry that are swimming around in there as well. 

The pair in the photo, are the parents of the juveniles in the first post on this thread. That tank has given me the highest female to male ratio, and coincidentally enough it is the tank with the lowest temperature so thinking the sexes must be linked to temperature. 

Dad has been busy tending the nest and I think the eggs are going to hatch today. I will have to be careful doing my water changes because usually I blast eggs and fry everywhere and he comes and gives me the stink eye before going and collecting everyone again. 

My B. uberis who are suffering from velvet still have been looking perkier. The female who had an ulcerated face seems to be healing and one of the males (I think it is the father) has built a bubblenest in a film canister that she was investigating yesterday. There is one obvious female in there along with two smaller possible females. I have a spare wild-caught male uberis who lives with my rutilans that I have been trying to grow a female out to pair up with. Also have two nearly full-grown sons who are still bunking with dad that I may hold onto. 

Otherwise, everyone but my B. rutilans juveniles are looking good. Rutilans look like hell but as long as they are still eating and swimming around they should recover. 

I have a buyer for my B. strohi pair so will be kind of happy to see the back end of those. Never really got attached to them like I did my original pair so at the moment they are just taking up space.


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## MattsBettas

This great news! What about PVC piping as hides?


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## LittleBettaFish

I used to use it, but don't like the look of it. The terracotta once it has gotten some algae and been covered with peat moss and leaf litter looks a bit more natural. 

I used to use PVC pipe for my big mouthbrooders because some of them were pretty big. 

I have so many fry growing out at the moment. Not as many as splendens would produce mind, but heaps more than I am used to. I have 6 out of my 14 wild betta tanks used as grow-outs, plus the fry that are still in with their parents. 

My poor BBS hatchery has been getting a workout and I have been pumping dried cat food into my two grindal worm and one white worm cultures to get them producing enough for near daily harvesting. 

Bloody peeved though that after all this running around I did with my mum yesterday to get ready for a big interstate dog show, I didn't get to clean any of my tanks. The grow-outs were already overdue, but I really did not have the energy to do them at 11pm at night. So going to do a 50% clean today and 50% clean tomorrow just to get all the grunge off the bottoms.


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## LittleBettaFish

Took some pictures of my tanks today and the other day after a bit of a clean-up. 

The light is only over those tanks to take photos, otherwise the plant in there grows entirely on whatever sunlight comes through the clerestory window, which really isn't heaps. 









B. rutilans tank



















B. uberis tank










B. burdigala tank (wild-caught left, captive-bred on right). Male is the one you can see at front of tank.

I also accidentally tipped out all these eggs from the film canister in my uberis tank. Thought the male had just built a nest and not actually spawned as his daughters are too small and mate is recovering from velvet. But guess they felt good enough to go at it haha. 

Just finished my two hours worth of water changes. I have to rest all these buckets on glass lids over the fry tanks so I can drip water in while doing the other tanks. So glad I decided to get nearly every single tank its own siphon/bucket. Would have spread that velvet through my fish room again if I hadn't.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well decided to sell all of my juvenile B. unimaculata off except for the biggest male and his father. Someone I know from another forum is taking a reverse trio (one female and two males) in a week or so, depending on how they improve from the ammonia spike I had that my test kit for some reason wasn't showing the first couple of times I tested. 

They take up too much room, and I have to be extremely heavy handed with the water changes to keep the water quality good. Plus if I kept a female, I would just end up with more of them. 

They are my 'mum's' fish but I told her after peeling one of the runts half-dead off the carpet that I am selling them as I am sick of them. 

Just focusing solely now on the coccina complex of bettas. Although I do want either an imbellis, stiktos or smaragdina male to keep as a pet as a replacement for a domesticated splendens.


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## LittleBettaFish

This post has nothing to do with wild bettas.

For the last month or so, I have been thinking of setting up a native tank again for a school of 6-8 pseudomugil mellis (honey blue eyes). Since I am living on the poverty line at the moment haha, this tank is going to be made up of whatever I have on hand and whatever I can scrounge around at my grandparents' farm today. 

Basically, I only want to spend money on the fish. 










Tank will look something like this, but with more wood and no hairgrass. Also, I will be using my Aquaclear 20 instead of that crappy internal filter I was running before, and it will be in a different size tank. 

However, I was also toying with the idea of a 3D background, which will look like the bank of a river and have room for some emersed native plants. 

So plan for today is to go collect some rocks and leaves, and dig up whatever tea tree roots I can find. They do seem to have a permanent puddle that grows what appears to be glosso and other emersed natives in there so may bring some home and see if I can't make use of them.


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## LittleBettaFish

Tonight as I was feeding everyone, I realised that the dead fish in my B. rutilans 'green' tank is not the one I expected. Now I am just hoping it was not my B. brownorum sub-adult who I had previously thought I had killed when it was younger. I am also fed up with the several non rutilans fish in there, because it is preventing my greens from spawning. I know I have a definite male/female pair because I have seen them courting. 

So I am setting up a 40L tank tomorrow and stuffing my spare B. uberis male, B. tussyae male, possible B. brownorum sub-adult (if that wasn't the dead fish) and spare B. rutilans male in there. Hopefully with enough hiding places and cover they should leave each other alone. 

The only annoying thing is I am going to have to tear the tank apart to catch everyone and it is just looking how I want it. 

Took these pictures earlier today of a couple more of my tanks. These are along the bottom shelf of my rack:









Wild-caught B. brownorum pair left, B. rutilans 'green' juveniles right









B. hendra/B. burdigala grow-out left, B. uberis grow-out right

Here's a close-up of one of the B. uberis fry. Growth has been fairly slow on these because I have not been feeding them heaps and only doing water changes once every couple of days.


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## Hallyx

So glad you started this thread, LBF. I love your photography, and your commentary is delightful....as well as educational.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks for the feedback Hallyx. Have you still got your smaragdina (I think that is what it was) male? 

Also, if anyone reading this journal has anything they want me to address in a blog entry, please let me know. I have covered a lot of material since it started so I am always open to new ideas, especially coming from those looking at getting into wilds or who want to learn more. 

Otherwise, today is going to be a big fish day. Going to switch my B. hendra and B. brownorum tanks around and set up the tank for my misc. fish to go into. Also going to set up my 20L tank for my four burdigala juveniles as they are getting big enough now they don't need to be in a baby size tank. 

Also thinking of setting up something like this for my poliaki killifish female and getting her a male for company. Her previous male died and I did notice that they were available at the wholesalers so I may be able to get a replacement fairly cheaply.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=jS2lfModSEA


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I have been having a bit of a rough patch with my fish room at the moment. I'm trying out a formalin/malachite green medication on my rutilans juveniles and their battle with velvet, because at a low pH copper becomes very toxic and I don't want to have to keep exposing them to it. 

If this medication works and no one dies from it, I will use it in my couple of other tanks where the fish still have some symptoms of infection. 

I must have knocked the plug to my persephone tank heater and the tank was sitting on a chilly 20 degrees this morning. They are understandably looking lethargic, and if anything happens because of this I will be kicking myself.

In good news, looks like I have a few females in my male dominant burdigala spawn. Hoping this is the case as I want two pairs to keep on and a few females to sell with males to at least recoup some costs. 

Mum and dad are getting taken out and put in their own tank. It's too cramped in there now and all the male juveniles are harassing mum and fighting with dad. Just need to save up some money and purchase a couple small pieces of wood to use in their new tank. 

Got these photos of two juveniles from that tank sparring. They are so adorable and very tame. They are like a school of piranha when my hand goes in the tank. 













































Mum coming over to investigate. She is quite shy so I rarely see her out and about.


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## MattsBettas

So awesome! Good luck with the meds...


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## BeautifulBetta123

Oi love your wilds! So stunning! Definitely stalking this thread!


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## LittleBettaFish

I hate velvet. Just when I think I have it licked, it crops up in one of my tanks again. It's ridiculous and bloody hard to spot on these fish because of how strong their natural iridescence is. 

Rutilans are looking a lot less clamped up in the medicated water. I have a towel over their tank and have ramped up the temperature to 30 degrees celsius (86 degrees Fahrenheit). This is their second day of treatment and hopefully will finally give these poor juveniles a chance to be healthy again.

And thanks BeautifulBetta. I do love my wilds even if sometimes it is frustrating to the point of tears.


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## Fenghuang

The last picture with mama fish is so darn cute. Good luck with the treatment, LBF. I hope the velvet bites the dust.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha I think mum will be glad when they have moved out. Several of her sons are nearly big enough to start spawning soon so I think she has been getting heckled a bit lately as I noticed some fin damage. 

Here's another juvenile from the same tank.










Still very confused as to why both unrelated pairs of B. burdigala have had fry with the dark spots on their sides. None of the adults have them, and it is supposedly a trait only the very similar looking B. uberis has. My captive bred pair is from one of the top wild betta breeders so I doubt he would be incorrect in his identification of them. 

Then again, the sons out of my wild-caught male blow him out of the water colour wise. This is about the most colour I get out of the dad.


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## LittleBettaFish

No one seems to have keeled over in the rutilans tank. Water went cloudy as but I was doing a 50% water change today anyway. 

They are looking a lot better. The extremely warm water seems to have made them a bit sluggish (they are at 30 degrees when normally they would be around 24) but their colouring is still good and they aren't clamping their fins or scratching themselves from what I could see.

According to the directions on the bottle, I have 2 more days of medication to go. Not sure what to do after that. I think I may just repeat the treatment. I hate the really vague instructions medications seem to give. Like they never mention whether you should be doing water changes or not. 

I want to find a store selling a big piece of manzanita that I can hack to pieces and use in a few of my tanks. Like this:

http://www.piscesnaturalproducts.co...ge/product/Manzanita_Sandbl_4c90618baccf5.jpg

Unfortunately, only a couple stores sell it and not very cheaply either.


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## LittleBettaFish

Got a few pictures of my 'free-range fry'. These are fry/juveniles that I have not removed from their parents' tank. These fry basically raise themselves. Whoever don't get eaten by their parents or older siblings, survive so only the strongest handful are left. I sometimes throw in BBS or grindals for them to feed on, but usually the only food is whatever they can forage (my tanks can usually comfortably support at least 10-20 growing fry for quite a while). 

This was a spur of the moment photo shoot, so glass is not clean. Also, it is incredibly hard to capture good photos of fry in tanks with so many places to hide and other fish harassing them. 

B. burdigala (captive bred parents so not same tank as the above photos)




























B. hendra 








Parent spying in background











B. burdigala (wild-caught parents)


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## Chesh

I've been reading through your amazing thread (still a long way to go before I'm caught up to these _ADORABLE _baby pictures you just posted!), and just wanted to let you know that you have a new devoted fan! I found you when a few members pointed me in your direction after hearing me babble about B. channoides. . . I've fallen madly in love with them, and am _thrilled_ to find someone with the hands-on experience who is so willing to share. This thread is just incredible, and your dedication is astounding. Thank you SO much for taking the time to put all of this up! I've learned so much from the bit I've seen here already, though I'm nowhere near ready to bring any new fish home right now - I still have a _LOT_ to learn. . . 

Great thread, great shots, great job. . . and thank you so much for _all_ of these wonderful postings!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. Feedback like that always makes me feel good as wild bettas are so underrated by a majority of people. 

Dug out this photo of one of my channoides males (when I had them). Friendly and gentle little fish, and very prolific. Mine were like guppies! I had two males holding at the same time from one female. She had quite the appetite haha


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## Chesh

Thank you so much for posting this image! He is STUNNING! I don't understand what there is_ NOT_ to love about these fish. . . Every new thing I learn just puts me farther under their spell. . . One day, when I get there, I hope that I am able to keep mine as well as you obviously are keeping yours. ^.^


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## LittleBettaFish

Mine are currently debating how 'well' they are kept because they haven't been fed today haha. 

There are so many species of betta outside of splendens that I think there is an option for everyone regardless of preference. 

Most of the mouthbrooders (particularly the bigger species) tend to be pretty outgoing. I was playing with my unimaculata juveniles today by cupping my hand and letting them swim through it. They always have a fight over who gets to sit in there.










Here's my old albimarginata male telling a splendens off.


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## Chesh

Awwww, momma - don't starve those babies!









I think it's just that people don't know they're out there. I didn't. . .which is why I'm so happy to see you spreading the word on these amazing animals. I've been having a wonderful time learning about only a few of the many different species of Betta available, but not very often seen, in the hobby (by me, anyway). It's really hard to pick a favorite. . . I love interactive fish, feeding by hand and being a comfortable part in their world makes me sooooo happy! ^_^

Keep up the posting! This journal is just amazing! One day I'll get caught up, lol!


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## LittleBettaFish

How many burdigala can you fit into a 30x30x30cm cube (7 gallons)? 



























She who popped out all those eggs to make those fish haha

Then I finally got some decent shots of my tussyae male. He now shares a 10 gallon tank with a uberis male, two rutilans males and what I think is a brownorum male. He never sits still long enough for me to get a good photo of him, but since I moved him over into this new tank he is out all the time and always coloured up.


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## LittleBettaFish

Poor uberis female is looking extremely sick. She has what is basically pop-eye either because her immune system is shot to pieces and she picked up something bacterial, or because of the infection she looks like she has on her head. 










I didn't realise how sick the poor girl wasm as she was looking quite good only a few days ago. I think she has scratched her face, gotten an infection and then her adult sons have attacked her as she has torn fins and they were chasing her around before I pulled her from the main tank.

I do not want to hit her with any strong medications as I am afraid at this point it will do more harm than good. Just going to see how she does with some epsom salt (apparently good for pop-eye), clean water and no one around to harass her. 

If it doesn't start to clear up/show signs of improvement I may look into medicating. 









Her hospital tank. It's on my bedside table so I can keep eyes on her.


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## Chesh

Poor little girl!  
Hoping for a quick, and complete, recovery. . .


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## LittleBettaFish

I am hoping that she gets better too. She swims around normally, but the wound on her head is just nasty and I think if I can get that to heal, she is going to recover. She's one of my favourite wilds as she has so much spunk and used to be the biggest pig. It's horrible seeing her go downhill like this so fast. 










Here's a picture of one of her daughters. I thought she had three, but one turned out to be a young male and I don't see the other one enough to be able to tell. This daughter was supposed to be her replacement, but I didn't mean this soon! I've only had her four or five months.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my uberis female is still hanging on! She hasn't eaten but there are blackworms in there for her if she feels hungry at any time. I put a sponge filter on low as the IAL was making her water cloudy, and she has no issue with getting to the surface to breathe. 

Her eyes are not looking as bad in my opinion as what they were, and while the infection doesn't seem to be getting better, it doesn't look to be getting any worse. 

Currently, she is just getting 50% daily water changes and aquarium salt as treatment. I noticed she still may have some ich from the original infection, but that will have to be the second step in treatment. 

If she recovers, I will be removing her and her male to a separate tank of their own and letting her three sons and two daughters share a tank. She has kind of fallen in the pecking order and I think being constantly harassed hasn't really helped her get better. 

Also have sold (well I think he is picking them up this weekend) three of my unimaculata juveniles. At this point, I just want them gone as they are too much hassle with water quality and jumping.


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## LittleBettaFish

Good news, the infection on the uberis female's head appears to be going down, and her eyes are nearly back to normal size. I thought she'd jumped out tonight but she was just hiding under an IAL. Amazing the places a wild betta can hide in a 2 gallon tank. Her sons and mate are waging war on each other so going to hopefully go to the aquarium on the weekend and pick up a big piece of goldvine to cut down and use in their tank. 

Decided to move my rutilans juveniles up off my bottom shelf as it is too dark down there (really need some fluros for my rack) and they never come out. Now they are out and about and I can keep eyes on them a bit better. 

Am pleasantly surprised to see that I may have around 7-8 (that I can count) females from what I thought was a male only burdigala spawn. Going to hold onto a couple pairs and then sell the rest. At least that is the plan but I will probably get all weepy and sentimental and want to keep them all haha. 

Did manage to find these three a buyer. Hopefully he is coming around tomorrow to pick them up. Lost most of their siblings to some weird illness and will only have a runty female and the original male left. Going to hold onto her so he has company.




























Seem to be having a good run in my fish room of late, so hopefully it continues.


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## LittleBettaFish

Contemplating dividing my persephone up into two separate tanks or just moving them out of the 12 gallon long into a 60cm 15 gallon tank. Some of the less dominant males spend a lot of time at the bottom and the 12 gallon long takes up the space of a 60cm plus another 30cm tank on my rack. 





































Then my brownorum male wanted a couple of white worms. His female is nice and plump since she had some blackworms last night. Still no fry out of this pair which is exasperating. I think at this point I am going to be doomed never to rear fry from any of the brownorum I have owned!



















Tanks are looking blah at the moment. I really want to go get some fluro tubes to run on top of each shelf for my plants. That way, I can get a bag of aquasoil and sprinkle some handfuls in each tank, and then chuck in some floating watersprite and amazon frogbit to help with the water quality. 

Wishing my female burdigala would grow out faster. I think I could probably sell pairs for at least $30 but haven't really looked around at what price wild bettas go for from private breeders. Some extra cash would be nice though.


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## Chesh

Swooning for those B.persephone. . . those were another that I've been looking into lately. 
Sounds like you're getting a bit frustrated *hugs* I hope you get those naughty little brownorum to give you babies. And soon! How's your sick little patient doing?

If you don't mind my asking, what is your water hardness? Sorry if you posted the info somewhere and I missed it. I have soft water, but I know that some of these guys can be really sensitive. . .


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## LittleBettaFish

Out of the tap we have like zero carbonate hardness. Melbourne tap water (at least where I am) is really soft. 

The coccina complex have to have extremely soft and acidic water. Most people keep the pH around 5-5.5. They aren't as adaptable as other species, even captive bred stock. 

Brownorum spawn all the time but the female is an egg eater and the male is a wuss. I am waiting for them to spawn again so I can catch the female and put her in a breeders' net. 

Uberis female is still alive. She isn't looking as awful, and the swelling around her eyes seems to be going down slightly. She has been using her cave and still moving around so hopefully if she holds on she can get better.


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## LittleBettaFish

This week I have big plans for my fish room.

Once the new goldvine I purchased has been soaked enough to sink, I will be moving my B. persephone colony into a 60x30x36cm tank. Since it is shorter than their present home, I can then fit my rutilans grow-out next to it. They had to get shifted off my rack due to issues with space and I want them back on there. 

I want to split my hendra fry and burdigala fry that are currently sharing a grow-out tank up, so they are both in separate 45cm tanks as they are starting to become aggressive towards each other. However, they are infected with ich so I will be treating them all together first before I move them. 

I also sold off my three unimaculata juveniles so I only have the father and a young female now. Their tank was originally bare bottom and with minimal decoration as it was serving as a holding tank/grow-out. The plan is to add substrate (Up-Aqua soil as they don't need a super low pH), some broken up terracotta pots for caves and some wood and IAL just to give it a more natural feel. Plants will be giant/standard duckweed and some vallisneria nana. 









The male

The uberis female is still alive and hanging in there. She doesn't seem to be looking as bad as she was, but she is still not eating, which is worrying as she was such a pig previously.










Also, my uberis fry in the grow-out are maturing nicely. Shame nearly 90% of them seem male.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I have I think four rutilans 'green' adults in one of my tanks. I was thinking I hadn't seen them in a while when I catch this going on today.





































Pretty sure that is the original son and the father, both of which are two years old (well father is slightly older). So not going too badly. 

Unfortunately, I lost the mother through my own stupidity and had one of the remaining adults die a week or so ago. I believe one of the smaller adults is a female but not sure as they are quite elusive. 

This species is very special because it is known to mouthbrood. My male has mouthbrood with all his fry. The male he is sparring with is most likely the very first fry he spat out to show me haha. I thought he was ill because his throat went all swollen and he started hiding all the time. 

I have 20 more juveniles in a separate grow-out, so hoping to get at least one male/female pair out of them. 

This is quite an aggressive species so I have to put in lots of cover because otherwise they can tear strips off each other.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Well the uberis female I bred is definitely going to spawn with her father. She is in the film canister under a very big nest and is trying to lure him in with her. 

Started treatment with formalin and malachite green in my hendra/burdigala grow-out to treat the ich in there. I have plenty of replacements so don't mind if I lose the runts out of that tank as long as I get rid of the ich. 

I am wishing my goldvine would hurry up and sink already. It normally takes at least a week or two, but I am hoping because my pieces are quite spindly and they are weighed down with a rock, it won't take that long. 




























Persephone were being on their best behaviour today until I went over and sat on my bed and everyone starts tussling again. I am desperate for some of my burdigala pairs to grow out so I can sell some and use the money to purchase fish supplies. I want some amazon frogbit, 9L bag of aquasoil and some watersprite. 

I need to email the importer Jodi-Lea about when the final (boo hoo) ever AB shipment date is as I want to bring in a pair of _pure_ stiktos. I also want to ask whether I can simply pre-pay for a pair of coccina from Hermanus. I don't want to miss out if she only orders one pair next time they are in stock and someone else buys them first.


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## LittleBettaFish

Got some photos of my Betta hendra. This is a recently described species and is very beautiful. Unfortunately, my pair don't like the camera so good photos of them are rare! They have at least a dozen fry/juveniles in with them, and then a ton more in a separate grow-out. They are quite prolific when the mood takes them.









Male









Female (she is always barred up, I don't know why)


















One-eyed fry I couldn't cull



















This was how small the female was when I originally got her. She's certainly a lot 'stouter' nowadays. Although having kids will do that to you haha


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I am going to be sorting out my unimaculata tank today. 

Because they don't require a super low pH, the plan is to use my remaining Up Aqua substrate over the bottom the tank rather than peat moss. 

I have some terracotta pots I am going to attempt to break in half so I can use these as hiding places for two of them. Although after my previous attempts at breaking up pots ended in failure, I don't hold out much hope. This may be something I sweet talk my dad into doing with one of his many power tools haha. 

I also have some very neglected vallisneria nana growing in a tub outside, and I am thinking of planting it into a Chinese take-out container filled with a mixture of organic potting mix and sand. This way I won't have to make the actual substrate in the tank especially deep. 

Then I will just chuck in some twiggy pieces of driftwood and some duckweed and that should be a more suitable home than the bare and 'Spartan-esque' tank they have now.


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## LittleBettaFish

Spent all of this morning cleaning grow-outs and trying to separate the biggest of my hendra/burdigala fry into a different tank to allow the smaller fish some space to grow. 

I thought I was going to have to cull the swim bladder affected fry from my other burdigala grow-out, but it seems like the majority are improving and starting to swim without sinking. I have sequestered them in a breeders net and turned the sponge filter up to try and get them moving around. They have two weeks to improve and if they don't they will be culled. 

My uberis female is still alive. I put some peat moss in her hospital tank because the reflection off the bare glass frightened her. Her infection has cleared up completely and her eyes are normal size now. Just keeping her separate as she is still a bit subdued/clamped up.

Am sick of my current fish rack. I want a nice swish set-up where everything is tucked neatly away. Plus it is too small for what I need. I have had to put tanks elsewhere in my room which I hate. 

At least my persephone are their usual charming selves.


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## LittleBettaFish

Did a bit of a photoshoot with my burdigala tanks. God I have so many males. I don't know how I am going to get rid of them all. I am just praying the ones I think are female stay female and don't turn out to just be males that haven't developed yet as I want to be able to sell a few fish to recoup some of my expenses. 

These are the juveniles/sub-adults from my wild-caught pair



























Then here is an adult captive-bred (not by me) female









I believe this is a daughter from the above female 


















Then this is my rutilans rescue male. One of the males he shares a tank with seems to have pruned his ventrals some. He was very sad and sorry when I got him, but now he is huge and quite aggressive.









Then finally here is my stunning little Chromaphyosemion poliaki female. I am thinking of setting up a proper tank (she is sharing with a pair of my wild bettas presently) and getting a pair of Aphyosemion australe (similar species) to keep her company. Either that, or ask a guy I know who works at the wholesaler if there are any male poliakis available to pair her up with.


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## LittleBettaFish

Day two into ich treatment and everyone is still with me. No one seems to be showing any adverse reaction to the medication. Hoping this time I will kill it off for good. 

Everyone in the persephone tank lost interest in spawning/maintaining their nests. They have a very short attention span and I think someone ate the eggs before spawning was even finished. 

I can't tell if my hendra pair are sick or what is going on with them. They clamp up all the time and the female just looks a bit off, but then the other night they were in full breeding dress and today I think they are actually spawning. I would think if they were sick spawning would be the last thing on their minds.

Looking at these photos of my remaining hendra/burdigala fry it's hard to think they are suffering from ich. 























































It's only that they scratch and that I have a super strong torch that I can spot the cysts on them. They are due to start treatment tomorrow. I was just waiting until the water temperature stabilised.


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## Fabi

Nice fish u got here )


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. Hoping things will be less stressful once I get everyone healthy again. 

Just sent payment through for a pair of pure Betta stiktos so pretty excited. If things all go according to plan they should land in Australia on the 17th and be out of quarantine on the 24th. 

Going to keep them as pets and then maybe consider spawning once I have more space/time.


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## LittleBettaFish

I packed away the BBS hatchery today. I ran out of BBS eggs and now my juveniles are all big enough for other foods, I am not going to bother to purchase another lot of eggs. 

I'm not sure if I am supposed to repeat the ich treatment or not as the instructions on the bottle could not be any vaguer. It says a three day treatment is enough but I think that is bull. However, its main ingredient is copper and I don't want to poison my fish. 

My uberis female looks like hell. I am not sure if she is going to pull through or not. I would hate to lose her to freaking ich after she survived the infection on her head. Right now she is in with my burdigala fry getting treated with them. 

Luckily one of my grow-outs is actually doing well. This is quite a heavily stocked tank and on a whim I tested my ammonia and it was rather high. So now I am doing large, daily water changes to help keep it in check. The juveniles seem a lot happier, and I have noticed they are a lot less skittish and not clamping up any more.


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## LittleBettaFish

Here are a pair I don't really show off much. My Betta unimaculata male and his juvenile offspring (thinking female at this point). I lost nearly all of this spawn to what I think was complications resulting from ammonia poisoning (one of my test kits was giving me a false negative). I had four offspring left and I sold the other three. 





































Now they are doing much better. Although their tank looks terrible. Needs a makeover but I can't be bothered. 

Female looks like a fish blimp because she ate all the brine shrimp I put in there, while the male was hiding under the sponge filter for reasons known only to him.


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## LittleBettaFish

Found one of my uberis sub-adults dead. Lately, I noticed one of the female juveniles and the two remaining juvenile males were never out in the open. I had seen their dad chasing them around a lot, and I think the dad attacked the son as he has been really aggressive lately.

I decided to pull the two remaining males and the hiding female from the main tank, and put them in a tank of their own. That left one sub-adult female in with the male. 

Well they are pleased as punch because after I nearly tore their tank apart getting the others out, and did a water change, the two of them are now spawning. 

I rarely see my coccina complex fish behave so aggressively. The only time something like this has happened was when a couple years back my group of rutilans ganged up and killed one of their siblings/offspring. 

My original uberis female is still hanging in there. I am going to give her another week and then if she isn't making any recovery I will have to euthanise her. It is cruel to just let her suffer for my sake.


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## Hallyx

So sorry to hear both items of bad news. As a dilettante petkeeper, those kinds of things really get to me. I'm sure it's not easy for you.


----------



## BettaLover1313

Very sorry to read about your female, I really hope she pulls through again since you obviously care about her a lot.

Just finished reading through your journal and you have absolutely gorgeous fish!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. Most of my sick fish seem to be improving a lot lately so I am hoping I can put all these problems in the past. 

Uberis female has been moving around more, but it isn't enough of an improvement for me to say that there is definitely no chance of her being euthanised. Makes me sad when I see all the old photos of her and she was looking great. 

In less depressing news, I made the two hour trek on the bus in freezing cold weather to the fish store to pick up some new fish.

I decided my poliaki female needed some killifish company, and until I can get my hands on a male for her, I got some closely related companions instead. 

This species isn't particularly rare or difficult to care for, but they are one of my favourite killifish species. Something about them just makes me feel happy. I think it's the fact they look like they are smiling. 




























They are bunking in a breeders' net in my unimaculata tank (I know I should have quarantined but I was too tired and stressed from the bus ride), but tomorrow I will be setting up a tank for them and the poliaki female.


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## Chesh

KILIS!!! Gorgeous ones, at that! Girl, I'm so sorry you've been having so many issues over there, glad things are starting to look up for you in that respect. I LOVE getting a free moment to pop on and see what's going on with all your little beauties. . .


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## Fenghuang

Wow, that killifish is a beauty. What species is that?


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## Wildbetta

Great to see that you have gotten some Aphyosemion Australe. I have a pair of the orange ones. I love the way they look and are so active and colorful. 

On another note: I do hope your female pulls through for ya soon.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah I had quite a few killifish species in the past, but lost/sold them. I have never had much luck with them, even in cycled aquariums where the parameters are all stable. 

It sucks here because there are so many species that are available for import, but which never come into the country. I love the chromaphyosemion genus but alas there are only three or so species I have seen from that group.

This was my first australe male. He had two females, but for some reason the store wouldn't let you purchase them in anything but male/female pairs.


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## LittleBettaFish

So killifish are doing great. I got their new tank sorted out last night. I put some peat moss on the bottom as I've found most fish like the colour and texture of this as a substrate, and just have the heater running to stabilise the temperature. 

Going to go to Kmart and pick up some green yarn to make a spawning mop out of. Then maybe I can get some eggs out of this pair. Only had very sporadic luck with rearing killifish fry in the past but hoping to change this. 

Although my fish are all doing well I am having a bit of a tough week emotionally. Got a few personal problems in my life I need to sort out. Makes even doing the things I love hard. 










Then moments like this help to cheer me up. She is actually as evil as that photo makes her look. I think if I ever became superfluous to her she would sit on my face while I was sleeping and smother me.


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## LittleBettaFish

Hendra/burdigala/uberis juvenile group shots






















































Trying to wean this lot onto NLS pellets. They were not impressed by their first tasting today. However, I noticed that many of the pellets that had fallen onto one of the IALs had vanished so I am hoping that as they have softened some of the juveniles have eaten them. 

The uberis juveniles in the tank next door are also going well. However, it looks like I have a *lot* of males in there so hoping they don't start ripping each other to shreds as they mature.


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## BettaLover1313

They're so cute!


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## blueridge

LBF just wanted to say that I love reading your blog from time to time when I get to and as always your fish are amazing! Keep up the good work!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Blueridge. 

I haven't had much time to do anything with my fish the last few days. They have just been getting water changes and food chucked at them and that's about it.


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## blueridge

That's ok. Sometimes I get into a funk with taking care of mine. You'll get over it soon I'm sure. Just keep taking pictures for me every once in awhile so I can drool all over my computer screen.


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## LittleBettaFish

I have a confession to make. I didn't euthanise my uberis female.

The other day I put some substrate in the bottom of her hospital tank and she seems to be moving around more than she was and aside from the clamping and poor appetite, looks okay. 

I am going to try another treatment with aquarium salt because that seemed to perk her up last time. 

It's hard because she got through the infection and has hung on for several weeks now. I feel like we have come so far that if I can just pull her through this, she will start to pick up. 

She has another two weeks to improve and then I will most likely euthanise. 

In better news, my group of Betta rutilans 'green' sub-adults/juveniles are doing quite well. I look to have a couple of females in the group so I am hoping that I can continue this line for a few more generations.


















(What I think is one of the females)

They also have four related adults in another tank. I think three are full siblings and one is their father. They were the first wilds I ever bred and so I have a soft spot for this species even if it's not one of my favourites. 

Otherwise everyone else is going okay. I am on a new medication that makes me really drowsy so I haven't had a lot of energy left to devote to my fish. I think I need to go back to daily water changes on my hendra/burdigala grow-out as the 50% every second day isn't cutting it. Which is annoying! Wish I had more space for more racks and tanks.


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## LittleBettaFish

Fish are all angry with me. We ran out of blackworms the other day and now we have to wait until Saturday/Sunday to get some more. 

I thought it would be a good time to start getting some of my younger fish onto pellets. So far they are very unimpressed with my efforts. 

The only one I got to take pellets is my australe killifish female. Now all she does is lurk at the surface waiting for me to put food in while the male sits forlornly in his spawning mop.


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## LittleBettaFish

Got some photos of my Betta rutilans 'green' juveniles/sub-adults. They are maturing quite nicely. Hoping to get several females from this group just so I have some pairs to keep this strain going.





































Their parents were two or so years old when this group was conceived. I think I still have the father but unfortunately, I lost the mother not that long ago.


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## Saphira101

Your fish are incredibly beautiful.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Saphira.

Well, I had a trio of uberis I was looking at selling if one of them turned out to be female and not just a young male. 

I was thinking maybe I would see maybe some courtship behaviour that would let me verify their sexes and then I could whack them up for sale. 

Noticed the male had a massive nest going today, and look in with my torch and he has a nice batch of eggs in there. 

Now I am going to have to see what happens because he is a first-time dad and I don't want to destroy all his efforts. Looks like the sale might have to be postponed for a couple of weeks.


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## LittleBettaFish

Forgot how much I enjoyed keeping killifish. My australe gold pair are doing spectacularly well. Spawning regularly, eating whatever I put in their tank, and they don't seem to mind having the poliaki female in there with them either. 









Australe female









Poliaki female

I collected some eggs from their spawning mop and have them floating in a chinese take-out container. A few look to have eyed up and I am hoping that I can get them to hatch. 

Only problem is now I am just wishing I had the space and funds to set-up more tanks for killifish again!


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## LittleBettaFish

Going to seriously overhaul my fish rack over the next few weeks. I want to put in live plants such as frogbit, water sprite and mayaca in all of my tanks including grow-outs because I want to cut down on the amount of water changes I am doing. 

This means I am going to have to install lights over each shelf of tanks. At the moment I am just looking at fluros because they are cheaper to purchase and this rack is going to eventually be torn down once I move my fish downstairs. 

I also have to organise my tanks better. I want to have separate shelves for my breeding pairs, groups of adult fish and grow-outs. I hate how my tanks look presently and they are starting to sprawl off the rack again. 

Plan is to order IALs online, source some plants locally and get my dad to help me install some lights. I also want to purchase a couple of plastic water drums and age my water for water changes in this. I am wondering if I am causing fluctuations with the water chemistry in the tanks with fry/juveniles when I just do changes with water out of the tap. I have a spare 200 watt heater lying around so I figure why not rig something up. 

It's going to be a lot of work, but I think my fish will be happier and healthier in the long run. These are quite sensitive species, particularly when they are fry so I want to try and keep my set-ups as low maintenance and 'hands-off' as possible. 

Anyway, for those that read all this, here is a photo of my pair of A. australe pair courting. 









They are such active fish compared to my wild bettas and the male is always on the move chasing the female around and trying to convince her to spawn.


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## LebronTheBetta

Your fish are all gorgeous!  Your A. australe bettas seem to have "tribal" markings. The boy is the bottom one, correct?


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## LittleBettaFish

The australe are killifish, not bettas. I used to keep both killies and wilds but then I lost nearly all my killies to disease. 

The bottom one is the male. They are not a rare species but I think they are exceptionally beautiful. It's a shame killies are not as readily available here in Australia. A new species was recently described that is absolutely stunning.

http://www.reef2rainforest.com/2013/06/21/new-killifish-species-from-cameroon/


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## LebronTheBetta

Oh, my mistake. And thank you for the link.


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## LittleBettaFish

Was just checking on my killifish eggs that I had collected from the spawning mop. I had been lazy and not bothered to add methylene blue or an airstone to the container which can cause the eggs to fungus. 

Much to my surprise, I have five or so tiny fry hatched out! I added in a small amount of microworms to the container but I think they aren't quite big enough for it yet. 

Now comes the tricky part of raising them. I have learned with my killifish to take it slow and so I am going to leave them floating in the container for a couple of weeks to avoid causing stress. 

I probably have a stack more eggs left in the spawning mop as I haven't been collecting them. Will be awesome if I could build up a colony of these fish.


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## LittleBettaFish

My hendra pair look so much happier now I moved their juveniles out into a separate tank. One of their offspring has a deformed eye but since it survived this long without intervention I thought I may as well let it live. 

Got the great news that my stiktos pair were sent out today so they should be arriving tomorrow. Crossing all my fingers and toes that they arrive okay. I thought I'd paid the poor transhipper, but turns out that I had put all the money into the wrong paypal account. 

My killifish fry are doing fine. There is six that I can see, plus some eyed up eggs. I also collected around a dozen more eggs from the mop and have them bubbling away in a separate container. 

Now I feel torn. One part of me loves my wild bettas, but another part of me wants to just sell the whole lot of them because lately it seems I have had nothing but trouble. 

The fry/juveniles seem really prone to coming down with velvet/ich and since my pairs spawn quite frequently I am always afraid I am going to start an outbreak in my thus far uninfected tanks. 

At the moment, my killifish just seem so much easier. I do a couple small water changes a week, and they are thriving. Plus it takes ages for the eggs to hatch so I can get myself prepared properly. 

Anyway, enough moaning, here are some pictures of my uberis fry. They have whatever external parasite it is that runs rampant through all my grow-outs, but they are doing fine apart from that. Got a heck of a lot of males in this group. 




























Then here are some better snaps of my male and female australe.


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## LittleBettaFish

My stiktos pair arrived in perfect health and condition. Unfortunately, their temporary tank is quite bare and I think it's spooking the male. Along with blackworms and some brine shrimp, I am planning on getting a couple of clumps of java moss from the fish store tomorrow. 

Except for the infected tanks, all my wilds are doing fine. I had a delivery of IAL the other day and so I put some in every tank with some oak leaves and that has kept everyone busy. I have been meaning to get pictures but it makes it hard because it's winter now and my bedroom is quite dark and if I put a light over the tanks all my fish go down into the leaf litter. 

I do however, have some photos of my killifish male and his fry. I have counted seven fry and they are all eating MWs at this point. 


















In his spawning mop



















As you can see the fry are pretty tiny so I am being very conservative at this point in time with water changes and water quality.


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## Saphira101

Those fry are too cute!

Best of luck!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. Never had much luck raising killifish fry. I had a couple that jumped out when they started getting bigger and then I had to euthanise this one I bred due to disease. 










I am just hoping I can get this seven through the next couple of weeks.


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## BettaLover1313

They're looking great!


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## LittleBettaFish

Sold my home bred trio of Betta uberis to a girl I know from another forum today. Was sad to see them go, but it gives me one less tank to clean. 

Now I'm trying to shift 20 odd Betta burdigala sub-adults, but so far had no interest locally. I won't ship and I suppose that limits my market. 

I have also decided that I am getting out of wild bettas and will be keeping killifish instead. I will be keeping my mixed sex groups/pairs of wild bettas as I couldn't part with any of my current adults, but I will not be making any special effort to raise any fry that might be born. 

I am just sick to death of all the problems I seem to have with the wild betta fry/juveniles and I am finding my australe pair to be a heap of fun. They are also much easier to photograph than my wild bettas!


















Poor female really needs a male but no one has any of this species in stock



















Their fry are growing really well. I added a tiny bit of java moss and some peat to the container and they seem to be enjoying it. 




























I can't wait until they are big enough to sex properly.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well, have been making the effort to spend some time with my wilds again and am feeling less overwhelmed when I realise it's only a couple of tanks out of around 14-15 that I have problems with. However, I still won't be purposefully breeding wilds in the future and will be selling/giving away any fry that I am raising now once I get them healthy and at a sellable size. 

I also got some really nice photos of my wild bettas the other day and my stupid camera ran out of batteries so I am going to have to charge it and upload them. 

My killifish and fry are still going swimmingly. The fry are obviously growing, and the dozen or so eggs I collected in a separate container are starting to eye up. So looks like more A. australe fry are coming in the near future. It's really neat watching the whole process of the fry developing within the egg. It's also nice to have some time between collecting the eggs and the fry hatching to get everything prepared.


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## LittleBettaFish

Had a busy day fish wise. Emptied and cleaned out several tanks that were just sitting on my bedroom floor and moved all of my burdigala, uberis and hendra juveniles/fry/sub-adults into a single 2ft tank. 

Then I had to do water changes on my other 13 tanks. 

I have also run into the problem with breeding fish that are really a niche market (my wilds) in that I am finding it difficult to move my 20 odd burdigala on to new homes. Thinking I might just take them down to my LFS and see if I can't trade them in for supplies. Selling some for cash would have been nice though. 

Have some exciting news in that the dozen or so eggs I collected from my killifish have started hatching. Their siblings are doing really well, and I am hoping that I can get a majority of this latest batch to hatch. Then I can start collecting more eggs. 

Took these shots of my juveniles before I moved them all in together. You can't see in the photos but they are covered in ich again. Very aggravating to say the least.


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## Chesh

Just catching up over here. . . you are one busy girl! I can't imagine keeping up with so many tanks, don't know how you do it! They're all so lovely, though!


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## dramaqueen

How many species of wilds do you breed?


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## LebronTheBetta

Your australes are still my favorite!
Is that yarn you put in their tanks? Or is it java moss? Because if you say it is, that doesn't look like it..


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks, Chesherca. It's not too much work, only an hour or two every couple of days. 

DramaQueen, I currently keep eleven species of wild bettas. However, the other day I made the decision that I won't be actively breeding wilds any longer, so I'm going to be selling off all my young fish once they are healthy and at a sellable size and just keeping my adults as pets. 

Maybe in a year or two I might get back into breeding wild bettas, but for now I want to do more with killifish. 

LebronTheBetta, it is yarn. It's a spawning mop I made for them to lay their eggs in. Only java moss is in my fry containers. AUS are one of my favourite species as well. I want to get the chocolate and Kape Lopez strains, but not sure if I am going to have to purchase eggs from a breeder or actual adult pairs. 

Got a dozen more eggs from the mop a day or two ago so they are now bubbling away. I have at least 15 AUS fry now and they are doing really well. Someone local is going to sell me some BBS eggs so hopefully I will see an improvement in growth.

Going to try and rig up a better fry raising/egg hatching system today. My current one looks rather ghetto.


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## LittleBettaFish

Phew, just finished cleaning out all my tanks. Put some IAL in just to spice things up. My males enjoy nesting under them, and having a fight when a rival gets too close. Accidentally destroyed this massive nest one of my burdigala males was making. He's been working on it since last week and he was not pleased that I ruined it. 

Got my killifish hatching/fry system worked out. It needs bigger Tupperware containers, but these ones will have to suffice until I can get down to the store to get some more. 



























My first lot of fry









A very fat and content female


















I put the spawning mop in a different way after the water change and my male was busy exploring it. He sort of lurks in the yarn and waits for the female to come past so he can court her.


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## LittleBettaFish

My persephone have turned into feral fish. They would not sit still for any photos, not even with food bribes. So these are the best I have.























































Then I have my burdigala family. This tank holds original female, original male, their adult daughter, their adult son, two juvenile males and I believe one female fry/juvenile. The mother is always squabbling either with the male or her daughter, hence why she is all beat up looking. 























































This is one of my favourite tanks as all the fish in there are very friendly. I rarely see the dad though, as he is usually busy working on a bubblenest somewhere.


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## LittleBettaFish

Not certain if it's possible to spam your own thread but whatever. My killifish never fail to cheer me up when I am feeling down and so I got some photos of them after a feed. This time I even went all fancy and cleaned the glass.



























How can you be sad when it looks like your fish are smiling?


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## LittleBettaFish

Going to pick up some BBS eggs tonight from a guy I know who lives only 15 or so minutes away. This should do my killifish fry until they can be weaned onto grindals. 

Got them some 1L plastic containers as the store didn't have any cheap bigger sizes. It's double what they have now anyway so it should do for a little while. 

Intending on treating my sick juveniles/fry today. I finally got the water temperature up to 30 degrees as I realised my thermometer wasn't actually working properly. Would love to have them healthy as they are doing really well otherwise and it would be nice to move them on to new homes when they are better. 

Finally, I took these pictures of my wild-caught stiktos male. Him and his female live on my bedside table and they behave in basically the same manner as domesticated splendens. They are just slightly shyer and so I can't make any real sudden movements.



















These are supposed to be my mum's fish (she paid for them, their import fees and shipping costs) but she has barely glanced at them since they arrived. She is much more interested in her suicidal unimaculata male and his daughter that 'we' bred.


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## dramaqueen

Nice pics! Thanks for sharing.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks DramaQueen. 

I have started treatment for my main ich infected grow-out so fingers crossed it works this time. I have two other grow-outs with more minor infections so they will be next in line. 

Thanks to someone from the Australian betta forum, I have some BBS eggs. My killifish fry had their first meal (only required 3 drops from my 1ml syringe and they were full) and so I am happy they finally have enough food to start doing some serious growing. 

Going to use the leftover BBS for the parents and my smaller burdigala/hendra fry.


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## dramaqueen

I hope you get your ich problem under control.


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## LittleBettaFish

Me too. Since I turned the heat right up, they are looking really bad but I am hoping as the treatment continues for another week or so it will kill it off. 

Looking at the amount of eggs I am harvesting from my killifish tank I think I need a bigger grow-out set-up. I have three 1L plastic containers and a jar for my BBS hatchery inside of a 45cm tank and it is getting rather cramped. Think I am going to transfer them all into my 12 gallon long tank when I take my persephone out of it.


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## LittleBettaFish

Some photos of my 'obese' Betta burdigala juveniles/sub-adults. I think it was all the blackworms and grindals they have gotten. You can see none of my wilds are going to starve any time soon. 




























Then we had a shot of one of my persephone males from this morning. I tried to get more but they would not sit still and the rest of the photos turned out rather _unflattering_. 










My killifish fry are doing great. Noticed one had hatched out in the egg container so gave it some microworms. Unfortunately, I buried half the eggs when I was moving them in the peat moss so I can't tell how far along they are/if any have gone bad. We shall just have to wait and see.


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## LittleBettaFish

Sold three of my burdigala juveniles (siblings to the ones in the above photos) to a man that lives nearby. Gave me some extra cash at least so I can put it towards a couple more killifish species. At this point I am waiting for striatum, chocolate australe and poliaki to come back through the Australian wholesaler. 

Going to offer my Betta hendra breeding pair for sale. I have heaps of fry from them to carry on with and I thought since I am not breeding in the near future, someone else could use them. 

Thought I only had one hatching out in my killifish egg container but when I turned my strong light on tonight I found I had three fry in there! Pretty chuffed as that brings my total up to approximately 20 australe fry. I think I might swing by the $2 shop tomorrow and pick up some food safe 1L containers as the original fry are getting bigger. 

It is not fun however, sleeping in the same room as my BBS hatchery that has an airstone going on full blast the whole night. That along with four air pumps (one of which is under my bed) can make sleeping a noisy affair haha.


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## LittleBettaFish

Some better shots of my persephone. They got a water change and a glass clean along with everyone else today so I thought I might as well snap some photos while my tanks were looking decent. 





































Then there is the tussyae male I bred. I think he is actually just over a year old now so he is doing well. Still really sad none of his siblings made it to adulthood as wild bettas seem much more group oriented and it would have been nice to have some companions of his own species. 

However, he is content to share his 10 gallon tank with three rutilans males and an uberis male so life isn't too bad.



















I moved my two lots of killifish fry into a spare 2 gallon tank I had lying around and so I will slowly be increasing the amount of water in this over the next week or so. The biggest of these fry is now able to take grindals so I am quite pleased with their growth considering the conservatively sized containers I had them in and the fact they were on MWs for a while until I could get some BBS.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just wanted to share this photo of our 15 year old cat Bandit (when I was little I named him for the white band around his back leg). He has had a few health problems and nearly died earlier this year, but aside from a visit to the vet the other day with an upset stomach, he has bounced back. 

He still needs to gain another 500-600 grams before I will be happy, but I am just glad that he is still around.


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## BettaLover1313

Bandit is adorable! I'm glad that he's a healthy kitty!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. Admittedly, he is sort of odd looking, but he has a great personality and having lived with him for 15 odd years now it would be hard to imagine life without him. 

In fish news, I had my pair of Betta hendra spawn. They are supposed to be sold this Sunday and now the male has a massive nest of eggs he is tending to. 

I am really struggling with this ich in my grow-out tank. Everyone is absolutely covered in it now and it won't go away no matter how I treat it. I treated it for a week and a bit with Ichonex which is a malachite/copper treatment and it hasn't even dented it even with the heat cranked up to 86 degrees Fahrenheit. Tried salt treatment previously as well as formalin and malachite. 

I decided today I am going to cull out the runts and the extremely sick/near death fry. Someone I know from another forum is bringing me over some strong ich medication made up by someone from his work I believe (he works at a wholesaler) so I am praying that this finally kills this damn infection off. 

The biggest of my australe fry moved into a new 8L/2 gallon tank the other day. They are now taking grindals alongside their BBS and I am seeing definite growth. 

I have four or so fry hatch out in my egg container and when I shone the torch in there last night I could see at least four or five more eggs that were very eyed up and so obviously going to hatch soon. 

These are just some awful photos I got of my biggest fry last night.


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## LittleBettaFish

Spoiled my killifish yesterday by purchasing some bolbitis for them to play around in. Their ceramic spawning cave I ordered apparently got shipped out from Taiwan so no idea when that is going to arrive. 

Sold five fish today and made $60. Going to put it towards a pair of killifish as I now have some space for them. 

Going to do a big water change tonight and dose my grow-out with this different medication I received yesterday. If that doesn't work I am going to cull everyone and sanitise the heck out of that tank before it ever gets used again. 

Anyway here are my killifish having some fun.





































They are having a fasting day tomorrow as I think they are getting rather plump!


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## LittleBettaFish

My terracotta spawning caves arrived from Taiwan today. I am used to my wild bettas who tend to ignore these kinds of things (I spent over $50 on pleco caves/hides for them that go unused), so was pleasantly surprised to see how appreciated my new purchases were. 

Within a couple minutes of being put in, my australe female was guarding it from her companion and even got the male to come in an have a look around. 

Bit bummed as the species I wanted to get came into the wholesaler as a shipment of all females. So now I have to wait until they get some males in to get myself a pair. For now I am just contenting myself with organising their tank. It still needs some anubias or java fern and a different sponge filter, but otherwise it is looking perfect. 





































The last shot is my poliaki female sneaking in. Poor thing is never going to have a male at this rate. I think I might have to see if anyone has any eggs with her locality/strain that I can hatch out.


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## LittleBettaFish

Sun came right through my window just then and so I snapped some shots of my australe fry. These are the biggest ones. The dozen or so others are still way too small to photograph.


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## Saphira101

Too cute! Those spawning caves are really cool.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. I saw them in someone's tank from an international forum and only stumbled across an overseas supplier for them the other day. I think I might get a couple more as I intend on keeping several more species of killifish and I like my tanks to match.

Ugh, noticed that the underside of my top shelf on my rack has had water come through. Going to have to move all the tanks off it, get the spare shelf out from under the bed, put a coating on that and swap them over. Don't want the whole shelf to collapse.


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## LittleBettaFish

This is how you have a sneaky fight when you think mum isn't watching. I have to say though, for all the sparring these males do on a daily basis, they rarely cause physical damage to each other. I often wonder if there is some way to bring the level of aggression in splendens back down to a level similar to that of their wild cousins. There doesn't seem a need for the excessively high level of aggression shown in many pet/show splendens as they are no longer used for their original purpose. 





































I noticed one of my rutilans sp. green males had a slightly larger mouth than normal. It is aggravating as I cannot tell if he is holding eggs or just has a big mouth. I am going to change their tank around one of these days so I can keep a better eye on them. I think I have a female in there somewhere but I can't be 100% certain without either fry or seeing them spawn. 

One pair that isn't shy about spawning right in front of me are my killifish. They were having a great time this morning showing off for the camera.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I culled out nearly all of my really heavily infected ich juveniles. I only have eleven now out of over 70 fish. Those I left were the biggest (some are nearly full-grown) along with a few smaller female burdigala I wanted to hold onto. I don't think I have any hendra left. They seemed to be the worst affected of the lot and were really emaciated and dreadful looking. I hate culling. Especially when the juveniles are the size they were and they had put in such a long struggle to live. 

Anyway, I moved the remaining eleven into a smaller and more fish friendly (has a layer of peat moss over the bottom) hospital tank. I'm not really sure where to go from here. Nothing I have used seems to put a dent in this annoying parasite. Temperature, salt, copper, nothing I do even slows it down. 

In other news, I had a couple more killifish fry hatch out. Going to get a 25x25x25cm cube for the bigger ones to move into and use their 20x20x20cm cube for their smaller siblings. 

The bigger ones recognise me now even though they are only like 1cm in size. As soon as they see me come over they all swim up to the front of the glass wanting to be fed. I think I have one male sprouting and he is absolutely adorable. 

Makes me sad to think of all the species I had and lost. Now I am going to have to start from scratch again and it is going to be a lot harder now I don't have as much money as I used to.


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## LittleBettaFish

Some killifish fry shots from today. 



























So hard to believe that the above fry were only this big not all that long ago...









I also have so many of them. I would have to say at least 30 with more eggs eyeing up each day.


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## BettaLover1313

The fry are so cute!


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## LittleBettaFish

I know, I have completely forgotten my bettas in favour of these guys haha. 

At least I know this lot will be easy to transition onto pellets. They eat anything I put into the tank.


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## LittleBettaFish

Decided I am no longer collecting killifish eggs from my mops. I have way too many killifish fry now I have sat down and actually counted them all. Plus there are still lots of unhatched eggs in my container. 

Plan is to start collecting eggs again once these group of fry reaches sellable size.

Here is what I think is a little male based on the orange on the anal fin. 










I did some tank cleaning/moving today and am quite happy with how things are looking. Because I took a piece of wood out of my persephone tank I thought I would placate them with some film canisters to play in. 

Well a couple of my males have torn their fins wrestling, one male has built a nest and is defending it against the group of males hanging around below and my biggest female who is the only one of the females to actually have spawned is lurking around awaiting the opportunity to enter. 

They can have the canisters until tomorrow morning and then they are getting taken away again. They just get too frisky with them in there. 


















Very plump female. She was by herself showing off to a male who had managed to snag himself a canister unnoticed by the others.


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## Skyewillow

lol, apparently those canisters mean "Bow-chika-wow-wow" in Betta


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## LittleBettaFish

Pretty much haha. It does amaze me that some of my pairs can not only fit inside the film canister but spawn in there too. I guess they are quite flexible.


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## LittleBettaFish

Some of my rutilans sp. green sub-adults. This group had some issues with their health previously but it seems to have resolved and they are looking really good. I think I have a few females in there (they are quite difficult to sex) and this species will be one of the only wild species I plan on keeping. 

I am really interested to see if a pair from this tank would mouthbrood rather than bubblenest like their father does if I spawned them. I want to know if it is a behaviour that is genetic instead of environmental. 

The only annoying thing is whenever they see the camera flash they always tuck up their ventrals so I have to be super quick to get a decent shot.


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## LittleBettaFish

This is just a rant that has been building for a while and I figured here was as good a place as any to post it.

I wish I had more money to spend on this hobby. It sucks being basically broke, but I have been out of work so long now that I have this huge phobia about how I am going to explain this massive gap on my resume to prospective employers. I really wish I had just gone from Subway straight into another job as I think it would have been easier, but that job seriously destroyed my self-esteem and sucked the soul out of me that I just couldn't. 

Now I have like zilch savings because I was an idiot and learned the hard way to make a spending plan and stick to it rather than just waste money on impulse buys and frivolous purchases. 

My parents want me to go back to university but my 6 months there was worse than my job. I hate grade based/competitive environments like that and was so happy when I graduated from school. I was thinking of doing an online course but that just seems to me like not 'real' study. 

And if one more person asks me what I want to do with my life or what I plan on doing I may just implode. I wish I could just wake up tomorrow with a job and that was that. 


Moving on from that, I thought I would show the upgrades I have made to my previous ghetto looking killifish grow-out. I am intending on replacing one of the plastic containers with another 20cm cube and this will be where my younger fry are moved to as I have over a dozen of them just in one of those 1/4 gallon containers. 









Before









After

The last container is my egg hatching container which has a few very young fry and some unhatched eggs. Then next to that is my BBS hatchery. The coke bottle on top is to stop the salt water spraying everywhere. Not attractive but it is effective.

End goal would be to have a tank custom built that is 150cm long by 30cm wide by 20cm high and use this to grow-out my fry in a system similar to the above. However, for now this more modest version will suffice. 










These guys are growing amazingly fast for how many there are in such a small space and with not very big water changes. Although having watched a video where a group of them grew to quite a decent size in only an elephant's footprint, I wonder if they don't give off the same sort of 'stunting hormone' as bettas.


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## Hallyx

To prospective employers: "I'm a part-time, professional fish-breeder. Wanna see pictures?"


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha I was just going to say that I was a breeder of rare wild betta species.... 

It just takes 6-12 months before I see any financial return and then I run at a loss more than a profit. 

It's so irritating. I am a really good worker. I will put up with a lot of crap and no matter how mundane the task will do it to the absolute best of my capabilities. I used to show up to my old job half an hour early and work later without being compensated simply because I wanted to get everything done properly and ensure the store was clean and that everything looked good for the customers. 

It's just unfortunate my boss didn't seem to appreciate that and did things like hire incompetent idiots because they were cheap, let the fridges break down almost constantly, tell me to lie to the health inspector that we didn't have outside kiosk storage and not make me a full-time employee even though I managed her store basically 40 hours a week. Oh and she also wasn't paying me superannuation until I asked and then it all magically ended up in my account. 

Being someone who is quite passive in real life (I hate confronting people), it was exceedingly difficult for me to resign from that job. I should have done it sooner but I always felt guilty and that I would be letting them down. 

I probably sound whiny but it would be so nice just to have a steady, predictable job (even dare I say boring!) with regular hours that at least would give me some financial freedom again. I feel like I am going to be paying off my mum for the rest of my life for what she has done for me over the past year or so.


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## MattsBettas

Good luck in finding a good, stable job. I'm sure it will come eventually.

Oh, and by the way, saying that you breed rare, critically endangered species professionally sounds pretty impressive. Seriously.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think my parents are hoping one does! 

It probably sounds more impressive to fish people who appreciate the work and time that goes into breeding and rearing fish. Especially bettas. Non fish people always make this face when I tell them I breed wild 'Siamese Fighting Fish'. Most have no idea what a wild betta is so I explain they are sort of like wolves compared to dogs. 

I usually get asked why my tanks are so dirty by visitors and you can just see their eyes glazing over as I explain about tannins and why they are important to my fish.

I had to tell my mum to stop telling everyone about my blog. I said unless they were a hobbyist they are most likely not going to understand why I would make up a site about my fish and it just kind of makes me look weird.


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## Hallyx

"I feel like I am going to be paying off my mum for the rest of my life for what she has done for me..." 
Don't we all. <sigh> Don't we all.
​


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## LittleBettaFish

I did some re-arranging of the main killifish tank today. I took out all the IAL, put in a worm cone and have temporarily put in the second terracotta cave that was supposed to be for my striatum. Once I get a pair of those it will be getting taken out. 

I am planning on getting another anubias and then maybe something like fissidens, christmas moss or mini pellia tied down on slate to go on the bottom. Would like to also have some frogbit at the surface but not sure where to get it around here. 


















This one is so funny. He went in and she followed.



























Their updated tank. It's just a simple 12 inch cube but they seem to like it.


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## LittleBettaFish

So, I am selling my pair of brownorum hopefully in the next couple of days. This will be good as then I can empty their tank and use it for my killifish. Plus it's some money in my pocket that will be going most likely towards some plants and some fish food.

I have decided after much deliberation to also sell my uberis pair. I figure someone can put them to better use than me and they are just taking up space on my shelf. 

If they sell, that will leave me with my persephone, burdigala and rutilans sp. green as the only species of coccina complex wilds I have. These are all fish I am actually fond of so they will definitely be staying on until they die. I am considering combining all my burdigala into one tank. It seems pointless having two separate tanks for the same species. This will then give me two extra tanks and heaters to play around with if I need them. 

There are also four burdigala sub-adults that I would like to add back in with the main group as the three females will help balance out the gender ratio. 

Then I am just going to heavily plant the crap out of these tanks with floaters and floating plants such as hydrilla and water sprite so I can cut my maintenance down to only once or twice a week. 

Took a few photos of my poliaki female. She has had a very turbulent life with me here. She managed to survive the wipe-out of my previous killifish 'community' tank, and then about a million different moves that included everything from a 2L jar to an outside summer tank. 

She is friendly, but not as boisterous as my other two. She is quite pretty when she is coloured up as the photos show and I am hoping that I can one day find a nice male or pair for her to go in with. 



























(This is how she usually watches me when I am trying to take photos, I was only fortunate she stopped to rest in the bolbitis).


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## LittleBettaFish

I just found this photo from around the time I first got her while going through my files. She is so much bigger nowadays. 










Then here was a very bad shot of her male (never did manage to get a clear shot of him the whole time I owned him).










I will say I wish I still had all that java moss!


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## Chesh

Rant on, girl - we hear ya *HUGS* I'm definitely going to have to agree with some of the others - THIS is what you need to be doing, you're so good at it. . . maybe some day you'll find a way!

Tanks, fish, photos - stunning, as always. I always have to pick my jaw up off the ground when I make my way over to this thread. Keep up the good work, you're seriously inspirational.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks for the kind words Chesh. Fish have been my passion for as long as I can remember (I went through a period of endlessly drawing fish stores when I was younger) and I hope that this is something that doesn't change.

I keep wild bettas simply because I prefer fish that have been altered little if any from their natural state. I love the fact I can watch the entire life-cycle of my fish play out in their tanks all the way from conception to death. There's something about watching a young fry emerge to swim alongside its parents and older siblings. 

I am not in the same league as someone like Hermanus Haryanto who breeds and keeps a jaw-dropping number of species, but I like to think I do my best spreading awareness about wild betta species and showing people that they are more than just drab and excruciatingly shy fish.

I have decided in the future I will be working to further my line of persephone and rutilans sp. green. I have several pairs in my persephone tank and I believe a handful of females in my rutilans green tank. 

The only species I would consider adding to this, would be Betta livida. They are a stunning species and definitely in need of some conservation. It would be awesome if I could ever source a pair again. 

Here is the possible future of my fish room, one of my rutilans sp. green sub-adults (I believe this particular individual is male).


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## Chesh

They're beautiful, what is it about these that you're drawn to? I don't know how I'd ever choose. . .


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## LittleBettaFish

Do you mean the species I am deciding to keep? 

Betta persephone were my holy grail wild betta for a very long time. They are one of, if not the most beautiful of all the wild betta species in my opinion. 

Betta rutilans sp. green were the first ever wild bettas I successfully bred. These sub-adults are from my original pair who were over two years old when they spawned. I sadly lost the female from that pair but I think I still have the male in with his three or four adult offspring. 

All of the species within this group are supposed to be bubblenesters. Only two have been known to also mouthbrood. 

My male rutilans has never built his nest the entire time I have had him. He always mouthbroods. Therefore, I am interested to see if this is genetic or an environmental trait in his offspring.


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## Chesh

Yes, exactly what I wanted to know!  Really fascinating stuff, and they truly are beauties. . . how are they, temperamentally?


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## LittleBettaFish

Firstly, here is my updated killifish grow-out tank. 










The cube on the left houses my biggest fry, while the one on the right houses the smaller ones or ones that have newly hatched. 

The jar at the back is my BBS hatchery and the plastic container in front of that is just there in case I want to hatch some more eggs out. 


My wild bettas can be aggressive at times, particularly during courtship when it is not uncommon for both fish to come out with torn fins, missing ventrals and damaged scales. However, it is not to the scale of splendens. I can house males together generally without issue and adults tend not to predate their fry.

There are exceptions and some fish are more aggressive than others, but generally they seem quite content to live together in the pairs/groups I have them in.


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## LittleBettaFish

My killifish fry are growing so fast. I have two Betta hendra fry that I managed to rescue after I sold their parents (their siblings all died as they were very young) and they are getting outstripped very fast. I may have to move them to a safer location just to avoid them being eaten. 

Not certain what I am going to do with them if they manage to survive through to adulthood. At this moment in time I am thinking they can just go in my miscellaneous male wild betta tank.

These are some photos of my big killifish fry (probably should call them juveniles at this point). They were put out that I had forgotten to feed them their breakfast of grindal worms this morning.




































This was after lunch










I have so many males. I just hope I get some females as well.


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## LittleBettaFish

How do people get their fry switched over onto dry foods? I am hopeless at this. Even when I starve my fry for several days, the spoiled things never want to make the switch. 

I have some NLS fry formula (it's like a powder) and I have been trying to get my biggest killifish fry to take it. The problem is, as soon as they eat it they spit it right back out. They don't even have it in their mouth long enough to get a taste. 

Their parents are like addicted to their NLS pellets and as soon as they see the container coming they sit and wait at the surface. I was hoping their fry might be the same. 

Gets darn expensive feeding live/frozen all the time. 

My persephone are the only smaller wilds I have that will eat pellets. My rutilans used to be very good and take them too but they have gotten stubborn in their old age. 

So can't wait to get my hands on a pair of Aphyosemion striatum. I have had their tank waiting for a couple weeks now. It was just irritating the wholesaler only got females in with the last import. 

This is my fish rack as it presently stands. Everything except my three killifish tanks live on there. I hate seeing all the cords running everywhere it just looks so messy. When I get my proper racks downstairs I am going to run PVC pipe off a high-powered air pump so I don't have tubing everywhere, and use flaps to hide the lights and equipment cords.



















Top shelf (L-R): Betta burdigala, Betta burdigala, Betta rutilans sp. green, Betta uberis

Middle shelf (L-R): Betta persephone, Betta stiktos, Miscellaneous males

Bottom shelf (L-R): Betta rutilans sp. green sub-adults, Betta burdigala sub-adults, Betta unimaculata


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## Saphira101

Nice fish shelf! I'm jealous.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. I remember when I first got it. I recommend racks to anyone who has multiple tanks as they do make things a lot more organised. Also, if you get a proper rack, they are a lot safer than using particleboard furniture. 

Unfortunately, I'm going to have to take all the tanks off the top shelf and replace it, as water must have sat for too long on the shelf and it's gone right through to the other side. 

I've been meaning to do it for a little while but it keeps raining and so I can't run some stain over the new shelf. 

Next time I think I will use something like yellow tongue. It can stay exposed to weather for months without coming to harm and so I figure that it will give me some more flexibility if water does spill. 

I wish my brothers/dad were like my grandpa. He is so meticulous. I imagine he would have made a kick butt fish rack. My dad and brothers are more rush in with power tools and get it done as quickly as possible.


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## LittleBettaFish

Some more killifish juvenile (I am calling them juvenile now as I figure they are big enough) picture spam.

I had my bright light over them tonight and I think I do have a few females in there. The males are colouring up so nicely and when they start sparring I wonder how I am supposed to choose only one pair to keep on. 













































This was when no one would come over to get their photo taken


















One of my very young fry. This is in my other grow-out tank.




































Caught sparring.

Also in other non-fish news, I want to buy this bedside table to go with the bed head I have been looking at. I have so outgrown my old bedroom set and it's embarrassing to invite people over. I would love to replace it all. Only thing is, I am going to have to take a loan from the BOM (Bank of Mum) to get them both. 










I have also realised I have the curse of expensive taste. Show me a piece of clothing or an item of furniture in a magazine and I will invariably always pick the most expensive one as my favourite. I really just need to find myself a sugar daddy to pay for it all.


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## LittleBettaFish

Now the weather has slowly been showing signs of warming up, I've been thinking about my sad looking tub pond that has been going since last summer. 

It's black plastic and I am not really sure how much water it holds. Presently the only plants in it, is some struggling giant/standard duckweed, as well as a tiny bit of native pennywort that has somehow survived in near darkness. 

I am kind of tossing up what livestock to put in there once we get to summer. I don't think it stays hot enough overnight (last summer we had some really cold nights) to keep a lot of tropical species.

As something way out of the left field, I was contemplating Danio margaritatus. According to what I have read they can tolerate temperatures down to around 20 degrees celsius. Once it got too cold I could probably just bring the whole tub indoors and then put it out again the following summer. 

However, I have been meaning to ask mum if I could dig a hole and half-sink my tub pond into the ground. I thought this may help insulate it better against temperature fluctuations. I would also be putting a mesh lid over the top of the tub to stop predators and my dogs from getting in there. 

Not sure on plants as this point. Thinking maybe something like mayaca fluviatilis, java moss and elodea. I figure they are hardy and grow quickly. I will also be stripping out the old substrate and using either ADA Amazonia or Miracle Gro soil. 

I have been meaning to make a proper tub pond for ages now, but our last summer was just so wacky and I had a tank outside instead that I never got around to it. Hopefully this time I am more prepared.


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## LittleBettaFish

Today was supposed to be the day I moved my rutilans sp. green sub-adults in with their older siblings. It's also an absolute ripper of a day outside and I had a whole list of things I intended to do. Of course this has to be the day I get cramps from hell and wish for the millionth time I could bequeath my fertility onto someone who really wants it. 

Anyway, got some quick snaps of my wild bettas. They are not photogenic in the slightest after my killifish who at least sit still long enough for me to get my camera to focus. 

I have no clue what is up with the mouths of these two burdigala females. I am not sure if the males in with them are injuring them or they are doing it to each other, but they are the only fish in the tank with this issue. Doesn't bother them at all. They were all squabbling minutes before over who got to eat the last of the grindals.


















Mum









One of her many sons









Her 'curvaceous' daughter

Then my persephone who decided to squander all the beautiful natural light streaming through my window and onto their tank by hiding in their leaf litter. Appreciative sods.



















My uberis pair spawned the other day and the father is actually right out in the open with his nest and eggs this time around. Not certain if they have hatched yet but at least it is giving him something better to do than just sit in his log skulking about. 

Been reading threads about fish rooms and shrimp rooms on other forums. I think I need to start investing in lottery tickets. I swear shrimp people have the neatest set-ups for their livestock. I have moss/fissidens envy looking at some of their displays. Must be nice to be so organised.


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## LittleBettaFish

Did a big shake-up of the fish rack today. Moved some fish, emptied some tanks and wasted a lot of time making a big mess. 

Now everything is all cleaned up, it looks a lot better. 

Thinking of scrapping the peat moss substrate in my wild betta tanks and using a cheap 'aqua soil' instead. It makes less of a mess, and will provide some nutrients for my hydrilla. Since I am not going to be breeding any time soon, I don't mind if it buffers the pH up slightly. 

The next big project will be condensing my two burdigala tanks into a single 2ft tank as I know in one tank at least there are a number of juveniles I don't want to accidentally leave behind.

Now I've been spending some more time working with my tanks, it reminds me why I got into wild bettas, specifically the coccina complex, to begin with. I think I might add a couple pairs back to my collection when I do the permanent move downstairs. However, this time around I am not going to stress about spawning them or growing out fry. I will just enjoy them for what they are. 

I wonder if I can find any money trees for sale on ebay haha. 










Here is one of my adult rutilans sp. green. This fish is at least two years old, possibly more. He shows no signs of slowing down soon and now has a number of sub-adult siblings to deal with. I will get a full tank shot tomorrow once the water clears up. I think they just need some more java moss and maybe some frogbit and their tank will be perfect.


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## LittleBettaFish

So my unimaculata pair (mum's fish) spawned last night. I had changed all their tank around, replaced the substrate and put in a terracotta cave and some IAL so I assume this is what triggered it. 





































Female used to be the runt of the surviving sub-adults that I sold, but now she is really coming into her own. 

The present scape is only temporary. I have some terracotta tunnels on orderm along with a tennis ball size worth of peacock moss and a golf ball size of flame moss that I will be tying down to the tunnels when it all arrives. 

Then I will be adding in some frogbit and some watersprite as these fish are very jumpy (male has a cloudy eye from one of his many suicide attempts) and I thought it might help keep them in the tank and diffuse some of the bright lighting.

Also, I know the heater has fallen down. I didn't want to have to mess around in the tank too much because it might spook the male. 


I thought I would also share some photos of our oriental cat called Rama/Rami. He is one of those cats that is a vet's wet dream. We got him from a bit of a BYB and so he came with a lot of issues and quirks. 

He is a compulsive sprayer (on prozac for that), has gingivitis, has excess cartilage in his throat (vet found that when she went to put what I think was a tube down there) and excess cartilage on his chest. 

He used to have extremely bad asthma and I think his lungs actually haemorrhaged at some point. He has this weird stretchy skin and his front legs are like double-jointed and point inwards at this disturbing angle when he is sitting down. 

He has basically no immune system, so can suddenly crash if he picks up something a normal cat could fight off. One day he got extremely sick and we rushed him to the vet where they thought he had a blockage and recommended exploratory surgery. We agreed and although they found no blockage, they said it looked like he might have cancer instead as some nodes were inflamed. My mum was hysterical as he was only like three or so at this time. 

Turns out though that it wasn't cancer. Just some sort of gastro/stomach bug that he had been hit particularly bad by. Odd thing is, after the exploratory surgery, his asthma basically stopped. He still coughs on occasion, but doesn't need to have medicine daily like he used to. 

I think he was younger than the breeder said when we got him as he was *so* small. He is the biggest cuddle cat though. I always joke we need to get him one of those baby slings as he loves being carried around in your arms. He also has an addiction to fetching. He fetches the weirdest assortment of toys and household things and will bring them to you in the middle of the night and start pawing your face to wake you up and play. I have a video of him somewhere fetching me a bag of bread. 

Yet for all this and the fact he has absolutely ruined our carpet/some of our furniture with his spraying, I would not trade him for the world. Life is going to be that little less fun when he is gone. 









The hoard of octopus toys from just one night that I found under my bed this morning



























The culprit

Funnily enough, for all that, his 'Aunt' that we have from the same breeder is perfectly sane and healthy. Only real problem is that she has an allergy to food with corn/cereals in it and will vomit it up. 

The whole saga with Rami showed me why it is vital that you do a lot of research beforehand if purchasing from a breeder.


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## BettaLover1313

Rami is absolutely adorable! Sad that he has so many problems though, but it sounds like you and your family love him very much, which is all he could ever ask for!


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## LittleBettaFish

Yes, he is very spoiled. I think even though he has cost us so much in vet bills, it was actually a good thing that we purchased him. 

The spraying alone would have most likely had him either put down or sent to the pound in a majority of homes. Coupled with all his medical complications, it was probably better he found a home with a family like ours, as my mum and me are very dedicated to our animals. 

There are times though when it's like we have a gremlin in the house. He's either eating something he shouldn't be, trying to trip you up at the top of the stairs, jumping over with our three German shepherds, or stuck hanging off something like the curtain railing. 

He used to have an obsession that something was under the fridge for ages. He used to hit his toys under there from time to time and even when we fished them all out he would still just sit there and stare at the fridge.


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## LittleBettaFish

Got some good news to share for once. 

I managed to rescue two very young and very tiny Betta hendra fry after I sold their parents (male spawned only a few days before pick-up by buyers). I put them in with my killifish fry and when I didn't see them, I thought perhaps they had died or been cannibalised. 

Imagine my surprise tonight when I see a much bigger hendra fry cruising around near the surface. I don't know if the other one is still in there or not, but since I had to cull all their older siblings to get rid of a highly resistant strain of ich, I am hoping that this fry and its sibling both survive. 

I was contemplating purchasing this species again, as I originally sold the parents thinking I had plenty of replacements. However, when the treatment failed to work and I had to cull all their offspring, I ended up losing it from my fish room.


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## LittleBettaFish

This is going to be a writing only post. This is mostly me just wanting to put my ideas down somewhere as I figure out what I want to do with my current fish rack/set-up.


Moved all of my burdigala into a single 2ft tank yesterday afternoon. Talk about a mammoth task! There were at least 40 fish of various sizes and ages that needed catching and moving and then both their old tanks needed emptying and cleaning. 

Their new tank doesn't look great. I still have to work out what I want to do with my wild betta tanks appearance wise. All my tanks have to match or at least follow the same theme. 

I do still like the au naturel look with thick leaf litter over peat moss, but it invariably makes it difficult to keep track of and interact with my fish. Plus if I disturb the peat moss/litter section at all it stinks like rotten egg. 

Therefore, I am debating on laying down some aqua soil susbtrate in all my wild betta tanks. I think something like ADA Malaya might be good. I know it basically has very little nutrient value, but it also shouldn't give me a massive ammonia spike (going to run it in a bucket with some duckweed for a couple weeks just to make sure) and it looks to be the best at acidifying water. On top of that, it is a very natural colour. 

I may sprinkle a couple handfuls of peat moss over this as my wilds do seem to like ploughing through it and getting it everywhere. 

On top of this, I will do a _very thin_ litter consisting only of IAL. Instead of letting leaves decay and break down like I normally do, I will be replacing old leaves once they start to fall apart. I was considering using large instead of small IAL as I want the water to be extremely tinted and the bigger the leaf the more tannins released. 

I am pretty limited in my wood choices at the moment as I am on a shoestring budget and a decent piece of goldvine (looks basically like roots) would set me back at least $20-30. 

However, I have been looking at this new type of wood called 'Mekong driftwood'. Depending on whether or not I can pick myself up some part-time work in the next couple of months, I may look into purchasing a few pieces to complement my existing goldvine. 

Now comes the part I can't really decide on. What plants should I use in my wild betta tanks, if any?

I really want a floating plant. Duckweed, even giant duckweed, is rather small and tends to make a mess whenever you want to do maintenance. So I was thinking Amazon frogbit. However, I don't know if the Malaya would provide enough nutrients long-term to keep it alive. I've only ever had success with this plant in a tank where I used ADA Amazonia. 

Watersprite left floating is also another option. Pros are that it is cheap, not very demanding and grows very fast. Cons are that it does take a little while to transition its form from planted to floating, and I have found it does tend to brown off in parts and so requires some care to keep it nice. 

I have a bunch of hydrilla as well (looks very similar to elodea) and I am not certain whether to incorporate this into my tanks along with the above plants, or just leave it out. I am facing the same dilemma with using java moss. I do like it because it is low-maintenance and provides plenty of cover, but I think it may mess up the whole look I was going for, and it can be a bit of an algae/detritus trap. 

I have decided as I lay awake in the dark watches of the night courtesy of my cat, that I do want to continue with keeping wild bettas. I know I was going to get more seriously into killies, but honestly I think my heart is still with the coccina complex. 

Now all my fish are healthy things have been a lot less stressful. I think the whole ich saga in my grow-outs really burned me out. This is why I really want to get a proper system in place for my wild betta tanks so I can take a much more 'hands-off' approach to maintenance. 

I have seen how my killies have been thriving with very small water changes done only with aged water, and I think I was getting too aggressive with my wild fry. It was most likely the fluctuating water chemistry that caused the ich in the first place. 

The plan now is that I am going to purchase two plastic water jugs/drums with taps and only use water from these in my wild betta tanks. Although my tap water is very soft already, I think going with aged water that has had some IAL in it and been pre-heated to the perfect temperature will help prevent massive fluctuations in pH, temperature and hardness. 

I have some money squirreled away that was going to go towards killies, but now I may invest it back in a couple new pairs of wild bettas. This time though I will be taking a very natural approach towards keeping and breeding like I used to. Our transhipper has down an order for some wild betta species so may see what she has on offer when they get out of quarantine at the end of the month. 

It's funny how changeable this hobby can be. One moment you are convinced of something so completely, and the next moment something happens to throw your carefully laid plans right out the window.


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## LittleBettaFish

Tiny Betta hendra fry with a stomach full of BBS. I had a quick look with my torch but couldn't see its sibling. Not certain if it's in there so I am going to take out the moss tomorrow, move all the big killifish fry over into the other grow-out and see if I can't find it.


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## LittleBettaFish

Today I didn’t do much with my fish, as I was far too busy nearly electrocuting myself over at my next door neighbour’s house. Like the saying goes, no good deed goes unpunished. This afternoon I learned not to plug my vacuum into dubious looking power boards. 

Instead my fish got half an hour of me crazily rushing around trying to fit in water changes between feeding cats and cooking dinner. 

I had my tunnels arrive from Taiwain for my unimaculata tank. I realised as soon as I opened them that I really could have ordered a size down. I am just paranoid because bettas seem to be masters of getting themselves stuck and so I thought better to be safe than sorry. So now my unimaculata pair are looking at an upgrade to a 2ft tank because the tunnels look ridiculously out of scale in their current tank. 

I am beyond thrilled with how my rutilans are going. The sub-adults have become so friendly all of a sudden, and I think their presence has encouraged their older siblings to be out and about a lot more. Unfortunately, I think I have all males from the last spawn. I really hope this is not the case as I so wanted to work further with this mouthbrooding strain. 

I was contemplating sourcing a small group (maybe four) of unsexed coccina from the wholesaler here in Oz to keep as pets. I sort of like having my tank of miscellaneous males, and if I happen to get a pair out of it well that would be even better. I think they are still available so I may look into that further. Haven’t had coccina in a looooong time. They were the first wild species I actually kept. 

I am also currently tossing up between standard rutilans, brownorum and hendra. I am kicking myself for selling my hendra since I lost all my replacement juveniles, but my brownorum never successfully spawned for me so I would like to give another pair a go. Will have to see how much I can save up between now and the time when they become available next. 

My burdigala group are still settling in to their new tank. Funnily enough, the two fish that are the most comfortable in there are the two youngest juveniles. 

I am a bit concerned about my wild-caught female as she has lost some condition of late, so I may put her and possibly her male (if I can find him) in a special tank on my bedside table. I only just got the previous tank off there, but she is one of my favourite fish so I don’t mind sacrificing it. 

Also decided to hold onto my uberis pair. The female is just such a ham and since I moved their tank so it sits lengthways on my rack, they have been a lot more active. I think if I sell them I am really going to regret it. 

Anyway, here are some random photos of my burdigala. This is all I got before my camera died.


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## LittleBettaFish

Took some photos of my Betta rutilans this morning. This was the very first species of wild betta I bred successfully, and the species that has led me back into wilds after I thought I was done with them. 









































































Unfortunately, someone in there seems to have a thing for biting off ventral fins, so that is why they are so short on most of the fish. The big one in the photos has to be at least two years old now. Hopefully I get many more years out of him yet.










Then we have one photo of my tussyae male that was interrupted by a stupid pond snail. Since I am back into keeping wilds I may need to find him a female to live with at some point. He is a year old now so will probably be a geriatric when that finally eventuates!


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## LittleBettaFish

I want to rant.

I have these annoying bloody water stains on the outside of nearly every single one of my tanks that I cannot get off. I tried vinegar, nail polish remover, window cleaner and this cream cleaner product called Jif, and they are still there. 

I think it is some sort of reaction between the cling wrap and the water (possibly because my water is quite acidic) as it only happens on tanks with cling wrap over them. Of course I obviously can't remove the cling wrap because my fish would jump out, but these are all quite expensive rimless tanks and not only do the water stains look unsightly, but they also wreck my photos as illustrated perfectly below:










I tried using a scourer pad with vinegar but that just scratched up the front of my rutilans tank so I discontinued that. If anyone has any suggestions I am open to them. I thought maybe I should buy a pack of razor blades and very carefully try and scrape it off without scratching up the glass too much. 

Luckily my uberis female decided to move out of the range of the water marks so I managed to get these two shots of her. I bred this girl and am quite pleased with how she turned out. 



















My persephone have turned completely feral. Their tank is getting a proper clean out with all the old leaf litter being removed and replaced, and their wood being arranged properly rather than just thrown in wherever. 

As you can see in these pictures the glass also needs a good scrub down. I cannot stand looking at it any longer so I will be getting stuck into that after lunch. 




























Otherwise everyone else is doing well. I am moving my wild-caught burdigala female over into a separate tank this afternoon as well. Once she has put on some weight and I am happy with how she looks, I will try and net her male. He can keep her company as he is very docile and doesn't bully the females too much. 

I have $75 saved up from fish sales to go towards a pair of wild bettas. I think there is a new betta shipment landing on the 28th so will contact the transhipper and see if she has brought in anything I want. 

Then this photo is from a thread I posted in the picture section of the board, but it is one of my favourites I have taken of my rutilans, so I wanted to put it here as well. 










This basically sums up why I keep wild bettas; natural beauty, and a _whole_ lot of attitude.


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## Skyewillow

how do you get such clear and precise photos with the water being so dark? I can't catch the colors on my female at all. >_<


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## LittleBettaFish

Usually I put my T5 50 watt fluro over the top of my tanks before taking photos. Otherwise, my mum's camera is really good and the flash provides enough light for a decent shot. 

It just takes longer to get a good photo because the fish hate the flash and if it goes on for too long they nick off.


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## Skyewillow

yea, I have the same issue, my female Mahachai takes off as soon as she sees the camera come out, the male will sit there and stare at me for a few minutes because he thinks that I'm going to feed him whenever I walk past his tank. lol

your persephone are gorgeous!


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha this is why I get most of my shots either early in the morning or in the late afternoon when the sun comes in on everyone's tanks. They seem to be much more obliging to having their photos taken then. 

My persephone have turned into ferals. I can hardly see them when I look in their tank because of all these algae/detritus on the glass. Their tank is a really cool Mr Aqua 12 gallon long so I figure I might as well show it off.


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## Skyewillow

Their cabinet doesn't let much light into the tanks, but I did improvise and use the flashlight app on my phone to get some more light for the webcam to take some photos. I posted them on the wild bettas thread.

I'd be feral in a tank like that too! All prowling and stuff! lol


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## LittleBettaFish

The males (there's I think around 15 or so of them and around 7-8 females) spend all day sparring/displaying and skulking about.

I have banned them from having any film canisters and anything permanently floating in their tank. They go on a bubblenesting bonanza otherwise, and then spend all their day tearing up each other's fins. 

I saw your pictures of your mahachai pair and they look like they are settling in really well. Sometimes if you load them up with food before you take photos they are too lazy and full to move. I do that with my more skittish fish.


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## Skyewillow

lol that ban! No floaties for you! You've lost that privilege!

That male is a bottomless pit! No matter how much I feed him, he thinks he'll get more if he greets me at the front wall! lol He'll dance for a few minutes, and if I don't feed him, he'll get bored of me and hide... Fickle beast.

It's really funny how little things like film canisters will bring out the wildness in your fish.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think it's because the females are in there. I have a tank that has five unrelated males in it, and even though there are film canisters in there, they never even attempt to make nests. 

My stiktos male is obsessed with his canister. All his master bubblenesting goes on in it. His female just likes floating around in hers.


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## Skyewillow

I got a giggle out of the mental image of your female stiktos just floating around in hers! LOL


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## LittleBettaFish

Sometimes it gets stuck up against the glass so I have to turn it around so she can get back in. My males are always getting locked out of theirs because of the filter current pushing the canisters around. 

I just finished cleaning out my persephone tank. I couldn't believe how thick the leaf litter was in there. I really don't like how the wood is now positioned, but it's a hard tank to scape being so long and narrow. 

At least I can see my fish. I think they are in shock because it looks so bare.

I reckon I will put a WTB for a whole lot of java moss up on one of the local forums. I want it to fill up all the open space in my tanks. 

I will get some pictures of my persephone tank once the water clears up. Just need to set-up my burdigala tank and I am done with my fish chores for the day.


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## Skyewillow

My domestic girls used to have the same problem with their mesh or bead tubes, then I decided to take pity on them and suction cup them to the wall, tying the tube on with fishing line.

I need to figure out how much is appropriate for them to be eating, he's always mooching.

I would love to see how their tank is done. I'm still trying to work everything out, and with all of your wilds, you're kind of my hero lol


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## LittleBettaFish

Some of my wilds have gotten quite fat, so I have cut my feedings down because I feed basically all live/frozen foods. I feed most of my wilds once a day or once every couple of days and of late, I prefer to leave them still slightly hungry rather than full.

Haha there are much more experienced keepers and breeders than me out there. I think I just take more photos. The water is clearing up but most of my persephone are still quite clamped since I moved everything around so I will get some shots tomorrow. 

I have given up on catching my burdigala female today. I forgot I am using the tank I was going to put her in as a 'plant hospital' outside so will have to find alternative accommodation for her. I thought it would be easy to snag her with my net since she doesn't move around a lot. Boy was I wrong. I can see her at the front of the tank now...mocking me.


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## Skyewillow

They never move much until you have a net in your hand. Never fails! lol

How did you get into wilds?


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## LittleBettaFish

I can't really remember what sparked my interest in them. However, I have always liked species from the coccina complex, and when a group of coccina became available at my LFS I purchased them all. 

My 'official' first pair were my rutilans. I sadly lost the female but I think I still have the original male and his first born son in there. It's hard to tell as they look all very similar. 

Then it sort of grew from there. I owned fish from other complexes and still do, but the coccina complex remains my favourite by far.


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## LittleBettaFish

Who would have thought condensing two tanks under 5 gallons into one would be such a hassle?

I wanted to use one of the tanks for my wild-caught burdigala pair, and so thought I would put all of my killie fry/juveniles into the one tank rather than the two separate cubes I have now. 

Obviously, nothing is ever simple when it comes to fish, particularly when I am tired and cantankerous. Two of my biggest juveniles shared a brief acquaintance with the carpet and I managed to catch them before they started off on their exploration of the underside of my chest of drawers. I then had another two (looking back it was probably the same two) leap out into the water section of my bain-marie style grow-out. I don't even think this water is conditioned and I sometimes pour salt water from my BBS hatchery into it, so suffice to say I was not that thrilled with them embracing their inner flying fish. 

I did however, manage to separate out my single hendra fry and it is now living in a 1L plastic container of its own. I was worried it might be eaten by the bigger juveniles, so now I can keep eyes on it and make sure it is doing well. 

While I think I sprouted a whole head of grey hairs, none of my killies were remotely traumatised by the whole affair if the amount of BBS they ate was anything to go by. 

Just finished doing all my water changes on my wild betta tanks. Now some of my rutilans have their ventrals growing back in, I have been studying them all closely to see if I have any females. Looks like I do have one female amongst the sub-adults so when when I have my racks downstairs she will have a tank of her own with one of the best males. 

Uberis male has a nest but I'm not sure if there are eggs in it or he is still courting the female (their courtship always seems to be a very protracted affair). 

My burdigala have settled in nicely to the big tank. The mouth damage is clearing up on my two Hermanus females. I think because there are more females in the tank, they aren't being constantly harassed by the males. There are a couple nests I see in the film canisters so that seems to be a good sign. 

Persephone are still getting used to their tank. I definitely want some java moss in there to provide cover for the less dominant males. 

My all-male tank is having a pond snail invasion. I usually like snails, but these pond snails are terrible. I wish their shells would erode and they would die because they make a mess everywhere. Otherwise all the males in there are doing great. The male rutilans that has some sort of growth in his mouth that I always think is going to die appears to be thriving even if he is starting to resemble the Elephant Man. 

Going to the not so LFS tomorrow because mum is purchasing a 2ft tank for her unimaculata pair and I need to pick up some blackworms and see if they have any java moss in stock. Hopefully they don't have any wild bettas in stock because I have no ability to resist the tiny coccina species they seem to get in. 

I would have taken some photos, but my mum has reclaimed her camera to get some photos of my dog Nike's nieces and nephews. Her half-sister (same mum but dad of the sister is the grand-sire of Nike) had a litter of ten and my mum being a big puppy person is over there visiting. 

Me personally, I hate the puppy stage. I much prefer when they are old enough to hold their bladder overnight and not view absolutely everything as chew toy. Of course Nike is two years old and she still likes to gnaw on the back door frame.


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## Skyewillow

I always love how you write these entries! ^_^

it may take a long time, but we squished our pond snails and let the bettas eat them that way. It took about 3 months for us to get rid of them between that and scraping off the egg clusters and throwing them into the trash. it was tedious!

I'm looking forward to seeing if you find anything at the LFS.


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## LittleBettaFish

I am planning on tearing that tank down and removing the leaf litter so I figure I might just do a mass culling of the pond snails then. It seems to have worked in my rutilans tank as I threw out all the old leaves and washed everything else in boiling hot water.

Got some updated photos of my killie juveniles. They are really fast moving now so a lot harder to take good photos of. I had to bust out my grindals to get them to stay still.




































Male starting to get in his adult colouration









The father of the group











Then here is a beautiful photo of Nike's sister with her puppies. Apparently she is a natural first-time mother. Her and Nike are so alike in appearance it is uncanny. Mum is on a puppy high and is now all excited about breeding our dog Eos towards the end of the year. I knew I shouldn't have let her go visit any puppies. 

I have this feeling we are going to end up being like 101 Dalmatians, except with German Shepherds instead.

I hope I don't find anything I like at the aquarium. I am trying to hold onto my money to see if any hendra or brownorum pairs get imported in on the 28th.


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## Skyewillow

Wow, those killies grow FAST!!

Puppies are a blast, as long as someone else's shoes are eaten and you're not on poo duty. lol

I'm wishing you lots of luck on the brownorum or hendra pairs! I was on Aquabid today, ugh! It almost killed me, they had 2-3 pairs of Mahachaiensis listed!! Too bad this pair broke my piggybank! lol


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## LittleBettaFish

I think the killies are around a month or so old now. But they do grow fast, particularly when I only do 20% water changes every second day. That was why I moved my hendra. I was afraid they were going to so outstrip it in growth that it might get eaten. 

They didn't have any wild bettas that I was interested in when I went to the aquarium today. They did have some nice splendens so I had to make an effort not to look at them too closely.

Instead I got a 2ft tank for mum's unimaculata pair, some NLS pellets for them as well and three serves of blackworms for the rest of my wilds. 










I also set this tank up before I went out. I will be borrowing some java moss from my killie grow-out and the IAL should sink after a couple of days. Hopefully my burdigala female likes her new home. At least I can keep eyes on her if she is by herself and make certain she is eating properly. 

I hope she gets one of the species I want in. Otherwise I am probably going to have to wait another month before the next shipment arrives. 

Are you just interested in mahachai at the moment or thinking of branching out further into that complex?


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## LittleBettaFish

Success! Caught my burdigala female and she is now in her new home. I saw her male yesterday and was going to net him then but the tank wasn't ready. It's hard because all the males look very similar. He just isn't as brightly coloured and has a rounder head than his sons and the other males. 










The water is cloudy from the IAL. It will clear up in the next couple of days. Tested the ammonia levels because the substrate is ADA and they are at 0ppm so will throw some duckweed in just to make certain they remain that way. 

Then two of my rutilans were having a sparring match. I did have a group brawl going on outside the film canisters but they were too high up in the tank to get a decent shot. 























































Ages ago before these two were born, one of their older siblings was attacked and killed by the others. They can be an aggressive species so I do just have to watch to make certain no harm is being done. Luckily, in this case it was all display.


----------



## Skyewillow

LittleBettaFish said:


> Are you just interested in mahachai at the moment or thinking of branching out further into that complex?


I'm definitely looking into branching out into the rest of that complex. I really like Stiktos, splendens, and siamorientalis, and if I get that far through it, I may as well get all of them! ^_^

The rutilans are so pretty! too bad they're aggressive.


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## LittleBettaFish

They aren't too bad as there are at least 20 of them in that 10 gallon tank. However, since they are the last of my line unless I have a couple of females in there, I don't want to take any chances of them harming each other.

I think you should get stiktos next. This is my male out of his breeders box for some exercise in the main tank. He is okay with the female now having lived next to her for so many weeks, and so he is allowed out if I am there to watch. 










I think he has gotten so used to his breeder box though that he doesn't like to leave it. He was only out for an hour or so and when I walked past he had put himself back in there! So much for exercising. I have to get my dad or brother to cut up my sheet of perspex so I can properly divide their tank in half.


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## Skyewillow

Yes, I'm definitely considering stiktos once we move.

That's funny how he put himself back lol!


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## LittleBettaFish

His female was in there with him too at some point. I think he is a bit afraid of her now. She's not as submissive as she used to be and has given him a few nips of her own when they have been in together. 

Was quite bummed to see that the brand new tank my mum got for her unimaculata pair had a big dent in the bottom corner, right on the silicone join. I only discovered it after I had put in the substrate and started filling it. 

Fortunately, I had a spare 2ft lying around so they are now both in that until we can take the broken tank back to the store. 

I am pleased with how my wild-caught burdigala female is doing. She is very tame so as soon as she sees me she comes over to spy. Her tank is still slightly cloudy, but clearing up. 

She ate three whiteworms and some grindals this morning. Hopefully, I can put some condition back on her and then her male can join her to keep her company. I saw him in the main tank and was so tempted to net him but decided to give her some time alone. 

I've ordered an extra 100 watt and 25 watt heater. The 100 watt will be going in with the unimaculata and the 25 watt will be spare in case I get a pair of wild bettas in the next week or so.


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## LittleBettaFish

Here are my unimaculata pair in their 2ft tank. I have to add more water and a couple of IAL today, but otherwise they seem happy with it and I'm hoping the duckweed in there will grow to cover the surface and the peacock moss will take over at the bottom. 





































They were doing their usual spastic tank move jumping yesterday but seem to have settled down this morning. They had some whiteworms for breakfast and the male managed to sit still long enough for me to get a couple of shots. He is literally half blind and so can be skittish if I startle him. 

Then I noticed this burdigala fry was out in the open so I got a couple photos while it was eating. I think it's the smallest/youngest burdigala I have, and it looks to be female based on its ventrals. Hopefully this is the case as I have a _lot_ of males. 



















I think we are getting a replacement 2ft tank. However, I don't really want to have to shift the unimaculata _again_ because it is time-consuming for me and really stressful for them, so I am not sure what mum wants me to do with it. Maybe I will just see if it is okay for my persephone to move into. I am finding their 12 gallon long not very user friendly and I think that a 10 gallon would be too small for them all.


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## Skyewillow

the unimaculata tank looks amazing! And that baby is so adorable with her full belly! ^_^


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. They were smashing on their cling wrap all last night so I was not very happy with them. Crazy fish. 

I definitely think I am going to replace all my tanks with aqua soil as substrate instead of peat moss. Just makes maintenance and the long-term appearance of the tank a lot easier and neater. I think one or two 9L bags should be enough to do all my tanks as I don't use much. 

It's funny, no one even bothers the several small fry/juveniles I have in that burdigala tank. They are in with adults and sub-adults that are not even related to them, and the only fighting that takes place is between themselves. 

It's like once the juveniles get to a certain age/size, they no longer predate their younger siblings. 

I also think my uberis pair spawned. The male was not pleased as I accidentally dropped all these blackworms in his nest when I think there were either eggs or fry in there so he has now moved the whole thing from the log into his film canister.


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## LittleBettaFish

Phew, finally finished the mammoth task of moving around 25 persephone into a different tank. 

I was sick of not being able to see them very well because the middle shelf is so dark and so now they are in a tank up on the top shelf next to my rutilans. Rutilans supervised the whole process and are not sure what to make of their new neighbours.










The substrate had already been used in another tank and was still wet, so even though I didn't disturb it, there was some clouding of the water. Plus I also used 20 litres of water from the persephone's old tank, and since that was very heavy on the tannins it does not make for a very pretty picture at the moment. 










They seem to be settling in fine and are all exploring and staking out their own territories within the tank. I'm hoping to get some java moss so I can provide some more cover on the bottom of the tank as this seems to be where they spend most of their time. 

With them moved, that means I now can turn my two tanks on the middle shelf longways, which the fish seem to prefer. The plan is to set up two extra 30cm cubes on there for prospective new pairs, and move my stiktos pair into a divided 30cm tank as I want the male permanently out of the breeder box. 

I also have a Mr Aqua 12 gallon long spare now. Not certain what to do with that. Might wait and use it when my racks downstairs are ready.


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## LittleBettaFish

My poor persephone are traumatised by the move. They have lived on that second shelf basically their whole lives so I expect it will take them a couple of days to settle in. 














































The water is not as tannin heavy as it was, so going to be adding some more IAL as their colouring is not as strong as it usually is. Hopefully once that is remedied they will start to feel more comfortable. 

I am now debating on whether or not to use ADA Amazonia in my tanks rather than Malaya simply because it is a darker substrate. However, I am going to have to let it sit in a bucket or something for at least a couple months before I would even think of putting it into my tanks. 

I think I am going to have to go back to the place here that sells the whole range and see in person how the Malaya looks. It's sort of hard to judge based on photos posted online.










My tussyae male is _not_ very pleased with having his tank going longways down the shelf now. This will be the next tank I will be overhauling once I get some substrate. It looks bloody terrible, and is overrun with pond snails. 

I want to lay down some proper substrate, eradicate the snails, put in some nicer pieces of wood as well as get some plants in there. At the moment there much cover, and with five mature males in there I don't want any fighting to break out.

Also my unimaculata pair spawned yesterday in their new tunnels. They broke off to come over and see what I was doing (I was doing a water change) and then went straight back to business. Be interesting to see if the male holds to term in the new set-up. Now I have a bigger tank for them and a more organised fish room, I don't mind if they have some fry.


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## LittleBettaFish

Today I took some photos of the youngest members of my burdigala families. Oddly enough, while these are the smallest fish in the tank, they are also the boldest and have seemingly no fear about living alongside full-size siblings and tankmates. 


















































































Until I can get my wild-caught female back on track health wise and separate out her male from this group, these burdigala will be the only juveniles/fry I have of this species for a while. 

In fact, apart from a lone hendra fry, they are the youngest bettas in my entire fish room.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Nothing much exciting has been happening here. My unimaculata male swallowed his eggs and everyone else seems more interested in eating and sparring rather than spawning. 

My wild-caught burdigala pair are together in their own tank now. I can't work out what is wrong with the female. She has a good appetite and is willing to eat, but it's like something is physically impeding her ability to swallow. I am going to hit her and the male with an internal parasite treatment and hopefully she will put on some condition. 

I did manage to snag the first mossie larvae of the season from my neighbour's house and she hunted a number of them down. I forgot how much bettas enjoy chasing them around. 

This is their tank as it stands currently. It's only a 25cm cube but they are an extremely peaceful pair and there are a number of places to hide. It looks better now that the water has had time to darken. 










I ordered a whole heap of mayaca fluviatilis, Asian water grass and hydrilla to go in my wild betta tanks. So I just need some java moss and a couple more bags of aquasoil and I will be ready for my big overhaul. 

I've also been chasing this stupid fish around for days trying to get a decent photo. He and the other males in there have been looking so nice lately and yet every time I get my camera out all that rich red colouring disappears.



















My hendra fry is thriving. It is still very small (I don't mind how slow it grows just as long as it stays healthy) and yet it recognises me and comes over when it sees me. Yesterday I was leaning over its container fixing up my BBS hatchery and I look down and see these big eyes staring up at me. I wish its sibling had survived as the poor thing is alone until it matures and I get my hands on another pair. 

I also am supposed to be getting two heaters delivered. I thought it would be today but so far I haven't see any sign. I was planning on purchasing a pair of wild bettas (the transhipper supposedly ordered them in) once they come out of quarantine later this week and I want the heaters to go in their tank.


----------



## MattsBettas

What type of wilds are you thinking about?


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## LittleBettaFish

At the moment I want to get hendra again as I sold my pair thinking I could get my juveniles better. Since I couldn't and culled them I would like to have this species again.

I am also thinking of brownorum. My pair never had a successful spawn where fry actually were produced so I sold them and want to replace them. 

The transhipper apparently ordered both species but she won't know what she has got until they come out of quarantine. I am just worried someone might get in before me. 

Mum wants a pair of macrostoma again so they will most likely be in the not so distant future. Hopefully this pair doesn't boil to death like her others.


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## LittleBettaFish

Got one good photo of my surviving hendra fry. It is apparently around 40 days old now. Still very small but I am not after fast growth. At the moment it is in this 1L take-out container, but I will be very carefully moving it this week into my spare 2 gallon cube. 

I love watching this little fry grow. I can't wait until I can start to get an idea of gender. I am hoping less frequent water changes with aged water is going to help stave off the velvet that juveniles and sub-adults of this species seem particularly vulnerable to. 



















This photo was taken after a grindal worm breakfast, hence the fat stomach.


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## LittleBettaFish

Got my new plants delivered. I put the majority in my unimaculata, persephone and burdigala tanks. However, I also put a small amount in my stiktos, uberis and rutilans tanks as a test to see whether mayaca would grow with only natural light. 

Unfortunately, it wasn't as many plants as I imagined in my head. I really want to cram these tanks full of floating plants to provide cover and help with water quality, and so it looks like I am going to have to save my pennies and put some money towards purchasing more. I think I can find water sprite and frogbit fairly cheap, but java moss in bulk rather than in 'seed' amounts seems harder to source. 









Unimaculata tank.









Persephone tank.

I am slightly concerned about my persephone tank at the moment. I noticed one of the males was moving oddly, and when I got the torch I could see a grey fuzzy stripe down his topline. Because I don't want any fish in that tank getting sick, I am going to euthanise him. I only hope that it is not contagious, and this male only contracted it because he was in some way compromised. I really hope it is not some deadly strain of columnaris that is going to wipe out my whole tank in the next few days. 

All I can say is, fish, why must you do this to me!?

The rest of my persephone look okay and apart from a rutilans with a scraped head, everyone else is doing well. 




























My male stiktos is going crazy working on his nest. The female is skulking about with vertical barring so we will see what happens.


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## Skyewillow

Your unimaculata tank is droolworthy! I love how it turned out!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. It was mostly me just chucking some wood in and then chucking some moss on top of that haha. Hopefully once the plants at the surface start to grow the tank will become more shaded and they may be a little less skittish. None of my wilds are fond of bright lighting, not even my captive bred ones.


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## MattsBettas

You could try quarantining him before euthanizing him. Not only would it well, not kill the fish (immediately), but you could get a better idea of what the disease is as it progressed. 

I think your persephone are my favorite species of yours. I don't know why. They aren't the most colorful or the biggest, they just look good lol. 

Macs are awesome, but so are hendra and brownorum (the species with the green dot, right?)


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## LittleBettaFish

Honestly after all I have been through with disease etc. I just can't be bothered. I don't want to risk contaminating any of my other tanks because I don't have the money or will to start over again from scratch. 

I have only just got everyone better again and the whole thing nearly burned me out of this hobby for good. 

I know you are against culling/euthanasia in a lot of cases, but this doesn't just look like a superficial wound (my rutilans head for example looks nasty but is already healing up) and so I want it gone ASAP. 


With that said, my persephone are also my favourite species. The colours are just incredible and I love watching them sparring and displaying. 

Yep, brownorum are the ones with the green blotch. Although some individuals can be missing their blotch altogether. 

Looks like I may have some stiktos eggs on the way as my pair are wrapping. Never tried my hand at spawning a species from this complex so this is going to be quite the learning curve as I know they can have massive spawns.


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## Skyewillow

I'm excited to watch your stiktos spawn hatch and grow!! If I had the room here, I'd be starting my Mahachai. I guess once the tads are gone, I can, since it's a 10 gallon bin, and they should be fine in that for a few months, and we're supposed to move (whether we want to or not) in about 2 months anyways.

which species would you recommend for someone just getting into mouthbrooders?


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## LittleBettaFish

Mouthbrooders are fairly easy to keep. It's just getting the male to hold to term that can be the problem.

Apart from macrostoma and some of the more obscure complexes that I don't have much experience/knowledge of, anything from the unimaculata, foerschi and albimarginata complex are pretty easy to keep. 

It just depends on how much room you have as the unimaculata complex species are not small fish by any means.


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## Skyewillow

once we move, there'll be quite a bit more room. lol


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha so far I have the most pathetic amount of eggs in my stiktos tank I think I have ever seen one of my bettas produce. I'm not sure if he has shoved them all up into the bubbles where I can't see, but if he hasn't there aren't many there. I think I counted like...two.

I can't tell if they are still spawning or not. The female is lurking in her moss so who knows what on earth those two are doing. 

I put a whole heap of film canisters in my persephone tank and they are being thoroughly investigated by everyone. The long-term plan is that I purchase couple more 25cm cubes and use them to house a pair of persephone and a pair of rutilans.


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## LittleBettaFish

Stiktos male has more eggs than I thought. Doesn't seem to be an enormous number but he is doing an awesome job as a first-time father. Will have to see what happens when the fry hatch out. 

Fortunately, he spawned in the film canister so this sort of helps prevent eggs and fry from falling out and getting lost on the bottom. 

Last night I also had the absolute biggest OMG moment. 

I have a tank that houses three rutilans (I'm not sure if one is a brownorum) males, one uberis male and my tussyae male. These are all mature males who through misfortune never ended up with a mate. 

My uberis prefers to spend most of its time under the wood I have in there so I rarely if ever see him. However, last night he came out and I could not believe how absolutely massive he is. I thought at first he had dropsy because he was _so_ big. He did not stay out in the open for long but I guess someone must be eating all those blackworms I put in.

I wish I had taken a photo. I am not sure if it was a distortion of the glass or the angle he was at, but I seriously think he must have been at least 5-6 cm from head to tail. 

My tussyae male on the other hand, is more amiable to having his photo taken. I think he is a year or just over a year now. I regret losing his parents but I always seem to have bad luck with keeping tussyae. I once lost two females within days of arriving, and then my other female died after a heater malfunction. 



















I really need to go to my not so LFS and pick up some more substrate. I can't stand how horrible some of my tanks are looking.


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## LittleBettaFish

It's raining and I'm incredibly bored at home so here are a couple more photos I took before my camera battery died. 

Here is my tussyae male again showing how these fish can transform from drab to fab. Most wild bettas in fish store tanks look like the first photo, which means they are often overlooked by prospective buyers.



















Then here is a good couple shots of my rutilans male (he is the standard 'red' form). His red is rich enough to rival that of any splendens male I have seen. Unfortunately it does not tend to photograph well due to the tannins in the water.



















Finally here are two of my Betta rutilans sp. cf. green together. The one in the foreground is the one with the scraped head and behind him is one of his older brothers. The size difference is quite obvious as the older sibling is at least one and a half years old.


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## Skyewillow

they're all so gorgeous! I'm definitely drooling over here!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks it was water change day today and everyone got some mosquito larvae so they were much more active than usual. 

I adore that tussyae male. Coming home and finding nearly all his siblings dead on the floor after I had accidentally knocked their lid ajar, was one of the most devastating things ever. His remaining sibling jumped as well when they were still juveniles, and so now he is the only one I have left. 

I think one of the big breeders/sellers of wild bettas, Hermanus Haryanto has tussyae. I was going to try and see if there was not some way I could get a female to go with my poor male. 

So far I have been unable to get a decent photo of my one hendra fry. That all changed now it is living in a proper tank. Did a water change, and managed to snap these two shots.


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## Skyewillow

AWW!! cute!!! <3

I posted pics of my wilds over on the other thread for you. Finally charged the camera and got a good shot of his royal highness lol


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## Hallyx

Thanks for mentioning Hermanus a few weeks ago.I looked u phis site. What an incredible amount of amazingly beautiful fish.


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## LittleBettaFish

Hermanus has a pretty big operation. Most of the wilds coming through Jodi-Lea/Fishchick Aquatics in Australia come from him. My burdigala, uberis and persephone are either descendants of stock from him or have actually come from his fish room. 

Seems like my stiktos male has eaten his eggs. I thought as much and so I tipped all the nest out this morning, and there was nothing in there. 

I do have to admit that while I was excited about having some fry, I don't mind too much as I was going to be moving this pair into a new tank and fry would have put a hold on those plans. 

Hopefully this one time does not set a pattern for bad breeding behaviour though.


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## Skyewillow

Boo! I hope he doesn't make that a habit!!


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## LittleBettaFish

To make myself feel like less of a fish breeding failure, I went and had a look at my burdigala tank. Only two of the fish in there are fish I purchased. The rest I bred myself.

I have a surprisingly large number of females in this tank. I always thought I would end up with more males. However, my wild-caught female seems to have given me a good percentage of daughters. I was contemplating crossing one back onto the father as the mother is still rather fragile at the moment. 









Not 100% on the gender of this one. It has quite a large dorsal but a very straight anal and female looking ventrals.









Nice young male. 









Female









A rather nice-looking female. Got to love that dorsal spread.









Thinking juvenile female based on finnage and colouration.









Young male in the background. One of his sisters swam past and made him go out of focus. 









Another nice daughter out of my wild-caught female. 

Then I have a couple photos of the biggest of my killifish males. These fish are absolutely adorable. Hopefully I can find them new homes with fellow hobbyists.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my stiktos male has fry still hanging from the nest and yet he is now also wrapping with the female again. She obviously couldn't wait to have another go at this spawning business. 

They are an odd pair. He has not even been all that defensive of the nest site even when she wasn't interested in spawning and they only share a 5 gallon tank.

Suppose it shows just how individual these fish can be in terms of aggression.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well yesterday I did a complete tear-down of my uberis and miscellaneous male tanks. This was partly because I couldn't stand looking at them, and partly because I am going to be picking up some aqua soil today. 

My poor uberis male first managed to jump out of the tank and land on my top shelf before falling around two metres to the floor. I couldn't quite reach him so it took another five or so minutes before I could get him back in the tank. 

Then once I had removed all the leaf litter and siphoned off the peat moss, I noticed that only the female uberis was still in the tank! I rush back to the bathroom and luckily the male was in the colander I use to drain the water through. 

He is now flaring at the female and exploring the tank so I assume he is feeling better. 

My miscellaneous male tank was so disgusting. While it looks natural, having peat moss and leaf litter as a substrate makes cleaning harder (you can't disturb the peat moss without sending it everywhere) and it tends to end up smelling like rotten egg. 

The positioning of the wood in there was also not very good and so I cut one of the pieces in half to give them more places to hide. I also procured some java moss from another of my tanks and positioned it around the wood. I think I need to maybe put a WTB on some of the Australian fish forums for a couple tennis balls worth of java moss. I forgot how good it is to have in wild betta tanks. 

Apart from that, my male stiktos is still looking after his fry and eggs. The fry are now almost fully horizontal so I think they should be leaving the nest soon. Be interesting to see whether the female ignores them or predates them. 

My hendra fry is loving having more space to move around. I can't wait until it starts looking more like a fish and starts getting its adult colouration in. 

I have tried emailing the transhipper about whether or not she has a hendra pair in stock as I really want to buy them, but so far no luck with a response. I am worried someone might get in before me. 

Oh well, suppose if that happens I can always contact Hermanus and see what he has in stock and whether I can just import directly with the next shipment. 

Pictures will be coming later today. It's morning here and my fish have just woken up.


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## LittleBettaFish

Here are some quick photos of the progress I have made.










This is the male tank complete with new ADA substrate and wood layout. I think I really only need another piece of goldvine and some floating plants, and that will finish off that tank. Water is still cloudy from the aqua soil.










Tussyae male is not sure what to make of the new changes although he likes the cave.










Rutilans male rarely makes for a flattering shot.










I put aqua soil in my uberis tank, and also changed the layout of the wood in here. I think it looks more natural this way, and provides the fish with some environmental enrichment as they have to go in and out of the manzanita branches. 

The first batch of stiktos fry are now free-swimming and have strayed from the nest. The second batch have not yet fully adsorbed their yolk sacs and are staying put under the male's watchful eye. 










I still have a lot of aqua soil left. I was only going to get a 3L bag but mum offered to get me the bigger one as it would save us having to make multiple trips back and forth to this shop.


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## Chesh

The tank looks good!!! ^.^

Does Aquasoil leach ammonia into the tank when it's fresh? I've read that it does, but maybe that was a different kind. . .


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## LittleBettaFish

According to what I've read and experienced, Malaya and Africana don't release much ammonia at all. They contain the least amount of nutrients (unlike Amazonia which can release more than 8ppm of ammonia), but I don't have very demanding plants and am using them more for their colouring and their buffering capabilities (they generally can get the pH to stay around 5). 

I have been testing all my tanks I have used aqua soil in so far, and I have not been getting any readings for ammonia at all. I also don't use a whole heap. Only a thin layer along the bottom.


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## Chesh

I'd thank you for the usefulness of your post, but my thank button has vanished! Thanks for the info, though!

Which wilds would you recommend for a beginner?


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## LittleBettaFish

The splendens complex of wilds seems pretty forgiving. If you are in to mouthbrooders though, species such as albimarginata and channoides are practically beginner-proof. You could easily do a pair in a 5-10 gallon tank as they are extremely peaceful. 









I replaced the substrate in my main burdigala tank just now, as it was a mix of some generic brand of aqua soil and Africana and it was annoying me. The plants in there are growing really well, particularly the riccia and hydrilla. I think it's because along with 6 hours of artificial light they also get a couple hours of afternoon sun when it's not overcast. 









Of course all the burdigala in there were thinking their world was coming to an end. 

Stunk the house up brewing some blackwater extract to use for water changes. I put in some peat moss, IAL and some alder cones from our backyard. I want to keep the water as dark as possible as it brings out the colours on the wilds.


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## LittleBettaFish

I had just finished doing all my water changes and was sitting on my bed and enjoying watching my killifish juveniles swimming around in the afternoon sunlight. 

That was until I saw one of the smallest ones looking decidedly 'salty'. I thought maybe I was mistaken (I sure bloody hoped I was mistaken), but nope, looking at a couple of other juveniles I confirmed this tank has been infected with ich. 

I have started treatment right now with Waterlife Protozin. It is a different medication from what I have used previously so hoping it will work. 

I just cannot believe my luck and do not know why this is something that keeps happening. 

The tank they are in has been sitting empty for months and was thoroughly cleaned with boiling hot water and white vinegar. The juveniles have only shared a bucket/siphon with their parents, and they are the first tank done when I do water changes so no chance of me spreading anything to them. 

I have been very conservative with their water changes and only used aged water with very close parameters to what they have in their tank already. I thought maybe this was where I went wrong with my wild betta fry as I did quite large water changes with only tap water. 

When I moved them into their new tank, I moved them across entirely in their old water and then did some small partial changes over a couple of days. 

I have been so careful and it's just not fair. Every time I think I have this parasite gone from my fish room it is back with a vengeance and in some tank that has never had a problem. 

I so hope this medication works. I have no idea what I am going to do otherwise. I don't want another tank of chronically sick fish.


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## Skyewillow

I hope that the medicine works on your babies too. Too bad you can't get "prazipro" I've had some success with it on Ich.

also, you just reminded me to clean my wild tanks.


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## LittleBettaFish

So do I. It's extremely aggravating to have this problem keep on cropping up even though I do everything right.

Then I see these people with unheated bowls and poor water quality whose bettas never seem to run into any issues with external parasites. 

And I had a really good day today. Got all my fish tanks cleaned and organised all the stuff on my fish shelves. 

Now I am really nervous as I have several juveniles in my main burdigala tank and if they contract something like all my young fish seem to be doing lately that's at least thirty fish infected.


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## LittleBettaFish

Am I going insane, or are there actually visible differences between these two fish?



























Mystery fish


















Rutilans male









Both males together

I am trying to determine what species exactly the first fish pictured is. I am thinking it is Betta brownorum, but he doesn't have the lateral spot so characteristic of this species. However, with that said, I have seen other brownorum that do not have any spot at all. 

The head shape seems slightly different (the suspected brownorum has a bigger head) and the 'brownorum' male has more iridescence on the anal and dorsal fins. 

I just can't see how this male can be Betta rutilans because I only have two standard rutilans (I originally had a male and male/female pair) and since I lost the female I should only have two males left. 

The 'siblings' of this mystery fish are my rutilans sp. cf. green and so as you can see it looks nothing like them.

I did however, have a single brownorum fry I rescued and grew out with my rutilans and yet this fry somehow managed to avoid me noticing it (I thought I had siphoned it out accidentally) until it became a juvenile. 

I just want it to be a Betta brownorum because its father was a mouthbrooder rather than a bubblenester, and then I would only need to purchase a brownorum female.

Sometimes I wish my fish didn't all look so alike!


----------



## Skyewillow

the jaw looks heavier on the Mystery male, actually, you're not as crazy as you think. Unfortunately, I don't know enough about either species to be of more help than that.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Yeah, they _just_ aren't different enough, and that stupid mystery male doesn't have the characteristic blotch most brownorum do for me to say 100% that is what he is. 

I would really like if he was though. I lost that entire group of brownorum not long after I moved that one fry out into my rutilans grow-out.


----------



## Skyewillow

He's also shinier on his sides, like he has more iridescence than the rutilans.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Yep, that is how I mainly tell them apart. 

I think I may have to euthanise my other rutilans male soon though. He has always had these tumor type growths in and around his mouth and now they are getting quite large and I think impeding with his ability to eat.

He definitely has not grown as large as these two males.


----------



## Skyewillow

Poor fella :-(

How are the Stiktos fry doing?


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Really good. I have to get my torch in there to have a look but the first batch are now free-swimming and have left the nest. 

The male decided he did not like having his nest right up against the front glass, so he spent all of yesterday building a new nest in the film canister and then carefully moving all the newly hatched fry over. 

I am going to let these fry grow out naturally if I can, and I am aiming for between 10-20 adults from the fry I have now.


----------



## Skyewillow

by "naturally" you mean with mom and dad? That's how I'm planning on going too.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

If I can. The father does not seem to have any interest in them, but if the female starts cannibalising them, I may have to move her to a separate tank or put her in a breeders net. 

I find I get much smaller spawn numbers this way, but the fry that survive to adulthood seem to be a lot more resilient than those I separate from the parents and rear in a grow-out tank.


----------



## Skyewillow

sounds like a good plan to me. I'll probably keep her 2.5 open if I can for the female, just in case


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Well that was almost a disaster. 

I hadn't seen my wild-caught burdigala male for a couple of days, and since it was a small tank and it was sending up some red flags, I took all the moss and IAL out to have a look for him.

What I found, was the female sitting on the bottom and no one else. 

Uh-oh, I am thinking as I am frantically searching on my floor for any signs of a body.

That was when I remembered the sponge filter. I have one that looks like this in there, and turns out my male had gone in and gotten himself basically stuck up in the section of pipe hidden by the sponge. 

I actually had to cut him out as he was otherwise unable to get out and was very stressed. 

Now I have stuffed the entrance to the filter with filter floss so hopefully that should keep him out. 

I would have been devastated if I lost him, as he and his female are my favourite burdigala. 

His female is such a tiny thing. She seems healthier now than what she was previously. Her fins got torn up by a daughter I put in with her and the male. The daughter thought it was a great game to chase and harass her mother.


----------



## Skyewillow

omg! I'm glad he's ok!


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I think my fish just thought I was having too much of a good run lately.


----------



## Skyewillow

they were just testing your intuition.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I have to learn to not be so freaked out every time I see one of my fish clamp its fins. 

I've noticed most of my Betta rutilans sp. cf. green clamp their fins quite frequently over the course of a day. Of course my mind immediately flashes to thoughts of velvet or ich when I see this, but I have been over them with a torch so many times and can see nothing of the sort. 

My persephone males also do much of the same when they are not displaying or sparring, and I am wondering if it is something to do with the large number of males present. I suppose the best way to avoid a confrontation with your brothers or harassment, is to look at small and non-threatening as possible. 

As you can see from the photos below my rutilans look pretty parasite free. They are very tame as I have reared these all myself and all come swimming over (with fins fully open I might add) as soon as they hear me tap on the glass. 



























One of the big males threatening a younger brother









Threat is intensified here









Content now brother is out of the picture (quite literally)


----------



## Skyewillow

the male mahachai keeps his close unless he's displaying. I always worry that he's sick too, but his water is clean and he's healthy.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Yeah my stiktos is the same. My mum told me I have that Munchausen by proxy with my fish haha. 

I saw some of the stiktos fry down on the bottom of the tank having a pick through the peat moss. They are driving the male crazy as he keeps thinking they are from his most recent spawn and need to be captured and put back in the nest. 

My male unimculata is holding. So far it has been a couple of days. They are a lot calmer now I have the floating plants in, and they don't jump around like they used to. Will have to see if the male holds to term this time. The pH is a lot lower, there is more cover and he seems a bit more serious about it. 

His daughter has just been busy stuffing her face in front of him.


----------



## Skyewillow

poor guy. lol

-chomp chomp nom mwar chomp nom-

he looks like he's thinking "darn kids"


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Haha that's his female in the photo. She actually was one of the runts and I held onto her to keep the male company. Now she's nearly as big as he is. Apparently her full brother had 40 fry or so not that long ago so I have to check up with their owner and see how they are going.

Here is the male. When he is holding he will come right over and sort of ram into the food with his mouth closed. I always feel so sorry for the mouthbrooders because they normally can't eat.










The species in this complex are so friendly though. They are big enough it almost sort of hurts when the adults bite your hand.


----------



## Skyewillow

How large is he? I saw some beautiful pictures of them on google yesterday when I was looking up the brownorum and rutilans.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I would say about 4-4.5 inches. My ideii pair were massive. I reckon they were around 5 inches head to tail. 

I think because the male was wild-caught he never grew as big as a captive bred fish would have.


----------



## Skyewillow

wow!! Those are a lot larger than I thought they'd be!


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Yeah, this whole complex is big. I originally had this pair in a 10 gallon tank and it started feeling a bit cramped. Now they are in a 15 gallon tank there is more space to move around.


----------



## Skyewillow

Sounds like I'll have to start scrounging around to see if I can find a pair once we get settled after our move.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I think unimaculata shouldn't be too hard to find. They are fairly easy to breed if you can get the male to hold to term. However, ocellata and pallifina are two related species that look very similar.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Awesome. I sent an email this morning asking if the transhipper here had any Betta hendra pairs from this last shipment. She hasn't gotten around to sorting them yet, but if there is a pair in there she will put it on hold for me. 

I am crossing my fingers that there is indeed a pair in there. 

If Jodi-Lea ever throws it all in I think it would be a very sad day for the hobby in Australia. She provides such a great service, particularly for betta enthusiasts.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

It was water change day today and so I used some of my extract I made up a couple days back. Kept the water nice and tea coloured as sometimes with my regular water changes I can strip the tannins out. 

I made some more today using chopped up IAL, so I am going to keep using that until I get my water change drum/jug set up next week some time. Then I will have heated and aged water on tap for my wild bettas. 

As an aside, I have been doing some reading on velvet over the past couple of days. Based on what I have read, I wonder if my adult fish in previously infected tanks aren't still carrying the parasite in low numbers.

From what I've read, it seems like velvet can sometimes infect only the gill/fin tissue, particularly in healthy fish. Then, when something happens to cause stress, it becomes a full-blown infection.

The difficulty is that my fish are so elusive, so small and so strongly iridescent, a mild infection could be difficult to see. This is making me wonder (especially with my rutilans) whether they don't in fact have velvet still, but they are just healthy enough at the moment that their immune system is sort of keeping it in check. 

It also does seem to be the case that when the fry of these species are separated from their parents, they are much more vulnerable to infection from velvet. I think this explains why I had such high incidence of it in my grow-outs versus in the tanks where the fry were left to grow out alongside their parents. 

I may also have to move my persephone group into a bigger tank or sell off some of the extra males. They seem kind of cramped in their current tank. I feel a 60cm tank like my burdigala group have may be a better size for them. It's only a shame the one my mum got was damaged and I think she has sort of left her run too late to take it back and get a replacement.


----------



## Skyewillow

That's something I never would've considered with velvet.

And you can send me that guy in the last photo, the markings of his eye make him look like he's scowling lol


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Haha, this is the angry complex of wild bettas. They always look like they want to murder me in my sleep. 

Velvet is such a nasty parasite. Much nastier than ich by far. I think it was velvet rather than ich I had infect my main grow-out. I do wonder if my rutilans have a mild infection in their gills because while they seem alright for the most part, I noticed one of them this morning has a very sore and inflamed looking gill. 

I was browsing the wild section of a French betta forum, and it seems like I was not the only one who had recurring infections with this complex of fish. It has been like a living nightmare trying to get it out and keep it out I tell you.

In more positive news, my stiktos male is just being the best father. He is on his third batch of eggs now and is doing a great job looking after them all. Once this lot hatch I will remove the film canister so he can have a break from almost continual father duty. 










You can see some of the fry up near the IAL in this photo.

Also, think my unimaculata male may be serious about holding to term this time around.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Okay, I have decided to bump up the heat in my rutilans tank and do a six day course of Protozin as my gut tells me there might still be some velvet lingering in that tank. Here is a picture of one of the sub-adults with the scratched/inflamed gill that is causing me some concern. 










Since being rescued from the sponge filter, my wild-caught burdigala male seems much less skittish. I see him swimming around most of the time now. Unfortunately, the only photos I could get were of him right up under the film canister. 



















Unimaculata male still appears to be holding. His female is out and about being her usual exuberant self. Their tank is looking really nice now that the Asian water grass is sending down roots to the substrate and the moss is starting to grow.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Got some photos of my unimaculata female just now. I was checking on her male to see if he was holding and since he wouldn't touch any of the frozen bloodworms I put in, I assume that he is. 

Only one more week and a bit and I may have some fry on my hands. May need to buy some BBS if this is the case.

The female is such a pig. Every time she sees me approach the tank she shoots out from wherever she is hiding and goes and waits in the corner for food. 


















The open mouth is basically how this species flares









Waiting for food in the corner









Showing how much the roots from the water grass have grown

This pair seems a lot more comfortable in this bigger tank. The mayaca, water grass and duckweed helps keep the water quality in check, and I no longer see either fish jumping around as much as I used to. 

Got two empty 7 gallon tanks set up with heaters and substrate on my second shelf. One is for my (hopefully) hendra pair, while the other I haven't decided what to put in there yet. A guy who lives locally (he owns a pair of siblings to my unimaculata female) is going to donate some java moss so I will use that for cover until I can afford some more plants and some ceramic caves. Some IAL and some duckweed from my pond tub down the back and it should at least be set for a temporary home.

I was thinking of using water sprite in both tanks. With a smaller volume of water, I want to minimise the need for water changes, particularly if I am rearing fry in there. 

Also this is what I have to put up with on a daily basis with my cat. While I was doing water changes the other night, he decided it would be a good idea to jump up and get himself stuck on the curtain railing. 

At least it wasn't the one behind my fish rack as he has pulled that whole thing off the wall before and I think it would probably take out a tank or two.


----------



## Skyewillow

lol aren't cats fun?!

I'm still drooling over your unimaculata!!! <3

Also Kheiyw does the same thing of seeing me, and then he waits for food.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

That cat is a terror. He was jumping over the baby gate into our kitchen this afternoon with two German Shepherds who wanted to maul him. I don't think he's realised he resembles an oversized rat when he runs around. 

Me and mum have decided that one rack downstairs will be for my coccina complex species, and then the other rack will house unimaculata species (thinking unimaculata, gladiator, patoti and macrostoma at this point) and my stiktos pair. 

My wilds are very cross with me. I ran out of blackworms and have been trying to get them back onto eating more frozen foods. I even purchased some new brine shrimp and bloodworms today because the old stuff was slightly freezer burned and only my burdigala group and my unimaculata female ate it. 

I just realised before that you have a journal too. Your mahachai (I can never be bothered spelling out the full name) pair are looking good in the photos you have of them. The dark water definitely brings out the colours and iridescence in the wild bettas.


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## Skyewillow

I actually just started the journal a few days ago. :-D

Also, I rarely bother spelling it out, let alone trying to pronounce it, it's usually "the wilds" or "his/her royal highness" because they know they're spoiled rotten. lol

A friend of mine offered me some microworms (since everyone has decided I'm crazy enough to breed them now), and while I was definitely considering it, someone else decided that they were sending some to me, whether they creep me out or not! So I guess it's been determined by fate, now I just have to figure out where to move everything to maximize the little space I have. Also, if I give anyone else daphnia, the male gets jealous and starts dancing at the front wall as soon as he sees the cup going by (probably the only betta in the world who's happy to see a "death cup")

I never did get around to ordering the shrimp eggs, I get sidetracked easily.

what breed is your oversized rat again? I'm sure you've mentioned it, but I'm currently too lazy to look it up. lol


----------



## LittleBettaFish

He is a very poorly bred oriental we picked up from a 'breeder' before we really knew what we were doing. Has a slew of health issues and has racked up at least $5000 in vet bills and is only like five years old. 

I think we should have chosen the other kitten that was there with him that was hiding and hissing at us from a box haha

Microworms aren't creepy at all. Although worms of any sort don't really creep me out too much. I think live blackworms are probably the worst as when they get on your skin and move around it feels like they are trying to burrow into you.


----------



## Skyewillow

yep, definitely gross (worms). I can handle nightcrawlers just fine... it's the small and white worms that get to me.

usually the feisty ones are the best cats ever!


----------



## Wildbetta

Loving the pics in your journal! Although I am not as big a fan of either the splenden complex or the coccina complex, I love seeing good pics of them and hearing about them. 

I love seeing your unimac female. She is adorable! She looks so small in those last pics.  What did you do to make her "flare" at you?

I do hope you are able to get rid of the velvet that seems to harass you to no end. I personally have never dealt with velvet (knock on wood) and hope to not have to.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks WildBetta. She is actually small as she was always the runt and so is only around 2-2.5 inches. However, she is growing and I except one day she will eventually be the same size as the male as she gets fed enough. Also, I made her display by using a mirror. The male hates his reflection but since he was holding I didn't want to stress him out.

Velvet seems to almost go hand in hand with the coccina complex. My unimaculata, ideii, strohi, channoides and albimarginata never contracted velvet, not even their fry when I grew them out separately from their parents.

It's why I am trying to be more hands-off in my maintenance through the use of live plants to maintain water quality, and aged water (tinted with IAL and peat moss) for water changes


----------



## Hallyx

LBF,
With modern water conditioners as good as they are, what advantage do you get by aging your water? I understand why you like peat and IAL.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Because my water comes out of the tap with a higher pH but then this pH drops quite drastically after 12-24 hours because it has a very low (basically 0) KH value. 

I am after stability in my water parameters, so I want to make the water I am adding into the tank as similar in conditions as I can to the water I am taking out. 

I plan on putting some peat moss and IAL into a stocking, hanging it in the bucket and then running an airstone and heater so it is always ready to go.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Ugh, I got all excited last night about seeing a fry pop out of my unimaculata male's mouth. Then I wake up this morning and he has swallowed them. Since the fry I saw still had its yolk sac attached, I doubt they would have been released. 

So while he was out and about, I took a couple of photos. His eyes always look cloudy from certain angles. I think he did damage them when he jumped out once and was nearly fully dehydrated, but he seems to see alright and definitely has no trouble finding his food. 





































His female seems to be growing by the day. I hope she doesn't end up too big as she is getting to be something of a bully. 










Persephone are being terrors. I really think they need a 2ft tank. I am going to put some moss along the bottom to provide some more areas of cover and hopefully that should help make the less aggressive males and females more comfortable.

Also my killifish juveniles are doing really well. The ich looks to be retreating and they seem to be bigger every time I look in their tank. 

I had to euthanise one last night. It was this male everyone used to attack. I don't know why as he wasn't particularly small or weak. However last night he was lying upside down on the bottom breathing heavily with all his fins torn off. I decided that it was best to give him a quick end rather than let him suffer. Parents have shown absolutely no sign of ich. They are still fat and healthy as ever. 

Sadly I lost my hendra fry the other day. I noticed it was having difficulty swimming around and then I went to check on it later that day and it was dead. Don't know what happened there.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Put some moss in my persephone tank and everyone was all excited about that so I hope people are ready for a persephone picture spam!









Their tank (will be getting some more moss ASAP)













































Some of the males in the tank going about their business









Then we had a fight break out between two males



























..And then two females

Love these fish so much. Just wish their tank was bigger. Darn you broken 2ft tank!


----------



## Wildbetta

I wonder with your unimac male if he swallows because the female pesters him to spawn again. Sometimes the only way to avoid that is to separate the holding male. I have chosen a breeder net for the ocellata male since him and the female are so "inseparable" to cause less stress. I also use one with my picta male since I can't keep the breeding boxes that sit outside the tank on the tank that is in the living room. Seems to do very well for me and might be an option if you really want him to hold full term. Love the pics of the persophone. They are the only true green betta there is and that makes them very unique.


----------



## popcorndeer

nice fish! :nicefish:


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Popcorndeer. 

Wildbetta, I am thinking that the first few times it was because the conditions weren't right, but this time I think it was because of the female. The only concern I have about putting her in a breeder box is that she will somehow jump out or get herself stuck or something like that.

These are my mum's fish and she is very attached to them, and I had a lot of difficulties with rearing the batch of fry the female is from. Therefore, I am afraid to change anything in the current set-up/housing arrangements because it would break her heart if I lost the female. 

However, I think I might have to separate her if they spawn again. She's just too much of a nuisance. 

It's funny how different my persephone look under different lighting. Sometimes they look really blue and then other times they look green like in the pictures above.


----------



## Wildbetta

I would put the male in a breeder net that actually sits inside the tank so there is no chance of him jumping ship since the lid of the tank would cover it. 

Here is some pics of the current setup with the breeder net. He is in there with a betta log right now. 





I always stick something in the breeder net with the holding male (no matter what species) for them to hide in. With the smaller species it is usually a piece of PVC pipe.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I prefer to keep the male out of the net. He is a big time jumper (he nearly died once and has been out of the tank at least four or five times) and I think he would react worse to being put in the net than the female. 

He has been in a net ages ago when I was integrating him back in with his juvenile offspring and he did not like it very much. 

I was talking about a net in the tank. It's just I have had this fish jump out of what I thought was a jump-proof tank so I am a little wary haha.

I was carrying him upstairs in a bucket once, and just as I had finished warning him to stay in the bucket for what is about a ten second journey, he decides to jump out. Because there were renovations going on, of course he flops over into a pile of sawdust.


----------



## Skyewillow

of course he'd wait until after you explain why jumping during the trip would be inadvisable.... men! lol


----------



## Wildbetta

I totally understand where you are coming from. I did things that way with my macs while I still had them. I pulled the female instead of the male. So it is one of those things that you work with to find out which way works best.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Yeah he is very naughty. He sometimes jumps out if I am too slow to get their food into the tank so I have to be very on guard. The jumping has cut down a lot since I got them into this bigger tank and provided more surface cover. 

This is why I like bubblenesters!! Argh haha


----------



## Skyewillow

they still try to jump. I was scraping planaria off of Kafae's front wall and she penned herself in between my hand and the tank. she panicked, went up and out, but luckily bounced off of the lid and back into the tank.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Yeah I have had a few (okay more than a few) of my coccina species go up and out while doing maintenance. But that is more when they are startled. Otherwise I can remove their glad wrap completely during water changes, and not have to do the 100m sprint back with my water bucket to make sure no one has jumped out. 

Got this photo of my stiktos male. He is looking good after rearing basically three consecutive lots of fry. Hopefully he and the female take a break for a while.










Then here is my new aging water system. The stocking is stuffed full from peat moss and I will be adding some new IAL tomorrow to make the water extra dark. I eventually want to have a big 100L tub or something set-up like this in the storage area of our rumpus and use only this water for water changes. 










Unfortunately, this is only 20L so may need to set up another one so I am not continually depleting it.


----------



## Skyewillow

There's that handsome fella! I think I could pick him out of a lineup! LOL

I've broken the news to Mike that I want to save up for some persephones from Amelia. Most likely I won't be able to get them until after we move, but it will give me ample time to figure out how I'll get the extra funds to do so.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

He is quite stunning, particularly in the super dark water I have him in. Saw a couple of pretty big fry (well big compared to their siblings) and so they seem to be doing alright. Wish they could have waited until I could get them into that bigger tank to spawn though!

Good luck with the persephone. They are a beautiful fish and their future definitely needs to be secured in the tanks of hobbyists, as it seems quite likely it will one day become extinct. 

Here is also some pictures of my killifish juveniles to show how well they are going.


----------



## Skyewillow

they're getting so big!


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I know! They are so friendly. Every time I go past their tank they swarm over and demand to be fed. I can't really see any ich on them, and while I know that's no guarantee they are 'cured', at least it hopefully means it is in the stage of its life-cycle where it can be killed. 

I was surprised at how fast the growth rate was on this group as I only do very small partial water changes. I wonder if they just don't produce as much of a stunting hormone as bettas do because some species come from small bodies of water in the wild.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Persephone are getting used to posing for pictures again haha. It's good now that they are on the top shelf as there is enough light for me to be able to generally get okay photos. 

Plus they make for great models as they are always doing something. I want to make the water in this tank super dark as it really brings out their awesome colours.


















Female




































Gang fight

I also don't know what on earth happened to the persephone male with the grey line down his back. I never caught him, and I only saw him once after that day. I haven't noticed any bodies or any fish with the same thing so maybe it just healed up on its own. 

My wild-caught burdigala male is being really weird. He just glass surfs all day long. His tank has plenty of things for him to do and the female is in there, but he just goes up and down the side and front of the tank. I did have a daughter in with them, but she just kept harassing her mother so had to go back in with the others.


----------



## MattsBettas

I saw some of those orange killifish at the shop the other day. I wish less then half were dead and the rest were columnaris free though... Too bad cuz they seem like amazing fish.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

They are awesome fish. Mine seem to be recovering nicely from the ich, and they are so friendly. Unlike my wilds, they spend most of their time out and about and are always excited to see me (or more likely the food I am carrying over for them). 

Killifish do seem to sometimes do really poorly at fish stores. The store I got the original pair of these from had some striatum that were emaciated and nearly dead from dropsy. They had been there for ages and I had been in a couple of times and seen them degrading in quality. 

My original male is really fat now. I give up on putting him on a diet. 










Then these were the juveniles after breakfast this morning.


----------



## MattsBettas

That's too bad. The nicest fish are always the ones that fare the worst at shops... 

Just out of curiosity, how much do they usually go for?


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Yeah I know. Sad because they also tend to be the ones that don't sell the fastest and so they also have to sit there the longest. I feel bad for wild bettas in most fish stores. Usually they are beaten up, stress-striped to hell and just laying on the bottom breathing heavily. 

My pair were $24. I've seen them for more here because they aren't exactly common. Not sure how that would compare to prices in Canada. America always has really cheap fish so I sort of laugh when people are complaining about paying a couple of bucks for a VT.


----------



## MattsBettas

They were 16 or 17 each here. But that was at the pricy store (but that's pretty much the only store that ever brings stuff like that in). I'm sure if there was any actually competition here things would be cheaper... 

Americans get it so easy in the fish world lol. If we had 1$ per gallon sales here and cheap fish that you can ship to you for 15$ I would... Well... Have too many fish.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I know! If it was only basically $5 to import fish into the country I would have way more fish than I do from AB and overseas breeders. Here it's like $22-27 per fish and then another $22 to get them shipped to me from Jodi-Lea's. 

I'm always surprised there isn't some sort of mandatory quarantine period. Here our fish have to stay with the transhipper for 7 days before being released.


----------



## Skyewillow

I paid almost $90 for the Mahachais, but that including shipping. Our fish are cheaper here because there are large breeding farms in Florida where most of our stores get their livestock year round for dirt cheap.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Yeah wilds from Jodi-Lea tend to be in the $70 - $350 (macrostoma) mark. I don't mind paying those kind of prices because her fish are always in top notch condition compared to wilds from fish stores/wholesalers.

Hehe wanted to share with you my persephone female 'Ugly Betty'. She has a really funky topline that you can't see unless you view her from above. It sort of dips in behind her head on either side making her head look bigger than her body.

However, she is full of attitude, and has an IAL at the front of the tank as her territory. Today a male was on it trying to steal her grindals and she told him that was not acceptable behaviour.


----------



## Skyewillow

I like ugly Betty!! She's my kind of lady LOL


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Well my unimaculata pair spawned again this afternoon. The female was absolutely full of eggs and the male looks like he has a decent mouthful.

However, that is not the most exciting news.

I come home tonight and saw something very small moving around in my unimaculata tank. I got the torch out and had a look, and see two absolutely tiny unimaculata fry. Considering how much moss and plant cover is in that tank, it is a very real possibility there could be more. 

So these are the first fry from my home-bred female. So proud of my runt. 

The plan is now to keep her very well-fed so she is less inclined to try and eat them. I think they are too fast and small for her to show much interest in, but I want at least a couple survivors to rear.


----------



## Skyewillow

YAY!! How exciting!!! ^_^ 

I'm wishing them luck in avoiding mom lol


----------



## LittleBettaFish

The fry are smaller than I remember my previous mouthbrooding fry to be. They are similar in size to my coccina complex fry. 

Found this photo of my persephone when they were really young. I remember how freaked I was about the red fins. It was cool watching the blue slowly cover it up.


----------



## Skyewillow

Wow! they look so different now! They were adorable.


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## LittleBettaFish

Managed to get two photos of one of my tiny fry. Mum was lurking around right under it because she thought I had food so I gave her some pellets to keep her away. 

I found their old AB ad and apparently the male was wild-caught from the Sangatta River. At least I know his locality now if I want to sell any fry later on down the track. 

Made the photos a little bigger than normal so the fry is actually visible. The white things on the right are MWs I put in.


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## Skyewillow

omg so tiny!!!


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I was feeding my burdigala group and decided to snap a few shots while everyone was out and about. Otherwise when the light is on I never see them. I'm hoping darker water, thicker surface plant growth and some java moss will help them become more comfortable. 

I really should have done a headcount when I moved them into this tank. I reckon there would have to be somewhere between 20-40 fish in there. 









Male









One of the smallest juveniles in the tank









Four brothers sharing lunch









Showing off that beautiful dorsal









Juvenile being bossy (think maybe a female)









Young male bossing around an older female









Some males and females hanging out

I wish my uberis and 'spare' males were more receptive to having their photos taken as I feel like I am just photographing the same fish. My rutilans are being treated for velvet so can't have their photo taken, and my wild-caught burdigala pair are hard to get decent photos of. 

Be good when I have a couple more species in my fish room so I can get a more diverse range of photos haha

My persephone tank is almost exactly how I wanted it to look. Just really want some watersprite, some duckweed and some java moss to finish it off. 

Some males decided it was a good day for sparring while Ugly Betty was beating an overly curious sister off her leaf.


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## LittleBettaFish

After all this time I FINALLY got a photo of my stiktos female. She was actually being really friendly today so I think she is getting used to me. Her and the male were flirting with each other and he has a nest in his film canister so I am thinking another spawn is in the works. These fish are so prolific it is crazy. 




























The female is absolutely stunning in her breeding dress. I think I might break my 'no names' policy for these two because they have so much personality. I am constantly surprised at how gentle the male is with her. It's all display versus physical aggression. 

My uberis pair also spawned. I thought the male was just guarding an empty nest but when I put some worms in this morning for him I saw a fry fall out. I still don't know what happens to the fry in this tank. I think maybe the female eats them because the male has raised plenty of fry in the past. 

My rutilans seem to be coping with the velvet treatment alright. They have a water change due today and then I do the final dose on day six. After that I will be stripping out the old substrate in their tank and replacing it with aqua soil. 

Got news on the hendra pair from Jodi-Lea. She put them on hold for me and I'm not sure if she shipped them out yesterday which would mean delivery today. Unfortunately while I was busy verifying the cost of shipping I accidentally forgot to ask the cost of the actual pair themselves. Oops. Just waiting to hear back from her so I can send the money through. 

I didn't have anything prepared tank wise. I was waiting for someone to bring over some java moss, at the moment it is just a half-filled 30cm tank with a couple pieces of Asian water grass, a handful of floating IAL, some duckweed and a piece of PVC pipe. We are going to the aquarium Sunday so going to pick up some goldvine and maybe some water sprite if they have any. Hopefully what they have now should suffice until then.


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## LittleBettaFish

I have decided I will be moving my wild-caught burdigala pair back into the main tank. The female will be housed permanently in a large breeder net so she doesn't get bullied, and the male can just go back in as he can hold his own. 

This is because I will be selecting a pair of persephone to put into their tank and have another go at spawning this species. 

However, before that happens I want to stuff the tank full of duckweed (have this on hand) and something like water sprite/mayaca (need to buy) so that I can keep water changes to a bare minimum. Going to see if rearing fry in a tank with less water changes and therefore less parameter fluctuations results in no velvet attacks. 

If I get fry from this pairing I will most likely only retain one pair and then sell the rest as I just want enough to keep my own line going.


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## LittleBettaFish

Been sick, so haven't had time to update.

Quick summary is that I purchased both a pair of Betta hendra and a pair of Betta brownorum from Jodi-Lea. They should hopefully be sent out Monday next week, so should arrive Tuesday. Got one tank ready to go with some java moss, java fern, Asian water grass, duckweed and IAL. The other one will be set-up later today with pretty much the same things. Really want to get some fry from both species. Brownorum have proven to be quite a difficult species to successfully spawn.

My wild-caught burdigala pair are back in with the main group, and a pair of persephone are now sharing their previous tank. I got a nice plump female (I nearly netted Ugly Betty a few times), but had to content myself with one of the smaller males because I wasn't tearing the tank apart any further and the bigger ones were out of reach. However, he is still a nice fish and I am hoping that these two will produce some fry for me to further my line. 

Next species I will be adding to my fish room will be Betta rutilans (the traditional red colouration). I am likely selling two pairs of persephone to a fellow hobbyist for $70 each and so will be putting that money back into my wilds. 

My unimaculata male has thankfully swallowed his most recent mouthful of eggs. I have been counting the fry, and for now, there are more than enough in there for me to be content with raising. 

Uberis fry are once more MIA. I suspect the female. Male is too dutiful a father to eat his fry once they have left the nest. I suspect they will spawn again soon being that there was a lot of chasing going on. 

Don't have any pictures this time around. Cleaning all my tanks just now so everything is a bit of a mess.


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## LittleBettaFish

Here are some very bad pictures of my newly arrived wilds. The brownorum pair is slightly shyer so I only have a photo of the male at the back of the tank. 

The hendra pair ate some grindals and seem to be settling into their new tank well. 


















Female flaring at male









Male (not anywhere near fully coloured up)









Brownorum male too shy to come any closer for a photo


----------



## Skyewillow

I really like your hendras!!


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Both pairs are so much nicer than I could have anticipated. I went and caught them some mosquito larvae this morning and everyone was in the java moss hunting them down. 

I swear the brownorum male is mocking me. I will glance up and he will be at the front in full colour with his fins looking nice and I rush over and get my camera and just as I get him in focus he decides to dart off. 

All my fry I have currently seem to be doing well. Unimaculata fry had some grindals chucked in and I am setting up my BBS hatchery today. Stiktos fry are definitely not as plentiful but the ones left are thriving and I hope they grow to healthy juveniles/adults. 

I also still have uberis fry. This pair is incredibly shy (despite the fact the male is captive bred and I bred the female myself), but I managed to get a quick snap of the male before he went and hid while he was courting the female. 










Then I got this shot of one of the tiny fry. That tank has heaps of infusoria for them to hunt so I think I should get at least 5-10 that grow to adulthood if the parents leave them alone. 










My persephone pair are playing coy. Male has a decent nest but the film canister is in a position that makes it impossible for me to tell if he has eggs or not. 

Also my brother got my light that fell in my tank (while it was off) working again. Looks like it may be some sort of loose wiring. I'm only going to leave it on while I am there to supervise though as knowing my luck the thing will burn the house down. Still intend to replace all my lights with LEDs as they just use a lot less power. 

I am really hoping the new pair I want to purchase are actually from the coccina complex. I have a tank I am setting up for them and everything, and I have been looking at them for ages now. Will be devastated if I find out they are something else. 

Oh well, I suppose I can always chuck a pair of rutilans in there instead.


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## LittleBettaFish

Ugh, I was slack yesterday and skipped water changes. I didn't mean to, but I went for a bike ride with my dad and one of our dogs last night and having not ridden a bike in years, I was pretty tired and sore when we finally finished up. 

So first thing on the agenda this morning after a nice soak in an epsom salt bath is water changes. 

Apart from that, my two new pairs are settling in really well. Still can't get over how small they are compared to my other fish. 

I also cleared up everything with the transhipper about the identity of the fish I was looking at purchasing. They were indeed a member of the coccina complex, and I sent my money through yesterday for them. 

They are an undescribed coccina complex species. Whether they are simply a different locality of an existing species or an entirely new species all together still remains to be seen. But they are small, red and a bubblenester so I was sold. 

This is the tank I have prepared for them. Since this photo was taken, I have filled the tank and added in some java moss, Asian water grass and duckweed. I want to grab a couple small java ferns and maybe some water sprite over the weekend if I can. I have a 25 watt heater coming in the mail so that should arrive by the end of the week. 










I really like this tank. It is great for smaller wilds being long and shallow. It means I can create lots of areas of cover extending from the bottom to the surface without needing huge numbers of plants. 

Unimaculata pair look ready to spawn again. Female is absolutely bloated with eggs. Their fry are doing swimmingly (pun intended) and most are easily taking grindals. Can't imagine how many I will have when they all start reaching maturity! Parents have absolutely no interest in hunting the fry down. I was surprised considering how greedy they can be. I know the father wouldn't, but I thought the female might at least catch a couple. 



















I accidentally gave my spare male tank ich by transferring moss between the infected killifish tank and theirs a while back. This was before I realised the grow-out was infected and so I will be setting up a bare bottom hospital tank and treating the males in that. Their other tank can remain empty for the duration of the treatment so any free-swimming parasites can die off. 

Persephone still have not spawned. This is the most protracted courtship ever. They have been displaying and flaring for a couple of days now. Male has a nice nest if only he would use it. I am going to stuff them full of blackworms today and do a water change with slightly cooler water and see if that doesn't induce anything.


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## LittleBettaFish

This afternoon I had to cull one of my rutilans males (not one of my 'greens') who had tumors/growths in and around his mouth. I was sad, but he was losing the ability to eat as the growth had almost completely filled his mouth. I thought it best to let him go before he started starving. 

Been doing some 'bonding' with my new pairs. The brownorum female remains the friendliest of the four, but the others are slowly becoming less skittish. Still can't get a decent shot of the brownorum male though. 

Should be getting some new wilds tomorrow from a guy who lives local to me. It will most likely be either coccina or more brownorum. I tasked him with finding a brownorum female if he can't get coccina as I want to test a female with my 'mystery male' after his treatment is complete. 

Anyway here are the shots I managed to get of my hendra and brownorum. The hendra male was in the perfect position at the front of the tank with all his fins open and fully coloured up and then he startled and I missed the shot! So frustrating. 









Brownorum female. You can see her ovaries in this photo.









Hendra male mocking me.









A glimpse at what might be.









Got this awesome shot of his female though.


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## LittleBettaFish

Got my brownorum male to take frozen bloodworms from my tweezers this morning. Still spends most of his time at the back of the tank but he is not diving down into the plants every time I walk past the tank now. 

The neighbour's son/daughter-in-law have thrown their cigarette butts into my mosquito larvae container. So now I have to harvest my larvae from my tub pond out the back. Not happy as the tub pond doesn't have as many larvae. 

My hendra male enjoyed his breakfast as my photos show. They are not my best pictures but any photo that contains more than a blurry caudal fin is good enough for me. 




























My brownorum female wanted to know what was going on, so of course I had to give her some larvae too. 










Had to get a rough tank set up for my new wilds. Unfortunately, I need a lot more plants so going to get my mum to drive me to the LFS I don't usually visit and pick up some java fern and water sprite.


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## LittleBettaFish

I got my new wilds yesterday. Two coccina and a brownorum. The brownorum looks to be female like I wanted (she/he is absolutely dwarfed by the two coccina) but unfortunately, I think I might have gotten two male coccina. 

The preference would have been a male/female pair but it is incredibly difficult to sex the smaller wilds unless there are massive differences between the genders or all the fish are comfortable and coloured up. 

All three are extremely friendly and have been eating. The only downside is that the two coccina are infected with ich. However, I've found it's not all that uncommon for wilds from the wholesalers here to have ich because they do require specialist water conditions. These three will be in quarantine for a month before I even consider moving them into other tanks. In the meanwhile I will be beginning treatment for the external parasites as soon as their tank temperature hits 32 degrees celsius. 

Going to the aquarium tomorrow to pick up a few more packets of java moss and one or two java fern. These will be used in the tank for my new wilds arriving next week. 

I have a packet of 10 large IAL teabags coming in the mail. I plan on using these to tint the water in my water change tub. I found the shredded IAL became slimy and clouded the water, and I was running out of stockings to cut up!

I think my persephone may finally be spawning. Both the male and female were in the canister when I checked before fingers crossed I may see some eggs soon.

I am fairly certain my stiktos male either has spawned recently or is trying to encourage the female up to his nest. I thought I saw some younger fry in there but it could have just been one from the previous batch. 

Will get some pictures this afternoon/tomorrow. Most of my tanks need the glass cleaned and the water changed.


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## LittleBettaFish

My two new pairs have been enjoying daily feedings of live foods harvested from my pond tub out in the yard. They still surprise me with their tameness. Most coccina complex species (even captive bred stock) are normally shy by splendens standards. I was expecting it to take a lot longer for these new fish to settle in. But they act as if they have lived here for years. The brownorum female and hendra male in particular are always out and about.

Everyone has also coloured up now so I have had the opportunity to get some quite nice photos.




































Female brownorum



























Hendra pair


















Brownorum male (I only just got a decent shot of him today)

Yesterday I purchased some java moss (very disappointed with the amount I got for the price I paid), some water sprite and some java fern for my still to arrive pair. I have also added some Asian watergrass and duckweed to provide more surface cover, and just need to get everything where I want it. 

My current tally of coccina complex species now sits at nine and the new species I am getting will bring that up to ten. 

Somehow my tanks seem to have multiplied overnight. I now have 14 tanks I am running and I am still planning on purchasing a pair of Betta rutilans with the money I make from selling those persephone pairs. 

I guess I am well and truly addicted again.


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## MattsBettas

Sorry to hear about the rutilans. Always sucks when stuff like that happens. I have to ask, do you find tumors are less common in wild type species? 

Excited to see the pair that's coming to you.


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## LittleBettaFish

He's been the only wild I have had so far come up with those sorts of growths. 

I thought he was going to die ages ago but he somehow managed to get to this point and I noticed he was losing condition and the growths had advanced to pretty much filling up his entire mouth. 

Yeah I am like so nervous/excited. They are so expensive but how can I resist a coccina complex species?


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## LittleBettaFish

Got an updated photo of my rack this morning. There are four tanks missing from this photo. Two are on my sideboard, one is on my chest of drawers and the other is on my bedside table. 










The mismatched lights and cords/airline tubing everywhere still annoys me, but the tanks themselves are starting to look better than they have in a long while. 

I am rather surprised by how much I like the Malaya substrate. It sort of breaks down slightly when I add water, and ends up looking quite natural once the plants are in and the water darkens up. 

As you can see below, its slightly lighter colour doesn't wash my fish out at all. 










I also forgot how much my wilds love IALs. I got a delivery of some tea bags to use for my water aging tub as well as 25 large leaves to use in my tanks. 

I added one leaf each to my hendra and brownorum tanks and both males have already taken up residence beneath them. 










With a stomach full of mosquito larvae and a female to share his tank with, I don't think life could be much better for my hendra male. 

My unimaculata pair spawned last night. I was not surprised considering how full of eggs the female was. Male has a huge mouthful. 

Going to be working on getting the tank properly set-up for my still to arrive pair. I sort of just chucked the plants and leaves in everywhere and it does not look very appealing.


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## LittleBettaFish

I went ahead and started treatment on my wholesaler coccina pair and brownorum. The temperature is at 32 degrees Celsius and I'm using Waterlife Protozin as I have found this to work well on ich infections.

I realised I have no life yesterday when I was actually getting excited that the CFL globes I recently purchased fit the the clamp lamp that had been left untouched in my wardrobe for months. 

I now have it attached to the top shelf of my rack to offer light for the plants in my persephone tank. 

I'm hoping to pick up three UP-AQUA pro z LED lights for my rack. The mismatch of lights and the amount of electricity they are probably using on a daily basis is something I hate, and the UP-AQUA lights are reasonably priced, slick looking and have decent reviews from what I read online. 

My rutilans sp. cf. green are looking a lot better now they are back at a lower temperature (they seem to thrive around the 72-73 degree mark). I am nearly 100% certain I have at least one female in there as I have been watching her for a couple days now. Sadly, I don't have space for another tank so it may be a while before I can separate a pair out. 

I am hoping the storm last night and this morning has induced my persephone pair to spawn. Male has the biggest nest and they are always in the film canister together. Unfortunately, the film canister is right in the midst of the mayaca so it is difficult to tell whether the male has eggs or an empty nest.


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## LittleBettaFish

I am currently on cloud nine. My new pair arrived in perfect health about an hour ago. They were a couple of hundred dollars for the pair plus shipping and considering they could be a totally new species, I couldn't wait to have them safely in my tank. 

The male is a little shy, but his female has been out and about exploring. They are so small they make a 3.5 gallon tank look like it's double that size. 

Probably won't know what this species is for a long time, but they are red and small and so I don't care either way. 

I got these two photos of my female exploring. This was maybe ten minutes after being let out of the bag. 



















Then my spoiled rotten hendra male wanted to have his photo taken. Unfortunately, the glass needed cleaning so that sort of ruined an otherwise nice photo. 



















Bad news is that I have discovered a couple of younger burdigala with spotting on their fins. I have decided I give up on my battle with whatever parasite it is that continues to plague my tanks. Everyone is on separate buckets/siphons, I wash my hands with soap in between tanks and I don't put my tweezers into the water when I am feeding frozen and live foods. So I have no idea how it is spreading from tank to tank. I have been meaning to pick up a couple more test kits and also a digital pH monitor to see if something in my parameters makes my fish unhappy. But these being such sensitive species anyway, I wouldn't think I would get them spawning if the conditions were not to their liking. 

I've decided I am just going to bump the temperature down like I do with my rutilans and unless it turns into a full-blown infection in the tanks where fish display symptoms, I am going to leave it be. The treatments seem to be much more stressful than the actual parasite and just seem to make things a lot worse. All of my tanks are basically isolated from each other so there's no way I can spread it.


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## PetMania

Well, I hope the spotting goes away. Your fish are so beautiful. I just love how wild they look.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah it's annoying. Been dealing with it constantly for probably a year or so now, ever since I got an initial strain of velvet into my fish room. I thought I had completely eradicated it but sometimes I wonder. 

They are wild (some even wild-caught) and there is just something about them that is so much better than splendens. I love being able to house them in groups/pairs and watch them interact with each other. Seems much more natural than the isolation male splendens are forced to live in.


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## PetMania

Males can live with each other? I WANT SOME!! :-D Haha lol. But I do wonder where I can get these in the US.


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## PetMania

I absolutely adore the coloring on the male in your picture. He has a not-too flashy appearance that I love.


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## LittleBettaFish

The hendra? Yeah they are one of my favourite species. They have been around a while in the hobby, but only got officially described this year. Before they were usually called Betta sp. 'palangkaraya'. 

The female is really nice as she is a more subtle version of his colouring with almost permanent vertical barring. She is just shy so doesn't come out as much. 

I like the fact with wilds I can have probably over 100 fish and only 12 tanks. When I had splendens I had tanks sprawled everywhere. 

If you ever are interested in wild betta species (there are over 70 at present I believe), you can join the IBC Species Maintenance Program FB page. This will put you into contact with wild betta breeders and keepers from around the world.


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## PetMania

Thanks! I think wild bettas are beautiful and you can benefit from their requirements.


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## LittleBettaFish

A lot of people never get an opportunity to see wild bettas at their best. Unless fish stores know what they are doing, wild bettas they stock generally look clamped, dull coloured and stress striped. 

This is why I post so many pictures of my fish. To show how many different betta species exist, and to illustrate how beautiful they can be. 

I still think a fully coloured up persephone from Ayer Hitam is more stunning than any fancy splendens I have seen.


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## LittleBettaFish

Wow this female is so friendly. Most species from this complex spend their first few days quivering under a leaf or in a clump of moss, but not this little girl. She thought I was going to feed her and then decided to have a flare at her reflection in the heater. 



















She also looks rather eggy. Be so incredibly awesome if I got a spawn in the next couple of weeks. I believe I am the first person to own these fish in Australia and would be the first person to breed them as well.


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## PetMania

She's beautiful! I like how she is sticking out of the foliage


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha yeah she is such an adventurer. The male was following her around for a bit until his courage failed and he went and hid again. 

Thought I would post up some photos of my rutilans I took. These are the ones that I think may have a lingering velvet infection. But keeping the temperature and stress levels low seems to help them keep it at bay. They are a stunning species and the first ever wilds I ever bred. The oldest fish I own are in this tank and all of them will be with me for the rest of their lives. 













































This male is two years old and one of the oldest in the tank. Not sure if he is the father of everyone or one of the older brothers of the other fish.


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## MattsBettas

Those new fish look awesome. Any shots of the male?


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## LittleBettaFish

Nope. He is a scaredy cat and won't come out to pose. He mostly hides or follows the female around. 

However, my brownorum male was the same and now he is out all the time. The female acts like she has lived in this tank forever. No fear at all.


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## LittleBettaFish

Here is the best shot I have so far of my newly arrived male. I am thinking I might purchase another small sized java fern to provide cover along the bottom of the tank. 










As you can see though he is very nice. The red is very solid with minimal/no iridescence and his spade shaped caudal is very unique. 

They are so small and can hide very easily and so I keep having to check around with my torch to make sure they haven't escaped. 

My hendra male is such a great subject for photos. He was flaring today at the males who are about double his size in the tank over. They had been getting treated for external parasites and so had a towel over their tank. Now it's gone, the hendra male decided to show them who is boss.




























This last photo was him thinking mum was going to be dropping in some mosquito larvae to snack on.


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## Saphira101

That Hendra male is so pretty... I think I'm going to die from the beauty if I keep looking at him. :lol:


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## PetMania

Gosh, you are so lucky to have wild bettas. Your male is gorgeous.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. Even if he wasn't beautiful he has such a great personality. These fish may drive me nuts with their propensity towards velvet, but man are they stunning when the conditions are right and they are feeling good. 

My sp. apiapi female was out just now so I took the opportunity to get a couple photos as otherwise I probably won't get a chance for another few days. You can definitely see the eggs in her. 



















The logo on the tank is just over an inch long to give an indication of size.


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## Saphira101

Whoa! She's way smaller than I thought. So cute...


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah the hendra male is the same. He is only slightly bigger than an inch in size. I got three pairs from the same seller and they are much smaller than my other wilds who generally sit around the 2 inch mark (although my unimaculata pair are closer to 4 inches). 

The apiapi are supposedly the smallest of the wild betta species so only time will tell whether they get any bigger.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well some good news. My new pair of Betta sp. apiapi have got a bubblenest in one of the film canisters. Unfortunately, the angle it was at made it difficult to see and I kept spooking them when I tried to look in. Now it is turned around so it is easier for me to have a look so hopefully with this nest being built I might see some spawning happening. 

Would be so awesome to have a species no one in my country has owned before and get them to spawn within a couple days of arriving at my home.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Well this pair are spawning. Male was upside down in his film canister after he stunned himself haha

They've been in there several hours already so hoping that I get some eggs unlike some of my other pairs *coughpersephonecough*. 

My trio of Betta coccina are doing well. They are still covered with ich but they have all been eating and chasing each other around. I think I definitely have a female and a male. Just not sure on the identity of the third. I think it is a male as well based on the ventrals. 

I would love to get this ich cleared up in the next couple of weeks so I can set up a proper tank for them rather than the one I just threw together the same day they arrived.


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## LittleBettaFish

I managed to get a successful spawning from my sp. apiapi pair. If this does turn out to be a new species it will most likely be the first time in Australia anyone has ever spawned them. 

I saw eggs yesterday and male is still hanging under/in the film canister so I definitely think they are still in there. Because the tank is right next to my door I put up some 'privacy screens' on the side and back of the tank so as not to upset him. 

His female definitely looks a lot less plump. I was surprised a fish her size could produce eggs that were probably on par with my much bigger coccina complex fish. 










Did some long overdue water changes on my tanks yesterday, and none of my fish seemed to have an issue with me using water from my water aging tub. It was great as not only was the water already tinted with IAL and peat moss, but it was also at the perfect temperature so I didn't have to fiddle around with the taps. 

I'm also looking into using rainwater. I was thinking something like 80% water from my water tub and 20% rainwater just because rainwater is going to be limited over the next few months as we start to get into the warmer weather. 

Also, if anyone has any suggestions for good digital pH meters so I can get accurate readings for my tanks, please let me know. I am trying to hold my pH stable in the 4.0-5.0 bracket and the API test kit is crap and doesn't measure that low.


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## MattsBettas

That's awesome you got a spawn! 

I'm interested to see how rainwater works... It should come out fairly neutral with a low kh, right? That might be what I would need to use if I ever wanted to keep sort water fish. Except for the fact that we have snow here for half the year...


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## LittleBettaFish

I am thinking of putting a couple tubs out on my grandparents' farm as they live right up in the mountains and their tank water always tastes like I am drinking right out of a river (very earthy/pure). I was concerned about possible pollution, being only 20kms out of Melbourne. 

I think depending on where you are the pH of rainwater can vary. But I would assume that it would have a fairly low KH with a sort of neutral/low pH. This is why it is used by people who keep softwater fish. 

I was very chuffed with the spawn. I mean they were only here for two days or so before they spawned. Jodi-Lea keeps the wilds she has in awesome condition and I am glad they seem to like their tank as I believe they are wild-caught.


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## LittleBettaFish

Finally got a decent photo of my hendra female. I managed to lure her out into the open with grindals and then once the male moved out of the way, I got a nice full body shot of her. 

This was what I had to work with...









Then she retreated up to the back near the sponge filter and I got this shot









My brownorum male is also hard to photograph and this would have been nice if he'd closed his mouth and my glass had been cleaner.


----------



## PetMania

Is he supposed to have that green spot? Otherwise, he's gorgeous. 
Your bettas are livin' the life.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yep the green spot is characteristic of Betta brownorum and a couple other wild betta species. I love how it contrasts so sharply with the red. 

Thanks. There are still some things I want to change about my tanks. In particular darker water and more plant mass, but for now they seem pretty happy.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I did something really dumb last night. 

I found a whole heap of live bloodworms in my outside tub yesterday evening so I scooped them out and put them into my apiapi tank for the female to hunt down. 

Only when I looked in I could not see the female anywhere. It was then I noticed a small hole near one of the cords and I started to freak out. 

At first I just pulled out some moss and IALs. However, when the female still failed to turn up, I removed the sponge filter to have a look inside and took out the java fern clumps she liked to hide in. 

By now I was really thinking she had somehow jumped out. This was when I decided it would be a good idea to tip out the male and his nest of eggs to make sure that the female wasn't in with him. Unfortunately, the only thing that fell out was the male and his nest of eggs. 

By this stage I had written my eulogy for the female as I had taken almost everything out of the tank, and I thought it was impossible for even a small fish like her to still be hidden.

Turns out I was wrong.

The whole time the female was hiding in a small piece of java moss I had checked over but not removed from the tank. So I had tore apart the tank and disturbed the male and his nest for absolutely nothing. Fortunately, by the time I put the towel over the top of their tank (so they don't spook in the night) and went to bed, the male appeared to have settled down and was back to tending his nest. At least I suppose I got a good look at the eggs and there are a lot more than I originally thought.










This was my apiapi female after I put everything back in the tank. I swear wild bettas can turn themselves invisible. I manage to lose and find at least one fish a day in some of my tanks haha


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## LittleBettaFish

I got some photos of my coccina group (I think it is the same fish in all three photos) as they are starting to recover from the ich. Before, they were very uncomfortable with lots of clamping and flashing. However, as the infection is starting to respond to treatment they are behaving a lot more like normal fish. 




























I couldn't believe how bad the infection was on these three. Fortunately, my quarantine procedure is very strict (every tank has its own individual bucket/siphon, tanks with ill fish get left to last, and hands are washed with soap and hot water in between each tank) as I learned my lesson last time with introducing new fish directly into my tanks. 

There is also a tiny brownorum in there with them. I'm really not at all sure on the gender of it. I was initially thinking female but it doesn't seem as plump as my female brownorum have been in the past and something about it just says male. It would be a heck of a lot easier to sex these fish if they were a colour that allowed me to spot ovaries.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I have tails in my Betta sp. apiapi nest!! The eggs are just starting to hatch out (with the lower temperatures I keep my wild tanks at it takes a little longer) and the male and female have been doing some flaring and displaying this afternoon, so I think it may not be long before I have another batch of eggs on my hands. 

Until I learn otherwise or until this is proven to be an already existing species, I am the first person in Australia to successfully breed this fish. Now the female just needs to be good and not hunt the fry down once they become free-swimming.


----------



## Skyewillow

Congratulations! That's fantastic news!!!


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Well this morning some of the apiapi fry were slightly outside of the film canister, but once the lights were on and everyone was awake, the male moved the stragglers back in. This is a picture of the nest taken from above to show what I am talking about when I mention film canisters. These are actually diabetes medication canisters kindly donated by my second cousin's wife, but they work the same. 










Then I also have another nest full of eggs from my stiktos pair. They are such an odd couple. The male just builds his nest wherever and never has any issues with me doing anything with it. The female comes up from time to time to flare at him and chase him/be chased by him but there is never any real aggression between them. The splendens complex is supposed to be one of the most aggressive and yet these two are one of my most docile pairs.










I decided it might be nice to get some more photos of my brownorum pair before my camera battery died. However, I got this one shot of the female before I was interrupted by my hendra pair. 










The hendra pair demanded that I take photos of them and so I had no choice but to comply haha




























It's amazing the change in the female. A week or so ago I barely saw her, but now as soon as the lights come on she is out and about. 

I also took this photo of my unimaculata tank. There are maybe a couple dozen fry in there with the female and the male who has a mouthful of eggs. I actually removed quite a bit of moss from this tank and it has grown back surprisingly fast. 










So far the plan over the next couple of weeks, is to sell three pairs of persephone. Then I want to invest that money into purchasing more live plants (particularly java fern) for my tanks. 

I want to completely eradicate the ich in my coccina tank and the ich in my spare male tank and get both of these tanks set up properly. 

I also want to look into selling off or trading in my biggest A. australe pairs so that I can put that money towards my wilds as well. 

I also need to set-up a proper tub to harvest mosquito larvae from as my pond tub isn't cutting it in terms of numbers.


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## MattsBettas

Hey LBF, just wanted to say that I heard about your loss and that I'm very sorry. What species was it? How many? Was the heater he same brand that fried your macrostomas? 

Equipment malfunction is one of my biggest fears since you have no control over it, and it basically happens instantly.


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## LittleBettaFish

It was my burdigala tank. So counting the bodies it was about 30 fish of various ages. Only three of them hadn't been bred by me. 

It was one of my Eheim Jagers so yes it was the same brand. I find when they malfunction rather than just stop heating like one of the cheaper brands here does, they tend to overheat. 

I don't know what caused it. Probably this cursed house I live in. One day I am going to pile all my stuff out on the lawn and burn the damn thing to the ground. 

I wish I lived in the tropics where heaters were not necessary.


----------



## Hallyx

I'm a design engineer. I'm here to tell you that any company that releases a heater that breaks in the ON position should be sued. There is a way of making sure that, if it malfunctions, it tuns itself OFF.


----------



## Chesh

Ug, I agree! One of my biggest fears, too. . . I'm so sorry you've had to deal with this more than once, LBF. T.T

On a brighter note, the new shots are stunning - and congrats on a possible first breeding! VERY exciting news - and gorgeous fish!


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## LittleBettaFish

I have found my Aqua One brand heaters (not sure if they have this brand in the US but I know they do in the UK) will just suddenly stop heating. However, based on what I have read on other forums and my own experience, the Eheim Jagers seem to do the opposite. 

Apart from losing my burdigala, the rest of my fish are doing okay. Since my persephone pair I had separated are a failure, I am not sure whether to select another pair _or_ separate out the single rutilans sp. cf. green female I have with one of the older males and instead try and get a spawn from them. I would love to determine with an F2 generation, whether the mouthbrooding truly is genetic or environmental, as I have a feeling this may one day be described as a species separate from standard rutilans. 

My ich infected coccina are almost completely recovered. It's been almost two weeks with heat and Protozin treatment and everyone looks a lot better than they did when they arrived here. 

It's so great watching them slowly start to act like fish again. I got these photos yesterday of the dominant/biggest male. These are just 'aquarium strain' coccina without a locality name and so I would like to one day have a pair of wild-caught or captive bred fish that are from an individual breeder versus one of the Australian wholesalers. 




























This was the first ever species I owned and talk about baptism by fire! Oddly enough my coccina and my rutilans sp. cf. green actually seemed to have less problems in the early days when I knew nothing, than they do now. I actually never used to put lids or anything on those two tanks and for at least a year none of them ever jumped out. I look back now and cringe to think that I did that. 

I also got this photo of my sp. apiapi female on the hunt. I have been harvesting smaller mosquito larvae for her to eat (she is only maybe an inch total length) and so she is always lurking either on the bottom or up at the surface looking for food. 










I wish the male would at least give me one good shot but he is too busy with his eggs/fry. They were courting the other day in the main part of the tank and I am bummed that I didn't get a photo of them both looking their best.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I thought my apiapi male had eaten his most recent batch of eggs because my cat spooked him while he was in the film canister and when I checked on him this morning he had completely abandoned the nest and there were no eggs present. 

That was until I saw him frantically hunting around under the light clamp. Turns out rather than build his nest in the second film canister, he chose to do it in the space between the light clamp and the back glass of the tank. 










I suppose it is a rather safe spot for a nest and it's out of the way so he won't be disturbed. 

So far my hendra pair resist my attempts to get them interested in even the possibility of giving me a spawn. The male was not very impressed with his 'rival' even after a bribe of blackworms and grindals.


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## LittleBettaFish

Had a good photo morning in the fish room. I have found my wilds are intrigued by this pencil I have so I can lure them out with it long enough to take some snaps. 

I could only see one apiapi fry this morning. However, the female was fairly lean looking so I don't think she has eaten them. Plus I think with their size and the amount of surface cover in the tank it would be impossible for her to catch every single one of them. 

The male now has this impressive nest complete with eggs in the middle of the tank. He was at the front this morning and I tried to give him some grindals but he was more interested in getting back to his nest. It never ceases to amaze me how strong the paternal instinct can be in males who are still new to the spawning game. I mean I completely demolished his original nest and there are some males who may have just abandoned it and eaten any eggs/fry. 

I was going to get a photo of the male as he is so lovely but I didn't want to startle him. So I got a photo of his female hunting around on the bottom of the tank instead. 










My rutilans sp. cf. green were in fine form this morning. I think they wanted breakfast. Some of the older males in this tank are massive, but their younger brothers are pretty plucky and don't back down easily. 



















Then I managed to lure my brownorum male out with the pencil after he'd eaten and get a couple of nicer shots. He has this annoying habit of clamping his fins just as I press the button so nearly every single photo I get of him makes him look awful. You would think he could pick up some tips from the hendra male in the tank over.



















This is how a real model does it


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## ashleylyn

Guess who's going to spend the night reading your entire journal..


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha. Don't read it. With all my trials and tribulations you may run screaming in the opposite direction. 

Just look at the pictures.


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## ashleylyn

Haha, it's fine - I need to keep my mind off something. Almost all of my fish have died, I'm overworked, stressed, and missing my boyfriend (Army). I'm sure if anything reading about your trials and tribulations will keep my mind busy.


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## LittleBettaFish

Most of my issues seem to stem from the fact I once had velvet go through my entire system. Every fish was infected and it took me weeks to clear it up. After that I definitely had so many more problems. 

Velvet is evil and I have lost more fish than I care to admit because of it.


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## ashleylyn

Yeah I hear ya. Whatever this horrible thing is that kills my fish within 24 hours with NO prior symptoms and in perfect water conditions, it's going to make me lose my mind. Fish just need to always be healthy and live to a nice ripe old age. Because I love them and get too attached to the little critters.

>__<


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## LittleBettaFish

I know. It seems people who neglect their bettas have them live to this ripe old age without issue, while those of us that take the time to learn and give our fish the best care, face one disaster after another. 

It's very aggravating as velvet seems to attack my young fry and as this is not only the future of my breeding program, but also stock I intend on selling to try and recoup some of my costs, it is extremely frustrating to say the least. 

I also appear to have a very hard to eradicate strain in my tanks. I would love if I could just crank the heat up for a few weeks, add some medication or aquarium salt and have it gone. But nothing I do seems to kill it off fully. 

It's not even like I am careless and spread it through my tanks like I did in the past by sharing equipment. I have individual buckets/siphons for all my tanks and wash my hands and arms very thoroughly with hot water and soap if I have touched an infected tank.


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## Weaver

Oh gosh, I've finally read through this entire journal. Oh my gosh. I love it. I love it! I love your fish and oh my gosh, wild bettas are so neat! I just, wow, the wilds are so spunky! Maybe it's just me, but your IAL leaves in the water just make the iridescence on your fish pop at the viewer. 

I anxiously await for pictures and writing here.


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## LittleBettaFish

Lol you know I used almost that exact statement (the part about the iridescence popping) in the entry I am writing up for my blog on tannins. I reckon it is true though. I don't think the colour is ever as good on these fish as when they are in very dark water. 

I have been trying to get the water in my tanks almost orange with tannins as I love the look. Unfortunately, it is still a work in progress in some of my larger tanks because they require a lot more leaves and DIY blackwater extract to stay dark. 

I love my wilds and even if I seem to go through hell and back with them, I could never fully give them up. 

As a totally different topic, I finally got a picture of one of my newly free-swimming Betta sp. apiapi fry. 










I hope this does turn out to be another new species for this complex as that would be so exciting. 










The male has extended his nest and the female was flirting with him today so I'm not sure if they intend on spawning for a third time.










You can see his tail in the left corner of this shot as he heads back to his nest.










Then this is a close-up of the female. I absolutely love this fish. She has so much spunk and is always up to something.


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## Hallyx

LittleBettaFish said:


> It seems people who neglect their bettas have them live to this ripe old age without issue, while those of us that take the time to learn and give our fish the best care, face one disaster after another.


That's because we only hear about those when someone is bragging, or using the tale to justify poor or improper care. When, actually, neglected Betta die in their multitudes daily, unmourned, unremarked and unloved.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha yeah I know. It just is frustrating when you do everything right and things still go wrong. 

I mean my fish must be healthy and happy if they are regularly spawning. These are not fish you can just put into a tank and they will spawn. Yet I still get this bloody velvet popping up in tanks that have never even been infected before. 

This is why my plan is to purchase a digital pH meter and new GH and KH test kits and figure out if there is something amiss with my parameters. I also want to be able to compare the difference between my tank water and the water in my 'aging' tub. I want to try and get these as close as possible and with my current crappy API pH test kit and lack of hardness test kits, it is making that very difficult. 

Then I am just going to stuff each tank so full of water sprite, duckweed, hydrilla and water grass that I can get away with doing very small water changes once a week or so. 

Otherwise I am all out of ideas.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well today I went to the aquarium, got three packets of java moss and two medium sized java ferns. I intended on putting one of the ferns in my hendra tank because I thought that might make them feel more comfortable and incite some spawning, but they must have felt comfortable enough as they were spawning when I got home. 

So I put one of the java ferns in my brownorum tank as seen below.










The pair were happy with that and after a quick meal of live brine shrimp they were off having a flare and an explore.










Then I decided to put the remaining java fern and moss in my persephone tank as some of the males have been dominating and harassing others. Of course now they all decide to fight over who gets top position in the new plants!










Ignore the glad wrap and position of the plants. Eventually I want to get rid of the wood and just have this tank with moss, java fern, mayaca and water sprite. But I don't quite have enough plants to do that yet. 










At least I suppose this will keep them occupied for a while now. 

My stiktos pair are also spawning again. The male and female broke off to greet me and have a snack of brine shrimp and then they were right back into it. I love how casual an affair spawning often is in my tanks. 

The plan is to order some bunches of water sprite online (no stores seem to stock it) and a couple more java fern just to provide cover in the middle section of the tanks.


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## LittleBettaFish

Finally got some shots of my apiapi male. He seems to like hanging out at the front in the morning so as soon as I realised it was him and not my female I rushed over and took whatever photos I could. 














































He has some fry in his nest so he has been fairly pre-occupied with them. Both him and his female are absolutely stunning. The red on their bodies is so flat without any iridescence, and I love his spade tail. 

I did think I lost them yesterday though. Turns out they were just both in the film canister that faces the other way so I couldn't see them.


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## dramaqueen

He's pretty!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks DramaQueen. He has been busy this past week looking after his fry. 

I hope he and his female don't get much bigger as they are so adorable at their present size.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Well I was wondering where my apiapi pair had gone to. Turns out they were spawning in their canister. This is their third consecutive spawn. 

This morning I saw a number of fry from their first spawn swimming in the tank and dropped some microworms in. I am hoping the microworms along with the infusoria in the tank will hold most of them over until they are big enough for BBS. 

My hendra male is doing a great job watching his nest. It is good having a male so relaxed in my presence as it means I can turn on the light or have a look at how the eggs are going without spooking him. This is his nest he has built. It spans out from the film canister and is pretty impressive for a coccina complex species as usually they string together a few bubbles and call it good.










My unimaculata male and female were courting this morning. He only just released his last lot of fry, and she's already hassling him to spawn. 

Therefore, the male was a lot more coloured up than he usually is. He goes almost black and the blue scales and sheen intensify much more when he is in breeding dress. 


















His female resembles a blimp at the moment. That is a combination of food and eggs.


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## LittleBettaFish

I was downstairs, and decided to take some photos of my three goldfish as I rarely pay them much mind apart from water changes and feeding. 









My original fish









My original fish with its similar looking companion









This is my weird looking shubunkin. It doesn't really seem to grow as fast as the other two and it has always swam on sort of a tilt. 









Then my other silvery coloured one (I'm sure there is some proper goldfish term used to describe this colour)

The oldest shubunkin above, is what originally got me into serious fishkeeping. About three years ago, my dad moved interstate and left me in charge of looking after his goldfish tank. 

My dad had I think around five goldfish in a tank that couldn't be any bigger than 15 gallons. It ran an UGF, which my dad kindly cleaned along with the gravel in tap water and then bleach. When one of the goldfish developed dropsy, I did some research online and realised why when I was a kid all our goldfish seemed to die horrible deaths. Back then, we relied on what the fish store owner told us, and I didn't have the luxury of a whole Internet worth of information at my fingertips. 

Because the tank was now trying to cycle, I ended up with only two survivors. The shubunkin I have now, and a black moor who later died under very mysterious circumstances. These two were moved from their 15 gallon tank into our previous goldfish tank which I think was around 35 gallons. Still not ideal, but with appropriate filtration and twice weekly water changes I suppose it was better than the fate awaiting most $5 pet store goldfish.

I picked up two smaller shubunkin to keep my original fish company after the black moor died. By now the original shubunkin was in a 46 gallon tank and this is where the three of them have been since. I keep up with the water changes and they are on a combination of NLS pellets and frozen/live foods. I will readily admit that the previous bad care and current conditions have stunted their growth, but even so, they still all measure in at around 7-8 inches from head to tail. 

However, we have a new 4x2x2ft tank on order that these three are going to hopefully get moved into in November of this year (when the tank is supposed to arrive). This time I will be purchasing one or two canister filters rather than the four large internal filters I rely on now. This tank will be where these fish spend the rest of their lives unless we move to a place with space to build a fish friendly pond.

Most likely people will call me a hypocrite as I often express the opinion that bigger is better on this forum. However, in my view, there is a vast difference between being able to find the space for a 5 gallon tank, and being able to find the space for a 100 plus gallon tank. Particularly when I don't own the home I live in, and rely on the saintly patience of my mother when it comes to housing my fish. 

Owning these fish has shown me how big a commitment goldfish truly are. I cringe when I see threads on here where people own goldfish and think a 30 gallon tank is sufficient to keep these fish in for life. 

My goldfish are most likely never going to grow to their maximum potential size. However, they still manage to make a 46 gallon tank look cramped.


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## MattsBettas

Your fish look great. I love the apiapi male. 

I *might* have found a Canadian with some channoides. I was scouring over the internet and I ended up joining a UK (I think) based forum to contact a Canadian member who had posted pictures of a bunch of mouthbrooder species earlier this year... Fingers crossed.


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## LittleBettaFish

That would be great if you could find a Canadian with channoides. Have you ever tried just posting on the IBC SMP Facebook page asking if any Canadians keep/breed them? 

The apiapi pair are such lovely fish, particularly the male when he is out and about. Definitely a lot more eggs in the nest this time around.


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## dramaqueen

I like your goldfish.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha I have sort of a love/hate relationship with my goldfish. I always think they are basically on the opposite end of the spectrum from my wild bettas in regards to care, behaviour and size. 

I have some good news in that my hendra fry have hatched overnight! I always think this stage separates the good fathers from the bad fathers. It's a lot of work making sure the fry are secure in the nest at all times. 

I am avoiding doing any water changes on the hendra tank, apiapi tank and brownorum tank. It seems this is where things start to go wrong when I have fry present in the tank and so at the moment I am just going to let the plants take care of what ammonia there is. 

However, of late, I have been doing some reading up on TDS and aquariums, and I am wondering if this is something that poses a problem for the health of my fish. 

Melbourne tap water is generally considered quite soft, but we do have several catchments with varying parameters and I am not sure what catchment our water actually comes from. I got the results below for the TDS (measured in mg/L) for all the catchment areas that supply water to Melbourne and I am not certain whether these are too high for fish that require extremely soft water with negligible mineral content. 

Total dissolved solids​	39​	53​	36​	89​	109​	100​

I noticed peat moss was mentioned as a way of lowering the TDS and I do several filter bags worth of it in my water aging tub. I am also considering making some peat balls and placing these in each of my tanks, as I do notice that peat moss is also very beneficial in darkening the water and encouraging the growth of infusoria.

I also have my dad onto harvesting rainwater for me so I am going to trial that out. I was worried about pollutants as we are not that far out of the city (20km) but do live in the 'green wedge' of Melbourne so lots of established trees and hectares of parks nearby. However, a wild betta keeper in Perth uses rainwater and lives 9kms from the city and he said he had worse problems with tap than rainwater. 

I am hoping we get a few more rainy days so I can at least get a few buckets of rainwater to test out. Be interesting to test the pH and softness of the rainwater in comparison to the water in my tanks and that coming out of the tap.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

My rutilans sp. cf. green were in excellent form this morning. I managed to get some nice action shots of two of the older males sparring. This species actually does get very physical at times, and with over 15 males sharing a tank there are times when things get hostile. 









Younger fish thinking I was coming to feed them









Young male on left with what I believe is my only female on right









Young male flaring at his sister









More serious display









This is actually two fish









This was just after they'd given each other a few bites


















Back to displaying again

Then I got this lovely shot of my hendra male tending to his nest. Unfortunately, you can't see the nest as the flash obscured it. 










I also got a quick photo of my persephone sparring. I think it will be better once I sell those three pairs. Some of the fish in this tank have become quite elusive and I think it is because of a handful of dominant males that harass everyone else.


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## Hallyx

I love reading this journal, LBF. Your writing has such artless immediacy, it just grabs my interest. Just captivating. Puts me right there, identifying with everything you do.

And your photography is just splendid. Thanks for keeping the pictures small enough to fit on my page and to load in a reasonable time.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Hallyx. I just love to blather on about my fish (don't we all?) and this is a good place to concentrate my blathering. 

I hate really big photos when they take forever to load and stretch the page, so I always resize mine. 

I am sort of a 'fly by the seat of one's pants' photographer in that I will look up, see my fish doing something interesting and immediately run and grab mum's camera, which conveniently now lives in my wardrobe. 

I always am glad to know people are reading this journal as wild bettas need as much flogging to the public as they can get. 

This was the final photo I got of my rutilans males before they decided to vanish into the java moss. 










Then I caught my apiapi female at the front of the tank eating the grindals I put in. This pair are the very first fish I go and check on when I get up in the morning, and will remain in my bedroom when all the other fish are shifted downstairs.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my sp. apiapi male has now found international fame after being posted on a German based labyrinth fish FB page. Of course the owner asked me for permission prior to posting my photo up. 

A group of their fry were out this morning at the front of the tank. They are already bigger than their younger siblings, and they were actively eating the microworms I put in. Hopefully soon I can make the transition over to BBS soon. 

After discussing velvet with Rickey in the disease part of the forum, I went out and purchased two new nets. I like to harvest my mosquito larvae with a net, and was concerned about the possibility of spreading velvet further by using possibly contaminated nets to do so. 

Unfortunately, it has been so cold here still that the mosquito population hasn't quite taken off. I'm hoping that with a few warm days I can get some decent numbers of larvae in my tub to feed my fish with. 

I've also been busy collecting alder cones from three alder trees, and brewing up some blackwater extract for my tanks. 

I meant to get some cheap stockings last night while I was at the supermarket to cut up and make some 'peat balls' out of. I've already hacked up all my previous stockings for various projects and I don't think mum is going to lend me any of her good ones haha

I'm hoping this weekend I can get two pairs of my persephone sold as I want to put the money towards some watersprite, java fern, hornwort and frogbit for my tanks. I'm still not certain about whether to only retain 2-3 pairs of persephone and sell off my excess males. They don't seem to live as harmoniously together as my group of rutilans males do, but even for the most beautiful and rare of wild betta species, unless you are selling them as a breeding pair people tend not to want to buy.


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## Hallyx

What is that device your aplapi girl is focusing on in post #364?

I'd love to take a couple of persephone males off your hands. I just do pets, anyway.


----------



## Weaver

Awww! the apiapi male is an super-star now! Good luck with the sale of the Persephone's. 

Oh gosh, don't ask me ever about using hose and stockings... I'm an amateur costumer for our community theater and since we cannot buy wig-caps: I chop up stockings for them. XD


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I've had a very upsetting past day and a half. Our old cat who has a number of issues took a turn for the worst yesterday afternoon, and by this morning was gravely ill. He was very dehydrated, extremely weak and was non-responsive to anything but touch or a loud voice. 

My mum had a meeting she had to attend at work and then she took the rest of the day off, dashed madly home and drove him to the vet. 

When we got him to the vet his heart rate was extremely low. He is now staying at the vets on fluids and hopefully they can stabilise him enough to find out what is wrong. I am just praying he will pull through this and be okay. If not we are going to have to make the decision to have him put to sleep. It's not fair to have him keep crashing like this and have to keep going to the vet every few months. 

Hallyx, that is the end of the heater the apiapi female is in front of. It's the only way I can fit it in the tank and have the cord reach the powerboard. 

It also might be a bit hard to send you some persephone as I am in Australia and I assume you are overseas based on the demographics of most members on this forum. 

Yeah I am a notorious stocking hacker. I don't even wait for them to develop holes or runs I just go right ahead and cut them to pieces. I will have to put a couple of pairs on next week's shopping list. 

My brownorum pair were flirting this afternoon. The female had her breeding bars on and the male was trying to lead her into the film canister even though he has no nest. Be excellent if I could get a successful spawn from this pair as I know several people with brownorum pairs who have never had any luck with theirs. 

My coccina still seem to be doing well. The female was barred up and in full colour yesterday displaying to the dominant male so who knows, could be a future spawn in the works once I separate the other male and the lone brownorum out. 

This was the female giving me a good photo of her for once. I wish these fish had a richer colouring. I don't know what strain they are but the colouration is not as nice as pictures I have seen online or of the group I owned previously. 










Then I discovered today my apiapi female takes NLS .5mm pellets! I thought she would ignore them but she seems willing to try anything once. She also ate a couple of blackworms and the grindals I put in for the male. Undoubtedly she is going to give him another nestful of fry soon. 










Their fry are doing great. I am so nervous about these and the hendra fry showing any signs of velvet. Since fry seem to be the most susceptible to getting it in my fish room I am going to be devastated if it crops up in either tank. I have been so careful and have changed my whole maintenance routine in order to prevent infection that I would seriously have to consider my future in the hobby. 










They have been eating the microworms I put in, and I also seeded the tank with water from my outside tub which contains a lot of infusoria/microorganisms. I am going to be setting up my BBS hatchery on the weekend and will start giving them daily feedings for the next month or so.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

More photos of my apiapi female because she is almost always at the front of the tank searching for food and makes for an easier subject than the male. The male was very interested in her this morning, so I think my predictions may be correct. 

The fry seem to be getting really big. But that may just be because this pair are so small they don't have to grow very much to be at adult size. 





































Our old cat has apparently been stabilised at the vets. He has perked up from the fluids and put some weight on. The vet left a message for my mum last night and the only concerning thing is there have been some changes in his kidneys. The vet opens at 10am this morning so hoping to hear in a couple of hours about what exactly is wrong.


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## LittleBettaFish

Free-swimming Betta hendra fry! 

Neither parent has shown any interest in eating them so hopefully this continues to be the case. If I could get these fry to adulthood without any issues it would just be so great. So much has gone wrong for me in this hobby over the past year, so to have something actually turn out right for once would be unbelievable. 










My brownorum pair are being fish of mystery today so who knows what they are plotting. I want to purchased some more IAL so I can steep up a strong tea and use it to tint the water in their tank. 

I went over to my neighbour's house this morning to net some mosquito larvae for my wilds. Her place is like a mosquito breeding factory. I ended up with heaps. I don't know what the neighbours across the road think when they see me go over with my tupperware container and fish net though! 

Also our cat will live. We should be picking him up tomorrow at 3:30pm. He was so close to death when we took him in and the vet still isn't sure why he just randomly crashes like. She thinks it might just be an age thing as his kidneys don't appear to be failing or anything. 

I have never felt so helpless as I did yesterday watching my old cat almost become comatose and praying he could hold on until mum arrived to take him to the vet.

I have issues with anxiety and learning to driving a car is one of the biggest hurdles I have faced in regards to this. However, this is the second time I have been unable to get a sick animal to the vet and so it has given me the boot up the backside I need to get my license and learn how to drive.


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## Skyewillow

I'm glad to hear that your cat will be ok. I hate that feeling of helplessness that can come from not being able to act in an emergency.

I hate driving, my anxiety makes it bad enough that I have to take someone with me if I'm going somewhere I'm not entirely familiar with. bleh


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## LittleBettaFish

Turns out we may not be picking Bandit up tomorrow. The vet suspects it is pancreatitis rearing its ugly head again and this is what caused him to become so sick. His kidney levels are higher than they should be as well and though they have come down they are not in a normal range. 

So he may have to stay the weekend at the vet clinic as the vet wants to keep up the fluids and make sure he is fully recovered before coming home. 

Learning to drive is going to be a slow and painful process for me. I am not even going to book any lessons (sitting in an enclosed space with a complete stranger is not something I am particularly looking forward to) until I can competently drive my mum's car without crashing it. 

We also found a baby bird this evening while out biking the dogs. It was only very young with hardly any feathers and it was sitting in the grass alongside a busy footpath where people let their dogs off-lead. The nest was too high for my dad to reach even with a ladder so me and my mum took it home to keep it safe. 

We rang the local vet but they were closing by the time we got back to the car and so if the bird survives through the night it will be going there tomorrow morning. 

The poor thing was half-dead when we got it home. However, after being warmed up in its sheepskin 'nest' it perked right up and ate some tinned cat food.

I am hoping it doesn't have internal injuries and that the people at the vet are actually going to give it to a wildlife carer rather than just put it down. It is a native bird but I'm not really sure what their policies in regards to wildlife are. 

I still remember the one time my mum didn't want to pick up this baby bird we found while out walking. We had just gone a few steps when we look back and see the dog of the man behind us attacking it! He didn't even stop and while the bird was still alive when we brought it back to our house it died shortly afterwards.

I'm glad mum agreed to take this one as I didn't want to be in bed tonight wondering what had happened to it. At least if it passes during the night, it is some place warm and safe.


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## dramaqueen

Aww, poor little bird! I'm glad you took it to give it a chance to survive.keep us posted.


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## Skyewillow

LBF, rescuing all sorts of wildlife! ^_^

How is the wee bird doing today? Did he make it through the night?
Also, how is your elderly gent?


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## LittleBettaFish

Okay, bird survived the night and was very ravenous once it warmed up. We took it to our local vet in the morning and they were rather useless. The receptionist recommended ringing the wildlife people or trying to put it back in its nest, but kept saying how young it was and that no carers would probably take on a bird this young. They said they couldn't do much with it even though the person mum spoke to last night said to bring it in.

So anyway the baby bird then came with us in the car for all our errands so mum could feed it as we were gone several hours. 

On the way home we decided to stop in to visit Bandit (he is at a different vet), as he is going to be staying until Monday on fluids. The vet was reluctant to send him home as he is still not 100% and we both agreed we would rather be safe than sorry. As it turned out, one of the receptionists there had actually done a wildlife carer's course or something like that and so she had a look at the bird. 

We purchased some insectivore bird rearing mix to feed it, and mum is going to ring the wildlife people and see what they say. I know legally you are not meant to raise native wildlife, but honestly if their answer is that they are just going to euthanise it, we would rather give it a shot at life considering it has made it this far. 

We have successfully reared a couple of wild bird chicks in the past so we aren't bumbling our way through. The only thing that does concern me is aspiration pneumonia so we are just going slow and steady with the feedings. 

I can just see us on the news now being raided by the wildlife people.


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## Hallyx

I am not a big fan of agencies and their drones. Even people who do care are often overwhelmed with regulations and procedures they must follow to keep their jobs. Nor are they above prevaricating should it suit their agenda....if you know what I mean.


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## dramaqueen

I'm glad he/she is better today. Poor little thing! I say keep it, take care of it and release it when it gets old enough to be on it's own.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well we are going to contact the wildlife people today and see what they advise us to do. If there is a carer willing to take the bird and raise it then we will definitely give it to them. 

There seems to be about a hundred things that can go wrong hand-feeding baby birds and aspiration pneumonia seems to be the main one. I think me and a friend aspirated a sick chick in the past while trying to help it out and so I don't want to do the same thing to this one as that would be horrible. 

Otherwise had two people come over that I know from another forum/FB and purchase the two persephone pairs. I am thinking of possibly using some of the sale money to purchase a pair of Betta rutilans and the the rest on live plants, but I am not 100% certain. I am hoping the guy who I have reserved a third pair for wants to purchase them soon as that will be some more money in my pocket. 

I also have a whole heap of killifish pairs ready for new homes so I think I could move at least a handful on at $10 a pair. 

I woke up this morning and both my brownorum and hendra pairs were putting on a show. Of course being the fish nerd I am, I automatically got the camera and tried to get a few shots. The colours on the female hendra are just simply superb. I could easily watch these fish all day. 

The photos of the brownorum pair are not as nice because they were moving around a lot and my camera was having some difficulty focussing on them. 





































Plan for next week is to get more plants, move a couple of tanks around, and replace the top shelf on my rack as it got wet and I am afraid it is going to buckle under the weight of the tanks on there.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well as an update on the bird, we went and had a look at the nest yesterday as mum called the wildlife rescue people. Apparently being from the magpie family, the parent birds would stay around the nest site for a week or so even if there weren't any other chicks. I found this rather dubious but we went anyway and had a look.

Me and mum didn't want to just dump the baby bird in the nest (I have called it Sir Cheeps-A-Lot) and walk off thinking it was okay if there weren't any parents there. 

We had a closer look at the nest and it looks like it had collapsed and that is why Sir-Cheeps-A-Lot was on the ground. There was also not a single sign of any parent birds around even though my dad was there for just under half an hour and my mum was also standing around looking while we biked the dogs. 

Sir-Cheeps-A-Lot is doing well. Feathers are growing in on its back and it was flapping its wings yesterday and grooming itself. Every time you open the door now it starts cheeping for its food. I still worry about aspiration pneumonia or these million other things like sour crop and bacterial infections that can arise from hand-rearing chicks. A site mentioned listening to their breathing so I am trying to do that and all Sir-Cheeps-A-Lot wants to do is get in under my hair and make cheeping noises! I also have this fear that the cats have somehow gotten into the room with it so I spend half my day running around the house doing head-counts. 

Onto the fish side of things, I 'accidentally' emailed Jodi-Lea about a pair of Betta rutilans. Don't know how that happened. One moment I was checking my bank account online and the next minute I had sent an email off. 

I decided I am going to be setting up a tub pond in the yard for some spare bunches of Asian watergrass. It is so fast growing and a great plant to use in grow-outs/betta tanks that I hope to be able to sell some bunches of it to help put money towards buying live foods each month for my fish. 

I also want to move my persephone group back into their 3ft long tank. Since my burdigala died I have more room on my rack and I think that tank was better suited to the group than the one they are in now. I intend on filling it with java moss, watersprite, frogbit, java fern and duckweed, so the less aggressive fish don't have to just sit on the bottom of the tank to avoid being harassed. 

My rutilans sp. cf. green tank is also due for an overhaul but they have to wait until I do my plant order later this week. 

I am going to have to drain both these tanks anyway as the top shelf on my rack needs replacing due to water damage and I don't want to leave it any longer as it's not very safe. 

I've been slack with photos. Hopefully once my rack is back to how I want it to look, I will get some photos of everyone then.


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## MattsBettas

Your an awesome person, LBF. Legal or not, if no one else with more experience will do anything you're doing the right thing. Good luck. And post pictures of him when you can.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well for now Sir-Cheeps-A-Lot is here until its future is decided. 

I was going to get some pictures of it yesterday but I am trying not to get too attached in case it passes or goes to a wildlife carer. 

It makes me want chickens again though! I miss my chickens and the silly things they used to do and get up to. 

We reared several quite sick and weak baby chickens over the years and I still remember Brutus, who my mum would sleep with in her bed when we first brought him home because he used to miss his siblings and mother. 

He grew up into the most aggressive rooster though. He would always attack your ankles and really hated my elderly neighbour because he knew she was scared of him. I even got cellulitis because of him once. He spurred my bare foot (I was wearing the bright thongs he hated) and within hours it was swollen and so painful I couldn't bear any weight on it. 

He was also maybe 30cm high being a bantam, and so I would just catch him by his tail, tuck him under my arm and carry him around with me which drove him nuts. 

I was never sadder than when I came down and found him and his whole group of hens (most of which I had bred myself), dead with broken necks after a fox had gotten into their pen overnight and killed them. If I'd had a gun and was in the country, I would have waited and blown that fox away the next time it attempted something like that.


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## LittleBettaFish

I haven't posted here for a couple days since I've been sick and busy with our old cat and Sir Cheeps-A-Lot. 

Our old cat came home from the vet on Tuesday. They gave us this Royal Canin food for his pancreatitis and although I am not fond of Royal Canin and its ingredients list, we have to be mindful of what he eats now. So if it is helping prevent a massive crash like we saw the other week, I don't care what rendered animal parts or cereals are in it. Unfortunately, when my mum actually googled the food to see if there might be a better alternative it specifically said do not use on cats with pancreatitis! So we are going to ask the vet to clear that up for us. 

Sir Cheeps-A-Lot is still here. He seems to be doing alright. Most of his feathers have started coming in now and he is starting to get opinionated about what he wants to do and when he wants to do it. Yesterday we had a disagreement about him going into his 'nest' and sleeping as opposed to trying to climb out and sit on my lap. 

I still worry every single time he does something like fluff his feathers or yawn. I also have this fear about leaving the door to that room open. We have three cats that would like very much to get into that room. 

On the fish side of things, not much has been happening. My hendra pair spawned again, my apiapi and hendra fry are growing well and I moved my coccina group onto my rack so I have my bedside table free now. 

My burdigala tank is emptied out and their plants are all outside in a tub with some aqua soil in the bottom for nutrients. Of course my dog thinks it is more like a dog wading pool rather than a grow-out for plants I intend on selling. 

Jodi-Lea does have a pair of rutilans available. I emailed about the cost of postage but haven't heard back so going to shoot another email off today so I can pay and have them sent out early next week. This will allow me to pick up some plants for their tank and my other tanks over the weekend. 

My persephone group definitely need the 3ft footprint. I was watching them all today and with the amount of aggression the males show towards each other and the females I think a longer tank is much more suitable. 













































This poor male was being bullied by one of his brothers pictured above.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my sp. apiapi fry had their first meal of BBS just now. I wasn't sure if they were big enough yet but the majority of them (including the female) were there eating it without any difficulty. 



















I put some in with my hendra fry as well as they are surprisingly large but it looks like the female is really the only one having a go at that. 

My hendra male also was very fiercely defending his nest against the coccina male in the tank over. I generally have a piece of foam there to stop the hendra male stressing but I moved it when I was turning on the light and so this was his reaction.


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## MattsBettas

I love your Persephone. They seem to have the neatest interactions.

You need to post pics of Sir-Cheeps-A-Lot!


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha yeah I think it is because they are pretty territorial with each other so they are always putting on a show. 

I don't want to take any photos of Cheeps in case he dies suddenly. I have this feeling I will take these photos of him and something bad will happen like it usually does whenever I get attached to anything. 

He just had his 4pm feed and has been put back into his warm nest (it's really a cat bed with heat packs on top of a cat electric blanket inside of a soft dog crate). He has so many more feathers now than when we first found him. He also knows that as soon as the door handle to that room turns it is feed time. He was doing some preening today as I think his new feathers are making him itchy.


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## LittleBettaFish

Woke up to this...










So this is officially the second successful spawn from this pair. Male was not happy I pushed the camera in his face to get a photo. 

Today I am going to purchase some cheap stockings from the supermarket and make some peat moss balls to go in each of my wild betta tanks. I keep forgetting to put them on the shopping list, and I want to write an article on my blog about how to make them and how they perform long-term, but I can't do that until I have the stockings. 

I'm most likely going to be moving my group of B. persephone into the 3ft tank today. That's always fun as generally moving any tank of mine involves water going everywhere.


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## LittleBettaFish

*Hyperventilates into paper bag* I think my brownorum pair may be spawning. I so hope they are as that would be absolutely amazing. I just can't see into the film canister and don't want to disturb them but they are both in there and have been for the past couple of hours. 

Even if I got one fertile egg that hatched I would be happy (well as long as the parents didn't eat it).


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I finally have a brownorum spawn! A decent amount of eggs except they appear to be on the _bottom_ of the film canister rather than in a nest. This species seems to make for either really good (my first pair) or really bad parents (my second pair). 

I am hoping that these aren't eaten and hatch. I find with my wilds if I get a pair successfully spawning the first time, any subsequent spawns are a lot easier. 

The female had a nice big meal once she was out of the canister so hopefully she is too full to bother the eggs.


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## LittleBettaFish

As an update, I _think_ my brownorum male still has eggs in his nest. The day after they had spawned, there were no eggs on the bottom of the canister, and I thought maybe they had been eaten. However, the male is still in the canister and seems to be quite busy with his nest so I am wondering if he hasn't simply picked them up and put them where they are supposed to be. 

My hendra male has so many fry. They seem to produce a lot of fry per spawn for a fish from this complex. Because their tank is quite bare and the male has been very aggressive towards the female lately, I am going to drop by my LFS today and see if I can't pick up some java fern. I use it in my brownorum and sp. apiapi tank and it works well at providing cover. 

My group of coccina are doing well. Their tank is also rather bare, so I want to get some more plants in as they can be quite an aggressive species. The dominant male does have some suspicious looking marks on his pectoral fin that I noticed last night. However, they move their pectorals so quickly and they have so much natural iridescence that it can be difficult to tell whether that is the ich returning or just normal colouration. 


















Dominant male









Female


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## MattsBettas

How's the bird?


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## LittleBettaFish

I am so peeved. I think either the male or female brownorum ate the fry! When I looked in yesterday there were a couple of fry hanging from the nest and when I look in this morning there is nothing and the male has lost all interest in the nest. 

This species is so frustrating. I don't know what they require to get a successful spawn happening. All my other coccina species would be spawning up a storm in that set-up, but brownorum just seem to want something more. 

The pair were being rather aggressive towards each other when I just fed them so they may spawn again but what's the point if it doesn't ever eventuate into free-swimming fry? I also can't separate out the parents because every time I start moving fish around I end up making them sick. 

I am going to order a whole bunch of IAL online and brew up the most concentrated extract I can and add it to the tank. Maybe that will help get them in the mood. 

In equally depressing news, my unimaculata pair and fry also look like they have velvet. I think the parents have had velvet in the past so this is not surprising. Honestly at this point I am sort of hoping my original stock don't live for years because they seem stuck in this perpetual cycle of being struck down with velvet every few months. It seems the only way I am going to be rid of it, is for those fish who are affected or have been affected in the past, die. 

I've actually decided not to try and spawn my rutilans sp. cf. green because of this, and I now don't know what I am going to do with my sick unimaculata. Do I cull all the fry and focus on the parents or try and treat everyone even though it seems my success rate has been pretty dismal in that regard? 

At least my sp. apiapi pair seems happy. I don't know where all these eggs come from. I hope that the velvet is just contained to tanks where fish have been afflicted in the past and doesn't infect any of my new pairs. Then I might just sell everything and throw the towel in for good. 










I suppose I just have to try and focus on the positives at this point in the time.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I have some eggs again in my brownorum tank. The male has nests everywhere so I think he has been moving them around as they weren't there this morning. 

He was actively chasing the female away, which is better than my previous male ever managed. I will be monitoring these eggs a lot more closely this time around to see if the fry are being eaten and by whom. 

My sp. apiapi male was out and about this morning and his female was very barred up. I think his last lot of fry are now free-swimming so I assume another spawn is on the way. 





































Their tank is looking basically how I wanted it to. I just want to get another bag of java moss from the aquarium I go to and then it will be perfect. 










I also got this photo of my two coccina males (or at least I think the bottom one is male). I was surprised they were so close to each other as usually the smaller male gets chased off by everyone in that tank.


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## MattsBettas

The tank and fish look great, as always. I hope you somehow manage to finally beat the velvet. 

Do you find the dark water has any effect on plants?


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## LittleBettaFish

I don't really notice any affect on the growth of my plants. However, this is most likely because I use floating plants at the surface where the light is brightest, and then java fern and java moss underneath. 

I think really the only way I am going to get rid of the velvet in my fish room is for all those fish that originally contracted it to die and then throw out any substrate/plants associated with them and sanitise the equipment and tanks with something like boiling water to kill it off.


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## LittleBettaFish

Brownorum male has over a dozen fry hanging from the nest. I have fed the female right up, covered both sides of the tank to stop the other fish from disturbing him, and I am hoping that these fry may actually reach the free-swimming stage. 



















His female is so hard to photograph. Just as I get the perfect shot lined up she moves. For some reason the camera hates to focus on her and her eye/head always end up blurry. 



















My hendra male is sporting a torn tail courtesy of his female. They still have lots of fry swimming around in their tank. I really have to clear a spot downstairs for my BBS hatchery as it is just too loud to have in my bedroom. 



















You can see how much duckweed is growing on the surface of both tanks. I want to get some java fern into the hendra tank, replace the old IAL in both tanks with new leaves and maybe looking at getting a few pieces of frogbit. 

Now I am just procrastinating over doing water changes haha. I know I have to but there are just so many steps I have to go up and down to do them.


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## LittleBettaFish

Glad I put off purchasing java fern online. I just found a seller I have used before offering up a massive bunch of java fern (he said it is around a 10L bucket worth) for an insane price. I also got some java moss, a bunch of phillipine java fern and a bunch of needleleaf fern. 

That amount of java fern and moss would definitely fill up all the tanks that need cover, and then all I want to buy is some hornwort (I am determined to get this to grow in my tanks) and some frogbit. 

I put some film canisters in my rutilans and persephone tanks last night, and of course that is now where all the biggest males hang out. I'll be glad to get some cover into the persephone tank ASAP as it is really bare at the moment and far too easy for fish to start fights. 

As I cleaned everyone's tanks last night and gave the glass a wipe down with some Windex this morning I am hoping to get some nice photos later today. 

I'm wondering whether when I sell the two other persephone pairs, I can use the money to import in a pair of either uberis or burdigala from the seller who I got my brownorum, hendra and sp. apiapi pairs from. Would make for a nice Christmas/end-of-year present to myself haha.


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## LittleBettaFish

Brownorum fry are still there for the morning check. 

I brewed up some really strong IAL extract yesterday so going to add a small amount to my brownorum and hendra tanks. I would like to have the water a little darker. 

My persephone males have all claimed the one java fern in the tank as 'theirs' and so I can't wait until all the plants I purchased arrived. Most of the males have been tearing each other up so it would be good if they had more areas of cover they could use as individual territories.



























This male is the worst in terms of damage

I also got some random photos of my rutilans. 




























Plans for this coming week are to completely overhaul my rutilans tank with new substrate and plants. I've got a whole heap of goldvine I pulled out of my wild betta tanks that I want to sell, and I also want to start advertising the biggest of my killifish pairs up for sale. 

Today I have to convince mother dearest to drive me all the way into the city so I can pick up some live blackworms.


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## Skyewillow

What did you ultimately decide to do with the Unimaculatas; Are you treating them all, or culled the youngsters to focus on mom and dad?
I hope you can figure something out. :-(

Speaking of your killies. I found a pair at an auction yesterday, so I picked them up. I'll be setting them up a tub later today, and I'm hoping to figure out how to make them a mop.


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## LittleBettaFish

No I haven't done anything yet. The fry are still eating, growing and swimming around normally so I think I will probably just try and treat them and the parents. 

I have some free-swimming brownorum fry! Looking back I wonder if the previous group also became free-swimming overnight as it seems odd the male/female would suddenly eat them all after so many days. 

This is the first time I've had brownorum fry for probably close to a year so really happy with that. I must have got the right pair and right conditions for them to feel amenable. 

My plants got sent out yesterday but due to it being the Melbourne Cup holiday here, I don't think they will arrive until Wednesday. I can't wait, as most of my persephone males look like CTs at the moment. 

What species of killifish did you get? Aphyosemion australe like mine or something else? Making mops is so easy. It's just wrapping yarn around something like a book. There are heaps of tutorials online. 

Speaking of killifish, here are some updated photos of my sub-adults/juveniles/fry. The biggest are ready for sale now. I'm only going to keep one pair to live with the original male/female. 




























It's weird seeing those fish and knowing they were once eggs I picked off a spawning mop.

Also got some sad news on Bandit my cat. Turns out he does have cancer after all. He had some thickening of the intestines and the vet sent it off for a biopsy and it was lymphoma. Apparently we can treat it with steroids ($4 a tablet!) and if he responds well to the treatment and no other major hurdles come up, we could have another 2 or so years with him. Given his age and present medical problems, that was more time than I was expecting to have with him anyway.

So crossing our fingers Bandit responds well to this treatment once we start it and we will see the vet on Friday to discuss it all. 

Other than that he is doing really well. I knew when he was trying to get in and eat Sir Cheeps-A-Lot (who is flying now) that he was feeling better than he has in several weeks. 

Just need to keep him away from corn cobs.


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## Skyewillow

I'm thinking they're the same species.

(on a side note, I MADE the "tank" they're in for the photo)

The dingleberry male decided to go carpet surfing while I was dumping them into the tank, so I had to chase him... jerk. We're going to town tomorrow, I need to get stresscoat, and green yarn. Is there a certain kind/brand that you use?

I'll probably be bugging you about these guys too ;-)


I'm so sorry to hear about Bandit's cancer. He'll be in my thoughts this week in hopes that his meds work and won't make him sick. <3


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## LittleBettaFish

Yep those as Aphyosemion australe 'gold'. They are really easy to spawn and if you keep them well-conditioned you may be quickly overrun by killifish fry. I stopped picking the eggs off my mops because I have so many in my grow-out tank. 

They are jumpers so definitely recommend a cover. 

I use green acrylic yarn to make my mops. No specific brand, just whatever was cheapest. 

If you keep the male by himself (well with the female only) the white extensions on his caudal should get a lot longer. 

My hendra pair were barred up and aggressive this morning so I wonder if they might spawn again soon. I like how prolific wilds are, but I just wish the fry grew faster. 



















I am hoping that Bandit responds to the medication. He has been eating and keeping food down since his operation to remove the corn cob, which is one-hundred times better than where he was before the surgery. 

I don't actually know if it was better or worse to have a 'trial run' of what it is going to be like if he gets sick and has to be put down. Every night I think how fortunate I am to still have him sleeping at my feet.


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## Skyewillow

I currently have them in a 2.5 minibow with a modified lid (craft mesh glued over the gap in the back). I'll have to look that up tonight definitely, and I'm hoping to raise up a few eggs.

I don't know what's wrong with my younger spawn, they're just not growing like the desk ninjas are (which are getting huge), I'll be rehoming all but 1 of them next month.

Why did Bandit eat a corn cob??


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## LittleBettaFish

Well Bandit is a food thief and because I put butter on my corn cobs they must smell nice to the cats. 

He has grabbed a couple of corn cobs right out of my bowl in the past. But the last one he grabbed, he must have ingested a bit of the actual cob before I got it back off him and it caused a blockage in his intestines that we didn't notice until his second very recent near death experience. 

Here is a photo of him just now, living the life of leisure with his stalker Rama. 









Then there is Kannika who permits these two to dwell within her vast kingdom.


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## Skyewillow

Silly cats! Kannika is so beautiful!!!


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah she is stunning. Unfortunately, her personality is not as beautiful. She sleeps with my mum every night but I am more her person in that she will purr for me and not bite me if I do something like trim her nails. I'm not sure if that's because she genuinely has affection for me, or because I feed her haha

Poor Bandit has stitches right down his stomach and he has dropped a lot of weight because he was starving. He's back on three small meals a day and I am hoping even with the cancer, thyroid and pancreas issues he can get back to where he was before this all.


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## LittleBettaFish

Um wow. My plants just arrived then and I cannot believe how much java fern I actually have. I feel like I stole them from the seller I got such a good price for them! 










Now to figure out where I am going to put it all!


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## LittleBettaFish

I managed to fill up nearly all my wild betta tanks with java fern. I had a bunch of standard java fern left over that I have put into my 'spare' tank. This tank is going to be set aside for either a burdigala or uberis pair (hoping to get my hands on either one of these before the end of the year). I'm just going to run it empty until I get the pair so the plants have time to establish themselves. 

My hendra pair got so excited about there being new plants in their tank that I managed to get a whole series of them displaying to each other. 

I've noticed in wilds, horizontal barring doesn't always seem to indicate stress/submission as the female was the aggressor in a number of these shots. Another example is my unimaculata female, who shows only prominent horizontal barring when she is ready to spawn. 








































































Their tank


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## LittleBettaFish

My persephone group are having an absolute blast with all the new java fern in their tank. It's sort of just randomly thrown in there, but they don't mind. 





































Their tank is 3ft long so hard to get a photo of where it is lit up enough to see anything. Therefore, this was the best I could do. 










One of the ferns in there is an absolute monster. It's about a foot in length so I had to lay it on its side.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think this is what every fishkeeper likes to see. Healthy, happy fish that are comfortable in their surrounds. 


















Female














































My rutilans also seem to be appreciating their new plants. You really have to see these fish in person to understand how stunning that side iridescence is. 



















Got my BBS hatchery going and all my fry have just had a lunchtime snack. My unimaculata fry are getting big even though I have been slack with water changes and feeding and there are just so many of them. The owner of a fish store I frequent, has been looking at stocking wilds. If I can get rid of the velvet and grow them out to a sellable size I think I will just trade them in there. I can't be bothered holding onto them while I try to sell them privately and it's not like they command very high prices being so common. 

Two pairs of australe sub-adults have been spoken for, and the two pairs of persephone should be going to their new homes in the week or so. I also have a 20L bucket worth of goldvine I am going to flog off simply because I don't have any use for it and I might as well try and sell it if I can. That'll give me just under $180 to put towards a pair or two of wilds. My birthday is also coming up and so I'm hoping Jodi-Lea has an AB order due in December so I can see about purchasing a replacement uberis and/or burdigala pair.


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## twolovers101

Beautiful as always LBF  When I actually have my own house some day I think I want to try wilds, your black water tanks have so much appeal and the fish look so happy!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Twolovers101. The water in these new set-ups isn't quite as dark as my old set-ups but it is something I am working on. Unfortunately, mum is never happy when she sees me brewing up IAL extract in one of her pots! 

Your response is the main reason I continue with this journal. So many people have a lot of misconceptions about wild bettas and I want to show the true beauty of these fish. Many people seem to either be oblivious to the existence of wild bettas, or think they are nothing more than dull, brown fish.


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## twolovers101

I think they're beautiful! I particularly like your persephone and hendra... though I do have a soft spot for mahachais... Some day...


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah those two species are two of my favourites from this complex. 



















I still think my new hendra pair put on the best display out of any of my wilds.


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## twolovers101

*drools* *sigh*

Well, my pk male is about as close to a wild as I'm going to get right now lol. One day... I will have a pair though, are they difficult to keep?


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## LittleBettaFish

It really depends on the species. Some species are not very fussy about water conditions. Others such as my persephone and hendra really have a narrow band of parameters in which they are comfortable. 

Unless you can provide them with very soft/low pH water, they may not thrive. 

However, most of the mouthbrooders tend to be pretty adaptable, particularly if they have been captive bred.


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## twolovers101

Most places in Texas tend to have hard water  Pretty sure it's at around 7.6 where I am right now... not that I might not move in the future, but right now I'm planning on staying as south as I can get lol

Do you use IAL and drift wood to provide softer water? (I'm guessing that's one of the reasons you usually have so much of it in your tanks)


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## LittleBettaFish

If the water is really hard, you would most likely need RO water to bring the pH/KH down if you intended on keeping sensitive species such as those from the coccina complex. However, some of the larger species of mouthbrooders (unimaculata complex) can inhabit areas where the pH is higher and the water harder, so there is always that option. 

I am fortunate in that Melbourne tapwater tends to be extremely soft. I tested mine once with the API test kit and it was the lowest possible value on that. 

I used to just use straight tap water but after some issues with velvet and wanting to keep parameters as stable as possible, I now have a large, heated tub set up downstairs that I fill with tap water and let 'age' over several days so both the temperature and pH stabilise. I also have several pouches filled with IAL and peat moss to further soften the water and also add tannins. 

I mostly use IAL because I personally really like the look of dark water. Also because it encourages the growth of infusoria for my fry.


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## twolovers101

I'll keep that in mind  In the meantime I'll just look at your pictures and pretend ^^

I might try a blackwater tank at some point though


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## LittleBettaFish

You can always just emulate the look of a blackwater tank without having the exact conditions. It seems like unless the fish is wild-caught or a particularly sensitive species, most of the commonly traded fish in this hobby are pretty adaptable. You probably just wouldn't expect to see any spawning happening. 

Since I have been procrastinating on water changes, I decided to get my camera out and take some more photos. I can never have too many photos haha. 

My persephone are playing at being 'wild' fish at the moment so are refusing to let me get any decent shots of them. This was the best I managed last night and it was only when I was about to put the camera away that I got it. 










My rutilans are a funny group of fish. There are around 15-20 fish (some over two years old) in a 10 gallon tank, and yet most of the time I can't spot a single one of them! It's only if they think I might be feeding them that they bother to grace me with their presence. However, they are beautiful so I will forgive their lack of loyalty. 





































My coccina group are doing really well. I doubt the dominant male and female will spawn with the other male in there, so I probably should get him out at some point. They tend to be a lot more prone to striping up than my other wilds so it's hard to get photos of them in full colour. This is the dominant male after he finished off a blackworm. I got in quick before he could clamp up. 










You can see why they are also referred to as 'Wine-red betta'. 

This is their tank. The tannins show of their colours nicely, and the extra java fern provided the female and smaller male with more cover as this species can be rather aggressive at times.


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## logisticsguy

Beautiful pictures. I love your journal LBF. Ive learn so much about wilds species from it and its always so interesting.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think some days it is more interesting than others, but it's always great to hear people are reading along. 

I realised the other day I only got my first wild bettas back in March 2011. It didn't take long for a hobby to turn into an obsession. If only I knew all the things back then that I know now. 

In hindsight, I should have only purchased wild betta pairs through Jodi-Lea and not through the wholesaler. I should have had all my tanks on separate bucket/siphons and QTed anything that came into my fish room. However, perhaps most importantly of all, I should have incorporated live plants into my wild betta tanks a lot sooner. At the moment I am doing partial weekly water changes using only aged water, and my fish have never looked better. 

It's frustrating that in this hobby you generally have to learn through your mistakes , and these mistakes often mean the death of one or more of your fish.


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## LittleBettaFish

Woke up to find someone is a proud father once again. Male has built quite a large nest right at the front of the tank and there are a number of eggs in there that I can see.


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## LittleBettaFish

Discovered my sp. apiapi male had a nest full of fry while I was spying on their tank this afternoon. 










Then my brownorum pair were getting quite aggressive with each other and the male kept trying to get the female to follow him to the back of the tank so I think he might have a nest somewhere. I love this species. The green lateral spot just gives them so much character. 









Male









Female









Female wouldn't get out of the way 









Male flaring at a blurry female









Someone just couldn't get out of the photo in time

Signs that I could be taking too many photos of my fish is when the memory card is full and I have to delete photos so I can take some more.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well it was the romance that never was. Nothing has eventuated so far in my brownorum tank, but they are due for a water change today and a good feed of frozen bloodworms so hopefully that will perk them up. 










My hendra male is busy with a nest full of newly hatched fry. He told me in no uncertain terms that this was the only shot I was going to get of them before he moved them back into the canister. 

Speaking of canisters, I decided I'd better remove the ones in my persephone tank. The males have been so obsessive with them since they've been in. With the plants now in their tank, there are plenty of other suitable nesting sites. But no, everyone has to have a film canister of their own. 




























I think my sp. apiapi pair spawned again. The last batch of fry went free-swimming and now there appears to be more eggs in the nest. Honestly, I do not know when I've seen the male not actually guarding a nest. It's a shame as he is so lovely and I have so few photos of him because he is always hiding somewhere.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well now my brownorum pair have decided they will spawn after all. In spite of the fact I actually never changed their water or gave them bloodworms yesterday. 

I was bored this morning so I got some photos of my coccina group. I'm a bit eh on these fish. I mean I wanted them for ages, but now they are in my tank I kind of wish I'd held out and got a wild-caught or captive bred pair from someone like Hermanus. Not only were they infected with ich when they came from the wholesaler, but they are all massive and I sort of like my coccina complex species on the smaller size (first world problem I know). 

There's just something wild bettas from the wholesaler lack that the wild-caught and captive bred fish from the smaller overseas sellers/breeders have. 




























I think if I have the money and a pair of coccina come up for sale I will probably purchase them and sell these three. They are still beautiful fish though. The dominant male in particular.


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## LittleBettaFish

Here I am saying that I don't really want my coccina to spawn and someone goes and builds a bubblenest in the film canister and now the female is also looking rather plump. 

I've found a home for the spare brownorum that shares a tank with them, and then I am going to separate out the smallest male into something like a breeder net full of live plants as he is always starting trouble and getting himself beat up because of it. 

Had to do some vicious hacking of my new java fern. It developed these brown spots on the leaves (I've had this happen before after a tank change), and it seems to spread like a virus if you don't remove the affected leaves. My persephone tanks looks rather sparse now as a number of leaves were affected, so now I can only hope that the spread stops and any new growth comes in normal. 

I am a bit bummed because both that tank and my hendra tank were finally looking good. 

These are the two coccina I am going to keep in together. 



















The female looks nice when she is fully coloured up and not covered in ich. 

Then here is a shot of my brownorum male and the results of his most recent spawn. He was right at the back of the tank in his film canister, while the female patrolled out front.


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## LittleBettaFish

Someone went and aggravated the male while he was guarding his newly hatched fry yesterday and got her caudal and anal fins chewed up because of it. 










I did some experimenting with rooibos tea this morning. I want something cheap and fairly potent to keep the water in my aging tub dark and IALs just weren't it. I have trialled some tea I brewed up on the stove in one tank and it turned the water very dark. It doesn't seem to have had any impact on the fish (my coccina group) so I am going to monitor them for the next couple of days and if all goes well I'll go purchase a whole heap of rooibos tea bags and use them in my tub. 

You can see how dark the water has gone in the middle tank from the tea I added. 









I still think Betta hendra are one of the most beautiful of the wild betta species. Even the female looks stunning when she is fully coloured up. 



















The male meanwhile was being much more secretive and hiding up the back near the peat ball. 










Got my BBS hatchery bubbling away to feed my fry. Need to find somewhere that isn't my bedroom to put it permanently though. 

My unimaculata pair must have spawned because the male looks like he has a mouthful of eggs. I don't know why if you are sick with velvet you would want to spawn but I think it's just because this is a species I don't particularly want lots of that they do it. Their fry are growing ridiculously fast for how little I feed them and how few water changes I do. 

Been working out my set-up for downstairs. I think I want one four shelf, 1800mm wide rack instead of two 900mm racks. Otherwise I can't fit my 12 gallon long that houses my persephone on there. I want to do this right from the start, so I'm definitely going to get my dad to brace under all the shelves, and install wooden flaps to hide all my lights, tubing and electrical cords. That's the two things I wish I had done with my current rack as my shelves bow and the set-up looks messy with everything visible. 

With four shelves I should be able to fit all my current fish on, plus the pairs I still want to get, plus my BBS hatchery, plus one water aging tub and then still have space spare for another couple of tanks. 

Everything will be densely planted so I'll only have to do one or two water changes per tank, per week. That way I won't be overwhelmed by near daily maintenance. 

Now if there was some way to mass harvest mosquito larvae year round, I would be all over that. My fish are loving having several feedings a week of them and I'm going to hate when summer is over and it gets cold again.


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## LittleBettaFish

My sp. apiapi male was out yesterday afternoon so I managed to sneak a few okay photos of him. I wish he would open his caudal more, as unless he is displaying to the female he rarely has it at full spread.























































I had to laugh. I had a guy I know locally who also keeps wilds come over the other day to pick up some wood. He thought the female sp. apiapi was just a fast-growing fry as she is so small. We were both astonished at the amount of eggs she can produce in a single spawning being that she is only about an inch total length.

Their fry are doing really well. I haven't seen any signs of velvet or external parasites on them. The biggest are really starting to look like fish now which is always good. At least being a small species they don't have to grow much to be considered adult size. Also, they are going to be easily sexable because the males have that spade-shaped caudal. I am on tenterhooks waiting for them all to reach maturity.


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## Crowntails

Beautiful fish! I really love the Betta hendra. Amazing pictures as well.


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## Wildbetta

Love roobios tea myself. The water stays dark until you do a water change to remove it unlike the black water extract that I have used previously that the filters pulled out within two days.

Here is a pic of my 10 gal betta picta tank after adding the roobios



And to show the contrast -- here is the tank before adding the tea




I have been meaning to comment on this for around a month but keep forgetting until right this moment.


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## LittleBettaFish

I've seen rooibos used before, but since in my previous set-ups I had a lot more IAL and peat moss to keep the water dark I never bothered. Now I use aqua soil as my substrate, don't have wood and don't use as much IAL, I wanted something to keep the water in my tanks really dark. 

I went out and got some tea bags from the supermarket last night so going to boil some up today and make some more extract. 

I love the look of lots of tannins. I hate crystal clear water as I just think it looks rather unnatural. 

Thanks Crowntails. Hendra are simply stunning. They are one of the few wild bettas species where the female is as visually impressive as the male. They are also just so different from any of the other species in this complex.


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## Hallyx

A couple of years ago, I tried Rooibos tea just to see the effect on my two store-bought splendens. It seemed to make them a little lazy or mellow. I didn't see any affect on pH, but my water is quite hard and maybe I didn't know what I was looking for. I would try it again but I'm not all that fond of the appearance. 

I use IAL with my wild smarigdina. It seems to keep the pH down several points (nearer to 7.2 rather than my usual 8.0). I don't care how it looks in there; I never see him anyway.

I've read Rooibos doesn't have as much antibiotic characteristic as IAL, but I don't believe everything I read online. And I can't find corroboration. As soon as it stops raining here, I'm going to collect some Oak leaves.

Rooibos goes great with a few drops of maple syrup. A nice, dry, refreshing tea. Soothing and stomach-settling, at least for me.


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## LittleBettaFish

I'm using rooibos basically for the intense colour it can provide with only a couple tea bags in a pot of boiling water. 

Our tapwater here is very soft with a basically non-existent KH value, so I don't have to worry too much about trying to lower hardness or bring the pH down. 

I'm still using peat moss and IALs in my tanks. I just want something that is quick and easy to whip up so I can add in some extract whenever I notice the water looking clearer than I personally like to see. 

I had a taste of some of the rooibos when I made my first batch up. Unusual taste, it was quite bitter. I only really drink English breakfast and jasmine tea.


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## LittleBettaFish

Basically nothing exciting has been happening here. I made some more rooibos, hacked back more of my melting java fern, did some water changes and hatched some BBS. 

My brownorum pair tore each other up with the male looking rather poorly. However, it's been a couple of days now and I caught him picking a fight with the female again over breakfast. You think he would have learned his lesson but I guess not.


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## Aquatail

Your photos are amazing! And your wild bettas are so gorgeous!  I have discovered a new love of them. If you don't mind, can you answer a few questions? How much different is it taking care of them compared to splendens? I know they prefer lower pH and more tannins, yes? How do you deal with the pH difference when you do water changes?


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## LittleBettaFish

Their care all depends on the species in question. Personally I think wild bettas look and behave at their best in a natural set-up. This means live plants (in a low pH tank you can't cycle so you want live plants to help keep ammonia down), dim lighting, dark coloured substrate, tannins and either natural or artificial hides. 

On this forum, the 'average' betta tank seems to include very sparse cover, garish coloured gravel and bright light. So depending on how you normally keep your bettas, it could be quite a change. 

I also think wilds do better in species only set-ups, especially if you are serious about breeding. 

Wilds will jump. It's not a question of if but of when. People who have only kept splendens don't understand just how small of a gap wilds can and will get through. I use cling film over the tops of all my tanks and very carefully cut around the various cords so that there is not a single gap for my fish to push through. I have lost probably over a dozen fish to jumping, but none since I started doing this. 

Some wilds can be incredibly finicky about food. Hardly any of my fish take pellets and so their diet is predominately live/frozen foods. I've found the mouthbrooders seem to be less fussy than the smaller bubblenesters but I did have an albimarginata I bred myself who never touched pellets. Therefore, you may need to have easy access to live foods. I personally feed all my wilds a mix of live blackworms, live white worms, grindals, frozen brine shrimp, frozen bloodworms and live mosquito larvae and live bloodworms in the warmer months. My fish thrive on this diet and regularly spawn. 

Tank size can vary quite dramatically from species to species. For example, a pair of coccina complex fish can be kept in 5-10 gallon tanks, while a pair of macrostoma is going to need a tank in 20-30 gallon range. 

Some species of wilds, especially if they are captive bred, are not to be as fussy as others when it comes to 'correct' water parameters. The coccina complex is probably the most demanding, although there are perhaps a handful of mouthbrooding species that also have a requirement for soft, acidic water. Therefore, if your source water is more on the harder side of neutral, and you don't have access to RO, it is better to look at species that are going to be able to adjust to these conditions. 

For example, you could put a species from the coccina complex into tank where the hardness and pH are higher than they prefer. However, the fish is most likely not going to thrive, have a higher incidence of infection by bacteria/parasites (they are often not accustomed to those parasites/bacteria that exist in higher pH waters), and you would probably not see _any_ attempt at spawning. 

I am fortunate in that my tap water is extremely soft with a low KH value and a pH that drops from 7 to around 6 (low as my current pH test kit goes) after 24 hours. However, I now age my water in a tub downstairs where I add rooibos tea extract, IAL and peat moss, to further soften and add colour to the water. I also run a heater in there so I don't have to do anything but add water conditioner when I am doing water changes. 

I've found the fish have responded very positively to this method and when I get my downstairs racks set-up, I am going to have a couple of these tubs running. 

Last night, I got a few photos of my fish. First is my hendra male guarding his nest of (then) eggs. These have since hatched and he now is busy trying to keep everyone safe. 



















Then here is one of my bigger sp. apiapi fry. I didn't realise but I have an absolutely enormous fry swimming around in there. I saw it last night when I was trying to take photos of its siblings. 










I found a photo I took of the father on yet another forum yesterday. It's funny scrolling through a thread and then there is suddenly one of my fish.


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## Aquatail

Wow! You're quite the expert on wild bettas!

When it comes to natural, I don't have much experience there unfortunately. I've never used substrate and I don't have gravel. I find my tanks much easier to clean when they're bare on the bottom. I don't have any live plant experience, either. I hope to have some live plants someday, but I have no clue what to trim and when so I'm afraid they'd just die. And then there's my high pH. I guess wild bettas are not in my future, they seem far out of my experience range, plus I definitely don't want to breed anything and they do much better in pairs, right? Do pairs need to be a male and a female or do they get along in a same gender pair? 

I can still dream I suppose.  Might be nice to try a tank with substrate and live plants, though. Hopefully I'll do that someday and expand my horizons.

Another question, if you don't mind. Do you just let them freely breed? Or do you have separate male/female tanks and take them to a different tank to breed? Wouldn't others in a community tank eat the fry? Sorry for all the questions but they're just so interesting to me! I'll stop cluttering your journal with my posts, though.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha well wild bettas are all I have owned for ages now. I've probably kept over a dozen different species and successfully bred most of them. 

You can have them in bare-bottom set-ups, but my wilds have never liked them and I definitely noticed a difference in the intensity of colour when they were switched onto substrate. 

I use water sprite, java fern and java moss. Because I don't use a lot of light and don't want to do much maintenance/be fussing around, I go with plants that basically grow themselves. All I use on a couple of my tanks are lamps with 6500K CFL globes. 

Depending on the species, it is possible to have a pair of the same gender together. However, it all depends on the individual fish. I have some very docile males and some very aggressive females so it can be hard to know which ones will live peacefully together. 

A couple of members of the unimaculata complex and I believe it may be Betta simplex or some of the other larger mouthbrooders, actually do inhabit bodies of water with a higher pH. So you may find that there is a species suitable for your water conditions. Seriously Fish has probably the best information base when it comes to wild bettas. 

I let my fish freely spawn whenever they want to. I sometimes get up to two spawns in a week from some of my pairs. All of my wilds are kept in species only tanks and nearly all of them are kept in pairs. I have two tanks that are groups of fish and while in one of these tanks I have had pairs spawn, I never get any fry because there are just too many other fish. 

I used to do grow-outs but had a lot of issues and so now I am just back to my original method, which is to allow my fry to grow out alongside the parents. Some wilds will eat their fry, but usually with the coccina complex they will leave them alone. 

Anyway, clutter away! I hardly get any replies compared to other journals here and I always like to share my experiences with others who are interested in learning.

Also, forgot to add these two photos of my persephone.


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## Aquatail

Oh yes, that was another reason I don't have live plants. Don't they need more light? Or do they do ok with normal room lighting, which is still less because of the tank covers. I don't keep the tank lights on, and actually only two of my four tanks even have a tank light. That's one thing I never really understood about having live plants. Doesn't leaving the light on for awhile bother the fish or raise the water temperature?

Everything I have read about wild bettas (which isn't much yet, admittedly) has tank size recommendations by pair. Why do they live in pairs? Do they get lonely or do most people who have them breed also? Do they ever live by themselves? Since you let yours freely spawn, do you ever run out of space or do you have back up tanks?

Seriously Fish does have a lot of information! I will have to get a better testing kit to really see what my water parameters are. I have strips, but apparently they aren't very reliable. Been meaning to get one for a while and it looks like the price has dropped a little from last time I checked!

Anyway, I've been curious about where you even get wild bettas from. Are there special breeders for them or something?

Oh and your photos are gorgeous! I've said that before and will probably say it many times again, but they really are awesome! Do your fish hold still for you?


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## LittleBettaFish

Totally didn't realise you had posted a reply in my journal Aquatails. Sorry about the lack of response. 

Anyway, I actually have two tanks running on my top shelf with duckweed, water sprite, java fern and java moss and all the plants are thriving even without an artificial light source. I believe this is because I have a clerestory window behind my rack that provides adequate natural light. 

However, yes in most set-ups you would probably need to have a light running simply because natural light might not be enough depending on where your tank is positioned and what type of plants you are growing. 

My fish don't particularly like really strong light, but now most of my tanks have extensive surface cover and the water is very dark with tannins, the light doesn't concern them as much because there is less light penetration happening. I am really bad with checking the temperature of my tanks, but I've never noticed the water temperature rising dramatically even when my lights are on for 6-8 hours. 

I find some species/individuals are more gregarious than others. My coccina complex fish seem to prefer to live in pairs/groups than alone even though they are quite savage at times. My unimaculata pair is actually very bonded, whereas I am sure my stiktos male would be just as content living alone as he is sharing a tank with his female. Most people who keep wilds ultimately want to breed them rather than keep them as pets. This is why it is very hard to sell singleton wilds. 

My wilds don't have hundreds of fry per spawn. They tend to only have around 20 fry per spawn and these numbers start to drop once the fry leave the nest and have to compete with their siblings. The weakest either die off or are cannibalised by their siblings, and so while I only end up with a fraction of the original spawn, only the strongest fish survive. 

I have a heap of spare tanks I can use, but I also tend to leave my fish living in family groups and separate out pairs if I want additional fry (my wilds tend not to spawn in a group environment). 

I get mine from a lady here in Oz who purchases wilds from overseas sellers/breeders and brings them into Australia. I can also buy wilds through my LFS that have come through the main wholesaler here but after getting in several pairs and groups that have been seriously infected with external parasites I don't do that anymore. 

You can find breeders in your country, or contact someone like Hermanus (a top breeder of wild bettas) and import wilds in through a transhipper.

And I wished my fish would stay still for me! It takes a lot of shots for me to even get something half-decent to use. 

Speaking of photos, I got some of my hendra male enjoying the rooibos tea I added to their tank last night. It really darkened the water up and I am definitely going to continue using this in my wild betta tanks. 




































He has very young fry about to leave the nest so he has been hanging out under the nest chasing off the female.

Meanwhile my sp. apiapi female refuses to give me any good photos of late. All she does is sit in one corner of the tank staring at me and demanding to be fed. I also added a couple of cups of rooibos tea to this tank as the water wasn't very dark and I wanted to see how they would respond.


















This is one of their fry. I have a really big one I was trying to get photos of but it decided to go hide instead.


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## Aquatail

It's totally ok! You must be really busy with all those fishies to take care of! I have 3 betta splendens and 2 guppies and they exhaust me. >_< It's been a rough week for us but things seem to be getting better!

All your hard picture-taking work really pays off! Gorgeous pictures, as usual! ^_^ And I know what you mean, most of my boys don't stay still for me either. My newest boy, when I first got him, actually did just float there while I took pictures of him. It was pretty bizarre. I just tried again, wondering if he still would and he actually stayed pretty still. How interesting... Perhaps the camera mesmerizes him?

So how do wild bettas do with other water parameters like hard water? Is pH the only thing they're more sensitive too? Or are some species more sensitive than others like for pH? I totally realized in my head I was getting my pH and Hardness mixed up. >_< My pH is still higher, though. Quite the water chemist, aren't I?

And a completely non-betta related question. You live in Australia, right? What's it like there? Kinda out of nowhere, I know, but I've always wondered.


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## LittleBettaFish

Hardness and pH are inter-related. Generally hard water has a higher pH that is more resistant to change. This is why to soften water and bring the pH down, you generally have to cut it with something like RO water. 

On the other end of the spectrum, my tap water has essentially no buffering capacity, and so the pH will drop quite dramatically unless I use a chemical product or something like crushed coral to buffer it. However, because my wild bettas thrive in this kind of water, I don't have to do anything more than let it age in a tub with some IAL, peat and rooibos tea. 


Like I mentioned earlier, some wilds are very sensitive to water conditions whether they are captive bred or wild-caught. Other species are less fussy and can tolerate a wider range of parameters, you may just not get any spawning happening (most species usually like to see a drop in pH before they will spawn). 

I like living in Australia. The hobby is pretty expensive here, but prices do seem to slowly be coming down. I love the extremes of the Australian bush, and the many beautiful places we have here. To be honest, I couldn't really see myself living anywhere else. 

Last night my sp. apiapi male and female were out. I rarely see the male and he rarely gives me a good photo so I have to work with what I've got. I doubt I am going to see him much in the next couple of days because I think another spawn is going to happen soon.


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## LittleBettaFish

Why did I think it was a great idea to start a massive fish tank move on a 34 degree day?! Even with the air conditioner on it is still a toasty 26 in my bedroom. At least with all this warm weather, I am able to harvest mosquito larvae daily for my fish. 

Anyway, I moved my rutilans sp. cf. green group down onto my bottom shelf (they were originally in a 10 gallon tank on the top shelf). They were showing some symptoms of velvet _again_, so I will be treating them along with my unimaculata. 

I actually only thought I had 18 rutilans, but turns out I have 22. It is a testament to the size of these fish that 22 adults in a 10 gallon tank didn't even look overcrowded. 

While I was sorting out the sponge filter in their new tank, I had the even brighter idea of re-organising my airline tubing. I think that actually took longer than moving my rutilans and I only have nine tanks hooked up to that pump. Now all my tubing is labelled so I won't accidentally crank up the air in one tank and be looking at another and wondering why nothing is happening. 

I made a couple of hundred dollars out of my birthday money and money from fish related sales so I am going to invest some of that into more water sprite, more java moss and more java fern. I don't want to swap any plants between tanks, so any new tanks I set-up from now on are going to have to have new plants purchased. 

I do have some very exciting news in that I may be getting a pair of one of my grail wild bettas: Betta miniopinna. It just depends on whether they will get in on the December shipment. Otherwise I may have to wait until January. They are a Christmas present from my mother and I am crossing everything that things go smoothly and by the end of the month I have a healthy pair of miniopinna swimming around in one of my tanks. I never thought I would have the opportunity to own this species, and I am very excited at the prospect of finally getting my hands on them! 

I did get a few photos of my dominant coccina male this morning. I had some spare java fern left, and it was sitting in one of my spare tanks not looking very well. After I hacked off all the dead/dying leaves, I chucked the rest into my coccina tank and they have spent most of the day exploring.


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## Aquatail

I hope your velvet problem isn't too bad. 

So if you have 22 in one tank, what's your estimate for how many you have all together?

Congratulations on the Betta miniopinna! Are they rarer than some other wild bettas?


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## LittleBettaFish

No the velvet is currently just confined to the two tanks where the fish have been infected in the past. I am okay with that as long as it doesn't turn up in any of my other tanks. 

I probably have just under 50 adults with lots of fry growing out as well. It's easier with my wilds because I can have that many fish in only eight tanks. 

Yeah miniopinna are very endangered. They are basically the same as Betta persephone in appearance, but you rarely see them offered for sale. I just have to pay the seller, contact Jodi-Lea the transhipper and see if I can't get them onto the next shipment which should be arriving in Australia on the 11/12. Then it's 7 days in quarantine in QLD before they get shipped down to me. 

That's if everything goes to plan and nothing unforeseen happens. I just worry about shipping so close to Christmas, even though I get my fish sent express so it's only supposed to be overnight.


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## Aquatail

Wow, that's a lot! Congratulations on the fish again, I hope everything goes well.


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## LittleBettaFish

I used to have heaps more but between the velvet and the heater malfunction killing my big group of burdigala, I have had to slowly build my stock back up. 

I am waiting for the seller who I got my hendra and brownorum pair off to have pairs of uberis and burdigala in stock. Knowing my luck it will be after I have spent all my money. 

In a way I like that you can't just go to any pet/fish store and pick up a pair of wild bettas as it does tend to keep them in the hands of more dedicated hobbyists. But at the same time it can be frustrating as heck having to wait weeks or months until the fish you want are available again and then it ends up being quite a lot of $$$ per pair compared to most other fish species.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I've purchased my miniopinna pair and paid the transhipper all their import and shipping costs. Now I just have to wait and hope things go right. 

I plan on buying some java moss, water sprite and a couple of java ferns for their tank. Just got to find time (and someone to drive me) to go down to my not so local fish store. 

Their tank is a 'Fluval Edge' that I took the top panel of glass off. I really like the shape of this tank and think it is an excellent size for a pair of coccina complex bettas. Shame I can't just buy it as a standard tank. 

My brownorum male is almost completely healed up from his female's attack. He's been very active of late and has a bubblenest going in one of the film canisters so I think he is trying to convince the female to spawn with him. 



















It's hard to believe I was having absolutely no luck at all with my previous pair of brownorum. These two spawn at least once every week or two. 

I also got another photo of my dominant coccina male. I love the rich, burgundy colour of this species. I believe coccina and my sp. apiapi are the only two species from this complex to display the distinctive spade-shaped caudal.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well had an eventful morning. I nearly killed my brownorum female after she got stuck in the siphon during a water change, but she appears to be okay apart from some scrapes and has even been involved in some courtship with the male.

My hendra male's eggs are hatching or very close to it. He has been very busy dividing his time between watching his nest, chasing his female around and eating mosquito larvae. 

I took a full tank shot to show how the plants are going and you can see him up in the film canister to the right. 










I also got a couple of photos of my brownorum fry. These are two of my biggest fry in there that I have seen so far. 



















I seriously can't wait for these guys to colour up and start developing some spots on their sides! I found this really awesome presentation of a lateral blotch on a brownorum that went all the way down onto its anal fin. If one of them cropped up in my group I would be very happy. 

Now my sp. apiapi fry are all getting bigger they are much bolder. Most of them are usually out and about looking for food. I have been giving them BBS almost every day and they also snack on the smaller mosquito larvae and infusoria present in the tank. 




























I think they are going to spawn soon because both of them were up in the film canister and the female has been getting a lot rounder over the past few days.


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## Weaver

AAAAH. This last entry scared me. That brownum gal.... I hope she's alright. XD 

I love your idea of a film-canister as a little hidey-place for eggs and the fishies. Eee, your sp. apiapi gall looks gravid and ready to pop. Hoping things go well for you.


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## LittleBettaFish

The smaller wild bettas seem to have a particular fondness for film canisters. It is actually surprisingly difficult to source them nowadays. I was fortunate in that my mum's, second cousin's wife was doing a diabetes trial and the medication came in those canisters. 

Today I put my pair of Betta stiktos up for sale. I decided they should go to a dedicated breeder who will appreciate them more than I do. Only trouble is that I think there are very young fry in there with them so I am just going to sell the pair with their tank as well so no one gets left behind. 

If they sell, I will then have more than enough money to put away for my uberis and burdigala pairs. Mum told me that she didn't want the money back (they are technically her fish) and said she'd rather me spend it on fish I actually want.

I honestly don't think I could have a greater mum. She seems to have endless patience and support for me and my hobby. 

My brownorum female is doing well. I think they actually spawned yesterday after the whole stuck-in-the-siphon saga. She is swimming a bit oddly but I think I must have damaged one of her pectorals and her other one was previously damaged in a fight with the male. 

The scrapes on her head definitely aren't anything serious. As you can see it hasn't affected her appetite any.


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## LittleBettaFish

Not very happy at the moment. I just went to go check on my brownorum pair and found the male with nearly all his fins torn off and looking very poorly at the front of the tank. His female was looking like she was going to finish him off so I have him now floating in a plastic container where he is at least safe from her attacks.

He looks terrible and his fins had just grown back in. I'm not sure why she attacks him like that so randomly. Talk about savage.


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## Weaver

That gal, she's awfully mean to that poor brownum boy... maybe he said something to her about her figure and she took exception to his comments. Poor boy, I hope his fins grow back, that's so sad. 

Lucky you on finding the canisters, huh, I wonder if cleaning out medicine bottles well would be good for folks that cannot find film-canisters these days? Hmm.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah she is a vicious little thing when the mood takes her. I haven't figured out what triggered this attack and the previous one. Maybe a failed attempt at spawning? I'm really not sure. 

His fins should grow back. Wilds are pretty hardy. I just hope she didn't do any internal damage. 

I think that as long as a container is fish-safe, floats and the fish can get easily in and out, the smaller wilds will use it. 

I just sent a pair of my persephone home with their new owner. I have someone else purchasing a pair but I'm not sure when they are coming around to pick them up. I am actually quite relieved, as when I tore apart the tank to find a female, I realised I had more left than the one or two I thought I did. 

Now I just have to put their tank back together.


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## dramaqueen

Aww, poor fishie!!


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## LittleBettaFish

He's feeling better. They are now flaring at each other through the plastic container. I think he can just stay in there until his fins heal up completely and even then I am a bit hesitant to put them back in together as next time he might actually get killed by her. 

In the meantime I was convinced my sp. apiapi female had jumped out through this gap I hadn't realised was in the cling wrap. Usually she is the first to greet me but this time I couldn't see her anywhere. Fortunately she was just hiding and came out as soon as she realised I was feeding her fry.


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## Weaver

Aaah, jumpers! Poor boy, I hope he heals up well and jeesh, that girl of yours needs a serious time-out for hurting him. 

I do want to ask a quick question, what are your tanks? They look like those uh, High-Clarity Cubes on Truaqua. Super neat.


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## LittleBettaFish

My tanks are a combination of Do!Aqua, Mr Aqua and YiDing. 

I'm a bit concerned about my sp. apiapi group. Last night I startled the female and before she swam off, she flicked twice against the substrate. 

I have never seen her do that before and she hasn't done it again that I've seen. I also got my strong torch out and gave both her and the fry in the tank a thorough going over and I couldn't see any signs of external parasites although I know that velvet can be particularly difficult to spot on these fish. The ammonia in the water checked out at 0ppm, and none of the fry or adults are clamping or showing signs of distress. 

I also checked out my brownorum and hendra tanks and both the adults and fry in those tanks also seem clear. 

I hope it is not velvet. I will be absolutely devastated if it is. I think if any of these new fish do become infected that will be it for me and fishkeeping. I enjoy this hobby, but it is no use investing time and money into continually sick fish. I have been so careful with my maintenance and quarantine procedures I just don't understand how they could become sick. At this point in time the only fish I have kept without issue for longer than a couple of years are my goldfish, and I don't think that is really saying something about my husbandry skills as I think those three could survive a nuclear fall-out. 

As an aside, I am thinking of converting my persephone tank back to predominately wood, IAL and peat moss (over the existing aqua soil substrate). I think the colour of the fish was better and they were certainly a lot more active in this type of set-up. At the moment I barely see them and the blue iridescence just isn't as strong as it was before. 



















I will be keeping the watersprite in for cover, and I am hoping that as it fully transitions from planted to floating form, the roots will grow right down into the substrate making the whole tank look very natural. I also want to purchase some hornwort and give that a go. Because the water is quite cool, there is a nutrient rich substrate in place, minimal maintenance and lots of natural light, I am hoping it will grow. I have only ever had luck with it in one tank and so I might keep it in a breeder net first just in case it melts as I don't want mess everywhere. 

I am thinking of setting my miniopinna tank up in the same style as they are on the same shelf and very similar looking species so it will mess with my sort of OCD nature if they don't match. 

I also discovered 'Ceratopteris pteridoides', a very cool looking plant that I want. Unfortunately the only place that seems to have it is out of stock and based on a previous experience with them and shipping plants, I am not sure it would survive the trip to my house anyway. 

Floating plants have to be my favourite kind of plants. They just give tanks such a natural look and I love when the roots grow long and make it seem like you are looking at a slice of river right in your own home .


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I have been studying my sp. apiapi pair for the past couple of days and haven't noticed anything seems amiss. In fact they were out flirting with each other while eating mosquito larvae and BBS. 














































These fish are definitely the favourite in my fish room. They may not be the flashiest wilds, but they have a lot of personality for such small fish.


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## LittleBettaFish

Had nothing to do, so I took some photos of my persephone this morning while they were eating.


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## LittleBettaFish

I know I probably get more people reading this thread than commenting, but I would really appreciate it if anyone thought to offer their opinion on which of these below scapes they like best. 

Basically I want you to tell me which wood combination looks the most natural. However, please note that since each piece cost $30 (weeps), my preference lies with the scapes that require the least amount of 'trimming' for the wood to fit. Stupidly I took the width measurements of my tank down but forgot the length. 

1









2.









3.









4.









5.









6.









It was really busy in there today and my mum hates waiting at the counter to be served so unfortunately I couldn't get wood for my persephone tank. I think I will wait until after the start of January when I have more time to measure out the wood and see how it all fits together. 

I also got this photo of two of my hendra fry showing the difference in size between siblings.


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## Aquatail

Well I've never actually seen a natural wild betta habitat, but #4 looks the most natural to me.


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## LittleBettaFish

Actually most of the habitats my wilds come from are little more than glorified puddles full of leaves. However, I like the wood as it provides hiding places and means my fish have a solid base of shelter to retreat to when they are in the upper levels of the tank. 

I do like 4 as well. I'd just have to trim off a couple of the straighter tips.


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## MattsBettas

4 looks the most natural, but I like 1 and 5 a a lot too.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I've decided to go with 4 after some more fiddling around. I have the wood sitting in the tank now up on the shelf and it looks the best. I think 1 and 5 left just a little too much open space at the bottom. 

I think once I get watersprite in and the roots start growing down to the substrate it will look good. 

Now I am bummed I didn't have more time to get the wood for my persephone tank. 

Only problem with goldvine (the wood I am using) is that it takes a while to sink and tends to go really stinky and slimy whilst doing so. Therefore, I am going to soak it separately in a bucket and then add it to the tank. I still have to buy a heater, a sponge filter, watersprite, and put a layer of peat moss over the substrate. I haven't tried doing that with aquasoil before so I shall see how it goes.


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## Chesh

Gorgeous driftwood!!! Sorry I didn't make it around to comment earlier, but #4 is going to look_ AMAZING_ when the tank is all set up! I can't wait to see once you get it up and running! *ish excited*


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Chesh. I think it should look pretty good once it's in and the tank is fully set-up. 

This is where the tank is currently at. 










I have used peat moss over aqua soil as the substrate and the tannins were produced by three rooibos tea bags. I am going to hook up my sponge filter today so there is some water movement and hopefully if I order the heater as well today it should come before the end of the week. 

Then it will just be a matter of soaking the wood, putting the IALs in, purchasing some watersprite and waiting for the fish to arrive. 

I am going to leave the water level like that as I really like how watersprite looks when given the chance to grow emersed. 

Other than that I have barely had time to do anything over the past couple of days as we have been working on our backyard. I did water changes yesterday and cleaned the glass and that was about it. 

I do seem to have one persephone fry that somehow survived to hatch out in the main tank. Unfortunately, I don't think it will last very long with all its aunts and uncles in there.


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## Chesh

Gorgeous!!! And yes - I agree, Watersprite is LOVELY when it's allowed to grow out of the water like that - it's going to be a stunning tank, for sure! Keep us posted! (I know you will!!!)


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah I will definitely upload photos as the tank progresses. I meant to grab some watersprite on Saturday but forgot so this weekend we will be going down to my LFS and picking up a bunch. I wish more stores grew it floating rather than planted as it does take a while to transition form fully. 

I always feel like an oddball when I say how much I love tannins. One of my tanks was looking too clear the other day so I added some rooibos and this morning it's back to a lovely golden brown.

I am so hoping everything goes smoothly with this pair. They are going to be part of my species focus along with Betta sp. apiapi, Betta coccina (going to sell my existing pair and source a wild-caught pair to use for this) Betta brownorum and if I can one day get my hands on them: Betta livida. 

The plan is to keep three to four individual pairs of these species and use these as the basis of my breeding program. The rest of my species I will either only keep one pair spare or keep them together in a group.


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## MattsBettas

Tank looks great, will watch for updates. 

What species of licorice gouramis did you keep?


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## LittleBettaFish

I have no idea what species they were. They weren't labelled as anything and I didn't have enough experience to judge for myself. 

I wish they were more readily available here as I was browsing a forum dedicated to their conservation, and there are some simply spectacular species. They remind me very much of wild bettas and hopefully one day they will gain some popularity in Oz.


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## MattsBettas

Would it be possible for you to direct me to that forum? I might have the opportunity to buy a group...


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## LittleBettaFish

Google Parosphromenus project and it should come up. 

Their care is very similar to that of the coccina complex wilds. It's why I would have liked to have kept them as a complementary species to my wilds. 

That forum had some pictures of habitats facing destruction and it was very sad to see.

Also forgot to add that Cheeps is doing well. Unfortunately, I still have to feed him. I have been trying to give him mealworms and butchie boys to eat but he seems to mostly enjoy killing them and leaving their corpses on the floor of the cage.


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## LittleBettaFish

I thought I'd been a bit slack with fish pictures so I tried my best to get a whole lot but hardly anyone was cooperating with me. So I managed to get in two of my hendra pair. 









Hendra male guarding his newly free-swimming fry from neighbouring fish









Hendra female lovely as always

You can see how dark the rooibos made the water go overnight. I am contemplating pulling the java fern from this tank and letting the watersprite take over as it has been growing incredibly fast. I think between that, the IALs and the java moss there should be more than enough cover for everyone. 

I pulled a whole heap of live bloodworms out of my mosquito tub along with mosquito larvae. My fish always love these and here is a terrible shot of my sp. apiapi female polishing one off.


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## LittleBettaFish

My biggest sp. apiapi fry was out today (I suppose at this size it can probably be called a juvenile) after being tempted with some grindal worms. 

I have a feeling it is male because it's caudal seems to be developing a spade shape, but at this stage I still am not 100% certain. Oddly enough I haven't actually witnessed any cannibalism in this tank between the biggest and smallest fry. It seems I am still getting a number of very young fry present in the tank. 




























Then here is the female after she realised I was putting food into the tank. The male is up in the canister with fry. 










I ordered my two heaters (one for my miniopinna tank and one for the second water aging tub I am going to set-up) and some extra airline tubing online this morning so I am hoping that arrives early next week at the latest.


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## LittleBettaFish

Today my brownorum male escaped from the container I had him in. I could not see him anywhere in the tank and so I got the torch out and was looking under everything trying to see if he had somehow jumped out of the actual tank.

Luckily he appeared not long after and as his fins are nearly fully healed I figured I may as well try them back in together. 

My hendra fry are getting bigger by the day. I have seen what I thought were external parasites on some of the biggest, but when I look with the torch overhead the areas aren't raised and so I think it is their iridescence coming through and catching the light.

I suppose I'm just overly paranoid now after all the problems I've had. 





































Then here is the male. He and his female spawned yesterday so he has been stuck in his film canister tending his nest. I managed to get this photo when he came out briefly to chase off the female. 










I've had no news on the miniopinna so I wonder if they even came in this shipment. I'm not too concerned as it gives me more time to get the tank ready and they probably would have to stay up there anyway until after January due to all the public holidays. 

I've been pulling so many live bloodworms and mosquito larvae out of my tub outside. This was a quick two second harvest from yesterday and the fish absolutely love them. Some of the bigger fry I have, have also started to hunt down the smallest pupa (I think that is what they are called) and so I figure it helps keep them full in between BBS feedings. 

I noticed I only seem to get a lot of bloodworms when there is a large amount of decaying organic matter in the tub. The water is really brown and full of leaves at the moment so I think this is why there has been such an explosion in numbers.


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## MattsBettas

I wish I could culture live bloodworms up here. That's super cool.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah I was trying everywhere to find live bloodworms and then I realised I have a whole heap of them in my tub. I do wish I lived somewhere that it was warm enough to culture these sorts of things year round. Would help cut down on some of the cost of feeding.


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## LittleBettaFish

My poor brownorum male had the most stunning dorsal fin and now it doesn't look anywhere near as good since the female attacked him. I'm hoping it will grow in fully given some more time but that was one of my favourite things about him. 

They seem to be alright together although the female did come over to have a flare at the male and he did take some chunks out of her caudal. 

I am going to add a rooibos tea bag into their tank this morning so I hope the extra tannins help settle everyone. 

This seems to be a particularly savage pair and their fry are no exception. It seems like nearly all the fry in this tank have some sort of fin damage (one was missing its entire caudal) from fighting. 









































































Their weight is right where I want it. I will be happy if I can get them to stay in this sort of condition long-term as I did have wilds in the past (uberis and burdigala in particular) who would probably be considered obese. I don't know what I am going to do when it gets colder and there aren't any more mosquito larvae/bloodworms around. I don't want to rely solely on blackworms but I don't know how many of the fish are going to take pellets.


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## LittleBettaFish

I don't think my brownorum male is going to stay in one piece if he doesn't stop harassing the female. 





































I also got this photo of my biggest brownorum fry and the male. The parents are starting to pay attention to the bigger fry now and chasing them off when I put food in. 



















My persephone are having their film canisters confiscated once again because they have been fighting over them. The watersprite in their tank is going nuts because I realised when my dad chopped this tree down that was shielding my roof all this extra light comes in the top window. It is good as it means I can grow duckweed and watersprite without having to run another light.


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## JustinieBeanie

Wow all of your fish are so beautiful and you seem very knowledgable on wild bettas and their care! A lot of people seem to think that all wild bettas are dull, colorless and boring little fish- your thread sure proves this to be incorrect. May I ask what camera you are using? (apologies if this has already been mentioned, so far I've only just gone back in this thread about ten pages or so) Also if you are looking for film canisters, you might be able to find people selling some on a site like Etsy or Ebay.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. This is the main reason for this thread. There are so many species of wild betta in existence and I feel it is a real disservice to the fish that they are cast in such a negative light in comparison to splendens. In fact I was actually going to write a blog entry about that very point as it is a major pet peeve of mine. 

I use my mum's Canon Eos. I basically just use the close-up function and automatic focus and away I go. 

At last count I actually had around 50 film canisters. The wife of my mum's second cousin is on a diabetes medication trial and the medication is light sensitive and kept in what are basically film canisters. She has been collecting them for me and now I have a whole bag of them in my wardrobe. 

The wilds do love them. As soon as I put them into a tank I generally get a nest built.


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## LittleBettaFish

My brownorum were putting on a show this morning while they ate a breakfast of mosquito larvae. The male is just spectacular. This is why brownorum are going to be one of the handful of species I am going to focus on out of all my wilds. The aim will be to have the original pair with an extra two or three pairs that I use for breeding. They will all be kept in separate tanks to avoid cross-contamination and I am hoping I can get a line going beyond the F1 generation. 





































Hendra aren't going to be a part of this species focus. However, I will be keeping on a pair of fry to have as back-ups for the parents. When I was taking the first photo I didn't even see the fry there until I uploaded it onto my computer. 



















At this point, I am really happy with how these three 'new' pairs are going. I'm hoping that I was right in thinking the velvet is confined to those tanks previously infected and that by following proper quarantine and purchasing from Jodi-Lea exclusively, I can avoid future issues with the parasite. It's a shame I won't ever be able to attempt a spawn with my rutilans sp. cf. green but as I am still dealing with a recent flare-up, it is just not a risk I am willing to take. 

I am not sure if I posted this previously but I have decided to offload my coccina trio and eventually replace them with a wild-caught pair or a pair bred by someone like Hermanus whenever they next become available. They were sick when I got them, and I just don't think that helps their immune system later on even if the initial problem is cured. I'd rather with the healthiest stock I can source from day one. 

I've realised it's foolish trying to have the biggest collection of coccina complex species in the shortest space of time. It's not a competition. More important to me nowadays, is that I work within the boundaries of my limitations, and focus on purchasing stock that I know has come from reputable sources.


----------



## Hallyx

"A man's gotta recognize his limitations." 
~~ Dirty Harry Callahan (Clint Eastwood)


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## LittleBettaFish

At the moment those limitations are money and space. I was hoping I'd win the 70 million dollar lottery the other day but no luck there. Then I could have just paid Jodi-Lea a substantial fee to hunt down and source me pairs of wild bettas and liquorice gourami to go in my custom built fish room. 

I am supposed to be moving my empty fish tanks out into the cubby house but taking photos of my fish is a lot more fun. 


















Brownorum tank with hendra tank on right. 









He has a whole lot of fry in there that just hatched yesterday


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I don't think my miniopinna were on the December shipment. I'm going to contact Jodi-Lea today and see if she has them, and if not I'll contact the seller and tell him I've paid all my import fees already and that the pair can go on the next shipment into Oz (I assume it will be mid to end of January) 

However, I don't really mind. Their tank is nowhere near ready. I haven't soaked the wood, and the peat moss and glass developed this clear slime over it because I accidentally left the rooibos tea bags in there for a while without any water movement. So today or tomorrow I'm going to strip out the peat moss, empty the tank out, give everything a rinse, and then set it up properly. 

My two heaters and extra airline tubing arrived, so yesterday I went out and got a 13L bucket from our local hardware store and I'm going to use this and one of the heaters to age water in for my sp. apiapi, hendra and brownorum tanks. I've been meaning to do this for ages now but didn't have the money to pay for online purchases. 

My unimaculata adults are not looking very well, but their fry are thriving. I'm hoping that the treatment works or at least suppresses the velvet to a stage where the fish can remain otherwise healthy. My rutilans sp. cf. green seem to be slowly recovering. At this point I am going to probably keep both tanks in treatment until the end of January. 

Having these three new pairs reminds me of what it was like before all these problems with velvet, and why I originally got into the hobby. I will never forget the day I had to sit there and systematically cull a whole tank full of juveniles and sub-adults because I knew they were never going to recover. 

Anyway, here are a few photos I took of my biggest brownorum fry yesterday. I believe one of them is starting to develop a blotch on its side. Having never actually reared fry from this species to adulthood, it is going to be a first for me!





































I think the male has been working on a nest (of course in the one film canister that I can't look into) and so I am wondering if there might not be some fry free-swimming by Christmas day.


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## LittleBettaFish

My hendra male has been quite aggressive towards the female because he is guarding a nest of fry. The poor female is looking rather battered but she usually gets in a few bites of her own during courtship. 





































Then here is the brownorum fry that I believe has its lateral spot coming through. I think it's the darker spot on its side.


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## PetMania

Your fish are so beautiful!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks PetMania. Hopefully over the next few months I can replace my lost stock and have photos that aren't just of the same three pairs. 

My rutilans sp. cf. green are starting to look better. Most of them have unclamped their fins and their colouring has returned to normal. They are actively eating now, and the sores caused by the irritation of the parasite are healing up. I can still see the velvet on them, but I'm hoping the treatment will start to weaken it and let them start to fight back. If I can get this cured I am going to darken their water right up (I don't want to drop the pH too low due to the copper in the medication), chuck a nice big piece of goldvine in their tank and let them live out their remaining years here with me. 



















I really regret that I won't be able to get any further spawnings from this group, as this is such a lovely species and the ability to mouthbrood in a predominately bubblenesting complex is so unique. 

Unfortunately, my female unimaculata is in really bad shape. I was concerned about her male but all his colour has returned and he was eating alongside his fry this morning. She is very clamped, floats at the surface, and is very slow to respond to outside stimuli. Since I bred her and it's only early days in the treatment I am not going to make any serious decisions yet. However, if her condition doesn't improve over the next couple of weeks it may be kinder to euthanise her.


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## Hallyx

it's easy to see why you are so enthusiastic about your Brownorum.

But I must say I am thoroughly enchanted by your Hendra. I'd love to have a couple of those.


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## LittleBettaFish

The brownorum are more of a challenge because it seems like myself and several others I have seen posting online have had difficulties with getting a successful spawn happening. I think it comes down to pair compatibility. 

I notice that in this pair and my previous pair, the female has always been the aggressor. I think my previous male was extremely passive with poor paternal instincts as he would lose interest in defending the nest. However, while this current male is not as aggressive as his female, he is very protective of his nest and fry and will not permit her to come near it. 

When I kept my original brownorum in a group of six individuals, only a single pair would ever spawn and the male would hold the eggs in his mouth until they hatched. 

Hendra are stunning fish, but very easy to spawn, and I find they tend to produce quite a lot of fry for a species from this complex. Therefore, they aren't going to become part of my species focus because I think the Australian market is going to be flooded with captive bred specimens in another couple of years.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well after Christmas this year, I've decided next year I might just stay at home with my pets. It seemed for our Christmas Eve dinner with the neighbour that if something was going to go wrong for mum and me, it went wrong. I also spent the past couple of days feeling like my womb was trying to claw its way out of my abdomen so that only added to my general resentment of anything Christmas. 

I think the cherry on the Christmas Eve cake, was when me and mum discovered the sink was leaking. This was while she was trying to bake a cake for the trifle, and we had to completely clear out the bottom cupboard and try to figure out where this leak was coming from (turns out the sink itself was cracked). 

Then last night when my dad and older brother came around for dinner, the dogs scared the cat I was holding and he turned into a feline chainsaw before I could let him go. While I only got a couple of scratches on my hand and shoulder, I thought this was going to be when I got cat scratch fever and ended up in hospital on a drip. 

Anyway to make this fish related, I took a few fish photos last night while I was feeding everyone. My hendra male's spawn has become free-swimming as has my sp. apiapi male's latest spawn. 


















Brownorum fry









Sp. Apiapi female









Sp. Apiapi juvenile starting to colour up 









Hendra male with what could be a possible female fry in the background

I sold my final pair of persephone on the 24th so that has left me with $70 in my fish fund. Add to that the Christmas and Birthday money I have, plus the $90 if I manage to sell my stiktos pair in January, and I have enough to put towards a couple more pairs whenever they become available. 

The trouble is what species to buy. I really would love to have a pair of wild-caught coccina and a pair of livida, but I can't see either happening soon. I'm thinking then that maybe I should get a pair of standard rutilans (Hermanus did have some wild-caught pairs available not that long ago) and then maybe a pair of either uberis or burdigala. 

However, I'm sort of torn that I don't want to buy something like burdigala or uberis and then not have any money when a pair of coccina becomes available. Patience is such a virtue with this hobby. Particularly when I sometimes have to wait for a year or even more to procure certain species. 

Because I want to keep set-up costs down as much as possible, I'm thinking I might just have an empty sanitised tank/tub outside that I chuck some potting mix and watersprite into. That way I can harvest the watersprite from here whenever I need to use it in a new tank. Not only will this save me a few bucks on the purchase price, but it will also mean that the watersprite will have transitioned over into floating form already. 

Not sure how mum is going to feel about yet another tub in the backyard though. I already told her she is not allowed to tip out the clam shell wading pool that was intended for the dogs, but is now filled with mosquito larvae and bloodworms.


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## MattsBettas

I didn't know you sold your persephone. Those were always some of my favorites. I'm going to miss seeing your awesome pics of them haha. 

Your apiapi and the fry look amazing. Have you found any more info on them yet? 

Merry Christmas


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## LittleBettaFish

I still have a group of persephone here. I just sold three male/female pairs to some local wild betta keepers just in case something ever happened to my fish. They aren't a particularly common species in Australia so I figured it was best if some other people had pairs to work with. 

I haven't found anything else about the sp. apiapi. Most of the info I've found online is what I already know, or is one of my pictures.


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## Hallyx

LittleBettaFish said:


> ,,,, or is one of my pictures.


LoL Don'tcha just _love_ it?


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## MattsBettas

Ah I must have interpreted the "sold my final pair" wrong. I thought you were talking about your final pair, period, not the last pair you are selling. I think its good that there will be others breeding them, more breeders of endangered fish never hurts.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah I thought that's where you must have gotten confused. I was only ever going to sell three pairs (a couple of my females have sunken in topline so are not breeding quality and so along with them I wanted to retain two or three that were), and the buyer for the final pair had taken a while to get her tank ready. 

So this is what I meant by 'final'.

My sp. apiapi male is on a German labyrinth fish FB page and I also found his photo on two Asian based fish forums. Sadly with wilds some of the best information is from foreign sites (often European), and it can be quite difficult to make sense of the translations Chrome provides.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my hendra were putting on a spectacular show for me just now. Unfortunately, they move quite fast and so I only have a couple of photos of them. 

I don't think the female is quite ready to spawn again yet as she doesn't look very eggy. However, I'm sure now the male has an empty nest and she's had a few feedings of mosquito larvae this will change. 





































Every time I tried to get a flattering shot of the female she moved. So the best I have is this semi-in-focus one. 

Then I noticed my sp. apiapi male and female were chasing each other around as well. Unfortunately the camera flashed freaked the male out but the female was happy to pose for a photo. 










I can't wait to get some more healthy pairs in over 2014. I love watching the pairs and their fry all interacting.


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## LittleBettaFish

Managed to get some more close up shots of my hendra male. 




























My sp. apiapi male also made an appearance last night because I moved his film canister around to another spot and he wasn't happy about it.


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## LittleBettaFish

I caught my sp. apiapi spawning this morning and the blasted camera would not focus on them at all when the male was out flaring and chasing the female around. I had all these great opportunities for photos and by the time the camera had focused they were already out of shot. 

The below is all I managed to get. I did get to see the male catching a falling egg in his mouth so that was pretty neat. 



















I am always amazed at how many eggs the female produces in each spawning. Particularly when each spawning is usually only days apart.


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## Aus

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, LBF. I have missed you and your wilds, and am looking forward to catching up on all the news and pics.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Aus. I haven't seen you around for ages. I was worried something might have happened health wise that had kept you away. 

Anyway, my hendra pair spawned yesterday. The male looked absolutely stunning as did the female. Some of their fry are getting pretty big now and hopefully should start getting their adult colouration in so I can start guessing genders. 

My brownorum male was trying to convince his female that more fry would be great. I'm hoping she doesn't attack him again for his efforts as all his fins are almost completely grown back.










Their biggest fry is so adorable. Now when he sees me feeding the tanks next to his, he goes up and down the glass with the female trying to get to the mosquito larvae. If he turns out as nice as his father he is going to stay on as one of my breeding males. 









(He was clamped in this photo because the male was out of view staring at him)


I also have to rant here at this point. 

Why does it seem that when you are a responsible, knowledgeable and dedicated dog owner everything seems to go wrong ALL THE TIME? Yet those people who leave their dogs out in the backyard 24 hours a day, feeds it Pedigree dog dry and never takes it to the vet or socialises it, always seem to have these healthy, happy-go-lucky types? 

We work hard to train, socialise and exercise our dogs, we take them to the vet when necessary, feed them premium foods etc. and it just seems like we never see any rewards for our efforts. Nike is fear-aggressive towards other dogs and has hip dysplasia, Eos now has had pneumonia twice and she is only four years old, and I’m waiting for Ares to have some catastrophic problem with his hips or back due to his conformation and possible dysplasia (he’s never been x-rayed). 

Also, at this point in time I have decided much as I love them, I am never ever going to own another cat. They have absolutely wrecked our house with their spraying, clawing and vomiting. Not only that, but they seem to rack up vet bill after vet bill. Now Whistler our indoor/outdoor cat is peeing blood. So that is another vet visit and probably $$$ to fix. Then we have Bandit who has become the most finicky cat in the universe and at this point in time is more likely to be killed by me than die from his cancer if he doesn't start eating properly. 

The trouble is that I have a really short temper and am impatient so it doesn't really lend itself well to what is basically palliative care. Bandit has just had so many problems so close together for the past year that I am just getting burnt out by it all. I feel like my whole life at the moment is shovelling pills down his throat and trying to get him to eat. It's not even like he is on death's door and I could see that it was kinder to let him go. In actual fact, he looks the best he has in ages. I think it's more the stress of trying to make sure he stays that way that is getting to me. 

I've discovered it’s a lot easier to talk the talk in regards to responsible pet keeping, but it is bloody exhausting having to walk the walk.


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## Hallyx

This may be heresy on a pet forum, but I'm firmly convinced that a pet is kept for the benefaction of it's keeper. I've heard all the explanations and justifications, but my opinion remains unchanged. Pet owners keep their pets as well as they can in order to enhance and enjoy the pet-keeping experience. 

Exceptions are rehab workers and endangered species breeders and minders. And, even then, the satisfaction that they derive from their service can be interpreted as being self-gratifying.

If a "pet" of mine were destroying my home, costing me unaffordable amounts, causing unhealthful stress or seriously depressing my mood, I would have no compunction about relieving myself of the burden. I owe "pets" anything I can give them for their health and safety, but only insofar as it does not detrimentally effect mine.


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## Aus

LBF, I'm so sorry you've had a bad run with the animals' health. It really is stressful to have to deal with just one sickly animal, let alone worrying about a bunch of them. 

Hey, at least they're not horses! Just to give it an upside, lol. Talk about a pain in the ass, when your pet weighs half a ton and doesn't want its medicine.. 

Peeing blood's a urinary tract issue.. feeding wet foods only and some cranberry pills can help if it's just mild. If there's a lot of blood, might be a case of antibiotics and/or some stuff that breaks up bladder stones from your vet. 

I'm so glad to see your fishies doing well, and all these new varieties you have. Your pics are a treat as ever, and wowee, I love the blog! 

You know, I read somewhere up-post where you said something about realising you can take your time in building your fish up, that you don't have to have them all nownow. It's so true.. and as a general sentiment about pacing oneself, something I took to heart as the right words, heard at the right time, and you have my thanks for them.


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## LittleBettaFish

While I complain, I honestly don't think I could ever get rid of any of our pets even if they are making my hair prematurely grey. I mean Rama the worst offender out of all our cats, sleeps in my arms every night with his face next to mine. I don't think I could ever betray that kind of trust. 

We nearly lost him a couple of years ago and me and my mum were inconsolable. So, much as he is a destructive force unto himself, he is here for life.

I think it's just when multiple things go wrong especially around this time of year when it's hectic enough as is, it is very overwhelming. I mean it wasn't that long ago that we weren't sure if Bandit was ever going to come home. Then yesterday we are driving Eos to the vet hoping she isn't suddenly going to stop breathing. 

Whistler went to the vet and he has just had a shot and will just being kept on a watery tin food diet to see if that doesn't clear things up. He's had the same problem before when he gorged himself on very high protein dog dry. It's hard when he is an outside cat because I don't know what he is eating. The vet said his bladder was empty and there probably wasn't anything of immediate concern such as a blockage so hopefully he starts feeling better soon. 




















He is a devil boy and it's sad to see him so subdued and obviously hurting. The only reason he is an outside cat (comes in at night) is because he attacks all the other cats. 

I read that you lost most of your fish Aus and it is tough. It's very easy to burn yourself out in this hobby. Personally I think it is better to pace yourself. There's no need to rush headlong into things, and I am having a lot more fun now than when I had twice as many fish.


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## JustinieBeanie

Sorry to hear about all the troubles with your pets' health issues. We've had our fair share in the past, and even now as I type due to our one cats recent recurring bouts with severe constipation we are having to separate our two cats so we can monitor who is pooping in which litter box, so I feel your pain! Did your vet draw blood to assess Whistler's kidneys? Cats can be kinda prone to kidney issues and with the urinating blood, that's why I wondered. Good luck and hop everyone feels better!


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## LittleBettaFish

Nah he didn't have any blood drawn. Kidney issues is why we try to feed mostly wet food (I would prefer to feed all wet food but mum is the one who buys it) to our cats. 

At the moment the vet thinks it is probably just a urinary tract infection. Obviously if it gets any worse in the next couple of days we will either take him back there or to the emergency vet in the city for further testing. 

Eos is doing okay. The vet gave her medication to dilate her bronchial tubes and this seems to be making her breathing a lot easier. She is going in tomorrow to get what I think is a tracheal flush to see what has caused the pneumonia. 

Bandit meanwhile is moping around the house because mum had visitors and cooked roast beef for lunch and he is hoping if he looks sad enough someone might take pity on him and feed him.


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## Hallyx

If ever there were a picture looking for a caption, the fist one on this page is it.


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## LittleBettaFish

Are you talking about my two brownorum? I don't know why the male keeps messing with the female. You think after the second time she almost killed him he would learn to leave her alone unless she is receptive to spawning. 

I caught my dominant persephone female spawning with a male under a bubblenest at the surface and then going down to spawn with a male in a terracotta pot. I'm not sure if either spawn produced any eggs but she seems to have no issue spawning with multiple males in a group setting.


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## Aquatail

I'm sorry about all your pet troubles.  

The kitty in the pictures is very cute! Which one is he/she, if you don't mind?


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## LittleBettaFish

That's Whistler the Devil Cat. His hobbies include bringing decapitated birds to the doorstep, staring at the other cats through the window and wrestling with the dogs.


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## Joshaeus

I admit that this is a tad off topic, but are there any wild bettas that would enjoy subtropical (I.E about 64-75 degrees fahrenheit, or 18-24 celcius) temperatures?


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## LittleBettaFish

Probably not as low as 64, but I keep nearly all of mine around the 75 degree mark and they do fine. I definitely wouldn't want to go any lower than 70 degrees long-term.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think Bandit read my rant, because for the past two days he has been wanting to be fed all the time. He has gone off his BARF, but I have been feeding him this Applaws brand mixed in with some Wellness Core (he won't eat that by itself). 

Whistler has stopped peeing blood after a couple of days of watered down tin food. We are going to keep eyes on him, but hopefully whatever was going on is clearing up. 

Eos got her tracheal wash yesterday. She had to go under a general anaesthetic which always makes me worried. Someone I know recently lost a German Shepherd because there was a mistake. It's been hard keeping her quiet because the medication she is on makes her _feel_ better, even though her lungs are still very bad. It looks like it is going to be another 6-8 weeks of treatment for her to get it to clear up fully. Hopefully there's no scarring. 

I emailed Hermanus and my miniopinna pair should be coming by the end of January. I am so hoping things go alright because I would be devastated if one or both fish were DOA. Now I just need to get their tank properly set-up. 

My sp. apiapi fry have hatched and are hanging from the nest, as have my hendra fry. My dominant persephone female has been half-heartedly wrapping with a few of the males in the tank but I don't think any eggs eventuate as it is quite a distracting environment. I'm going to pull her and one of the males out into a separate tank in a couple of weeks and see if I can't get a successful spawn. 

My brownorum pair have been flaring and chasing each other around but there's been no spawning. I think the male's spot on one side is getting bigger as there seems to be more green iridescence than there has been previously. Fortunately, all his fins have grown back and he is looking stunning as ever. 



















Then my hendra male taking a break from guarding his nest




























My coccina pair died from what appeared to be some sort of bacterial infection. That is the last time I purchase wilds from anyone but Jodi-Lea. So the hunt will be on for a nice wild-caught pair to hopefully start my species focus with. It would be great if this could happen before the end of 2014. 

I also think tomorrow I am going to euthanise my unimaculata female. There's been absolutely no improvement and she is clearly suffering. I didn't want to do it today because it's my mum's fish and I didn't want to put a dampener on her night.


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## Aquatail

I'm glad your kitty's feeling better. I'm sorry about your unimaculata female.


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## LittleBettaFish

While unimaculata are not particularly a species I like, she is still a fish I bred myself and watched grow until she was big enough to have fry of her own. 

I think once the fry recover from velvet and are big enough to sell I will get rid of them all. I was thinking of keeping a son as company for the father as they do seem to be quite a gregarious species. However, I might just keep him in smaller tank by himself until he passes.


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## Aus

Happy New Year to you & yours, LBF!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Aus. I just stayed at home with my mum and my dad came over. I don't normally do anything on New Year's Eve. If it wasn't for them I would have been in bed before 11pm. 

Then mum accidentally let Bandit right on midnight while the fireworks were going off and I thought we'd start the year with either a dead or missing cat. Luckily he only ran over to the neighbour's front yard so he got caught and put back inside. 

I woke up this morning and found my hendra male busy tending his nest. He always moves the fry out of the film canister overnight and then puts them back in during the day. I don't know why. This male is like a parenting machine. He has raised dozens of spawns since I got him.



















Then my biggest brownorum fry was swimming around waiting for food. I'm hoping that the dark line on its side is going to be its lateral blotch as I like to have big blotches on my brownorum. It looks odd when they are either very small or non-existent.


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## LittleBettaFish

My hendra female was in a particularly feisty mood this morning and I took the opportunity to get some better photos of her than what I have. 

Some of her fry are getting quite big and developing a bit of attitude so the female has been chasing them around and putting them in their place. 









I'm wondering if that isn't a female fry based on the colour of its anal fin



























This was the male coming out of the film canister to go show off to her 

I also did a small water change on both my brownorum and sp. apiapi tanks. It definitely is a lot easier having the water already heated and treated when it comes to doing water changes. I'm going to have a look around for a couple of large buckets or plastic drums to use when I have my full set-up going downstairs. 

I've decided that I will put my pair of miniopinna into my 25x25x25cm tank instead of the one I was originally going to use. The only downside to this is that I will need to pick up a couple of smaller pieces of goldvine to use. Luckily we are going to be in the city on Friday so I can drop into the aquarium on the way home from the vet. 

Now it's 2014, mum really wants the renovations downstairs finished. This will mean I need to start deciding how I want my fish rack to look. We have decided to go with the industrial strength rack I am using now, but it will be 30cm wider and have four shelves instead of three as it will be accommodating my whole collection. 

The only thing is that we are not certain what to use for the shelves themselves. I am definitely not using particle board again as that just swells and bows. The options at present are some sort of marine ply, or to use the galvanised shelving that the manufacturer also offers. I'm thinking of using yoga mats under each tank, and then bracing each shelf. I found that even if racks say they can hold a specific weight, it just means the shelf won't collapse, not that it won't experience some level of bowing. 

Then there comes the difficulty of working out how many tanks I am going to be running. I figured that unless some new species of the coccina complex is discovered, the most I am going to get is 13. So that's a minimum of 13 tanks to house each pair or group. Then I am going to have further tanks for my species focus pairs which is where it gets tricky. 

Ah I can't wait for the day I have space enough to devote a whole room that is not my bedroom to my wilds.


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## Aus

LBF, what's wrong with the uni female?


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## LittleBettaFish

Velvet. The bane of my wild betta existence. It's only in my rutilans and unimaculata tank as they have both been infected in the past and I think the fry in the unimaculata tank were what led to a resurgence. 

That's why I am working on purchasing new breeding pairs, and only through Jodi-Lea.


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## Aus

Ah jeez, still with the velvet? Rotten stuff.. I recall you had issues with it some time ago. 

Well, I have a big bottle of protozin, tons of kettapang, two spare quarantine tanks and a lot of time on my hands atm, so if you don't wish to put her down, I'll take her if you like? (And that way if she doesn't make it, it's not your fault - seeing as this is your mum's fishie.. ) If she comes good, I'd of course be happy for you to take her back. Or keep her if you wish.. goodness knows, I have enough free tanks atm. 

That is, if she's not too far gone already?


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## LittleBettaFish

Unfortunately, she's pretty far gone. While the male is showing signs of recovering and their juveniles/fry are doing well, she hasn't done anything but float at the surface barely breathing for a while now. 

Velvet is a persistent parasite. Just when you think it's gone completely it rears its ugly head again. 

I was going to try and get an F2 generation out of my rutilans sp. cf. green, but I am not taking the risk now because they have been infected with velvet and don't seem to be able to be able to fully get over it.

It's sad as I am not sure where I am going to be able to source another pair of that species that isn't through the wholesaler.


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## Aus

Ah, that's so sad.. I hope your young 'uns finally shed it for good. 

I go to Jodi-Lea's site now and then to ogle her stock list. Unless the list is outdated, she has a rutilans pair caught wild, on there now? 

I don't have any immediate plans for new stock, but around March or April I might make an order from her. Maybe give strohi another go, or foerschi. 

She seems to have a few more species than last I looked..


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## LittleBettaFish

I believe it's outdated as she posted up a list on FB not long ago and they weren't on it. Also rutilans sp. cf. green are different from just standard rutilans. Hermanus (where she gets most of her wilds from) has the latter but not the former at least to my knowledge. 

I'm getting my Betta miniopinna pair hopefully in the January shipment from Hermanus, but he also has this Betta sp. wajok (seems to be an undescribed member of the coccina complex) available for sale so I am tempted to add them to my order as well. 

I wish I hadn't wasted my savings on splendens earlier on. Now I know exactly what I want to do with my fish I don't have the money to do it.


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## LittleBettaFish

And I had a finger slippage and emailed Hermanus about whether he had a pair of sp. wajok available for sale. I figured that I might as well get both them and my miniopinna posted to my house together to cut down on postage costs. 

Plus I still have that tank I had set-up for my miniopinna empty so the sp. wajok could go in that. 

Then in 2014 the hunt will be on for a pair of Betta coccina and Betta rutilans. Betta burdigala and uberis are not really that hard to source so I don't mind if I don't get my hands on either species until next year. I'm more interested in acquiring species that I either haven't owned in the past or haven't yet successfully spawned.


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## Hallyx

I do so admire a poster who can use the word "ogle" correctly .....and spell it right.

I'd still like to get a tank around a couple of those B. hendra. I've never see them on AB.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah if you want wild bettas it's best to go straight to the source and contact someone like Hermanus (his FB is Betta4Ever). AB has hardly any wilds. 

Got back from the aquarium with a piece of goldvine and some live brine shrimp. I think I might have to cut the goldvine in half as it is a sort of odd shape but I'm hoping my fish like it as it is going to provide plenty of hiding places. 

Came home to find my sp. apiapi pair spawning while their previous spawn is still a day or so away from becoming free-swimming. I guess they get to learn sex education _very_ early on.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I've been trying not to freak out since yesterday, but I am really concerned about my brownorum male.

I can't see him anywhere in his tank, but I also haven't seen any sign of him on the floor or under my shelves. I did a water change the other day, but I thought I would have noticed if he'd jumped and apart from that there has been gladwrap over the top of the tank 24/7 since then. 

I'm hoping he is just hiding. The tank is quite densely planted and he is only small. I just worry because he is one of my favourites and I would hate for something to have happened to him. 

This is actually my hendra tank, but my brownorum tank has even more cover than that, so you can imagine how hard it is to find a fish that doesn't want to be found in there. 










I got an email back from Hermanus and the sp. wajok pair was cheaper than I expected. So I am definitely going to add a pair to my January order. 

I decided to put my miniopinna pair into a 30x30x30cm tank simply because it will match the other two breeding pair tanks then and because the wood fit quite nicely in without requiring me to cut it up. This is the layout I liked best, and I am going to the hardware store today to get a thin piece of PVC pipe to cut up and use as additional hides. 










I don't know when my brownorum juvenile is going to start showing some colour. It is quite large, but still very drab at the moment. So far there are still no indications of velvet on any of my 'new' pairs or their fry. I did have a mild moment of panic with my hendra again but then I realised that it was just the heavy iridescence I was seeing.


----------



## MattsBettas

Hope you find the brownorum. Are your cats in your room? 

I love the watersprite growing half emmersed like that. I should try doing that.


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## LittleBettaFish

You know as soon as I posted this I looked in the tank with the torch (it was early morning here and so my fish were still asleep) and I found him hiding out on the bottom in the moss. 

I actually had a dream last night that I was catching all these brownorum out of some weird pond with a net because I was thinking so much about it. 

Yeah the watersprite looks cool growing like that. In the empty tank with the wood I am going to fill it halfway and have duckweed and watersprite as my only plants. Once the roots start to grow down to the substrate I figure it will provide plenty of cover for the fish and any fry they might have.


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## PetMania

Okay, I'm not the only one that dreams about their fish, phew!


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## oceanbetta11

beautiful bettas geargous bettas


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## LittleBettaFish

I dream about my fish a fair bit. It makes sense though because I think about fish most of the time when I am awake. 

Thanks Oceanbetta11. I think they are pretty stunning myself.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I made the decision to euthanise my unimaculata female tonight. I was trying to figure out when she was actually born and it was way back in 2012 so I've had her longer than I thought. 

I'm just waiting for the water to get cold enough, and mum to say goodbye and then I will euthanise her. 

I really hope velvet stays out of my fish room in the future. So far it seems to have only remained in my rutilans and unimaculata tanks. To say I would be devastated if it spread to any other tanks is an understatement. 

I am so careful I feel like I work at a quarantine facility. I have separate buckets and siphons, use rubber gloves when anywhere near my water aging tubs and wash my hands with hot water and soap whenever I touch any of the infected tanks. I haven't left any heaters unplugged or made any sudden changes to the water chemistry in any of my tanks of late. I've also sworn off purchasing wild bettas through any source but Jodi-Lea/Fishchick Aquatics as the ones from the wholesaler here always seem to be carrying nasty parasites. 

At this point in time I really don't think there is much more I could do. 

Anyway, this was my female unimaculata in healthier times. Sad to see how much she has wasted away.


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## Aquatail

I'm sorry about your unimaculata female.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my unimaculata female is actually still alive. Mum didn't want to euthanise her just yet, and because it's her fish and because she pays all the bills for _my_ fish we went to the fish store today and picked up some Seachem Cupramine. I haven't tried it before but will see how the fish respond to a 14 day treatment. 

I'm going to completely remove everything from the tank apart from the two terracotta tunnels (I'm hoping the juveniles don't all start fighting), and have it completely blacked out with an old towel. I think I might leave the temperature where it is but turn the filter up. 

Treatment is going to start tomorrow morning and hopefully we see some improvement. 

I did cut up the PVC pipe I purchased to make some tunnels for my miniopinna tank. I'm going to do the same for my sp. wajok tank and make up a couple extra for my persephone group. One of the employees at the hardware store was giving me this odd look when I was trying to figure out whether my fish could fit through or not. I suppose I I don't look like I should be in the plumbing section of a hardware store comparing lengths of PVC piping. 









Imagine the bottom covered in IAL, the water stained with tannins, and the surface and middle of the tank filled with duckweed and watersprite. The wood in the tank over is going to used for my sp. wajok. 

In other news, my hendra fry are growing very nicely. I think I have at least a couple of females but it's really a guessing game until the ventrals get bigger and their full colour comes through. At least with this species it is very easy to determine the different genders. I think I might cry if these fry reach adulthood without any issues. I had to cull all my previous hendra juveniles when they couldn't recover from velvet and it would be so unbelievably great if I could finally have a homebred pair to work with. 



























I snuck this picture in because he is such a stunning boy.

While I was waiting for my blackworms, I saw they had some burdigala for sale in one of the tanks. I looked in and there was this poor male struggling against the filter flow. They were all fairly washed out colour wise and I think it's a shame that this is often how most people see their first wild bettas in the flesh. Burdigala are absolutely magnificent when coloured up and comfortable. 

I think that is one of the problems with wild bettas, particularly the smaller species. The conditions they like are often not compatible with how most stores keep their sale tanks. So then you end up with these brown, stress-striped fish that do nothing but sit motionless on the bottom of the tank.


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## MattsBettas

I was wondering if you hadn't tried full blackouts and copper based meds yet. I really hope you can cure it once and for all.

I wish pet stores here got wild bettas in, period. I've seen wild bettas once and they were boring smaragdinas that weren't for sale and that I had no room for anyways. I think the main reason they don't get any in is because they do tend to look so crappy in their poorly designed stock tanks, and in out absolutely terrible tap water. If I owned a fish store I would definitely stock some select species, in proper acidic black water tanks.


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## LittleBettaFish

I've done copper treatments and blackouts in the past but it's so hard to tell when the parasite is completely gone, particularly on my wilds with all their heavy iridescence around the head and gills. Then there's the fact no one can give an exact time-frame on exactly how long a treatment should last before velvet becomes a non-issue. 

I wish the instructions on a lot of these medications were not so vague. 

It's a shame as even the store in the city that generally has some good set-ups for its more sensitive stock had their wilds over a light sand substrate with just a single IAL for cover. 

I thought if they'd used the dark coloured shrimp substrate they sell and maybe a handful of java moss or some watersprite chucked in there for cover, the fish would probably put on a better show.


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## rickey

LBF
Have you tried Praziquantel? although not known as a dinoflagellate parasite treatment I wonder if maybe something other that just velvet is also going on.

R


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## LittleBettaFish

I honestly think it's just velvet. Coccina complex wilds are especially prone to velvet, and I think I am just terrible at getting rid of it permanently in most of my tanks. I was reading a thread on a French forum where someone who kept species similar to mine was having the same problem with it just coming back time and time again. 

I've had previously treated adults that visibly appear perfectly healthy. Then they will spawn and have fry, and suddenly velvet will be back in the tank, first in the fry and then in the adults. I'm thinking in this case my adult fish have still been infected with it, but the infection wasn't serious enough that it was visible or caused any distress.

I'm not sure why my rutilans have it again though. I'm thinking it might have just been stress as they are an aggressive species, and there are many males living together in that tank. 

So far none of my new pairs and their fry have shown any indication of infection, and I'm hoping it stays that way. It only seems to reoccur in tanks where there has been previous exposure to velvet. 

Today will be dedicated to completely stripping out my unimaculata and rutilans tanks, doing large water changes on both, blacking them out and starting treatment with Seachem Cupramine. It's not a medication I've used in the past but I hope it does something, especially for my rutilans group as some of the fish in there are the oldest I own.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I emptied out my unimaculata tank and started their Cupramine treatment. I have removed everything from my rutilans tank apart from a whole heap of PVC pipe and some java moss. They are a fairly aggressive species and there isn't a whole lot of cover left so I didn't want them to be fighting all the time. 

Just need to fill up their tank with some water from my aging tub, work out the dosage for the Cupramine and put the blanket over their tank. I tested the water in both tanks today and it was 0ppm for ammonia. It says to leave the Cupramine in for 14 days so I think I'll test the water at the halfway mark and do a water change if necessary then. 

Hopefully by the end of these two weeks I'll have some sort of improvement. 

I also got contacted by one of the buyers of my persephone pairs. It looks like the pair I sold him is going to be coming back home because he is downsizing his wild betta collection. 

Since I am not going to put them back in with the rest of their siblings, I figured I might as well use this pair to breed from. I have a spare tank, heater and filter and just need to pick up some goldvine for both them and the big tank when I get down to the fish store next. 

I caught two of my males sparring today in the big tank. One of them has been nursing a wound on the side of his face, but that didn't stop him from putting on a show. 










Also paid for my pair of Betta sp. wajok from Hermanus. Now I have to get cracking on their tanks!


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## LittleBettaFish

I can't believe how big some of my fry are getting. Some would have to be several months old now, but they still only get fed once every one to two days, and I only do weekly 2L water changes. 

It looks like my biggest sp. apiapi fry is female so that is great. It only has small ventrals and a short, straight anal fin, and I'm hoping that if it is female, she will help form the basis of the breeding program I am going to set-up for this species/locality. I just wish all my juveniles would start showing some richer colouration as they look so bland at the moment. The hendra are starting to get in some iridescence and of course that sent me into a panic about velvet. Heaven forbid anyone shows any clamped fins from time to time. 




































Brownorum juvenile.

I swear I am so indecisive with how I want my tanks to look. I purchased a whole heap of java fern not that long ago, and now I'm already wanting to go back to wood, leaf litter and floating plants. 

I always think my tanks look good, then I go online and see how someone else has their tank set-up and I start getting ideas and next thing I know I'm down at the aquarium using a paper ruler to measure wood. 

I just forgot how fast watersprite grows, and how much cover its roots provide when left floating.


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## MattsBettas

My watersprite all died . It's definitely one of my favorite plants though, I've been trying to find some for sale locally but no luck. I'll probably post a wtb ad on my local forum, it should be common enough. 

Anyways, I hold you responsible for making me want it again, your tanks look great.

I hate how vague medication instructions are. I honestly don't think there's a med I've used without clarification from a forum... Usually there are people that already had the same question which is nice and convenient for me. 

Awesome pics as always!


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## LittleBettaFish

Watersprite is one of my favourite plants along with frogbit and dwarf water lettuce (sadly it doesn't seem available here in Oz). 

I love the look of floating plants with their long roots trailing into the water. It always seems very natural. My watersprite has gone crazy, especially since at least half of it is growing out of the water now. 

All those artificially contrived Amano aquascapes don't do anything for me. Give me dark water, floating plants and wooden tangles/snags and that's what captures my interest. I guess that is why I am usually attracted to blackwater fish species. 

My female unimaculata is at the back of the tank so I can't tell how she is doing, but everyone else seems to be coping with the medication and black-out fine. Fortunately Cupramine seems to have the least vague instructions out of all the medications I have used thus far, and the Seachem Support site seems to answer any questions I might have had about its use. 

I also realised it has been almost a year since I started my blog. It's hard trying to think of new topics to cover to go along with my general updates/fish pictures. Oh well hopefully with the arrival of my two new pairs I'll at least have some more fish to take photos of as I'm sure everyone has seen enough of my hendra, brownorum and sp. apiapi by now. 









(One more photo just in case you haven't)


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## Aus

It's really just enjoyable reading along with your updates, I am learning so much about wilds from them, and what the different ones are like. 

I too enjoy natural looking, jungly scapes. I'd like to try one with just leaf litter and wood some time, though I am planty person at heart. I don't think I could keep up with the whole co2, everything trimmed perfectly scenario, either. But they -are- nice to look at aren't they?

I know what you mean about going online and seeing other people's tanks. One I saw today made me totally rethink my plan for the 10g, so I'm off to the LFS on Saturday to pick up supplies in order to shamelessly mimic it. 

I'm cheering for the female uni.. and all the others, of course. 
Crossed fingers, for the ridding of the velvet!


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha I am really attracted to tanks that closely mimic the habitat fish are found in. Unfortunately for my wilds that would basically mean a leaf-filled puddle so I had to make some concessions. 

I can appreciate the effort and time that goes into creating 'nature aquarium' scapes, but I guess I will always be a biotope girl. I mean whenever the AGA competition results come out the first category I look at is the biotope one. I was really excited this year because there was a tank containing Betta coccina entered. I didn't understand how they could have one of the most stunning species of wild betta and not include a single photo of them with their entry. 

What tank was it that inspired you? I'm forever finding tanks that I think look great but when I try to emulate them my results are ... not so great. I've been meaning to trial hornwort again as I seem to be the only person who keeps wild bettas that can't grow it. 

I'm hoping the unimaculata female pulls through, same with all my rutilans. 

I forgot how easy mouthbrooder fry were to switch to pellets. I have never tried my unimaculata juveniles on pelleted food before, and the other day I put some of the NLS .5mm pellets in and they ate it down like I'd been feeding it to them forever. 

I'm hoping I can get them cured so I can move them onto new homes. If the female pulls through, both her and the male are going to be kept separated by a divider. I don't think I could deal with any more unimaculata fry.


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## LittleBettaFish

People often ask why I keep wild bettas, and this is why ... 

I love watching my wild bettas interact with each other, particularly during courtship and territorial displays. 



















I also like watching my fry growing up alongside their parents and seeing how their behaviour changes towards their parents and siblings as they mature. 

I did have a sort of sad moment just before when I was watching my stiktos pair. They are so friendly, and simply stunning fish. Their new home sounds like it is going to be a great place, but I think I will still miss them. I got one photo of them both together just before but unfortunately the male was out of focus. At least it shows the female's lovely colouring.


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## LittleBettaFish

Most exciting news I've had in a while. 

Was looking at my persephone tank earlier this morning, and there's this fry staring right back at me.

Looks like one of the spawns must have yielded some fry and this lone survivor has somehow managed to evade being cannibalised by its aunts and uncles. 

I tried to get some photos but small, skittish fry don't photograph all that well. 

It's fortunate I found it, as I was going to start overhauling my persephone tank next week. I think it's fast enough and looks enough like a fish now that the rest of the adults in there leave it alone. 

I really hope there are at least a couple more in there.


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## Aus

Ahaha. What a nice surprise! It's awfully cute, the way it's eyeballing you..

At least you know it'll be one tough little fish, having run the gauntlet.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah it is now on the other side of the 3ft long tank, and based on what I saw the adults seem to be ignoring it completely. 

Persephone look so different when they are young. I forgot how red mine all were until the blue came through on their fins.


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## MattsBettas

LBF... I have some questions. 

Someone on my local forum posted that they would be putting an order in online to a wholesaler/store and was wondering if anyone wanted to jump in. The stock list has channoides listed for 35$/pair, which, when you combine the decreased shipping and no import fees (which would be 20$ alone), is probably the best I'll ever get them at. Not getting my hopes up that I anything will work out but might as well check. 
So-

1) How big should the tank be? 
2) What's the max pH their water could be at? 
3) Food?
4) Anything else? Do you think I should go for it?


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## LittleBettaFish

A 10 gallon tank would do fine for a pair. Channoides are not particularly fussy about water conditions, particularly if these are captive bred stock. They do prefer like most wild bettas water that is soft with a low to neutral pH. If you water is particularly hard with a higher pH, you could possibly experience difficulties with inducing your pair to spawn. 

Every wild betta I have ever owned has preferred live/frozen foods to pellets or flakes. However, I've found mouthbrooders are fairly easy to transition over to pellets as they tend to be less finicky and much greedier than my coccina bubblenesters. With that said, I had an albimarginata out of a pair of my fish that would never touch a pellet so it all depends on the individual fish. 

Dark substrate and tannin rich water will show off these fish at their best. I like to use something like shrimp soil or aqua soil as most of these are designed to keep water soft and also help keep my plants healthy. 

I found my channoides liked cooler water. Think low to mid 70s. They don't mind flow from a sponge filter, and appreciate things like terracotta caves/pots and PVC pipe to not only use as cover, but also as potential spawning sites. 

Remember a tight-fitting cover is essential. I personally recommend cling wrap. I just put it over my tank, cut around my cords and press it down against the glass and as long as you are not pulling it off every two seconds it generally lasts a few days before it needs replacing. 

Don't leave any space even if it's only a few centimetres. I cannot stress to those new to wild bettas just how easily they can escape out of a tank. 

If your pair spawns it may be best to remove the female or put her in a breeder net. Some females will harass males to spawn again while holding and either cause him to swallow the eggs/fry or spit them out prematurely. Also you have to make sure the male is keeping condition on between spawns as it takes a lot out of them.

Hope that helps. I haven't had channoides in a while.


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## LittleBettaFish

I am glad I decided to hold off on euthanising my female unimaculata. I have had both them and my rutilans in treatment since Monday afternoon, and tonight when I was feeding the male and juveniles she came down and ate some of the blackworms. That is the first time I have seen her eat in quite some time. 

She still spends most of her time at the surface with her fins clamped, but she definitely doesn't look as bad as she was a few days back when I thought it would be kinder to let her go. 

My rutilans group are also doing really well. I lifted up the blanket to feed them and two males were busy sparring. 

I was going to purchase a copper test kit from Seachem to make sure my levels were okay, but unfortunately it doesn't look like it is in stock anywhere. I've dosed the correct amount and so I suppose I will just have to wait until the 14 days are up to see how well it works.


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## LittleBettaFish

I could not find my sp. apiapi female anywhere this morning. Until I saw her coming out of the film canister with the male. Their last batch of fry became free-swimming yesterday and the male's nest never seems to stay empty for long. 

My hendra pair were also putting on a show and going in and out of the film canister. I'm not sure if any spawning has happened yet, but I bet it will be soon.

My persephone fry is still alive. I did a small water change and cut back some of the watersprite last night, and this morning it was hunting through the java moss. 

I'm not sure if I mentioned it or not, but I am only going to be receiving my miniopinna pair this shipment. My sp. wajok are going to be coming on the next one which I assume would be mid-February. At least that way I have more time to get their tank prepared. 

My hendra juveniles have quickly picked up on the fact that I am the provider of food. As soon as they see me now, they all come over to the front and swim up and down the glass. 





































My brownorum and hendra tanks are looking like they need some work done. The watersprite and Asian water grass in particular are growing out of control. My sp. apiapi tank also needs some intervention. Part of me wishes I'd put the pair in a taller tank as the watersprite keeps pushing up against the glad wrap. 


















(The tank on the right is being used to soak the goldvine for my miniopinna tank)


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## MattsBettas

Thanks so much for the info. I'm thinking a 10g tank, 24-25 degrees, fed frozen brine shrimp, bloodworms, pellets, and white worms with plenty of driftwood and peat and ial (my water is really quite hard, think 8.0-8.2, but I shouldn't have trouble lowering it to 7.0-7.5) and some floating plants all covered in cling wrap should be good, correct me if I'm wrong. 

Is substrate necessary? Would I be better off with sand or bare bottom? 

I think I can do this. I certainly have enough experience with splendens to have an idea of what I'm doing in general, and these are typically a suggested species for wild betta newbies.


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## LittleBettaFish

I personally prefer a substrate but I know there are others who don't use one and have no problems with their wilds. 

I like to use a darker substrate than sand because I feel it brings out the colour of the fish a lot more. 

Wilds aren't hard. I actually found splendens were a lot more difficult to keep. I'm sure you will be able to look after a pair of channoides correctly.


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## MattsBettas

Ok, I'll go bare bottom/leaf litter for now and see how it goes. 

I think I've decided to go for it. I've wanted these for a long time and have the opportunity- why not? 

Thanks for everything. I probably wouldn't even be interested in them without you and your fish and pics .


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## LittleBettaFish

No worries. That's the main reason I post my photos on here. It still surprises me how many people don't even know these fish exist. 

My brownorum male has been very secretive and shy for a little while now. Today however, he decided to join his offspring and female in snacking on some grindals (I know they are his favourite so figured that would get him out). I wanted to make sure he was still healthy and hadn't been beaten up, and fortunately he is still looking good. 

The female's response to him being out was really odd. I think she was trying to intimidate him as she kept getting very close to him and following him around in more of an aggressive rather than curious fashion. She chased him off once, but then he went on the offensive and she backed down and let him stay. 

The photos aren't spectacular as these two move so fast I have to sort of blindly snap some photos off and hope that they are passable. 














































This is their biggest juvenile. I am thinking male still at this point, but we will see how the rest of the fry grow out. Just starting to see the red come through on some of these bigger juveniles. Although I think if my mum was that aggressive I would probably be trying to stay as inconspicuous as possible as well.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I heard some sad news yesterday. I sold a pair of persephone to a local hobbyist and they were going to come back to live with me because he was downsizing his collection. Unfortunately, the last I'd heard the female had developed dropsy and was most likely going to be euthanised. 

The only problem is that I was going to take the pair back because I could use them for breeding. I don't really have the space or finances to house a single fish, and I don't particularly want to put him with any of my other females because I only have a few left and they are too valuable to risk contracting anything. I'm hoping he can find the male a home with one of the two other people that have my pairs in this state. Otherwise I'm not really sure what to do. 

I had the buyer come and pick up my stiktos pair. Apparently they arrived at their new home safely and so hopefully they will be as prolific for their new owners as they were for me. 

Speaking of persephone, my single persephone fry is doing really well. A few of the adults have shown some interest in it, but they don't really pursue it or act aggressively towards it. 

Now I just have a whole heap of empty tanks. One for my sp. wajok, one for my miniopinna and one that I haven't decided what to do with. I think this is the lowest amount of tanks I've had running for ages. Looks a little less impressive than it used to, but at least the majority of my fish are healthier.


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## LittleBettaFish

Today I discovered as second, slightly smaller fry in my persephone tank. I like how these fry just go right up to the adults and sort of stare them down as the adults consider whether their niece/nephews are something worth eating. 










I hope these two are female, as I have so many males it would be great to get a few more pairs out of this group. 

These are the likely parents of the two fry. The female is the only one that spawns out of the few females remaining, and this male is the only one I've ever seen end up with at least some fry hatching. 


















She was fighting with the female in the foreground hence why they don't look particularly pleased with each other. 

I have sorted out the second shelf on my rack (I don't know why the photo came out so tilted). Basically the empty tank on the left is going to hold either a pair of B. coccina or B. rutilans, whatever I can source first. The middle two tanks hold my B. hendra and B. brownorum respectively, and the tank on the far right is for my B. miniopinna pair. Their wood is soaking in another container as goldvine tends to make a mess in the first couple of weeks of being submersed. 










The long tank on the top shelf houses my B. persephone group, and the empty tank next to that is for my sp. wajok. I decided to purchase some new wood instead of trying to cram the other pieces in, and I also need to purchase some more substrate as I finally ran out of aqua soil. 










This is a close-up of the wood in my B. coccina/rutilans tank. I went with a 45cm tank simply because my 30cm ones are getting rather crowded now that the fry are getting bigger and I thought it was better to start off with more space. 

My unimaculata female is showing continued signs of improvement. She seems to have stopped spending all her time clamped at the surface and is showing a continued interest in food. 

Sadly, two of my rutilans sp. cf. green did not fare so well, and developed dropsy. I think their immune systems are pretty shot at the moment and it seems like the smallest abrasion can turn into a full-blown infection. I had to euthanise these two fish this afternoon, but the rest of the group seems to be doing okay and I believe we are at the halfway point in treatment so here's hoping they can hold on a bit longer. 

The persephone male is going to a new home, so that worked out well. He will be joining his brother and sister there, so he won't be alone.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well this is our rather horrendous weather forecast for the next few days. 

http://www.bom.gov.au/vic/forecasts/melbourne.shtml

This part is what worries me as so many fires get started by lighting strikes and on these kind of extreme days it can be devastating. 



> The chance of thunderstorms in the afternoon with little or no rainfall.


Then there are also those idiots that drop cigarette butts or use something like power tools on total fire ban days. Worse is the people who start them deliberately. In a country like Australia where our summers have the potential for massive loss of life because of bushfires, I always think anyone caught lighting a fire should just be taken out and shot. It's not just people that are injured or die, but countless wildlife, pets and livestock as well. It's horrific. I saw the aftermath of probably our worst bushfire here in Victoria in person, and it was like the whole place had been hit by an atomic bomb. 

I am just posting this because bushfires are probably what I am most afraid of. It is also why I am so hesitant to move out into the country. I don't mind losing a house, but I would be crushed if something ever happened to my pets because we couldn't get to them in time.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well this is the second day of what is predicted to be 40 degree plus weather. I can't wait for the cool change to come through on Friday/Saturday. 

With this warm weather, it seems like every single stinging insect has been attracted to the tub where I harvest my mosquito larvae from. I suppose at least my duckweed is loving all this sun, although I need to add some more water because it has evaporated so much over the past couple of days. 

I haven't heard anything about my miniopinna pair. I am hoping that the next shipment into Australia has arrived/will be arriving soon so that I can get my pair in the next couple of weeks. I'm going to be filling up their tank today as the wood is waterlogged and I want to get the duckweed and watersprite established somewhat before the fish go in. I'm hoping once I put the wood in the tank it isn't going to decide to suddenly develop that slimy white fungus and foul up the water. 

The rest of my fish are doing fine. The rutilans and unimaculata groups seem to be okay, and I don't think any more of the rutilans have developed dropsy. They are still quite clamped and rather lethargic, but I am thinking that is partly attributed to the high water temperature, blacked out tank and medication. Next Monday will signal the end of the treatment so I am planning to go purchase some Cuprisorb to completely remove the copper. I will then probably repeat the treatment just to make sure that all the velvet is gone. 

I got some photos of of my various fry/juveniles. Unfortunately, it is hard to get them to stay still (now they are bigger their parents are not averse to chasing them off), so this was the best I could manage. 









Brownorum juvenile. A lot of these fry/juveniles seem male. I hope I have at least one female. 









Hendra showing some lovely colouration. I'm thinking female but who knows at this point. 


















Sp. apiapi. I think I have a number of females in this group of fry/juveniles/sub-adults. They are not as friendly as their parents so I had to bribe them with some mosquito larvae.


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## LittleBettaFish

According to Jodi-Lea's FB page a new shipment of fish arrived. Hopefully my miniopinna pair are on it and have arrived safely. 

I filled up their tank and put some IAL, a tiny piece of watersprite and the wood in there. I am going to wait on the duckweed for a couple of days just because if I put it in it gets all over my hands if I need to remove anything from the tank. 










It's really aggravating because the wood doesn't look like it is in quite the right place, but it's difficult based on the two photos I took to figure out what needs tweaking. 

My persephone were being rather active today. I tossed in some grindals and white worms and they were scavenging around in the substrate for those. My biggest fry was eating alongside some of the adults and always seems to have a rounded stomach so I am assuming it is getting enough to eat. The other smaller fry seems to stay at the surface more. I probably would too with that lot in there. 





































I really want to do something to this tank as it doesn't allow for very flattering shots of my persephone. That was the best out of about the two dozen or more I took. 

I did water changes on my sp. apiapi, hendra and brownorum tanks. It makes life so much easier having a bucket right there with aged, heated water. All I do is siphon out 2L of water from these tanks once a week and add the aged water in with a small jug. I haven't tested my parameters but my fish are happy, healthy and spawning so I figured that they must be okay. These species are the kind that will let you know when the conditions are not to their liking!


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## Aus

Your persephone fry crack me up.. idk why, maybe the big eyes, its a funny expression. I am so glad to see so many fry in your tanks, and your tanks look wonderful btw. 

Hope all your animals are doing okay in the heat. Mine don't know where to put themselves, poor things. 

I heard back from Jodi-Lea, seems there's not many pairs available, and none in the species I want. I'm waiting to see an updated list after the Feb order comes in, apparently I might be in luck there.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah they are growing surprisingly fast given I don't really offer much in the way of supplemental feeding. They actually had a tussle today with the small fry losing. I'm hoping at least one of them is a female as they are sorely outnumbered by the males in this tank. 

The dogs and cats are inside enjoying the air conditioner (except for Whistler who has to stay in the laundry because he couldn't keep from trying to attack everyone when I brought him inside). We've basically had the two air conditioners on 24/7 since Tuesday when this started. 

Yeah I think you got in a bit late as she did have a number of wilds a while back. Hmm I wonder what species are coming in, in February. I really am impressed with the quality of the wilds I got from Joty. I am wanting a pair of burdigala and uberis from him. I still am annoyed I didn't have the money to get all the pairs I wanted when Jodi-Lea last did a big order.

What I am really waiting on is a pair of wild-caught Betta coccina. I know it is desperate when I even have their tank partially set-up. Oh well, I suppose a girl can dream. 

I am waiting with bated breath to hear about my Betta miniopinna pair. I hate the whole importing process and then having to have fish shipped down here to me. I'll have to go through it all again in February when my sp. wajok come across as well. 

Got some more photos of my persephone males fighting after a water change yesterday and the addition of some rooibos tea. I don't know what it is about their current set-up but it just doesn't seem to allow me to get as crisp a photos as I used to.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I spent last night on the kitchen floor with the dogs. Remind me not to do that again. I was concerned about Nike because she wouldn't settle in the crate. So poor Eos had to go in the crate while Nike sat with her bum in my face the whole night. At least the air conditioner blows right into the kitchen so I was cool. 

I don't know what I am going to do with my sp. apiapi group. It's only about a 15L tank and there are at least a couple dozen fry and juveniles in there. Plus I caught the male and female in the canister just now getting ready to spawn again (their latest fry only just left the nest). I was thinking of moving the male and female to a separate tank and leaving this one as a grow-out. But they are doing so well in there that I am afraid to disturb them. 

The biggest female sub-adult is starting to be more friendly with me. However, she's still impossible to get photos of even when she is the third biggest fish in the tank. She is going to be partnered up with a male sibling when I can find one, and move out into a separate tank with him. I did notice a juvenile with a pointed caudal and longer anal fin so I think that might be a possible mate for her. 




























I swear every time I get the camera out she sits still long enough for me to line up the shot and then moves at just the right (well wrong for me) moment. 

I'm liking how lean my wilds are staying on this current diet. They have all gotten bigger since I've owned them, but they definitely aren't as thick-bodied as the fish I had on daily feedings of blackworms.


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## LittleBettaFish

Best photo I've taken of either of my persephone fry. It was sitting in front of one of the rooibos tea bags so I managed to get a fairly in focus shot of it. 










Just wanted to share because I am rather obsessed with these two little fish.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well while it's still hot here at least it isn't sweltering hot. The only good thing about the heat was that it boosted the numbers of mosquito larvae in my outside tub and my duckweed has never looked better. 

Not much to report since yesterday. My hendra female was quite interested in the male this morning so I assume that another spawn is not far off. 

I managed to get a full body shot of my biggest persephone fry. 










Also, my miniopinna tank is slowly starting to come together. I want to go to my LFS tomorrow to see if they have any watersprite available. I want this tank to eventually just be full of the roots from the watersprite and duckweed. 










I was going to do peat moss over the substrate, but I am hesitant because while it brings out the colour of the fish it does make a mess. I'm thinking I might just find a way of incorporating it into my filtration instead. 

I am anxiously waiting any news from Jodi-Lea about this pair. I'm hoping they came in on this shipment and are safe and well. However, even then they still have to both survive the trip down here all the way from QLD.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well the blanket has come off the hospital tanks and I am going to turn the heaters down as the water temperature is sitting at around 30 degrees. 

It looks like everyone is alive. However, the two adult unimaculata are still looking affected by the velvet, along with several of the rutilans. I'm going to test the ammonia in both tanks, as I haven't done water changes for the past 13 days, just to make sure there isn't any issue with the water quality.

Admittedly, it's not the remarkable recovery I was hoping for, but at least the fish seem healthier than when they started the treatment. 

I mean my unimaculata female was barely breathing and did nothing but float lifelessly at the surface with her fins clamped tight up against her body. Tonight she actually jumped to get at a whiteworm that was stuck to the glass. 










While this photo shows her fins clamped, she actually did open them fully tonight which is the first time in weeks I've seen her do that. 

I'm going to do some water changes tomorrow and then I think I will commence will another 14 day treatment. 

I really want to get this licked permanently. I feel so sorry for my poor fish that have to go through this again and again.


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## MattsBettas

LBF, how long does the goldvine need to soak? Can you run the sponge while it's soaking? Anything else I should know about using it? 

I got a piece today for the channoides. I wonder who inspired me to do so.


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## LittleBettaFish

I don't really have an exact time frame as each piece is different. However, I'd think it would need at least a week to become fully waterlogged, maybe more depending on how thick some of the branches are.

The one thing you have to watch out for is that goldvine seems particularly prone to developing a white slime/fungus on it when it is first put into water. I like to have a sponge filter or any filter going while the wood is soaking just because I feel that the water being stagnant makes this process a lot worse.


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## LittleBettaFish

I found some more watersprite for my miniopinna tank (I wanted it already have made the transition to floating form) and the leaves have sunk. It's basically ready to go. I just need to do a partial water change, put the heater in and wait for the fish to arrive. 



















It's not the most impressive tank, but once the roots start to grow on the watersprite I think it will look a lot better. I wanted something that provided a decent amount of hiding places, but not so much that I wouldn't be able to find fish or fry in there. My sp. apiapi female routinely sends me into a panic when I manage to lose her in about 15L of water. 

I also found a third persephone fry in my tank yesterday. It is roughly the same size as the others and appears to be doing equally as well. I am hoping that there are at least one or two more that I just haven't seen yet. If one of them is female, I could use her to produce an F3 generation alongside the further F2 fry I am planning once I separate out a pair from the main group.


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## LittleBettaFish

Still no news on the miniopinna front. I just hesitate to send an email through to Jodi-Lea because undoubtedly she is still sorting out fish that are coming out of quarantine. However, I do want to know if they are both in Oz and are actually alive. 

Was really bummed to hear one of the pairs of persephone I sold died in the recent heatwave. That means there's only one of my four pairs left outside of my fishroom and I don't even know if they are still alive. 

With that said, my three fry are thriving and getting bigger by the day. I am hoping that they are all females at this point because I want to have replacements for the ones I sold. 

My sp. apiapi male has another nest full of eggs. I swear these two fish have literally not stopped spawning since they arrived here. The longest I have seen the male without any eggs or fry to look after is about two or three days. 

My hendra male also has eggs he is guarding. I noticed the older juveniles near the nest so I wonder if they are waiting for the fry to become free-swimming. 

I did a water change on my hendra and brownorum tanks today, and on my persephone and killifish tanks yesterday. I will admit it is nice to not have as many fish as I used to. It barely takes me any time at all nowadays to maintain all my tanks. 

My persephone were doing some sparring because I changed the water so I took a few photos before they noticed me. 



























One of the remaining females.


















In front of the sponge filter is the favoured place to fight.


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## Joshaeus

Wonderful fish, Littlebetta! Since you are good with coccina complex bettas, I'd like to ask your opinion on something. It is a water acidifying/softening method that I've come up with, and I want to know if you think it would work. Here it goes:

A: A container seperate from the fish tank is filled with a large quantity of distilled water.

B: Said tank has a filtration system which contains what I call a 'battery' - a bag of an acidifying substance (likely sphagum peat moss) that is replaced once every about 2 weeks to maintian maximum efficiency.

C: The tank's distilled water is replaced with small (maybe 1 gallon to every 9 distilled? Would depend on the water hardness) amounts of dechlorinated tap water. Any buffers within the water would be so spread out that the acid would neutralize them, keeping the water at an acidic, presumably soft (I'm pretty sure KH, at least, goes down when buffers are overwhelmed) level.

D: If the battery is consistently changed, and tap water is not added in excessively large quantities at once, then acidic water would be able to be acquired without the use of a RO unit or a distiller after the initial water input.

Do you think that this would work?


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## MattsBettas

http://www.bettafish.com/showthread.php?p=3794218#post3794218


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## LittleBettaFish

Joshaeus I have to admit I am not very well-versed at all in dealing with harder water. Our tap water here has a KH of basically 0 and requires basically nothing but water conditioner to make it suitable for wild bettas. 

Hallyx on here is better at water chemistry than me. Your plan sounds like it could possibly work, but I don't want to give an emphatic yes if it is the wrong advice. 

I posted in your journal MattsBettas. 

I have done basically nothing fish related today. However, I did manage in the brief moment we weren't out running errands, to take a couple pictures of my fish. 

My brownorum male was out earlier today, which was a relief as I haven't seen him for a little while and I know how aggressive the female is towards him at times. He had some damage to his dorsal and anal but otherwise appeared in good health. 



















One of the biggest juveniles in the tank is showing some great colour. No spot, but I am still uncertain of its gender. I was thinking male the other day but now I am not so sure. It is very aggressive though and is always chasing its bigger brother off. 



















I also got some photos of my hendra yesterday that I didn't post. The juveniles are colouring up nicely as well and I can't wait to start sexing them. 














































These two tanks are massively overgrown. I'm not really sure what to do with them. I was thinking of pulling out the java fern and letting the watersprite fully take over but I think it's going to make too much of a mess and disturb everyone too much. So I guess it will have to stay like that until my juveniles/fry are bigger. 










I look at my current set-ups and maintenance schedule now and wish I'd done it this way since the beginning. All the time and money I've wasted, and fish I've lost.


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## Hallyx

"...wish I'd done it this way since the beginning. All the time and money I've wasted, and fish I've lost." 
Amen, Sister. And don't we all.
​


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## MattsBettas

LBF, I heard you got your fish in. We need pictures.


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## LittleBettaFish

I'll try and have some pictures up tomorrow or the day after. They are still quite stressed as I think the labels on two of the bags were swapped around, so my poor miniopinna male ended up in the wajok tank and one of the wajok ended up in the miniopinna tank. Fortunately, they didn't make capturing them that difficult (I'm sure that will come in time). 

I did get one of the female miniopinna. It isn't exactly a great shot but it's going to take them a couple of days before they settle in. 










I expect she will look like one of my persephone females when fully coloured up, except I think her ventrals will stay more of this bright red. 

I have wanted this species since I first got into keeping wilds. I never thought I would ever have them in my tank considering they aren't exactly easy to find.

Now if I could get my hands on some livida and coccina I would be really happy :mrgreen:


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## MattsBettas

She already reminds me a lot of the persephone, though I can't tell that much.

I'm very happy your fish got to you all safe and sound. Shipping fish is very nerveracking and I'm sure it's much worse with them being your dream species. Are they from Hermanus? 

You'll have to post pics one they've settled in and colored up and remind me why they're on my fish bucket list.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah this species and persephone are so similar. 

My miniopinna pair have discovered the film canister. They are now flirting with each other and the female is barred right up and following the male around rather than being chased by him. I doubt they'll spawn but at least it is promising considering they have only been here a couple of hours. 

Both they and the sp. wajok are from Hermanus. The miniopinna were my Christmas present from mum and the sp. wajok I got myself as I was rather curious to see what it looked like. 

I still have lots more species I want to get my hands on. I only have space for one more tank on my current rack, but once I get my new one I should be able to fit more fish on. My dream is to have the entire coccina complex and that will most likely be the only fish I keep (apart from my goldfish).


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I thought it was odd that lately I have been having such a good run in my fish room. I knew something was going to have to go wrong eventually. 

It turns out that my sp. wajok pair have ich. I noticed a white spot on the pectoral of one of the fish when they first arrived, and thought perhaps it was an injury. However, they both had some white spots showing this morning and so I'm going to push the temperature right up and just treat it with some multi-cure I have on hand. 

Only problem is that my miniopinna pair would have been exposed as well so I'm not sure whether to try and treat them or wait and see if they show any symptoms first. I don't want to weaken or kill them with treatment if it's not necessary. This complex doesn't particularly like extremely high temperatures and so I want to be careful as I don't know if I am going to be able to replace them should something go wrong. 

I suppose at least ich is easier to treat and less likely to kill my fish than velvet.


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## LittleBettaFish

Here's some pictures of my miniopinna male. They are not great because he doesn't stay in one spot for long but you can see that he is starting to get more comfortable with his new home. 




























He's been a bit hard on his female (although she does seem to instigate it half the time) so I definitely want to pick up some java moss this weekend just to provide her with some places to hide.


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## MattsBettas

They look great, I can see the similarities between them and the persephone but definitely differences too. I hope the ich doesn't take hold. 

Any pics of the wajok? Or are you going to wait until they're all better? I've never seen pics so I'm curious haha.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah so do I. I don't have any photos of my sp. wajok simply because their tank is really cloudy and the photos come out looking terrible. They are fully coloured up and swimming around hunting mosquito larvae and grindals so I'm hoping because there are only a couple of spots on them that I caught it early. 

They are very similar in appearance to normal Betta rutilans. I still can't tell the genders apart though so I asked Hermanus how he does.


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## LittleBettaFish

My miniopinna male is being very hard on the female. I put in some java moss yesterday but will be picking up some more tomorrow morning. She's got some damage to her fins and to her pectorals and I really don't want her stressed out. 

The male has a nest going on in one of the film canisters but I don't think the female is quite ready yet. Unfortunately, I didn't expect the male to be so aggressive towards her as most of my current ones are not. I think she is also quite submissive compared to my other females who will usually stand their ground. 










This is her up near the front of the tank. So far the male's method of wooing her seems to be 'continually stalk/chase her around'.

Also I got a couple of photos of one of my sp. wajok. Their tank is very bare so they don't like staying out from under the leaves for too long. However, I did manage to tempt one of them out with grindals.


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## LittleBettaFish

My Betta miniopinna male now has three bubblenests going. Two in the film canisters and one at the front of the tank. I fed them some freshly hatched BBS and mosquito larvae today and I am hoping that I can get the female plumper and more receptive to his advances. 

In other news, my rutilans sp. cf. green seem to be recovering well from the velvet. I picked up some carbon today to get rid of any remaining copper and I will be putting the substrate back in their tank tomorrow as they don't like the bottom being left bare. I'm hoping this time the velvet is gone for good. 

Unfortunately, my unimaculata pair aren't going as well. At this point I'm just sick of them being stuck in that place where they are not really improving but not really deteriorating either. I really don't want to be nursing a tank of chronically sick fish for months at a time trying to get them better. I've been there and done that and definitely couldn't do it again. I am giving it until March and if there hasn't been any visible improvement, I am most likely going to euthanise the whole group. 

My pair of sp. wajok however, are doing really well. Still can't tell which is the male or female (I'm hoping at this point there is a female), but they have been active, coloured up and eating in spite of the very high temperature (I think it's pushing 90 degrees). Tomorrow morning I am going to the aquarium in the city to pick up some java moss to go in their tank. Their wood is almost fully waterlogged, and that will also provide some cover when it goes in next week. I took some pictures of them tonight now the water is clearing up. They are beautiful fish and are very friendly. 




























I am looking at ordering some dried riparian leaves and some IALs from Aquagreen up in the NT. I might also get some hornwort to try out. I've used the riparian leaves in the past in my Australian native set-ups and the plan is to use them to add bulk and create a realistic looking leaf litter in conjunction with IAL in a couple of my tanks (namely the persephone and rutilans tanks). 

Other than some water changes and purchasing some rooibos tea bags while grocery shopping, I haven't really do much with my fish today. The plan tomorrow is to fix up my rutilans tank and sort my fish cupboard out.


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## LittleBettaFish

I had to euthanise my male unimaculata just now. He'd been acting listless and floating around at the surface recently. I have been busy and thought it was the velvet affecting him. However, today when I had a closer look I saw that he was suffering from quite advanced dropsy. 

I thought it was best to let him go. 

I did a water change on their tank today, added some rooibos tea and I am going to try a medication that contains acriflavine. I just need to pick some up from the store (mine expired) and after a further two week treatment I'm going to see how they do. 

I feel particularly sad for the female because they were such a friendly pair and almost always together. I have about half a dozen juveniles in with her still so I suppose at least she is not alone.


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## LittleBettaFish

I sold four pairs of killifish today and it looks like the buyer is coming back to pick up another four next Monday. Because I thought it was stupid to have two tanks holding the same fish, I put the original male, his three daughters I had separated and the lone poliaki female in with the others. I also moved all their plants across and it seems that everyone is doing well. I thought perhaps the original male might attack his sons but he seems more interested in chasing around the biggest of the females. 

I also was very excited this morning to see my pair of Betta miniopinna had successfully spawned. I thought this would take much longer based on the female's behaviour. However, I guess I was wrong as the male has a nest full of eggs that he has been watching over. Hopefully in another couple of days I will see some fry hatching. 

Otherwise nothing much else to report from here in Oz. The hot weather finally broke and it's much cooler today. However, it's still so dry and I wish we would get a couple of days of soaking rain.


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## Joshaeus

Out of curiosity, but do you think that most wild bettas need water doctoring? Obviously coccina complex bettas do for most of us, and rubra and foerchi complex bettas would also need water doctoring, but what about the other complexes?


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## LittleBettaFish

I don't have personal experience with a wide range of wilds as my area of 'speciality' is the coccina complex. However, I think most of the unimaculata complex (excluding macrostoma) certain species from the pugnax complex as well as the albimarginata and picta complexes are not as fussy about water parameters as some of the more sensitive species.

Captive bred fish also tend to be less sensitive than wild-caught stock. However, I'm sure that most wilds could live in 'imperfect' conditions, you probably just would not get any spawning occurring.


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## LittleBettaFish

My Betta miniopinna eggs hatched and the male has been doing a good job tending to them. 

I cleaned my sp. apiapi, hendra and brownorum tanks today. My sp. apiapi male has fry in his nest, my hendra pair just spawned this afternoon and my poor brownorum male looks to have had most of his anal fin removed. I am assuming that is from the female rather than one of the juveniles. I don't know what to do with him. I wish I'd used a bigger tank because that way I could have made a partition and kept him separated. 

Lately, I have been considering keeping Australian natives again. I am actually a fan of Australian natives, particularly pseudomugil species, smaller rainbowfish, galaxias, smelt and gudgeons. I definitely want to get a group of pseudomugil mellis (honey blue-eyes) and have them set-up in a biotope style tank as I really regret selling my original group. I also am considering pseudomugil tenellus because I like them as well. 

Now I have somehow ended up on Aquagreen looking at the natives he has available rather than the plants and IALs I was supposed to be ordering.


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## Joshaeus

Too bad about the brownorum male...they sound quite unfriendly by wild betta standards. Hope he pulls through.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well this morning I was going to net my brownorum male and put him in a separate container and look at getting him a small tank of his own. 

However, when I went to have a look for him, I found him lying with all his fins torn off upside down on the bottom of the tank. I have no idea when this happened or how long he has been like this, but he is in a very small container at the moment and I am praying that he is just in shock and is able to pull through. 

I have never had a female this aggressive (I think it is her because none of the juveniles are big enough to inflict that kind of damage), and I don't understand why he doesn't seem to fight back as all her fins and scales are intact. 

I will be crushed if he dies as he is such a stunning male. 

I will definitely be retiring this female from breeding if I can get a daughter to replace her with as she is just too aggressive. 

She has male offspring in there and she just flares at them and chases them off every now and then. But this is like a sustained and purposeful attack. 

Making me feel better is the fact that my miniopinna pair is doing so well. The female waits for me to put her mosquito larvae in now and spends all her time flaring at the hendra group and flirting with the male. Unfortunately, the inside of the glass needs major cleaning but because the male is a first-time father I don't want to do any maintenance until the fry are free-swimming.



















The male did make a brief appearance while I was taking these photos but they were moving too quickly for me to get anything but this really bad photo of the female in breeding dress. 










And my brownorum male just died while I was typing this. I can't believe I lost him. He was looking so well recently and I've only had him a few months.


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## Aquatail

I'm so sorry about your brownorum male. SIP


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## LittleBettaFish

He was one of my favourite fish, as he was so beautiful and so full of personality. I knew I should have pulled him earlier but of course I didn't listen to my instincts and now he's dead. I know she is only a fish, but God I hate that female right now. If none of his sons have his quality I am going to be even more disappointed as he was such a stunning example of his species.


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## BettaLover1313

Very sorry about your brownorum male. S.I.P.


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## LittleBettaFish

Today was a mix of good and bad. Good news was that my hendra fry hatched and my miniopinna spawned a second time. There is a whole nest full of eggs this time so hoping for a decent number of fry. 

However, the bad news is that I euthanised my remaining unimaculata juveniles and the female. She was displaying symptoms of dropsy along with several of the juveniles and I wasn't going to start to try and treat them after all they've been through. I gave their tank and heater a thorough wipe down with rubbing alcohol, and threw out their sponge filter. I'm going to give it a thorough rinse with the hose tomorrow and then let it sit dry in the sun for a couple of weeks. 

As they were my mum's fish, she now wants to get a pair of Betta macrostoma when my rack gets moved downstairs. Personally I don't particularly like the bigger species of wild betta, and no longer want to keep anything but the coccina complex. The bigger fish need more tank space, larger water changes, and I would have to keep the pair separate anyway because I don't want any fry. It seems like every fish I like she doesn't, and I don't really like having fish around that I am not very emotionally invested in. 

The fish I was considering for her was a pair of Apistogramma baenschi inka 50 or Apistogramma bitaeniata. That way I could do a very natural looking blackwater set-up and it wouldn't look out of place with the rest of my tanks. Plus the apistos are colourful, and based on the videos I've seen, are at least as bold as my wilds.


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## Hallyx

I love those Apistogramma from what I've seen and read about them. Thought seriously about getting one. But they aren't that easy to come by it seems. Not inexpensive.

Sorry to hear of your troubles. All I can offer is a <sigh>


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## LittleBettaFish

Everything fish related (except for some natives) is expensive here and I always seem to be drawn to the rarest and most expensive fish haha 

Of course it's probably the two species I'm interested in that I am not going to be able to source. I know Fishchick Aquatics gets in apistos but I'm not sure if she posts them from shop to your door any more or only does airport to airport. 

I found some here and while I have purchased fish from this store plenty of times in the past, after the fiasco with the velvet, I am always hesitant to purchase from anyone but Fishchick Aquatics/Jodi-Lea. Plus I always know the quality of her fish is superb. 

http://shop.coburgaquarium.com.au/livestock/cichlids/american/apistogramma-inka-50.html


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## LittleBettaFish

It's too hot to do much of anything today. However, I did get some photos of my fish. 

It's quite difficult to get in focus photos of juvenile bettas, particularly when their father keeps leaving his nest to come and chase everyone around. They also refused to pose for any group shots. 














































I had a look at my brownorum juveniles today and I don't think the males are going to develop that really vibrant red that their father had. He also had a lot of iridescence on his side and sadly it looks like my males are going to be much more washed out. Hopefully as they mature their colour starts to darken, but I don't think it will. 










Then here we have the homicidal female cruising about. Going back, I realise she has always had this sort of evil expression even when I first got her.


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## LittleBettaFish

I took a photo of my rack today. The only two wild betta tanks missing from this shot are my group of rutilans sp. cf. green that are on the bottom shelf, and the sp. apiapi tank that is on the adjacent sideboard. 










The empty tank on the top shelf is for most likely a pair of 'standard' rutilans, and I have a spare 2ft tank on my bottom shelf that will be divided in half with perspex and used to house a pair of burdigala and uberis when they next become available (and I have the money to purchase them). 

I am finally getting my set-up to how I want it to look and maintenance at this point couldn't be easier. I simply do once weekly 2L water changes on the tanks on the middle shelf, and 5L water changes once weekly on my persephone and rutilans tank. I really wish I had set-up water aging tubs with heaters a lot earlier. It certainly cuts down on time, and I definitely think the fish are doing better with this method. 










This is a closer look at my miniopinna tank. I think they were spawning again today and I saw a very small fry in the main tank so hopefully I will start to see more fry in a month or so when they get bigger and start coming out more.


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## Chesh

Sorry to hear of your recent troubles, but glad for the successes peppered in. You mentioned Apistos. . . definitely high up on my list of 'one day,' along with B.channoides. Such lovely creatures. . .


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Chesh. Losing my brownorum male was probably the biggest blow. He was such a stunning, healthy and personable fish and unfortunately I think his quality is not going to be matched by his surviving sons. 

I expected to lose my unimaculata group. They had been sick for so long, and in the end it was sort of a relief to not be constantly battling with the velvet. 

However, surprisingly my rutilans group seem to have made it through their treatment and are looking as good (and aggressive) as ever. I did lose a handful of fish, but there are still over a dozen of them so I'm hoping that this time the velvet has been completely eradicated. 

They are such a violent species. I had to put in some wood and more java moss, as they were tearing each other to pieces. I think I may need some more wood and definitely some leaf litter and surface cover because otherwise the smallest fish end up with all their fins gone. 



















I still think this juvenile hendra male is one of the best fish I have bred. He has such rich colouring and hasn't gotten too bulky through the body. He is definitely the male I will be retaining. 





































Then here's just a quick snap of my miniopinna female hunting down grindal worms and mosquito larvae.


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## MattsBettas

Ashlea the channoides are breeding! 

Any advice? Don't be surprised to hear from me more...


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I wasn't surprised. I did tell you that they were like guppies. 

Just try not to disturb the male. Some first time fathers will hold to term no matter what, but others will swallow if they start to get stressed. Let him be and if the female is pestering him put her in a breeder net or in a separate tank. 

However, one thing I did notice with my unimaculata pair was when I added in some crushed coral and kept the pH higher, they would spawn but the male would not hold to term. It wasn't until I dropped the pH back down that I got fry. 

So if they continue to spawn but the male continually swallows this could be one possibility.


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## LittleBettaFish

I was trawling back through my Photobucket account yesterday, and it was both startling and rather horrifying to see just how many fish I've owned during my short time in the hobby. While I did sell a great deal of fish to other hobbyists, there are still plenty that died under my care. 

I was perhaps saddest about the wilds I lost including several persephone, my juvenile tussyae, my pair of ideii, and my first groups of coccina, unimaculata, brownorum and uberis. Most were due to jumping, but some were because I simply didn't appreciate how sensitive some of these species are and there wasn't a lot of information I could find online (that wasn't in another language) to push a very raw beginner in the right direction. 










This picture reminds me of where it all started. That was my one half of my original Betta rutilans sp. cf. green pair. This was probably taken some time in 2011. While I did have a group of coccina, I still think of my rutilans pair as my first 'proper' wilds. They were the first fish I successfully spawned, and I miss them both very much. I have no idea what happened to the female, but I believe the male died during this most recent velvet treatment. 

I always think it's good to look back and see how far you have come. I remember when raising even one fry seemed impossible and yet now I have tanks full of them. At one point it seemed like I would never get past all those issues I was having with velvet, but I did and my newer stock has been flourishing. 

That's why I always get sad when I see people who remain steadfastly secure in their ignorance. I think those individuals that are open-minded, and amenable to further learning, get the most satisfaction from this hobby. I know some people might think I know everything there is to know about the wilds I keep, but I've really only just begun on my journey. I never stop learning, and even now, several years on, my fish still find ways to challenge my preconceptions.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my rutilans must have heard me reminiscing because I have a pair spawning in one of the film canisters. This was completely unexpected because they have been so sick up until recently, and because I have never seen any fish from this group show the slightest interest in spawning since the original female went missing. 

The original male was a mouthbrooder. Honestly I don't know if this is him or one of his sons so I would be interested in seeing what method he uses if this spawn is successful. 

Now I am torn. I didn't want to attempt to get an F2 generation from this group because they most likely still have velvet, and they would pass that onto their fry. But once this group dies I probably won't be able to source a wild-caught pair of this species as no one really knows much about it. 

At least if I do separate them I can easily tell them apart from the others. The male is the biggest in the tank and the female has a stuck out gill flap from an old injury. 

Sometimes I feel like one of those people who look at dolphins and can tell them apart. I'll be counting notches in fins soon.


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## LittleBettaFish

It doesn't look like the spawn from my rutilans pair eventuated in anything. I gave them a feed of whiteworms and grindals this morning and everyone was eating which is always a good sign. 

I have been seeing some of my miniopinna fry out at the front of the tank now they are bigger, and I managed to get a photo of one before it went and hid in the watersprite. 










The female miniopinna of course is always out and about. I gave her some mosquito larvae just now and she was alternating between hunting it down and flaring at the hendra male. 



















This pair seem very content with their set-up. I still can't believe I was not only able to get my hands on a pair, but also to have them successfully spawn and produce healthy fry. The male spends most of his time rearing fry in the film canister so I rarely see him out. I am hoping he is like my sp. apiapi male and never stops spawning. 

I have been trying to make my sp. wajok feel more comfortable and fatten up the one I think is female. Because their tank is bare and the water very stained with tannins, it makes getting decent photos quite difficult. Hopefully I can convince mum to go to the aquarium tomorrow to get some wood for their tank. 










I think this is the male. He hates the brownorum female in the tank next to theirs and I always catch them flaring at each other and swimming up and down the glass. I did tell him that she killed her male so he'd better watch out but he seems confident he could take her. 

Then my hendra male was waiting for me to feed him so I got a quick snap. You can see his lovely son in the background of the photo. It still looks like a majority of the juveniles (if not all of them) are females.










Speaking of the brownorum female, I think I am going to move her into my 25cm cube. She has been harassing the biggest male and female juveniles, and I don't want to leave her in there in case she kills one of them. I just need to pick up some more substrate and then she can go next to my persephone tank. She's just too unpredictable and vicious to be allowed with others of her species. 

I was also rather chuffed to hear my blog was mentioned in an article in the latest addition of the Flare magazine. I am not actually an IBC member, but someone mentioned in on the Australian wild betta FB page. Now I'm going to have to lift my game in putting up posts as I have been rather slack of late!


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## Hallyx

And I'm still in love with your Hendra...especially himself.


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## LittleBettaFish

I agree, he is such a stunning fish. I really need to get a video of him and the female flirting. She colours up immensely and he gets this amazing vertical barring. I am honestly really glad I sold the original pair of hendra I had as there is no comparison between the quality of the two. 

I also took a couple more photos last night. This first one is of my sp. apiapi female out hunting grindal worms in the substrate.










Then this is the biggest sub-adult, her daughter (almost the same length as the mum).










I also got a photo of one of my persephone juveniles. As you can see, the fins are red. The blue/black colouration comes in as the fish matures. I believe this one is a female so I am very happy about that as she doesn't appear to have any topline deformities and I may cross her back onto one of the adult males. 










You can definitely see the similarities between both her and the miniopinna female.


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## LittleBettaFish

I saw a quite large (they are only a couple of weeks old) miniopinna fry today. I also saw two smaller fry at the back of the tank, so looks like there are a number of them surviving. I don't think either parent are predating them. 

However, I am wondering if the way I am keeping my tanks now isn't skewing my gender ratios towards larger numbers of females. I had a look in my sp. apiapi tank and it seems like they are all females in there. I'm hoping that as they mature the genders become more balanced. It seems like I either get one or the other, never a 50/50 split. It does make selling them a lot harder as unlike splendens, people only ever want pairs of wilds. 

I'm still waiting for more of my brownorum to become sexable. The biggest male juvenile was flaring at the mirror yesterday and darkened up considerably so I hold hope that he will develop the same rich red as the original male. 

My rutilans still seem healthy and content. They are just in a lifetime quarantine because I will never know for sure if the velvet is completely gone or not. They are a tough group of fish, and 'm hoping if I can keep the environment as low-stress as possible, that at the very least what velvet is still there won't turn into a full-blown infection.


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## LittleBettaFish

Okay, I put some rooibos tea in my sp. wajok tank and have been giving them some whiteworms and grindals along with the mosquito larvae, and today the striped one was in full colour and they were both flaring at each other. 

I tried to get some clear photos of both fish to compare, but the dark water and flash made this rather difficult. Plus they kept clamping up their fins when displaying so that wasn't much use. 

I still cannot see very much difference between the two. One is a slightly darker shade of red, and may have slightly shorter fins, but that's about it. I am starting to seriously wonder whether they are both the same gender. 

I think I might email the seller with a couple of pictures and see if he can't help me out. 














































The rounded stomach is because they just ate.


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## Weaver

Ooo! You did Roobios-water for a change! Do you like it? Are you seeing any differences in that water as compared to the IAL? From what I've seen using Roobios tea, it does tend to fade to a more yellowy-orange if left for too long in tank.


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## LittleBettaFish

I've been using rooibos tea now in my tanks and water aging tubs since around October I think. I only float the tea bags for a couple of days and then pull them. It does provide a slightly different colour from IALs, slightly more of an orange tint. However, the tannins come off the the tea bags a lot faster than off the leaves so if I want to get the water darker in a short amount of time, the rooibos is what I use.


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## LittleBettaFish

My miniopinna male was out today so I managed to sneak in a couple of photos before he went back to the film canister. 



















Then I went and had a look at my rutilans tank and I think I am going to have to remove the film canisters from there and look at putting some more plants in because the biggest males were sparring. There's been some fin damage done, and I just don't want to cause any excessive stress to them because they only recently recovered from the velvet. 





































But I have to admit they look so nice when they are flaring and displaying. It's funny how when you look at them in real life their sides appear green (hence the name Betta rutilans sp. cf. green), but under photos it usually comes across as gold instead. 

The two pictured are big boys. Probably about 5cm total length.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just been plodding along here today. Did a couple of water changes, filled up my two water aging tubs, tried to convince my sp. wajok pair to show some interest in each beyond flaring and chasing, and then took some photos. 









Hendra male 


















Hendra juvenile male



























Betta miniopinna male









Betta rutilans males sparring

These two empty tanks I have are driving me nuts. I am going to be so happy when I eventually fill them. It's been hard lately to resist the allure of purchasing fish other than wild bettas and putting them in there.


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## LittleBettaFish

I've decided to do a full-on biotope style aquarium for my rutilans group. I'm going to use a mixture of peat moss and coir over the top of the aqua soil, and then have a very thick layer of leaf litter over the top of this. The only plants are going to be watersprite and maybe some Amazon frogbit just to help provide surface cover and manage the ammonia. 

I was thinking of making a raised section at the back out of something like a 3D background so I can hide the equipment, provide a shallow area for shyer fish to retreat to, and also that way the goldvine will look like roots growing down from the 'bank' into the water. 

I'm hoping I can achieve this in the next couple of weeks as some of the males are looking ratty. 



















Then surprise we have my coccina male who I thought was dead, but really wasn't. I also found his female. They are living with the rutilans group currently and I am not sure what to do with them as they have been exposed to the velvet parasite and I don't want to set-up another tank, have them spawn and then have them give it to their fry. 










My sp. wajok pair are _still_ playing coy. I'm going to drop their water level right down and add some more tannins. We are going to the aquarium this weekend so going to pick up some more wood. Here was what I think is the male chasing my finger. 










I placed an order for some hornwort, hydrilla, IALs, dried riparian leaves and peat moss from an interstate seller and so once I get the invoice for it I'm going to pay and that way it should hopefully arrive next week. 

I want to try hornwort again in my tanks. I think it might like the cooler water and aqua soil of my wild betta tanks. 

Other than that, I really need to clean my goldfish tank and fill up my downstairs water aging tub with the hose. But it's cold and I am procrastinating.


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## LittleBettaFish

My sp. wajok pair are going to get threatened with a flushing soon if they don't start behaving. 

Yesterday I completely changed around their tank because I thought the 'female' might be more comfortable as she was always displaying horizontal barring and being harassed by the male. I dropped the water level down, added in some IAL and rooibos, put some peat moss over the substrate and also picked up some wood from the fish store to go in the tank. 

Well now it seems like the female has become the aggressor and the poor male is missing half his caudal and some of his anal fin. 

I got a photo of them both together. I thought the female might be the one at the front, but I sent an email to the seller with this picture attached to see if I didn't accidentally get two males. That could explain all the fighting and why there has been no spawning happening in spite of the fact that conditions are perfect. 



















I also managed to break the heater in my water aging tub since my last update. I didn't realise the heater was still plugged in, and I procrastinated so much that the water in the tub evaporated to a level where the heater was exposed. I went down wondering what this smell of burning plastic was, and turns out it was my heater guard melting. 

I have some miscellaneous tanks, plants and equipment I'm going to sell. Hopefully I can get it sold so that I not only clear up some storage space, but also can put the money back into my wild bettas. 

Right now I want to get a separate tank set up for a pair of Betta persephone. Now I have the space and a heater spare, I figure I might as well try to get some more F2 fry.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I have this feeling in the pit of my stomach that my brownorum group has velvet. I got my torch out and had a look, but it is so difficult to spot on these fish; particularly the juveniles that haven't coloured up yet. I didn't see anything, but the female is clamped up more than usual and I caught her flicking off things earlier today. She also has an abrasion around her head/gill area and that is a symptom of velvet I am very familiar with. 

All the fish in my other tanks look alright (even the rutilans group) so I'm hoping I don't end up with a full-scale outbreak on my hands again. At this point I'm going to test the water for ammonia just to be sure and then dose them with Seachem Cupramine. 

Hermanus (the seller of my sp. wajok) said I had a female and that these fish are aggressive, but I am still not 100% sure. Their tank is set up perfectly for fish from this complex and yet they have just been fighting non-stop. 










You can see the damage done to the one I thought was the male but Hermanus says is the female. It used to be the aggressor, but since the tank change it has been getting attacked all the time. 

This is the tank as it currently stands. 


















Left side









Right side

As you can see there is plenty of leaf litter cover and nooks/crannies in the wood for the two of them to get away from each other. The watersprite also provides a lot of cover at the surface. 

In better news, I noticed my hendra male was acting oddly. Turns out they must have spawned because he has a nest full of eggs up against the side of the tank. My sp. apiapi male also has some fry in his nest and today I found a juvenile male that has coloured up beautifully who will eventually be getting paired with my biggest sub-adult female. 

I also found that there was a small amount of water in the dog paddle pond along with a heap of dried alder leaves. This was absolutely teeming with mosquito larvae, even more than the tub I set up purposefully has. 

I think the key might be the location and the depth of water. I'm going to sneak a tub or bucket up there and hope mum doesn't notice hehe.


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## MattsBettas

I hope your wajok are m/f. 

Good to hear about the spawnings and hopefully the brownorum are fine.


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## LittleBettaFish

The sp. wajok better be male or female or they will be finding new homes haha. I already warned them if they don't start behaving themselves that I am going to flush them down the toilet :devil:

It's a shame as their tank is now one of the nicest looking set-ups in my fish room (much as the photos suggest otherwise). They have $80 worth of wood in there and if I had known they were going to be this troublesome, I would have saved it for another tank. 

I really do like the wood though. It is the first time I tried it, and it is supposedly comparable to ADA hornwood. It sinks immediately, but doesn't look as clunky as Malaysian driftwood or Mopani. Too bad it is so expensive. 

I think the brownorum do have something going on. I did notice one of the juveniles clamping the other day but I thought it was because it was responding to the presence of its bigger siblings. 

I swear this species has been nothing but trouble for me. My first group got velvet also and were euthanised, my previous pair didn't successfully spawn the entire time I owned them, and now on top of losing my stunning male, this group probably has velvet too. I love brownorum but talk about terrible luck.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my naughty wajok pair have been officially separated. One of them is very torn up and I was worried it was going to end up like my brownorum male. 

It's now floating in a container temporarily, and of course now all they want to do is flare at each other through the plastic. I noticed that container fish is a lot feistier now it knows it things can't get physical. 

I'm planning on getting a large glass jar, fill the bottom with peat moss and some leaf litter, and throw in a couple of sprigs of watersprite. Then I'm going to find a place for it to sit in the tank and the container fish can live there permanently. At least until its fins grow back and I can get a better look at it. Unfortunately, this means I am probably going to have to destroy their lovely looking tank to accommodate it. 

Still not sure what to do with these two. Probably sell them if they can't get along.

I am wondering if my brownorum female doesn't have ich rather than velvet. She has a white spot near her gill and perhaps the beginning of some more on her head. The whole group have been scoffing down mosquito larvae over the past couple of days and she is still very coloured up and chasing various offspring around. My plan right now is to slowly bump the temperature up and add some Seachem Cupramine. I still have no idea how this happened. I was wondering if because this group seems a lot more aggressive than my other family groups that stress has been a trigger. 

The rest of my fish are doing fine. I'm sort of going through 'blah' phase with the hobby at the moment. The other day I was tempted just to put everyone and everything up for sale and get myself some Australian natives instead. Whether wild or not, bettas definitely seem to be much more of a pain in the rear than other fish. I'm still cut about losing my brownorum male, and I didn't have the money to throw away on a pair of fish that are too aggressive to live together.


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## LittleBettaFish

I'm so ready just to give up on bettas completely. Everything will be going along smoothly for weeks/months, and then despite me not doing anything different, I'll end up with sick fish, dead fish and fish that just want to kill each other. 

After some consideration, I've decided to sell my sp. wajok pair. I have the one with the most damage to its fins in a jar now so it can recover, and still all they want to do is fight with each other. I am hoping I can at least get back half of what I paid for them. I don't know what I am going to do if I can't find a buyer. Hermanus said they were an aggressive species but this is like a whole other level of aggression. 



















I don't even want to look at my brownorum tank right now. I can't believe in spite of all the precautions I take, they still end up sick. Plus now I'm worried that I might have accidentally caused cross-contamination between them and my hendra/sp. apiapi tanks. 

Then to top it off, my miniopinna female pops up with what looks like small white dots on her pectoral fin. Awesome. They appeared to be gone this morning but I can't tell if it was damage done by the male or if it was ich/velvet. I really don't want to start dosing medications or upping the temperature too dramatically because this pair cost me nearly $200 and I literally can't afford to lose them. 

I feel like I spend half of my time in this hobby whinging. In fact if I go through this journal a large bulk of it, is me venting my frustration and disappointment. It's just so discouraging to hit roadblock after roadblock. First it was my inexperience that led to the death of some valuable fish, then it was the velvet that I seemed to spend an eternity fighting, and now it's aggression and some other external parasite. I feel like I just can't win. Then when I see people keeping fish successfully for years in sub-par conditions, it just makes me want to flush my whole collection down the toilet 

The best news I have had in the past week or so is that my newest hendra fry are starting to become free-swimming. 



















But apart from that, there really hasn't been anything very rewarding or relaxing about this hobby recently.


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## LittleBettaFish

I thought I haven't shown any pictures of my killifish for ages. I sold a number of them, and the rest just live as a group in my 2ft tank. I keep meaning to sell off the rest of them but they sort of grow on you - like a wart. 

Sadly, the male has lost his lovely tail extensions because I think one of his sons nipped them off. However, he seems to enjoy living alongside his sons and daughters, so I don't mind too much. 









This is where they all live



























This is my original male. He is massive now and no one is game to take him on. 



























Then these are a couple of the smaller males









One of the females (I only have a handful of these left still) 










Finally, my poliaki female. Her male died ages ago and now she just lives with the others. None of the males attempt to mate with her and she is almost as big as the original male nowadays.

Yes, they all do look like tubs of lard. I gave up on the diet for this lot.


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## beautiful Betta

I guess that's why they are hard to find and expensive, because they are difficult to keep. The little babies look great. Your tanks look great, really creating a natural environment for them. I loved the little orange ones.


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## LittleBettaFish

This complex is probably the toughest. When they are not trying to actively kill each other or contracting external parasites like velvet (sadly they are quite susceptible), wild bettas are extremely easy to keep. However, they are not very popular and don't display well in fish store tanks, so I think this is why they are not often seen. 

I only ever buy my wilds through Jodi-Lea nowadays. Been burnt a couple of times with sick stock and the fish that come through her are always in great shape. 

The orange ones are my killifish. I keep saying I am going to sell them all/trade them in at the LFS, but somehow they are still here. They are very outgoing and friendly, so very similar to bettas in personality.


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## Betta Nut

wow.. is that... yarn in some of the pics? A nifty fry hide? Wondering why you use it.


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## Aquatail

The killifish look really cool! ^_^ What is the yarn for?

For the sp. wajok pair, maybe you could find someone who would keep them in a divided tank so they couldn't get to each other and fight? That's just a thought, but I remember you saying most people don't really get wild bettas when they aren't going to breed them? Does that make it really hard to find new homes for a single fish? Someday I'd like to get some wild bettas, but I wouldn't want to breed them. For when I do eventually get set up for some, how hard would it be to not get pairs?

Also, for the miniopinna female, I could be wrong since I'm not an expert, but have you considered Lymphocystis? Again, I could be totally wrong, but I believe it often starts showing up on the pectoral fins and has a habit of disappearing and reappearing in a different place.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah unfortunately unless they are at least a male/female pair, their chances of finding a new home are slim. Particularly because only a few people own this species in Australia. 

It depends on the species as to whether you only want individual fish. Some fish are very popular and easy to spawn. Also breeders always seem to have an excess of one sex, so you'd probably be able to find someone willing to part with all males for example. 

The yarn are their spawning mops. It's where the killifish lay their eggs. I haven't been checking mine because I am not really interested in rearing fry. However, I was collecting tons of eggs from my original pair when I was checking them daily. 

It's not lymphocystis. I looked again yesterday and the spots are still on the pectoral and there were a couple of spots on the fry in there too. At this point it looks like ich. I am wondering if it is because my sp. wajok pair had a minor infection of ich when they arrived and the bags were mislabelled so for a brief time, one of my sp. wajok was in my miniopinna tank while one of my miniopinna was in the sp. wajok tank.


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## Aquatail

I hope you are able to find someplace for them to go. I can't quite remember if I've asked you this already, I think I have so sorry for asking again, but is it possible to have two males or two females live together peacefully? Or would it be better to just have one by itself?

That does sound like ich, I hope it's not serious.


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## LittleBettaFish

It honestly depends on the species. There are around 70 species of wild betta in existence and aggression levels not only vary between species, but also individuals. 

For example you can usually keep two male channoides or albimarginata together without much trouble, but I would be hesitant to do the same with two males from the splendens complex. Females can be every bit as aggressive as the males, particularly if there are only two, of them so once again I am not going to go ahead and say you could absolutely do it. 

Some species of wild betta are more gregarious than others. I've definitely noticed that some of my fish when kept alone are much shyer and less colourful than when they are kept in a group or pair situation.


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## Aquatail

Can you recommend a few species that are generally friendly and non-aggressive? Or a few species that may do better on their own? Also, when you keep more than one together, do they generally pick on each other a lot? I imagine that depends on species and individual as well, but are some more prone to picking on others? I would want to keep stress as low as I could. Lately it seems like you've run into a lot of sickness and I'm wondering if maybe some of your fish get a bit stressed from being picked on and are a bit more susceptible? Almost like sororities, if I'm not mistaken? That could be totally wrong, but it's just something I thought of.

Also, thanks for taking the time to answer my questions! ^_^


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## LittleBettaFish

Albimarginata and channoides are probably the two most peaceful wild betta species. I never see either of mine fighting even when I kept two males together with a female. Rather she'd spawn with both of them and they'd both be stuck with mouths full of eggs. 

I've actually had a very good run since I got in my new pairs. The previous velvet infection was most likely because I used to share equipment and never quarantine. Then once it was in every tank it was basically impossible to get rid of fully so it would keep coming back. 

I assume there is always going to be a low level of stress when housing these fish together. However, it does seem to be my more aggressive groups (rutilans and brownorum) where I find disease is more likely to break out. 

Also, many of my fish are wild-caught. They are already quite a sensitive complex in terms of water conditions, so I don't think it takes much for them to get sick.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think I might look at trying my hand at endlers/guppies. I've decided I'm going to take a break from purchasing wild bettas for the moment. I'll work on getting my brownorum and miniopinna healthy, but unless a pair of Betta livida come up for sale, I won't be adding any further wilds to my collection. 

I just want to try something completely different. I found this awesome looking strain of guppy and I think it would be fun playing around with genetics to see whether I could eventually produce a fish in the same vein as this. 










Only issue is my water is very soft, so I am going to have to work at increasing the hardness and pH as I doubt any guppy is going to thrive in a pH under 6. 

There are pairs of tiger endlers for sale at my LFS, and a guy interstate has feral guppies for sale that have basically reverted to 'wild-type' without human interference, that I wouldn't mind picking up a male or two from. 

http://www.aquagreen.com.au/plant_data/Poecilia_reticulata.html

At least hopefully it will be easier to offload a bunch of excess guppies than it is to offload excess wilds. Plus the initial purchase cost is much, much lower so I will probably have a greater chance of at least breaking even as I already have most of the equipment on hand.


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## Aquatail

Every time I ask you questions, I start envisioning my own wild betta tank. How it would work, which species to put in it, etc.... >.< This time I've been looking for species better suited to my hard water and higher pH. I can't find any mention of alkalinity(KH) though, does that not matter?

Captive-breed wild bettas will take pellets generally, right?

Also, I have no experience whatsoever with substrate, plants, using tannins. If I were to do any of that, I'm a bit concerned with how it would affect my water chemistry? When it's left out, my pH rises, so if I have anything in the tank that messed with that, I'm not sure how water changes would go.

Those guppies do look awesome!


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## LittleBettaFish

Betta simplex, Betta mahachai and I think species such as Betta unimaculata and Betta ocellata can tolerate higher pH levels/harder water. 

If your water has a decent KH value, adding things like IALs, peat moss, rooibos etc. are probably going to do little to affect your pH or overall hardness. This is why you generally have to cut hard water with RO water if you want to lower the pH. My pH drops very dramatically because my KH is basically non-existent and so has a poor buffering capacity. 

I've found mouthbrooders will very readily take pellets. Bubblenesters have always been a bit of a hit (stiktos) and miss (all the rest of mine) for me.


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## Aquatail

I was looking at Betta mahachaiensis, but I think it's the same as Betta mahachai just a different name. From what I've looked at, it does well in higher pH and hard water. The temperature recommendation also seems to be mid 70s to low 80s. Betta simplex was another I looked at, but the temperature recommendation seemed a bit cooler, like room temperature in my house. I would be concerned about fluctuations even if I put a heater on low, especially at night. With the mahachai I could put a heater in with them and have the temperature stay pretty consistent.

Am I getting all this right? I haven't done an enormous amount of research since it'll be a while until I'm really to do any of this, but I'd like to start planning at least.

Is this species rather friendly as well, or maybe better off being alone?

Also, what's a decent KH value? Last time I checked the alkalinity was 120ppm, if I remember correctly.


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## LittleBettaFish

Mahachaiensis is its official name but a lot of people still call them B. mahachai because it is slightly easier to type out. 

I think most of the mouthbrooders prefer cooler water. Mahachai should be fine in water that is mid seventies to low eighties. 

To be honest, I don't really know much about any of the other complexes. While I have kept and bred a number of species outside of the coccina complex, I don't really have a ton of experience. A site like SeriouslyFish is probably going to be one of the better resources. 

I really only have a basic understanding of KH/GH/pH etc. and how it all works and what ideal numbers are. Because my coccina complex prefer extremely soft and acidic water I haven't had to really do much reading or fiddling to get conditions right.


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## Aquatail

SeriouslyFish was one of the sites I was looking at, as was IBCBettas.

To be honest, I only have a general understanding of KH/GH/pH, so you may know better than I do. I know some, but as far as good/bad/ideal numbers, I have less knowledge. I would imagine 120ppm is a decent enough value to keep the chemistry stable if I add things like IAL, but I'm not totally sure.

Are there any more resources you can recommend? I haven't seen much on behavior that's not for pairs, but if I did get two of the same gender and they picked on each other too much, would dividing the tank and just keeping them side by side be a good backup plan?


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## LittleBettaFish

Sadly, there aren't a lot of comprehensive resources regarding wild bettas that I have found - at least not in English anyway. I have a number of foreign sites (namely French and German) that I browse through as I find they provide some of the best information on wild bettas. However, I use Google Chrome and you sort of only ever get the general 'gist' of what is being written, not a word-for-word translation. Unless you happen to speak either language. 

There's no reason you couldn't divide your tank in half. If they are the same gender it's not going to cause any issues. 

If you really want to learn more about pH/KH/GH I'd contact Hallyx. That's someone with a lot of knowledge on water chemistry.


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## Aquatail

Sadly, I don't speak either, but perhaps I could try and see if I can get the gist of it? Are there any particularly good ones I could try and look at?

You said if they're the same gender it wouldn't cause any issues. What would happen if they were different genders? Does that cause extra problems?


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## LittleBettaFish

I'll PM you a couple of the ones I've found because they are forums and I don't want to link to them here. 

Otherwise if they were an actual male/female pair there would probably just be a lot of sexual frustration going on if one or both fish were ready to spawn and they couldn't get in with each other.


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## Hallyx

I loved those Killi pics a couple of pages ago. I hear they're as companionable as Betta. How long do they live?


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## LittleBettaFish

A. australe aren't annuals, so with good care you can usually get around three years with them. 

I've noticed my Chromaphyosemion killies have always been a bit shyer, but this group and all the ones I've owned from the Fundulopanchax genus have always been as friendly as bettas and about twice as boisterous. Their days are divided into swimming, sparring, spawning and eating.

Also I noticed my sp. wajok outside of the jar building a nest in the film canister so I am going to assume that at least is male.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I am thinking the sp. wajok 'jar fish' is a female. It's definitely getting plumper, and I moved the film canister with the bubblenest closer to the jar to see how it responds. I am thinking maybe I can keep them like splendens. If it is a female, it can live in the jar until it is ready to spawn and then I will let it out. 

I've decided against guppies. I'm going to get back into killifish - specifically the Chromaphyosemion sub-genus. That way I don't have to fuss with my water and they will be happy in a similar environment to my wild bettas. 

I want to get some eggs from a killifish breeder who lives interstate. However, last time my attempts at hatching eggs he sent didn't go so well. Since it's been a while since I successfully hatched out my A. australe eggs, I plucked two off the spawning mops and am going to see how that turns out. They were already eyed up, so I don't think it's going to be long before they hatch anyway. 

Worst comes to worst, I will just wait until he has some young pairs of the species I want available. 

I am definitely going to need some more BBS eggs though. I also need to clean up my cultures today and re-do my microworm culture as the hot weather has knocked them around. 

I'm also not sure whether to move my coccina pair out of the rutilans tank. They get rather harassed by the rutilans, but they have been exposed to velvet and I don't really want to have multiple tanks of potentially infected fish going again. But then I worry the stress of living with the rutilans might cause a relapse so I still haven't fully decided. 

I haven't got any new photos to post as my wild bettas are still in my bad books.


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## beautiful Betta

Good luck with it all. I am totally on board with what you are saying about the stress bringing on another relapse, but it's a tough one to know what to do for the best. If the Rutilans are quite tough could you not move them, and leave the Coccina where they are to avoid stressing them.


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## LittleBettaFish

There's twenty odd rutilans and only the pair of coccina, so it's easier to move the coccina :mrgreen:. The rutilans are pretty aggressive and they are in a bigger tank to let them get away from each other when they need to.

I might just move the coccina. I've got the space and it will probably be less stressful for them both. 

It's funny how the two coccina can pick each other out of all those fish. They interact in a completely different manner with each other than they do with the rutilans. 

I think I might use my old Fluval Edge. I hacked the top off it, and it is a good size for the pair of them. I have everything else I need on hand so I might set it up today and see if I can't catch them both tomorrow.


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## Aquatail

Why do you want to get eggs instead of a young pair? Do you like raising them?

On the situation with the coccina, it seems to me that if stress does cause a relapse, it would be worse than having another tank of fish that are potentially infected. That's my thoughts, at least.


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## LittleBettaFish

It's cheaper, and often eggs are more readily available than pairs from a particular species. 

Plus I do enjoy raising fry, much as this journal may suggest otherwise!


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my brownorum group look very unhappy since I raised the temperature in their tank, but my miniopinna pair seem to be coping okay. Since I cured the ich in my sp. wajok pair with just a temperature rise for two weeks, I am hoping I can do the same here. 

My killifish eggs still appear to be okay. It's weird how you can see the eyes of the fry through the egg, and I am impatient for them to hatch. I shot off a message on FB to the killifish breeder about some Ch. poliaki 'Bolifamba' eggs, and also in regards to a pair of Ch. splendopleure whenever he has some available. There are also a couple of other species I would like some eggs of, but I have a bunch of stuff I want to sell first to help fund that. 

I also got some photos of my sp. wajok pair. I think my female (?) needs a bigger jar but otherwise they both seem happy and healthy. Unfortunately due to the tannins and the cloudy water in the jar (I added a bit too much IAL), the pictures are not great. But you can see how much damage was done to my sp. wajok female and why I needed to separate them. 









This is very obviously a male. He builds nest, flares all the time and his fins are quite large. 


















This is jar fish. I think it is female as now I can see some differences in form and colour, but I am still not 100% as it did build a small bubblenest in its jar as well. 









Here is the full tank set-up









Then here is the jar with the female inside. I have been doing partial water changes every couple of days with my aged water and the watersprite in there should also keep the ammonia down. This complex are not very active, and prefer to hunker down in a particular spot than spend a lot of time swimming around. 

I do like them so I'm not sure I will sell them. The female can just live in the jar permanently and if she ever gets plump with eggs, we will see what happens.


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## beautiful Betta

Sounds like things are looking up for you.


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## LittleBettaFish

I wouldn't say looking up. Not until I can get my Betta brownorum and Betta miniopinna back to full health. 

Anyway, it turns out that after seeing these updated pictures of my sp. wajok, Hermanus has said that they are actually both male. I did suspect this all along, and it's no wonder they were so intent on killing each other!

He has very kindly offered me a replacement female full of eggs for the next shipment into Australia. The female will be free of charge, I just have to pay her import fees and shipping. This should be sometime at the end of March. 

The other male that is currently in the jar will live in the jar permanently, because I don't have space to be running a tank for a single fish. I'm just going to upgrade him to a bigger jar to give him a bit more space to move around, and if the other male doesn't work out as a breeding partner, I will swap them over. 

At least now I know it wasn't anything I was doing wrong.


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## beautiful Betta

Lucky girl having two males to choose from, maybe you should put both males in a jar and see which jar the female swims around more, let her pick her male.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think I'll try her with the male outside the jar first. This is simply because they are next to impossible to net without tearing the whole tank up. Plus he seems like a more dominant male and has nicer form than the other. 

It looks like I will be getting some killifish eggs in a couple of weeks from the breeder interstate. I'm very excited and hopefully can get them to hatch. 

I picked at least 10-15 eggs off my spawning mops today. I don't know what possessed me to do so, but I forgot how much fun it was collecting the eggs and watching as the fry develop inside. I have a proper container to hatch them out in now, and it is hanging inside the main tank to stay warm. 

I am going to be changing up my killifish tank next week. I want it to look similar to my wild betta tanks as not only will everything match, but I also think it will make their orange colouring really pop. 

I took some photos of them today. They are such active fish, I have to feed them just to get them to stay in the same spot. 









Original male









The biggest and nicest of the male offspring









The smallest of the male offspring. There is also a really tiny female and I can't tell if they were late hatchers, are offspring of the fish in here, or are severely stunted (highly unlikely). 









One of the females.









Two sisters. 









The full tank set-up. You can see the container for the eggs.


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## LittleBettaFish

On Saturday, we went to the dog show that we have spent the past 4-6 weeks preparing Nike for. The judge was from the UK, and really gave the dogs a workout in the ring. The day started off cool, but by the time Nike's class rolled around it was absolutely boiling. 

There were 13 dogs in the class all up. Unfortunately, like I have told mum a hundred times before, Nike has absolutely no drive and is extremely lazy. She looked like she was out for a Sunday stroll in the ring and would not respond to either me or my mum's attempts to get her going faster and more enthusiastically. 

In the end she placed 8th. I was a bit disappointed. I thought it would have been good to be at least a couple of places above that, but she just didn't put in the work. This was the critique she got from the judge, and she did get a ribbon at least (I think these shows must be one of the only competitions where you get a ribbon for 8th :smile: ). 



> 60CM. Large strong and substantial of very good proportions and type. Good head and expression. Normal withers firm back croup should be longer. Upper arm of good length but should be better angled. Very good hindquarter angulation with broad thighs. Stands correct in front. Firm in hocks elbows and pasterns. Very good movement with a firm back.


I think the National is in May, and that is a *big* show. Now me and mum have a couple of months to figure out how to get Nike moving out in the ring. The only things she gets excited about are the cats, digging and the hose, none of which are really useful at a show. 

I haven't been to a dog show for ages, and being there on Saturday reminded me of why I don't go. In the end me and Nike just went and had a nap in the car because the classes went for ages and mum has a tendency to abandon me to talk to her friends. 

Apart from that, I haven't really done much fish-related stuff. A couple of my killifish eggs hatched and I now have fry that appear to be doing well. I overhauled my killifish tank so it matches my wild betta tanks but it is looking rather ordinary because the watersprite now has to fill in. I also did a headcount while they were out of the tank and I officially have 17 A. australe gold. 

I found a pretty big miniopinna fry so I think I might start putting some grindals or microworms in for them. My rutilans sp. cf. green are still going well, and my brownorum are all still alive. I did water changes on a couple of tanks today, and have a couple more to do tomorrow.


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## LittleBettaFish

I took some photos of my killifish today as they were picking blackworms out of the newly added leaf litter. The water is slightly cloudy from me kicking the substrate up while adding water in yesterday, but they seem to be dealing with the tank change well. The aim is for it to look very much like my sp. wajok tank with super dark water, lots of watersprite roots going down and leaf litter surrounding pieces of Mekong River Driftwood. 


















Original male (he has to get into at least one shot every time I get the camera out)



























Younger males


















A couple of females. 

I'm working on selling off some of my excess fish stuff so I can put the money away for some further killifish breeding pairs/eggs. My mum really likes blue panchax, so we'll most likely be looking at getting a pair in the near future replace the unimaculata group of hers.


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## beautiful Betta

They are so cute looking. The second from last picture your fish poo I assume in the picture looks like a worm. lol


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## LittleBettaFish

They are actually live blackworms. They were having a feed. You can see one poking out of the substrate in the 4th picture - that is what the male is looking at.


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## beautiful Betta

I see it, LOL.


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## LittleBettaFish

My Betta hendra pair are spawning. Unfortunately for the male, the female has the shortest attention span of any fish I own. So far she keeps stopping to chase off the curious juveniles and broke off spawning earlier to eat some grindals and white worms. 

She looks lovely in spawning colours. Her blue-green colouring really intensifies and she gets this brown stripe down the top of her body. 




































Male wondering where his spawning partner has gone....


















Aforementioned spawning partner busy with other things.









Back on track. 









Female stunned. 









That awkward moment when it's been several seconds and the female is still stunned. He actually started bumping her because she was upside down for a while. 

These pictures aren't the greatest because every time the female sees me she thinks I'm going to feed her and gets all excited. However, I just thought I'd share a moment I rarely get to capture on camera with my wilds.


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## MattsBettas

Awesome, LBF. I actually like these pics, good action shots and the lighting looks a bit different (which is nice).


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## beautiful Betta

They are amazing pictures, I doubt it is that easy to get a good clear shot of the wrap around that goes on, and the picture of the stunned female. For any members thinking of breeding it certainly helps to know what to expect.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Matt and Beautiful Betta (you snuck in while I was replying). I didn't want to spook them or distract the female too much and I had the light right at the back of the tank (it's a T5 2x24 watt so pretty bright). 

I also just took this photo of the female to show off that lovely colouration. 










And just because they are so much fun to watch and look great in photos .... more killifish!! 























































I was looking at habitats of Aphyosemion genus killifish (even though these are aquarium strain fish) and a lot of the habitats seem to contain a fair amount of leaf litter. My fish certainly seem to enjoy picking through it for their live food. I'm still not sure what surface cover to go for. I was thinking watersprite but I'm not 100%. I was considering Amazon frogbit as that does grow quite long roots.

I definitely can't stay angry or sad when I have a tank full of fish that look like they are perpetually happy. I'm going to be going through the hatchery today to see if any further fry have hatched/the original two are still alive. I really need to order some more BBS cysts. I have none and they are going to be needing it soon. Particularly if I have eggs on order.


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## beautiful Betta

your Killifish, look so innocent with their big eyes, yet cheeky too. Is there a reason why they have kill in their name or is it just a name?


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## LittleBettaFish

From Wikipedia:



> The name killifish is derived from the Dutch word "kilde", meaning small creek, puddle


My two killifish fry are still alive and eating the microworms I put in. I have a number of eggs that look almost ready to pop so I think I shall have some more fry hatching out in a matter of days :mrgreen: :mrgreen: . 

I'm going to end up with an enormous breeding colony of A. australe if this lot all hatch out and reach maturity.


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## beautiful Betta

That's great news you will have so many you might even be able to sell a few.


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## LittleBettaFish

I did sell 8 of my biggest sub-adults a little while ago. However, because I don't ship fish it is often hard for me to sell them, even though I was only asking $10 a pair.

This lot left are the smaller juveniles and sub-adults, although somehow my biggest and most impressive homebred male managed to evade all my efforts at netting him and remained behind. I guess he didn't want to leave.


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## beautiful Betta

what a clever lad. lol.


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## lovee1795

Those killifish are beautiful. I love the orange colors and their patterns, I've never seen them before. Lol. Also, I love all of your wild bettas, it makes me want to try my hand at them some day when I'm out of college. I've been stalking your journal for awhile so I figured I'd just drop a comment in, lol.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Lovee1795. Killifish are great fish, and there are just so many species out there that I reckon there is one to suit every taste whether you like big fish, small fish, colourful fish or not so colourful fish. 

I've said it in the past, but they remind me of a blend of Betta splendens and wild bettas. Particularly the Aphyosemion and Fundulopanchax genera. 

To prove my point, here is the original male sparring with his biggest male offpsring. 


















He's flaring at the male in the back in this photo. They move so fast and there are so many of them in there my camera has a hard time focussing on them. 









The troublemaker himself. A stunning fish and hopefully some of the eggs are spawns with him.


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## LittleBettaFish

Good news is that my miniopinna and brownorum all seem to have recovered from the ich. My brownorum female was still quite clamped but now the temperature is back to normal (it's been around 33 degrees celsius) she was swimming around normally this morning. 

A couple of my miniopinna fry are big enough to take grindals. There are two that are always out and they were sparring yesterday although they are still only about 5mm in size. 

My hendra male has a nest full of eggs he is tending. Expecting them to hatch in the next day or so. 

I discovered a stunning juvenile male sp. apiapi the other day. He looks the spitting image of the original male and he certainly has plenty of sibling females to pair up with. Going to be exciting to see how he matures. 

I also sold $40 worth of stuff yesterday and will be selling another $40 of stuff over the next couple of days. Although I want to see if one of the buyers would be willing to trade for some BBS cysts to save me having to order online and pay for shipping. 

Bad news is that I lost one of my sub-adult A. australe males and more devastatingly, my lone poliaki female. There was a small gap in the gladwrap and they must have jumped out through it. 

This is why I always push so hard for people to use cling wrap or something on their tanks that offer close to 100% coverage. When keeping species that seemingly have an inherent instinct to jump, I never take any chances.


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## MattsBettas

Sounds like some things are turning around for you. Sorry for your losses.


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## LittleBettaFish

Hopefully. Although nowadays I try not to get too hopeful about anything. 

This morning, I decided to move my sp. apiapi tank from my sideboard up onto the top shelf of my fish rack - next to my persephone. This was so I could move my killifish tank onto my sideboard as it won't be going on the new chest of drawers that is on order. Luckily their tank is only like 12L so I just emptied out 10L into a bucket, moved it onto the shelf and filled it back up again. Now I just need to summon the energy to do the same with my killifish tank. 

I also gave the sideboard itself a thorough clean. It stores most of my fish stuff such as food cultures, buckets, medications, water conditioners etc. and had been looking pretty dirty. I give it a week before it is dirty again. 

Then later this afternoon, a girl who lives locally to me, came around to pick up some plants. We have met and talked before, and we managed to chat about fish for almost three hours. It's always nice to have someone who understands the hobby to talk with, and whose conversations about fish don't start with them talking about the goldfish they owned once that died.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my brownorum still have ich. While there was nothing on the original female or the male sub-adult, I noticed one of the juveniles sporting two distinctive spots on her head. I'm going to turn the temperature back up and leave it like that for a couple of weeks. I forgot when I did it initially so I don't think I had it high enough for long enough. At least now I can see it is definitely ich rather than velvet or anything more sinister. It looks exactly like the ich my sp. wajok came in with so I am thinking I must have inadvertently cause cross-contamination between the two tanks. 

Hendra fry have hatched and the male is busy tending to them. I also look to have had another killifish fry hatch out bringing my total to three. I am anxiously waiting for the rest of the eggs to hatch to see whether I am going to be able to do the same with more expensive species. 

Speaking of killifish, my killifish tank has been moved over to my sideboard and I think they like being right by the door. I also set-up a proper hatchery so my eggs aren't just sitting in a container in the main tank. 

I also traded some subwassertang and a mixture of moss for about 40 grams of BBS cysts. I have some bubbling away in my hatchery right now that are only a few hours off being ready for harvest so I'm going to feed my miniopinna fry and my killifish fry and just divide the rest up between tanks with juveniles/fry present. I did forget how noisy the hatchery is though, so that is going down into the rumpus room today.


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## LittleBettaFish

Okay here are some pictures. My sp. apiapi group are settling in well after the move. So much so that I just discovered the pair were spawning. Here is the female sneaking some food in between wraps. 



















Then I think this is a male juvenile. Someone damaged his caudal, but the colour and ventrals say male. I can't wait until I can count just how many pairs I have in this tank. 










I got a photo of one of my elusive miniopinna fry with a stomach full of BBS. There's a few in the tank, I just rarely see them as there are a lot of hiding places.










This is what my rack looks like at the moment. On the top shelf are my persephone and sp. apiapi. On the second shelf are my sp. wajok, brownorum, hendra and miniopinna. The bottom shelf has my rutilans sp. cf. green along with my A. australe gold hatchery and a spare tank that is going to be a killifish grow-out. 










Finally, here are my killifish up on the sideboard. The anubias in their tank is getting sold and I'm looking at plants like hornwort and Amazon Frogbit to provide some cover.










The green yarn is the spawning mops. I haven't been through them in a little while so not sure if there are eggs in them or not.


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## cheekysquirrel

You have some beautiful fish! Thank you for proving that wilds aren't drab. One day, when I'm older, wiser, richer, and living in a house with better pipes and water, I might give wilds a go. Until then, I'll just stalk you 
... Not literally, of course. Please don't call the cops.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha it's a bit of a hike from Perth to Melbourne to do some stalking. 

I do know there are some wild betta keepers over there, and a pair of my Betta persephone went over to WA last year.

It's a very big misconception that wild bettas are the ugly cousins of the fancier splendens. This is why I like to pimp out my journal with lots of pictures.


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## LittleBettaFish

Okay I feel like I have been spamming my own thread, but some of these were too nice not to share. 

First up, are two of the smaller males flaring at each other.










Then just a couple of the smaller males swimming around. You can see that in a group the males don't really develop the flowing white extensions on the caudal fins that they do when you just keep them as part of a breeding pair/trio. 



















After those photos, I got the mirror out and my biggest male and his father were having a great time flaring at their reflections. 

This is the biggest male. He was moving so fast up and down the glass I couldn't manage to get him into focus. 










Then his father joins in (these two are very similar in size now)










The two of them together (father is in background flaring)










Finally, my biggest male upset that I took his entertainment away. 










I seriously love these fish. I have been browsing killifish forums all day. I can't wait to get some more.


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## LittleBettaFish

Sometimes when a boy killifish....









and a girl killifish....









love each other very much....
CENSORED

certain things happen....


















I have five killifish fry that I have seen thus far. There could be more newly hatched fry hiding in the peat moss at the bottom. Their hatching container is just a plastic take-out container (seriously it had Chinese food in it last week), that is filled with water from the main tank. 










The java moss and peat moss is to provide not only cover for the fry, but also to encourage infusoria. I do partial water changes every couple of days and run an airstone on low. This container sits inside a tank and is kept warm using a bain-marie type system. I have space for two more hatching containers and they will hopefully be set aside for Chromaphyosemion volcanum Mile 8 and Chromaphyosemion poliaki Bolifamba. 

Haven't done much with my fish today. Harvested some mosquitol larvae for my killifish and filled up the water aging bucket in my bedroom.


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## MattsBettas

Haha. Can you post pics of the new killies your getting? 

I swear I'm just going to pack up and move to Australia so I can buy all your fish. They're so nice, so many bucket list species in one room!


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## LittleBettaFish

I am only going to be getting eggs for the two species I mentioned. But I asked the breeder to put my name down for an adult pair of Chromaphyosemion splendopleure whenever they become available - http://www.aka.org/wak/Ref_Library/Aphyosemion/A.splendopleure.htm

Here are some pictures of the other two species to give an idea of what they look like. 

http://www.aka.org/wak/Ref_Library/Aphyosemion/A.poliaki.htm

http://www.aka.org/wak/Ref_Library/Aphyosemion/A.volcanum.htm

I'm hoping that I am going to be able to hatch these eggs. I am going to ask tomorrow whether he has been collecting any eggs yet or not, as I wanted some time to get my set-up ready and also have some practice with my australe eggs first.


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## beautiful Betta

good luck with your eggs, I liked the bolifamba male on that first link, he had loads of colours going on.


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## LittleBettaFish

My previous poliaki male was very brightly coloured. Sadly I lost him around the time a majority of my fish were infected with velvet. 



















Unfortunately, I also never managed to get a decent photo of him because he was quite skittish. His female was the one that recently passed away.

Many species of killifish are very wildly coloured. You'd think it had been selectively bred into them rather than naturally occurring. It's part of the reason I like them so much.


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## beautiful Betta

I was surprised when I saw the colour on that boy. And your other boy does have similar colouring. And no you don't really think of many tropical fish as having that much colour. most tropical are silvers and golds and some with odd bit of colouring but not that vibrant like the betta's. There was one fish I remember in my community tank when I had one. They were called rams in the UK don't what they would be here or if we would even get them here, I always liked them, they were funny little fish.


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## beautiful Betta

I found a image hope you don't mind me posting.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah you can get rams here. I've never been much of a fan of cichlids but my brother's ex-girlfriend used to have a pair of either gold or German blue rams.


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## beautiful Betta

I can honestly say I have never seen any when I go around the local fish stores. Maybe I always get side tracked to the tons of betta's in their little pots, lol. Then moan to myself at the ones not looking so good.


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## LittleBettaFish

I am usually too busy spying on the killifish and bettas at the two big aquariums I visit, to pay much mind to the cichlids haha. If there's a blackwater display tank, that is the one I usually gravitate towards. 

Just fed my five killifish fry some BBS and gave their container a water change. The biggest are starting to swim around the upper levels of the container, and it's fun watching them grow. It will be another week or two before they get moved into something bigger. I was trying to see if there were any other eggs close to hatching but they are all covered by the peat moss.


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## beautiful Betta

What sort of size to they need to be before they are big enough to go back in with the adults and not get eaten?


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## LittleBettaFish

There are a couple of smaller fish in the main tank that are only around the 1.5cm mark. These current fry will be going into a grow-out until they reach around the same size. Then they will go into the main tank. Hopefully I end up with more females than males because my present males run the females pretty ragged.


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## beautiful Betta

Well I hope you get your wish. So the boys like to have a harem of girls, lol


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## LittleBettaFish

Yes a lot of breeders have two females to one males because the males are rather like guppies when it comes to spawning. 

Had a scare today. I thought I'd lost my big male (the son not the father). I couldn't see him anywhere in the tank and I am frantically looking about on the floor and under the rack, when he popped up at the back. I also discovered a fry had hatched in the hatchery container that just had moss in it. There must have been an egg in the moss and so now the singleton is safely in with its siblings. 

I thought I haven't done any photos with my persephone group for a while now. They are looking great, and I think are actually coming up on two years this June. The juveniles are thriving, and a couple are as big as the rest of the adults in the tank now. I think a couple might unfortunately be male (it's hard to sex this species until the full adult colours come through), but I haven't been able to get a close enough look to make a more thorough assessment. 



























Dominant female in the tank and mother of the juveniles









That is her again to the right














































Unfortunately, their tank overhaul is going to have to wait until I get a job again. I just don't have the money to sink into a whole heap of wood and substrate. However, they don't really seem to mind and this is actually the only tank where my hornwort is thriving. It doesn't get any artificial light, only the light that comes through my clerestory window. 

Meanwhile the growth I am getting on the plants in my sp. wajok tank is insane. The duckweed and watersprite have taken over and it looks so natural. I want all my wild betta tanks to look like this eventually. It's just a matter of money, and not wanting to tear apart tanks with very young fry in them.


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## beautiful Betta

That was lucky you spotted the baby hatchling, he might have died otherwise if he couldn't find food. It must have been a relief to find you male. I sometimes here noises over by the tank and I cant help to get up and check it's not the fish, my tank is covered but there are area's he could get out, although my boy has never jumped and I think he would be fin heavy for big leap, but still it does make me look, lol.

Your other guys and gals are coming along nicely too.


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## LittleBettaFish

I know what you mean. As all my fish are in my bedroom, I always get a twinge of paranoia when I hear a splash. Even when I know all my fish are secure I still have to check. 

Well I have paid for my replacement sp. wajok female. The next shipment lands on the 25th and she should be on it. After a week quarantine period she will then be making her way down to me. Unfortunately, while the replacement fish is free, the import and shipping fees certainly aren't. It's costing me $40 to get her, money I really would have rather put towards something else. If she ends up being DOA I probably won't be bothered getting another replacement. 

My hendra fry went free-swimming. They are most likely eaten by now, although I'm sure some survive. My sp. apiapi fry are just on the verge of leaving the nest. The poor male will be devastated as raising fry seems to be his entire life's work. 

I found a big frothy nest in my miniopinna tank this morning and the pair were spawning underneath it. I thought the male would appreciate the extra feedings, rooibos tea and IAL I threw in. I got this picture of him the other day and he is looking very content. 










I've been hatching BBS every couple of days for my killifish fry and other young fish and they have been enjoying that. Even my adult wilds go for the BBS, although it takes a lot to make for a satisfying meal. 

My microworm culture really needs re-doing. I've been putting it off because it is one of my least favourite things to do. Plus mum freaks out whenever she sees me bring its mouldy self down into the kitchen. But if I'm going to have all these wild betta and killifish fry, I really need it on hand. 

Otherwise everyone is doing fine - or as fine as my fish ever are.


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## beautiful Betta

Well done, is your new girl coming in through Jodie.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yep. I paid for her import and shipping fees yesterday. Hopefully she manages to survive quarantine and shipping as my poor sp. wajok males could do with some female companionship. At least the one in the jar has grown all his fins back again. 

Unless a pair of Betta livida come up for sale, she will probably be the last wild betta I purchase for a while.


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## beautiful Betta

I hope she arrives safely for you.


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## LittleBettaFish

So do I! 

Well I have been lying around sick for most of the day, because it's that merry time of the month when my reproductive organs remind me that they are still present and accounted for. 

Since I was feeding my fish and trying to get some photos for my blog, I ended up with a whole heap that I figured I might as well post here.

First up is my B. hendra male, followed by his son, followed by a daughter. 

















Not very flattering as he gets skittish when his father comes past. 










Then we have my miniopinna female. The male is now tending a nest full of eggs so she has been on the look-out for him as he gets pretty protective. 




























Then we have my sub-adult brownorum male. His form is nice but his colour doesn't hold a candle to that of his father's. I am still hoping that it darkens as he gets older but I doubt it. I'm so disappointed I lost the original male. Stupid female. 



















Then just a fun one of my persephone.


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## cheekysquirrel

I love looking at your pictures! They're so cute!
I'm sorry you're not feeling well. I truly feel your pain. Once a month I can barely get out of bed except to take more ibuprofen and heat up Comrade Kitty, my wheat-filled cat. And then people say "the pain won't be so bad if you go out and get some exercise" which is a load of toss if you have uterine lining growing outside of your uterus.
Anyway, I hope you feel better soon!


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## beautiful Betta

I am in the same girls club, my worst day was yesterday, the first day is always the most painful for me. But when it's so warm it kind of makes you feel horrible and just want to stay indoors, but I need to go and get some shopping for me, lol.

Do you girls find that even on the forum you can get a bit short during this time, especially when its lack of care. lol, I noticed it yesterday and re-read what I was going to post and thought I better edit a bit, so I don't sound so harsh, lol.

I love the little pinky fish. I hope your feeling better soon I sympathize with you.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha my mum had me out on the bike yesterday to exercise the dogs yesterday as we have a big show in May and yeah, that definitely didn't do anything to make me feel better. 

I tend to get these terrible gas pains where it feels like there is a knife stabbing me in my lower abdomen and back. This is on top of the hot flushes, shivering, nausea and dizziness that make it difficult for me to do anything more than lay in bed with a heat pack like you said Cheekysquirrel. 

I thought I had endometriosis, but an ultrasound didn't show anything abnormal and I wasn't keen on getting anything internally done. It's hard too, trying to explain the level of pain you feel to a doctor - particularly a male doctor. I mean my pain can be very debilitating at times but I'm not sure if that is because it actually is quite severe pain or if I just have a low pain threshold. 

Admittedly, I become like a clumsy, raging monster the week or so before. My cat wouldn't take his tablet the other day, and I started angrily sobbing out of nowhere.


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## beautiful Betta

Oh gosh that's bad, mine are not as bad as yours, and mine can vary from month to month I still get short but I have had months with hardly no pain, and other times I get the period ache go through my legs as well as my tummy and I am shaky and I struggle to get the paracetamol down I feel so sick and literally gag. I also have a craving for sweet things the week before my period too.


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## cheekysquirrel

I wept because I had to take my stepdaughter to school. And when the dishes weren't done. And when my cat wouldn't spend any time with me.
Ultrasounds generally won't find endometriosis unless it's very advanced. We're in the same boat, LBF. Exploratory surgery doesn't thrill me. I might get it later on, but for now I'll just wail every month


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah I crave salty and sweet stuff something terrible, which really doesn't help with my stomach. I can just devour whole packets of chips and lollies. 

Just got back from biking the two dogs again tonight. I told my dad I need to get a full-time job again simply so I have a life and don't have to spend it biking dogs :mrgreen: But the two girls do like getting out and about. Eos has to take it slow since she got pneumonia earlier this year, but she has such a great work ethic and you can hear her howling in the car when she sees us ride up. 

We also saw an echidna tonight! The park opposite my dad's house is quite extensive. Last night we saw a wombat, and then this evening there was an echidna just about to cross the path. I've never seen one around here before so it was quite a pleasant surprise.


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## cheekysquirrel

Awww!! An echidna and a wombat? Too cute! I've only ever seen them in wildlife parks and the zoo. I did see a big bandicoot once. It looked like a bilby, though I'm sure it wasn't. It came right up to our back door. I so desperately wanted to cuddle it <3


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah we are only like 20km out of Melbourne, but because we are in a 'green-wedge' area, there are several very large parks and lots of bush that makes you feel like you are out in the country. 

The chiropractor we take our dogs to is out in the country and I think he gets bandicoots. You see them sometimes and they also go rustling through the shrubs near the deck, so the dogs think there's some monster lurking in there. 

I love most Victorian wildlife. Except kangaroos and snakes, and even then I don't hate them. I have had a ton of run-ins with snakes, but as long as you respect their space, they generally don't cause any trouble. Kangaroos just freak me out because the males are so big, and I don't like when they just rock back on their tails and sit there watching you and your dogs go past. 

Probably the most amazing thing I have ever seen was when we were up in the country and we turned a corner and on the side of the road is a wedge-tail eagle trying to fly off with a dead fox. It was utterly amazing. My mum got out and moved the dead fox so the eagle wouldn't get hit by a car and it sat in the tree and just watched her. 

My nan and pa have a pair of them up on their property, and I love watching them cruise the thermals.


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## LittleBettaFish

I had someone around to pick up the lot of anubias I had up for sale. It's always great to talk bettas with someone in person rather than online. I think it will be better though, when my fish rack is downstairs rather than in my bedroom as it does make it rather awkward when people want to see my fish! 

I did a quick water change on my killifish hatching container and my killifish tank. My five fry are doing well and growing rapidly in their 1/2L temporary home. Unfortunately I haven't seen any more eggs hatch. I accidentally had the heater half unplugged the other day and I'm wondering if the temperature dropped enough to kill the developing eggs. Hopefully this is not the case and I get at least a couple more fry. 

I also just finished up a large water change on my goldfish tank, and filled up my water aging tub for water changes this week. 

I managed to get a single photo of my sp. wajok male that is not in the jar. Their tank is like a jungle as you can see below, and neither male is as friendly as my other fish. Most of their time is devoted to flaring at each other. 


















The bottom of this tank is full of wood and leaf litter. 

I also got some photos of my brownorum group. I was trying to compare the second largest male juvenile to his older brother in terms of colour and form, but he just isn't mature enough yet for it to be a fair comparison. 



























Older brother









Then here is the only female juvenile I can identify thus far. The colour, lack of spot and shorter anal fin is what makes me lean towards female. She is a nice looking fish though. I actually prefer her over the original female. 

I managed to take a big chip out of one of my tank's yesterday. Then today, I got a sliver of glass from the tank stuck in my little toe. Fortunately, it didn't go very deep. Now watch though as I probably get cellulitis as I took off the band-aid tonight and have been walking around barefoot outside :mrgreen:


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## LittleBettaFish

Not much has been happening here. All my fish seem to be doing alright, although I had to put some more java moss in my rutilans sp. cf. green tank, because the males were shredding each other. It's no wonder they have to deal with recurrent velvet, when they spend most of their time trying to murder each other. 

Still only have five (rapidly growing) killifish fry. I think when the temperature dropped it damaged the developing eggs. They are still sharing the plastic container and I am changing out 1/2 the water every couple of days with water from the main tank. It still amazes me how fast killifish fry grow in a small volume of water compared to bettas. 

My miniopinna male was showing off to the female this morning. The weather has been quite stormy so I'm wondering if they are going to spawn again. There are a number of quite large fry sharing a tank with them, so can't wait until they start becoming sexable. 

I discovered a second male in my hendra tank, which is great. It still looks like I have at least a dozen females though. One of the females is about 2/3 of the size of the original female now. It will be interesting to see if she attempts a spawn with her father like my burdigala F1 female used to. 

Sadly it looks like at least two of my four persephone juveniles are male. The other two do look more female, but this species seems to take forever before they are 100% sexable. I'm hoping for at least one female. The plan is to purchase a male from Hermanus (the breeder/seller of my original pair) and then use this to cross on my F2 female(s), to prevent a genetic bottleneck with this line. I don't mind a bit of inbreeding, because I like to keep my lines/strains pure where I can, but I also don't want to compromise fertility and health in future generations. It would be great if five years from now, I could still be maintaining this species in my fish room. This sort of attitude seems to be sadly lacking in the Australian betta scene. 

At this point in time, I have a spare 30x30x30cm tank on the bottom shelf of my rack. I've filled it up, tossed in a heater, filter and some leaf litter and watersprite, and now I'm debating whether to purchase a pair of wilds to put in it - or leave it open for a killifish grow-out/breeding tank. 

I know I said that I wasn't going to purchase any further wilds, but the seller I got my hendra, brownorum and sp. apiapi pairs apparently has both uberis and burdigala available. The next shipment into Oz most likely won't be for a month, so it does give me some time to work out my budget and see if it's feasible. I'm leaning towards uberis because my previous pair were stunning and I find burdigala have a tendency to get quite large and not look as streamlined as some of the other species. 

I think I just have to face facts. I am always going to be a sucker for these fish! :mrgreen: even if they drive me to the brink of insanity. Maybe someday I will eventually own the whole complex, including any further undescribed species that might pop up between now and then. 

Anyway, I took this photo of my fish rack just before. 










Top shelf holds Betta persephone and Betta sp. apiapi
Middle shelf holds Betta sp. wajok, Betta brownorum, Betta hendra and Betta miniopinna
Bottom shelf holds Betta sp. cf. rutilans green, spare tank and killifish hatchery 

I just wish my rack was a foot longer. It would be great if I could squeeze 2-3 more tanks on. However, it takes up enough space in my bedroom as is. I had to move my bed out of the way so I could get this shot. 

There are no photos of my fish today. They don't seem in the mood for photos so I gave up.


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## beautiful Betta

Tough decisions ahead, unfortunately that is what a hoppy tends to be a money sucking project with no return, lol.


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## LittleBettaFish

Knowing my luck, as soon as I commit myself to buying a pair of uberis, a pair of livida are going to come up for sale. They are my next 'holy grail' species. Not only are they seriously endangered in the wild because of habitat loss, but they also seem to be very difficult to find in the hobby. I've been after a pair of them for several years now but haven't been able to get my hands on a quality breeding pair. 

It doesn't help I have spent much of the morning chasing down every last blog and forum I can that mention coccina complex fish. I have so many pictures saved to my computer of various fish and set-ups. I'm so envious of those people who are able to go out and catch these fish themselves. I would love to see in person, where and how these fish live as pictures can only tell so much. Of course I hate travelling, so pictures it is going to have to be.


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## LittleBettaFish

Okay, plan is to purchase a pair of Betta uberis if possible. Apparently this same seller may also have pairs of Betta rutilans sp. cf. green, so I am considering purchasing a pair of these as well. My group is 'unbreedable' because of the velvet, and I definitely do not want to lose this species from my fish room even if they are vicious buggers. 

My hendra pair spawned on Friday I believe. It looks like my miniopinna also have a nest full of eggs so that is always exciting. 

I got a couple of photos of my sp. wajok males, otherwise haven't really done much else with my fish since I've been doing dog/house stuff. 




























I also wanted to say that Bandit our old cat is doing so much better now we discontinued his chemotherapy. His appetite is miles better and I've managed to get him off the Fancy Feast/Whiskas and back onto his raw food with some Felidae grain-free wet mixed in as well. I've noticed a big difference in his general outlook and I think he might even have gained some weight back. Like I told mum, I'd rather a week of him like he is now, than six months of him being sick and miserable on the chemo. 









This was him preventing me from making my bed.


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## beautiful Betta

Oh god just noticed my typo, hoppy, should have been hobby, lol I do that sometimes mix my p's and b's by mistake.

That's good news about your cat, glad he is feeling better. I have a old cat, 16 she is very fussy with her food, I am getting to the point I don't know what to buy her anymore. She likes it one day then doesn't the next. What do you do for the raw food diet?


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## LittleBettaFish

I find cats are a whole other level of fussy compared to dogs - and it gets even harder when they are old and if they are dealing with medical issues on top of that. 

I honestly just feed Bandit whatever he will eat. The important thing is that he is eating. We cycle through foods from the Fancy Feast/Whiskas side of things, to the more premium brands such as Wellness/Eagle Pack. He usually only gets wet food because the steroid he is on makes him drink excessively anyway, and I also want to keep his kidneys healthy as long as possible. I prefer him to stay on the premium brands simply because I do notice a difference in coat quality, but I am not going to force him to eat those foods if he doesn't want to. 

Fortunately, Bandit has always liked raw meat. I will give him things like mince, chicken necks/frames and cut up steak/chicken breast. However, for a complete and pre-made raw diet, I use BARF.

http://www.barfaustralia.com/

I found it at PetBarn and he really likes it. Probably the only downside I have noticed is that if I feed it every day he can get a bit constipated. I think because of the bone content in it. However, I alternate between the BARF and this new brand of food I'm trying: Felidae Pure Elements and Felidae Pure Sea. I thought the mushy texture would have turned him off but he seems to really like it, as do our other two cats. I've also noticed his dandruff is clearing up and his coat is much softer and shinier of late.


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## LittleBettaFish

Looked in my hendra tank to see one of the sub-adult daughters wrapping with the original male. I have no idea what happened to the eggs from Friday so someone might have eaten them. This female is so small-bodied still that I can't see how she is going to produce any eggs at all. 

Amazing how instinct kicks in though. I suppose it does help the male has spawned a million times and so knows exactly what to do and how to do it. 

They just grow up so fast. I think I got this pair back in September, so I am pretty happy with that growth rate considering the size of the tank they are in, the amount of supplemental food I fed and the amount of water changes I did.


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## cheekysquirrel

Awww Bandit is adorable! I just want to cuddle him <3 
Cats are incredibly fussy. At one point Remy would ONLY eat Dine Desire Virgin Flaked Tuna. She turned her nose up at human grade tuna. Wouldn't even try it. Gave it one sniff and walked away.
I hope Bandit is OK, I'm sorry he's been so sick :-(
Glad to hear your fish are doing well :-D


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah Bandit has run the gauntlet on medical issues. 

It started probably a year or more ago when he nearly died from undiagnosed hyperthyroidism and what turned out to be chronic pancreatitis. 

We started going to a specialist cat vet in the city and aside from a few episodes where he had to visit the vet for fluids and treatment he was fine. 

Then he got _really_ sick. I thought he was honestly going to die and so did the vet when we got him there. 

She was palpating him and she suddenly gets this serious expression and tells us she feels a very hard mass. Biopsy tells her nothing and so after some deliberation mum and I decide to get him cut open to have a look. If it's cancer and it was everywhere, we told the vet to put him to sleep on the table.

Saying goodbye to a very drugged up Bandit and not knowing if we would see him again was incredibly difficult for me. I always like to be there when they pass and it felt like a betrayal to leave him. 

Anyway we got this call from our vet. Turns out Bandit had swallowed a corn cob! Unfortunately, it also turned out that he had some sort of gastroinstestinal lymphoma. We decided to do chemotherapy with tablets along with a steroid to keep the inflammation down (at least that is what I think it does) but as time went on, it became obvious the chemo was making Bandit very unhappy. 

After talking to the vet we decided to just keep him on the steroid and when the time comes that his quality of life declines, we will bring him in to be put to sleep. Hopefully that is not going to be for a while yet. 

I have to laugh. He is scruffy looking cat (he looks like he lives on the street), and when we take him to the cat vet the other owners in the waiting room are always taken aback when I tell them they don't have to say how beautiful he is. They probably think what a cruel owner I am haha.


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## MattsBettas

Very happy Bandit is doing better, hopefully he keeps his current quality of life for a while. 

LBF, can I use a few of your pics in a thread? With credit, of course.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah that is fine. What are you going to be using them for? 

I managed to get some photos of my spawning hendra, and while I did so, I discovered that the other sub-adults and juveniles are actually eating the unguarded eggs in the nest and any that fall down before the breeding pair can get to them!! 




































The female in the film canister got chased in there by the male because she was eating the eggs. 

I fed them all some mosquito larvae but being the greedy fish they are, I doubt that will hold them back for long. The stinkers. No wonder the mother is so aggressive to them when she is spawning.


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## beautiful Betta

He looks massive compared to her, I guess she was into older males, him younger girls, pervert, lol

Thanks for the link to the food, although I didn't think it would be actually raw food, I thought I would get the ingredients and cook it to some recipe, lol. I think she would be as sick as a dog if I fed her raw food. At the moment she seems to like the applaws range which is 100% natural, although complementary food, even although it looks better than the complete foods. But she is also enjoying the felix range which is new in coles, used be one of the top brands in the UK. I too buy all the expensive ones and she goes off them. I have even bought her in the human range skinless and boneless tinned salmon in spring water, she had a little bit then turned her nose up. tinned sardines in spring water. Tuna in spring water. Fish flavours being her thing. don't like chicken flavoured foods, literally just walks away from it.

In case of any interest. The new applaws clumping cat litter is great too. It is like a wood so not heavy, and is biodegradable and safe to flush down the toilet, which makes taking the daily mess out really convenient and does actually clump and scoop out well. I was a bit doubtful about the clumping claim on a wood based litter.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think Applaws doesn't have taurine - at least the cans anyway. Bandit was on them for a while but when he only wanted the wet I was worried about a taurine deficiency. 

Of course he is couldn't wait to get stuck into the maggot-filled rat our other cat brought to the front door.

We use a crystal kitty litter. Our oriental is a very bad sprayer and we tried other brands and types but he prefers the crystals and we want him using the litter tray as often as possible. 

Well my poor hendra pair got a lot of their eggs eaten. This is why I need space for two separate tanks - one to breed my pair in, and one to raise the fry in once they reach a certain age/size.


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## LittleBettaFish

Found a pair of my rutilans wrapping under an IAL. Naughty fish. I don't think this male has spawned before because he looks like he has no clue as to what he is doing. It's a shame that I can't separate a pair out to breed from, but I don't want to take the risk that the velvet comes back. At the moment, theirs is the only tank where it is still 'active'.

There must have been a whole heap of hendra eggs from the spawn on Friday that were not eaten because the male has a group of fry hanging from the nest this morning. I'm glad he has some fry to show for all his hard work, because he is such a devoted father. 

I had a peek in, and it looks like my sp. apiapi male has some fry that are almost free-swimming. The juveniles and sub-adults in that tank seem much less predatory because I do have a number of very small fry that are growing out alongside their older siblings. 

My miniopinna male is still hovering under his nest but he gets upset if I try and have a look so I am just going to assume there are still eggs/fry in there. Some of the older juveniles are getting really big. Hopefully they are not all male. 

Got some rooibos tea bags from the supermarket yesterday so I'm going to do water changes on all my tanks and refill my water aging tubs. 

I got some more photos from yesterday of my hendra pair spawning. They are not going to win any awards, but they do show off how beautiful this species is. 









Showing the vertical barring on the female



























Stunned under the nest









Would have been a nice photo if she was in focus and my glass was clean










Watching them spawn yesterday and watching my rutilans awkward fumbling today, I am reminded of why I love these fish so much. I do gripe, but admittedly apart from the death of my brownorum male, I have had a pretty good run with my wilds. Their maintenance is very low-key nowadays, and my 'hands-off' approach to raising fry has made life a lot less stressful. 

If only I had the space for a decent fish room, it would be ideal. I wish I could just knock down the wall between my room and the spare room and use the extra space to install a couple of large racks. Unfortunately, my mum does not seem enthralled with the idea oddly enough.


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## LittleBettaFish

I have a very lovely sp. apiapi male sub-adult who seems to have sprouted overnight. Oddly enough, his caudal is rounded not spade-shaped like his father. I'm hoping it grows some more as his anal fin is also really short. I don't know why all these these young males I have keep failing to match the beauty of their fathers. The only one who is a dead ringer for his father at this point in time, is my biggest hendra male. 










With that said, the colour on the males of this species is unreal. It's such a deep, rich red with basically no iridescence. 

I originally thought I had all females in this group of young fish, but it looks like there are several more males. Hopefully there are not too many more though.

I also got a photo of the biggest female offspring who is about the same size as her mother now. It wasn't a very good photo as she is usually busy chasing the other fish. 










Then I have a much smaller juvenile. Still too small and lacking in colour to correctly guess the gender. 










I harvested a whole lot of mosquito larvae from my tubs this afternoon so all my fish have full stomachs. Some tanks also got grindals and leftover BBS. I managed to get through all my water changes yesterday and I am just waiting for it to cool down so I can go fill up my water tub downstairs. 

I seriously do not know why I didn't have these water aging tubs set up earlier. They make life so much easier. Not only is the water is already heated to the appropriate temperature, but it is a much closer match to the water conditions in the tanks and already has tannins added so I don't lose the colour from my tank water.


----------



## beautiful Betta

His colour is good, nice and rich. Like Red Wine, lol


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha yeah. I suppose you could say that my fish rack is like a wine rack. Lots of nice reds in there. 

I wish the original male would leave father duties and come out more often. I rarely see him and I haven't taken a good photo of him for ages now. He is absolutely stunning but he spends all his time in the film canister guarding eggs/fry. 

I don't know what I am going to do with the group. Their tank is only 3.5 gallons and once all of the current group of young fish hit full size it is going to be very cramped. I suppose I am going to have to set up a second tank to move some of them across into... eventually.


----------



## beautiful Betta

You could look at getting a large food container, which could be used as a temporary tank. And probably quite cheap.


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## LittleBettaFish

I have a whole cubby house full of empty tanks. It's just finding the space. Ugh, why do I not have an entire room to dedicate to my fish?!


----------



## beautiful Betta

When I had more than one fish, I had this idea that I would buy a chunky wood open grid squares display cabinet. (this was when I had a few small 3 gallon tanks, that had filters and heaters. ) Then I would place my tanks within the squares, each tank being its own little piece of living art. That I could fill all the squares with a tank and a fish making it look beautiful in the home, but at the same time catering for all the fish's needs. kind of a living art display unit, and I had the idea I could tack the cables discreetly to the back of the beams keeping them out of site.


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## MattsBettas

Ever kept or know anything about B. ocellata? I kinda ended up with a pair...


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## LittleBettaFish

They are from the unimaculata complex obviously, and as I have owned ideii, unimaculata and macrostoma in the past, I can offer some advice. 

For a pair of ocellata, I think a 15-20 gallon tank is best. I did have my pair of unimaculata in a 10 gallon, but it felt cramped and I wouldn't use one as more than a temporary tank. 

I found that aside from my macrostoma, neither my ideii or unimaculata were particularly fussy about water conditions or tank set-up. I did notice that my male unimaculata held to term only when I dropped the pH down, but some males are most likely going to hold regardless. 

This complex are usually very personable fish, particularly if they are captive bred. All of my unimaculata complex fish would take anything I put in the tank, whether it was pellets, frozen or live. Just be fast when you put the food in the tank because they are extremely powerful jumpers and if I was too slow I would always end up with a unimaculata on my lap. 

I find these fish don't mind a stronger flow than a lot of other wild bettas are comfortable with. A large sponge filter should be more than adequate. 

If they do spawn you have to watch the female. My unimaculata female would start pressuring the male to spawn again while he was holding and this can disturb them and cause them to swallow. You may need to remove her or separate them if he is holding depending on how she behaves.

My unimaculata never ate their fry, but some pairs might. With these sorts of species unless you are willing to do a trial run, I usually try and remove the fry to a separate grow-out as soon as the male releases them. 

Hope that helps some. They are a pretty easy complex to work with.


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## LittleBettaFish

Okay I haven't updated this with news on my fish in a few days. We've been really busy doing house and dog stuff that I've barely had time to do more than glance at my fish tanks. 

Today I got through all my water changes and filled up my two water aging containers so they would be ready for next time. 

Spawning wise, my sp. apiapi male has a nest full of eggs - surprise I know. This evening, I also caught my persephone female (mother of the four juveniles) wrapping with a male under a nest while a second male hovered nearby. I don't know if any eggs were produced and doubt if they were that they would even survive, but spawning behaviour is generally a good indication that fish are happy and healthy. 

It looks like I will be selling one of my bigger hendra female sub-adults. Another hobbyist who has purchased from me several times lost her female and was keen to replace her. Be sad to see whatever female I pick go, but I can't keep them all. 

I still haven't heard anything about my sp. wajok female and whether she is in the country and ready to be shipped out. I am hoping to get her this week as the male in the main part of the tank has a great bubblenest going and that tank is just ripe to house a breeding pair. 

This afternoon, I also decided to remove the goldvine from my miniopinna tank. It was crowding the tank making it difficult to see the fish, and in the stagnant water it has a tendency to get quite slimy and make a mess of my plants. I discovered I have at least ten miniopinna fry of various ages. I did notice one of the smallest fry (maybe 5-6mm) has a hunched back. I'm going to see how it matures and whether the back straightens out, otherwise I will probably euthanise it. It's going to be hard enough finding fresh blood to infuse this line with so I only want the fittest to be retained for breeding purposes. 

I also moved my five Aphyosemion australe fry into a small tank and they are up next to the main tank now. As soon as they are big enough not to be considered appetisers, they will be going in there. I think I killed the remaining eggs when I left the heater unplugged because no more fry hatched and I couldn't even see any signs of eggs when I looked through the peat moss.

Tomorrow's plan will be to empty out the quickly evaporating water from the empty tank I have on my bottom shelf, and get it set-up properly for a pair of wild bettas. I still don't know what species I want to get next or when I am actually going to get them, but it won't hurt for the watersprite to have several weeks to grow in and mature. Otherwise it tends to look rather pathetic for some time. 

I don't have any pictures but will try to get some tomorrow as my fish have to be in the mood to have them taken.


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## MattsBettas

The ocellata are in a nice twenty gallon tank with a group of endlers that they took to surprisingly well. 

Your unimacs were one of the species you got to take pellets, right? 

Happy all is well in your fishroom, even though you are so busy!


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah my unimaculata took pellets. The bigger mouthbrooders tend not to be as fussy about food as some of the smaller species of wilds. My strohi, unimaculata, ideii and macrostoma all readily took pellets.


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## LittleBettaFish

Looks like my miniopinna group still has ich. I don't think I killed it off 100% last time. So I am slowly raising the temperature up and have added some aquarium salt even though I don't normally because I really don't want to lose any fry or fish from this. Hopefully two weeks at 32 degrees celsius should be enough to kill the ich but not my fish. 

Speaking of miniopinna, I'm looking at getting another pair of miniopinna and a pair of rutilans green if I can in the next shipment. I have found a seller who might have some available so I am just waiting to hear back. My mum has agreed to 'sponsor' my rutilans green because she likes them and she knows I can't breed my current group because of the previous velvet infection. I figure with these sometimes harder to get species it may be better to have 'back-up' pairs. Uberis and burdigala are very easy to source so I would rather put them off until later. 

I did take some photos last night, just of my hendra and sp. apiapi. 









This male is like perfection. It's amazing how much he has grown and matured over the past six or so months. You could not ask for a better father either. 


















The legacy continues with his son. Unfortunately, someone he only has one and a half ventrals because a sibling or parent bit the other half off. 

Also getting a lot more sp. apiapi males maturing. I realise now that my F1 males don't seem to have the same spade-shaped caudal as their father. This was why I was thinking I had so many females. 









Here's an F1 male here showing a rounded caudal









Possibly a female based on colour and fins









The original female with her biggest daughter in the background

At this point, I am considering setting up a 3ft tank downstairs and using it like a bain-marie system. I want to find some plastic jars/containers that are at least 4L/1 gallon in size and use these to house small groups of juveniles and sub-adults. I was trying to figure out some way of making the jars self-cleaning by attaching some kind of outlet to the bottom of each jar, so that I could avoid cross-contamination with multiple siphons. 

This will give my breathing pairs some room and allow more fry to survive. Plus if something happens in the main tank, I won't lose everyone.


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## MattsBettas

I still love the persephone and all the rest, but your apiapi have grown on me to the point where it's safe to say they're my favorite species that you own. 

I love the ocellata... But these sloppy wrappers are killing me! A couple of questions about your unimaculata complex fish... Did their dorsal fins quiver when they were excited? How long did they take to breed?


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## LittleBettaFish

I like my sp. apiapi too. I got contacted by someone who wanted to see if he could use their photos (and that of my sp. wajok) at the spring meeting for the IGL (I believe that is the International Association for Labyrinth Fish). 

Not only are they lovely to look at, but they are such characters. I do wish I saw the original male more. He hasn't been away from that film canister for more than a couple of days. It's been almost six months of continuous spawning and fry raising. That is absolute dedication. 

To answer your question, I have no idea about the dorsal fin. I also never sat and watched my unimaculata pair spawning so I can't say how long it took them to breed.


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## MattsBettas

I was fortunate enough to be there when they began trying last night and they haven't stopped going since then. I think it's a bit unusual that it's taking this long which is why I asked, but it doesn't bother me, breeding behavior is healthy behavior. 

I ask about the dorsal twitching because the female does it when they are courting, it's very notice let and something I've never seen.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah I would say my unimaculata pair only used to take a few hours to spawn because they do it in the morning and the male would have a mouthful by the afternoon. 

However, he had spawned before. I'm not sure how long it took him and the original female to spawn for the first time. 

I found when my unimaculata complex females were receptive to mating that they would develop very prominent horizontal barring versus the vertical barring my coccina complex females get. 

A guy local to me who keeps and breeds lots of macrostoma also said the same thing.

Any time my unimaculata female was eggy she would bar right up in what most betta keepers would call 'stress striping' and then spawn very shortly after.


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## MattsBettas

I feel bad for spamming up your bread with ocellata stuff... But the clumsy virgins (unless they were bred before sale) finally got it right! Any tips on getting him to hold to term? I know you had better luck in softer water with your unimacs... But is there anything else I can do to help him?

There's a pic of the big guy in my journal with his mouth full of eggs.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well the seller didn't have any rutilans green. So I am getting uberis instead as well as a second miniopinna pair. His prices are good so hopefully I can put some money away for a couple more species in the future. 

Matt, there really isn't anything you can do to ensure he'll hold. Some males will hold through anything. I had a channoides male who got chased around with a net and then dumped into an entirely new tank and he held the entire time. 

Trying not to disturb them too much and removing the female if she is harassing him is about all you can do. 

Not all first-time fathers will swallow. Some are awesome from day one. Some are also terrible and remain terrible no matter how much practice they get.


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## LittleBettaFish

This is for those who think it's just domesticated/fancy Betta splendens that are aggressive.

This is a 2 year old (probably getting closer to 3 now) male Betta rutilans sp. cf. green that I bred myself. He is in a 2ft tank where only really the top third of the tank doesn't contain any cover. He shares the tank with the rest of his adult siblings and I would say almost all of his day is spent fighting with his similar sized brothers. 




























Unfortunately, my glass is dirty and because these guys have had velvet they are last on the list of 'tanks I have to stick my hand in today'. 

However, you can see the damage that has been done. All of my bigger males look like this. I don't think any of them have a complete set of ventrals!

Even the smaller fish don't escape the odd nip here and there. 

Otherwise, I've got to chase up Jodi about my Betta sp. wajok female. Remind me to never again get my fish sent on a shipment that coincides with a big IBC show. 

Hopefully the female is alive and is just waiting to be shipped out because the male in the main tank is building nests everywhere. 

Paid for my uberis and second miniopinna pair, so going to start getting tanks set-up for them. I think I'll put the miniopinna into a 30cm cube and the uberis can go into a 45cm tank - similar to my sp. wajok tank now. I'm going to order some leaves online to go in the bottom of their tanks, and then have some watersprite and duckweed floating at the surface. 

I've decided my killifish can move to my rack downstairs, so that will give me space for a couple of cubes or a single 45cm tank on the sideboard. I'm hoping I can sell a custom made tank I don't use and this whole box of filters and related 'stuff' to fund the purchase of another pair or two. 

It's so aggravating living in Australia. The cost to import and ship the two pairs I just purchased to me, is more than the pairs cost themselves. I have about $100 in import fees and shipping costs to pay for four fish. It would be better if I lived in Brisbane. At least then I could shave at least $20 off the bill. 

I also just got my new bedroom set delivered. Unfortunately, my bedside table was damaged, but it probably wouldn't be able to fit in anyway while my rack is still up here. At least now when I have people around to purchase stuff, my room isn't going to look like it belongs to someone less than half my age. 

Of course there's not much I can do about the pastel pink paint.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my bed turned into a disaster. My dad came over for dinner after we'd biked one of the dogs last night, and I helped him put my bed together. 

Firstly, we hadn't realised when we purchased it, that it was basically veneer over MDF. With the price and the fact my mum's bed from them is such good-quality, we thought my set would be the same. However, that was our mistake and it was still very nice looking. 

Anyway we open the packet of screws. Turns out one of the screws is missing. Annoying but not a major hassle.

As we go on, it turns out the base to the bed was these two solid sheets of MDF that were meant to slot together and then be bolted to the frame. Well for some reason, one of the bases was 1.5cm wider than the other meaning they couldn't slot into place without there being this overhang down one side. 

Already a rather peeved about the bedside table being damaged before it even arrived, my mum called the store to complain as this was handmade here in Melbourne and took around 8 weeks to complete. To make matters worse, as we are taking it apart, my dad notices they haven't glued the veneer down properly on two of the bed leg bottoms so it has started to peel and crack. 

Suffice to say I was extremely disappointed. My new mattress got delivered today and now I don't know how long it is going to be until I have a bed for it to go on. 

To keep things fish related, I took some photos of various fish in my fish room this morning. It's me procrastinating on doing water changes. 

My hendra pair are either about to spawn or have recently spawned. Unfortunately, no photos of the male as he was in the film canister. 




























Then we have my second biggest brownorum sub-adult/juvenile. I'm sort of not happy with how these young fish are maturing. I like my brownorum to display a lateral blotch, and only two of my youngsters are. I think once everyone is at sub-adult size I will be seriously considering whether it's best to retain the nicest sibling pair and then sell the rest and purchase new foundation stock. 










Then my two sp. wajok males were going at it, so I managed to get a couple of photos of the one in the main tank. These are such big boys. Bigger than any of my other wilds.


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## MattsBettas

Awesome pics as always, and sorry about your bedroom set- good luck getting everything sorted out. 

One more question... Do I let the male hold to term and deliver in the main tank? Or should I move him to a different tank at a certain point to let him spit? I've seen people do both and it's confusing, moving him seems like it would be super stressful but at the same time I'm not sure how the babies would fare in the main tank...


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## LittleBettaFish

I never moved my mouthbrooders. I found it stressful as heck for them. I think it's rarely the fathers that will cannibalise the fry, but the mother. My channoides female would eat any free-swimming fry she could find as soon as the male released them. 

However, neither of my unimaculata touched their fry. Nor did my strohi or my albimarginata so I think it depends greatly on the individual pair. 

I did one time try to separate my unimaculata male and he just got out of the breeding net and back into the tank. So I gave up pretty shortly after that.


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## LittleBettaFish

Also got a few quick snaps of my Betta persephone. The lighting has such an effect on how their colour comes across.




































Juvenile. Hoping this turns out to be a female because I will be pairing her up with a wild-caught or captive bred fish of same locality (Ayer Hitam) to continue with my breeding of this species.


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## LittleBettaFish

I thought I'd lost my brownorum female. I hadn't seen her in ages and she used to be one of the first to come up to the front to be fed. 

Well the other day I not only found her, but also discovered the reason for her extended absence. 

It turns out, the biggest sub-adult male has inherited his mother's aggressive streak. Unlike her previous mate who was more bark than bite, this son of hers is not afraid to put her back in her place. He is much smaller than her, but he is the aggressor in nearly every altercation they have. 

Here he is this morning looking like the spitting image of his father. I put a film canister in the other day and I noticed an immediate increase in the level of aggression between them. The female knew exactly what that film canister was for, and I'm hoping the male works out what he is supposed to do as well. 










I also got some more photos of what I think is brownorum male I posted about above. Oddly enough he is maturing very nicely. His colour is different to his older brother's. He has more gold in his anal fin and is very dark. I am interested to see how he looks when he is fully mature. 





































I still find it amazing to think I bred and raised these fish. I look at my tank of persephone and rutilans and think maybe I am not such a bad fishkeeper after all.


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## Hallyx

LittleBettaFish said:


> ..... spawning behaviour is generally a good indication that fish are happy and healthy.


That seems intuitive. Yet we have been cautioned by more experienced keepers that bubblenest-building is not a certain indicator of health or "happiness." After all, it is said, they build nests in those filthy, cold petstore cups. And some (like mine) don't build nests even when well-kept.

As always, your observations would be very valuable.

And I so adore your Hendra. Himself is looking magnificent.


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## LittleBettaFish

I suppose it's one thing to build a nest and another altogether to successfully spawn and have the energy to tend to the eggs and fry. 

There are a lot of people who can get the former when they try and breed splendens, but not as many who are able to successfully achieve the latter. 

Yes some fish will happily spawn in dirty water without being properly conditioned, but most males do have to be in peak physical condition to be willing and able to spawn. 

I know it takes a lot out of my males when they spawn weekly. That is why I try to keep the live foods up and the water conditions (temperature, pH, hardness etc.) ideal.


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## beautiful Betta

Some great pics, the fish mostly look to be doing really well, with a few healing up nicely. It is so frustrating when furniture arrives and it is damaged. I have purchased far pavilions furniture a few times (they do a nice quality range that is affordable, IMO) but every time there was always something damaged that needed replacing, they always replaced no problem just the hassle of contacting them then taking photographs to send to them for conformation, just stuff you cant really be bothered with, and just wished the furniture was all perfect in the first place, is it that difficult to check before sending out lol.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah it is a hassle. Especially when it wasn't something you could see until we'd taken apart my old bed and got the new one almost fully assembled. My previous bed set came from China and it was better than this set that cost about twice as much and was made here in Australia. 

I sold one of my hendra female juveniles today. There was a bit of a heart attack moment when the bag slipped out of the buyer's hand and split open on the slate at our front door. Luckily the female seemed alright. I offered a replacement just in case but the buyer was happy to take her still. She was one of my biggest females so hopefully it won't take too long before her and the male waiting for her, are spawning. 

I found my biggest brownorum male has a bubblenest going in the film canister and both him and his mother were in there together. I would be interested to see if they did spawn, whether the red will become further washed out. This male is already lighter than the father and the female is more of a brown colour through the body. 



















The mum seems to have a tiny bit of swelling under her jaw. I don't know what that is from. She always seems to have something going on. 

I am definitely leaning towards getting a replacement pair of brownorum when I have the funds and selling most/all of this current group. Knowing my luck, they are probably mostly female.


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## beautiful Betta

wow that was lucky that the girl was alright. I was reading that a bit OMG, and so good of you to offer a replacement, I know she may have been a girl that you might have preferred to keep so slight ulterior motive, lol, but still a lot of people wouldn't and say well you dropped it.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well apparently she is settling in well at her new home and the male is not bothering her. I thought she was definitely going to be dead or severely injured but the water must have cushioned the impact. 

I actually have a whole heap of females in that tank. Only two look to be obvious males. The rest all look female. The buyer was looking at taking a second female if she could, but I wanted to wait to see how this current group grow-out as I don't want to give away my best fish and then be stuck with only the duds.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think it's time some of my biggest sp. apiapi juveniles/sub-adults moved into a tank of their own. I've been noticing a lot of caudal fins with chunks taken out of them and as the breeding tank is not very big, I don't want them to be going at constantly. 

I have a spare 25cm cube down in my shed that I am going to pull out and use as a secondary grow-out. I'm going to be ordering some dried leaves to go along the bottom with peat moss substrate, and then will add in some hydrilla, hornwort, watersprite and duckweed to provide some greenery. 

This is the mother and you can see the damage done.


















Chasing her oldest son









With a younger son









The same son as above. For some reason his head is really dark. I think maybe some sort of damage done. Possibly from the siphon. 

I was wondering why all my miniopinna fry and the female were beaching themselves on this IAL. I thought maybe they were reacting to something in the water or the ich, until I remembered I'd squirted some BBS up there. Now everyone is up on the leaf trying to get the last remaining shrimp. Unfortunately, I've noticed that my biggest juvenile is bottom heavy. I'm thinking it's from over-indulging in BBS so I am going to switch back to mosquito larvae and grindals for now. I find BBS seems to be the worst culprit for causing swim bladder issues in fry. Hopefully it clears up as the juvenile is around 2cm in size. 

I managed to get some photos of the female and one of the juveniles up on the leaf. You can see why I thought something was wrong with them. 














































My hendra male also had a bunch of fry hatch out overnight so he is very busy looking after those.


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## beautiful Betta

You would think there was something wrong, raising stress levels no doubt. 

Congrats on your new fry.


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## LittleBettaFish

Lol I doubt the fry are going to stay alive for very long. I think I saw their older siblings licking their lips over on the other side of the tank. 

My poor miniopinna male had no idea why everyone kept getting on the leaf. He has claimed the spot under the leaf as his and it was very disconcerting for him to have everyone up there. 

It's funny how nonplussed they were that they were being almost completely out of the water. One of the juveniles just laid on its side snatching at whatever BBS was in reach. It was like: "too...lazy...to...move...any...further". 

I'm really surprised my the size and number of the fry/juveniles in there. Considering I hardly fed them at all they have grown at a pretty decent rate. Now knowing my luck I will get like one female and the rest male. 

I should hopefully have that second pair of miniopinna in early May, along with my uberis. 

I'm wondering if maybe I can squeeze a 2m long rack downstairs rather than the 1.8m one I was looking at. That extra 60cm or so of space would be great. It means I might be able to fit another tank or two on there. I still have to get burdigala, tussyae, livida, coccina and rutilans before I have the entire complex. So many fish, so little time and so little money haha.


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## beautiful Betta

LittleBettaFish said:


> Lol I doubt the fry are going to stay alive for very long. I think I saw their older siblings licking their lips over on the other side of the tank.
> 
> I just cant help to think poor little guys, I guess that's nature survival of fittest and all.
> 
> My poor miniopinna male had no idea why everyone kept getting on the leaf. He has claimed the spot under the leaf as his and it was very disconcerting for him to have everyone up there.
> 
> Made me smile, just have images of him looking left and right so confused at what the hell was going on, does nobody know this is my leaf, lol.
> 
> It's funny how nonplussed they were that they were being almost completely out of the water. One of the juveniles just laid on its side snatching at whatever BBS was in reach. It was like: "too...lazy...to...move...any...further".
> 
> It's funny that those shots kind of reminded me of when I had been to Florida to sea world and seen the killer whales out of the water, on there little side platform where they displayed for audience. Sorry to any who disagree with whales in captivity but I had a great holiday and sea world would have to be one of my favourite parks. Would they even survive back in the wild if they were suddenly released as many now are even born in captivity.
> 
> I should hopefully have that second pair of miniopinna in early May, along with my uberis.
> 
> Hope that all goes well for you and they arrive safely.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I am sad. Found out the female sp. wajok Hermanus had chosen for me died in quarantine. I feel like I am cursed with this stupid species.

First they arrive with a mild case of ich, which because of the names on the bags being mixed up, spread to my miniopinna. Then I end up with two males who can't even live together without one almost being killed. 

Finally this female dies in quarantine. Apparently, I can have the female from another pair but this is going to cost more money, and if she arrives and is male, I am going to cry and sell the lot of them. 

It's reminding me of when I first got my persephone and it felt like everything went wrong.


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## beautiful Betta

So sorry to hear of the loss. Must be so frustrating when you have been waiting on her.

And just hassle and more costs for you. Try not to let it get you down.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well things are looking up. Not only did I finally work out a way to run my BBS hatchery without spraying salt water everywhere, but I also am getting my female sp. wajok shipped out today. There was a mix-up with the cost but that's sorted now and so hopefully I get a happy and healthy female arriving on my doorstep tomorrow. 

Also, I am hoping that the male in the main tank doesn't attack her or anything. Otherwise Jar Fish can have a turn as he seems slightly less aggressive. 

Got a 30cm cube cleaned up and scrubbed out for my miniopinna pair, and am about to drag a 45cm long tank up from the cubby for my uberis pair. My killifish group will most likely be moving downstairs, and I'm going to set-up a 30cm cube for either burdigala or standard rutilans, and a 25cm for my sp. apiapi juveniles/sub-adults. 

Then that will be me done fish wise for a while. Unless I can pick up a part-time job in the next couple of months...or possibly sell a kidney haha.


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## beautiful Betta

That's good news.


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## LittleBettaFish

My sp. wajok female arrived! For some reason the postman put her in the letterbox rather than on the doorstep. However, she was so worth the wait (even if it isn't the original female I ordered). As soon as I put the bag in the tank she started flaring at the two big males. Now she's in the tank she's barred up and following the male around showing a lot of interest. 

My only fear is that he might behave too aggressively towards her, but there is plenty of cover in the tank so worst comes to worst, she could hide out until I was able to remove him. 

Here is the male in the main tank investigating this new arrival. 



















Yesterday, my biggest brownorum F1 male spawned with his mother. There was a small nest of eggs in the film canister when I went to bed, but I think he's either tried to move them during the night or his siblings have gotten in and eaten the eggs because I only managed to rescue three out of this second nest by the front of the tank. 

Him and the mum were flaring at each other again today, so who knows if a second attempt is going to be made.


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## MattsBettas

Glad she arrived safely!


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## LittleBettaFish

So am I. Especially since her box was just tucked into the bottom section of our letterbox. 

I have no idea where the two of them have gone off to, but she certainly is one of the feistier females I've had delivered. 

The quick glimpses I have of her coloured up, show me that I wasn't just being an idiot about sexing this species, my two being both male really were basically identical. 

I also am working on getting my tanks for my uberis and miniopinna pairs set-up, as well as the grow-out for my sp. apiapi juveniles. So far I have cleaned out two tanks, ordered some dried leaves and live plants, and have peat moss soaking in a bowl downstairs. I ran out of ADA aquasoil and so I'm just going to use peat moss as substrate with leaf litter over the top and then when I get a new bag of soil, chuck a couple of handfuls into the tanks for my plants to use. 

So wish I could snap my fingers and give myself the space for an extra rack. Then I could easily run another 10 - 12 tanks on it.


----------



## beautiful Betta

So glad she arrived safely for you. Sounds promising for them breeding.


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## Aquatail

I'm glad your sp. wajok female arrived alright! ^_^


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I haven't checked this morning but my sp. wajok female was doing fine last time I looked in. Unfortunately, I think the male in the jar is providing a distraction to any breeding efforts as the male spends more time flaring at him than working on a nest. 

In other news I managed to artificially hatch two out of the three brownorum eggs I rescued. I don't know what happened to the third egg. The fry seem surprisingly strong. They only hatched late last night/this morning, but they are managing to stay up in the duckweed and the remaining bubbles by themselves. I do hope these two make it, as it was a miracle I even spotted the eggs at all. 

Other than that, my camera ran out of batteries so no photos until I charge it. I have to do water changes on all my tanks today, as well as start getting my two empty tanks ready. First step will be to fill them up, put in the peat moss substrate, chuck in a couple of heaters and get my sponge filters hooked up.


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## LittleBettaFish

My two artificially hatched brownorum are now almost completely free-swimming. I think I am going to need to upgrade their living quarters though, as they are actually only in a plastic tablespoon measure. My five killifish fry are also growing well. They now live in an air-powered HOB breeder box that hangs off the main tank, so I don't have to freak out about constant water changes or trying to fit one more tank in.

I've decided to move my rutilans green and killifish tanks downstairs. It's the only way I am going to have room for my hendra, brownorum and sp. apiapi grow-out tanks. Also I would rather have my rutilans green away from the rest of my tanks being that they most likely still have velvet. 

At the moment I still don't know how I am going to run my grow-outs. The option I am leaning most towards, is a large plastic tub, with smaller plastic tubs or tanks inside of this. It is not going to provide for excellent viewing, but I am on a budget, and it is not going to be a permanent housing solution. 

Because I am on such a tight budget and because they are going to tear each other to pieces if there is not enough cover, I went and got some yarn yesterday and have made myself up some large spawning mops. I'm hoping this provides enough cover along with floating plants, IALs and some PVC pipes. The sp. apiapi in particular have been doing some damage to each other, and I've noticed my original pair have stopped spawning now there are so many juveniles and sub-adults present. 











I'm also hoping this large tub will fit on the bottom shelf of my rack. I've only got the two 30cm cubes on it once I remove my rutilans tank, so that will give me just under 90cm to work with. 

The jarred sp. wajok male is also going to have to go in the tub. Unfortunately, he is proving to be a massive distraction to spawning efforts, and while my main male has built another nest, he spends all his time flaring at his rival rather than courting the female. 

I did manage to snap a couple of shots of the female. The water is so dark, it makes it difficult for the camera to focus on her. It looks like the male has taken some bites out of her caudal, but other than that, they seem to be getting along okay. 




























I was originally going to get a third species of wild betta in the June shipment. However, for the time being I'm going to hold off on that, and use my money to tidy up a few of my existing tanks. I need to purchase a couple more heaters as some of my 25 watt ones are struggling with the sudden drop in temperatures. I also want to purchase a whole heap of low grade IAL from Bettawan, and try and suss out a cheaper source for Mekong River driftwood if I can. 

Then here is just a photo of my hendra female, her biggest son (he has grown so much!), and one of my most likely female, brownorum juveniles.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just a quick update, my sp. wajok pair were either spawning last night or trying to, but if there were eggs they have been eaten. Now the male is back flaring at the other male so I'm going to try and move him out some time this week. 

My two brownorum fry are doing well. I'm going to try and slowly move them over into a slightly bigger container and then when they are big enough not to be considered food by their siblings, they will be added into the main tank. 

I picked up three 15L plastic containers for my grow-outs. Now I just need to find a tank or container that is big enough to hold all three of them, but small enough to fit on the bottom shelf of my rack. 

Apparently my dried riparian leaves and plants got shipped out today so they should arrive tomorrow. That will allow me to get the new tanks set-up fully, and then it will just be a matter of waiting for my fish to arrive on the next shipment. 

Mum thinks we can fit another rack downstairs that is the same size as the one I have now, so that will mean I could potentially fit another 10-12 tanks. This will at least give me room not only for further species, but also grow-outs/holding tanks for older juveniles and sub-adults. 

Other than that, been too busy today to do much more than stare at my tanks and consider doing water changes.


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## LittleBettaFish

My sp. wajok pair spawned again. I moved the male in the jar out this time because I didn't want him to disturb them. Both the male and female were quite confused as to where he has gone. I'm hoping these eggs hatch as it seems like I have waited forever for fry from this species. 

My two brownorum fry are doing well. I moved them from their tablespoon into a small plastic container with some IAL, hydrilla and watersprite and they will stay there until they are at least 1cm or so in size. 

I received my parcel of leaves and plants. The plants were good, but I got sent two bags of IALs rather than the dried riparian leaves I wanted. The IAL produce more tannins, but the riparian leaves last for ages in the water and I was going to use them to create leaf litter on the bottom of my new tanks. 

However, my dad has four weeks of leave from work. I am going to see if he can take me either to some sort of river way out in the country, or up to my grandparents' farm, so I can collect my own leaves. 

At least I have some extra IALs now I suppose. 

I got this nice photo of my hendra male and his son today. You can see these two are related to each other. This male is going to be retained and either paired with a sister, or I'll source a pair from the same seller and use the female for him, and the male for one of my F1 girls. 










I also got some rather terrible photos of a handful of my miniopinna fry. The biggest one would probably be classed as a juvenile, but it was so hard to try and catch it sitting still. The only way I got these photos was to use BBS as a bribe. 




























I have a surprising number of young fish in this tank. They are still being treated for ich, so hopefully in another couple of weeks I can bring the temperature back down. 

Other than that, I was good today and got through my necessary water changes (even the goldfish tank downstairs) without procrastinating too much. 

Tomorrow I have to contact Jodi-Lea about my uberis and miniopinna pairs to let her know about them, and then I am going to get to work setting up my new tanks. I was waiting for the leaves to arrive but now I am just going to have to get them filled up regardless. 

I really need to buy another 2-3 foot fish light for my bottom shelf. I would get more like the two T5s I have now, but they are very pricey. Might just have to look at a more budget friendly alternative. Like stealing haha.


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## cheekysquirrel

That hendra photo IS lovely! 
Shame about the leaves :-( At least you can use the IAL, I guess, but I imagine it's frustrating.
Good luck with the sp. Wajok eggs


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Cheekysquirrel. I love being able to watch my fry grow up alongside their parents and siblings....

at least until they get to a certain age/size and start fighting with each other. 

I'm really proud of my homebred hendra male. He has a smaller brother in there that I rarely see, although I probably wouldn't come out much if I had a dozen sisters and an older brother who likes to chase me around. 

I took a photo of my floating brownorum hatchery. Now I'm just hoping no one jumps in there and makes a snack of them. 










I also got some photos of one of my brownorum female juveniles. I honestly think apart from the obvious two males, every single fry/juvenile in this tank is female. I haven't seen a single lateral spot on anyone else, and they all look very much like the mother form wise. 

Sigh, this was the one species where I wouldn't have minded slightly more males than females!


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my sp. wajok has a small nest of fry. I thought he'd eaten all the eggs again but I think he was just stressed about the brownorum female in the tank over and so had the eggs in his mouth. Now I've blocked his view of the brownorum tank he is a lot calmer. 

There's not many fry in there but at least it's a start. 

My hendra pair are spawning as I type this. Mum and dad are busy not only trying to wrap and collect eggs, but also stop their dozen or so offspring from raiding the nest. Unfortunately, I couldn't get any decent photos of them spawning, but I did get some nice photos of the mum and of her biggest daughter. 


















Mum


















Daughter

I've really got to get off my bum and get my grow-outs and new tanks sorted. This is my rack as it currently stands. Very unimpressive looking. That two foot tank on the bottom shelf has to be pretty much emptied and moved downstairs, the smaller tank also has to be moved, and the plants in the polystyrene box have to find new homes in my tanks.


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## LittleBettaFish

Picked up a new tank for my grow-outs. I decided against using tubs so I have a 4 gallon tank for my brownorum juveniles, a 3.4 gallon tank for my apiapi juveniles and about a 5 gallon tank for my hendra juveniles. These may sound small, but my wilds are quite a bit smaller than the average betta. 

Have some sad news. My two brownorum fry I artificially hatched not that long ago have died. I found them dead at the bottom of their container just now. I'm not sure what happened. Disappointed, as I wanted to see how they turned out. 

I did however, get some photos of my miniopinna family eating some grindals and BBS (only way I can get everyone to stay still). They are coping well with the higher water temperature and the male and female even felt good enough to do some flirting tonight. With the amount of fry I have in the tank, I am wondering what I am going to do with them all, particularly if my second pair prove as fruitful. 









The female stuffed herself on not only blackworms, but also the grindals and BBS I put in for her brood. 


















Dispute over food









Dad in the background of this one









One of my biggest fry 

I did have a very small fry with a hunched back I was looking at culling. However, the only small fry I can see all seem to have straight spines so this fry either perished, or its back has straightened up as it has grown. 

It's fun watching the whole family eating together. I doubt the peace will last though once the fry get bigger, especially if the majority are male.


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## cheekysquirrel

Sorry to hear about the brownorum :-( Disappointing indeed.


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## beautiful Betta

I second that sorry to hear about the babies. On a happy note the family pictures are adorable, general family squabbles, lol.


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## Aquatail

I'm so sorry about the fry. SIP


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks guys. It was sad to lose them, and thus far there hasn't been any further signs of spawning from the big male in there with either the mother or one of the bigger female sub-adults. 

I'm hoping once I remove the majority (if not all) of the juveniles, fry and sub-adults from that tank, I might encourage some spawning behaviour. 

I find with my 'family' groups, the peace generally lasts until the juveniles start developing adult colouration. Then I notice a lot more aggression and usually the main breeding pair will show a marked decrease in spawning behaviour or stop altogether. 

On a completely unrelated topic, I just want to rant about people with small dogs who let said small dogs bark and bark and bark all day every day. Even when the owners of these dogs are home, it is like they are completely immune to their incessant yapping. 

The trouble is we have a neighbour on one side who we are friends with. She thinks it is funny to let her dog stir up our dogs by barking at the fence multiple times a day. Now there is a second dog over there, it's even worse because now they both bark. It gets to the point where I hope her grossly overweight dog has a heart attack on the way down the back steps because it's so annoying. Unfortunately, much as I love my neighbour, she is not a very animal savvy person, and she just doesn't understand why we don't really find it as amusing as her. 

My concern is that because we have three big dogs with much deeper and louder barks, people are going to think our dogs are the problem because they drown out the noise the smaller dogs make. Fortunately, two of our dogs are not very reactive and usually lose interest. However, my dog Nike is and it doesn't take much to set her off. Her mother and I think her sister are actually de-barked, and we really have to stay on top of her to stop her from barking at everything.

Then on the other side we have these neighbours that actually got a known nuisance barker (it's a terrier of sorts) and that used to bark for hours at a time. Now it's older, it doesn't bark as much, but now they seem to have another dog over there that barks all the time and is slowly driving Nike insane. It seems to run along their deck and up the fence barking, and on a beautiful day I had to lock all my dogs up inside because it wouldn't shut-up. I am hoping it is just their son's dog that they are babysitting otherwise my mum said she is going to go over and tell them that it is making too much noise because we seriously don't want to have to put up with years of barking like we got from their other dog. 

I also think I have misophonia simply based on my reactions to certain sounds (for example I literally have to leave the room or clamp my hands over my ears if someone is chewing because it makes me so angry), and dogs barking seem to be one of those sounds that triggers it. Therefore, it makes it hard for me to not get angry at our dogs when they bark. 

It's extremely frustrating, and I as I suffer from anxiety anyway, I spend a lot of time freaking out that someone is going to complain to the council about _our_ dogs. 

This is one of the downsides of living in the suburbs. Hopefully in a few years we can move out to the country. Of course knowing our luck, the first summer we are there a bushfire will probably burn our house down.


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## beautiful Betta

I know where you are coming from I have two little yappers, Toy poodle and a Pomeranian. And when they get going they do my head in, but I call them in and stop it as I cant stand it myself, but half the problem is my neighbours have outside dogs, plus other outside dogs in the area and none ever get called in. Sometimes the neighbours dog barks all night and he is near my bedroom. Groans and moans all night long, that's me tossing and turning trying to sleep. I am originally from the UK and we never had the outside dogs as is common here. I don't see the point in having a pet if you don't interact with it. My dogs are always safely shut in the family area of a night time. 

I find it strange that my neighbours didn't seem to worry at all about their dogs when I once spoke with them, I remember they had a little white one, wasn't sure what it was it needed grooming now and again, a couple of times it got into my garden and it was quite dirty looking, it was poodle looking. But anyway in conversation she said the little white one had ran away and they couldn't find him, and it was like oh well no big deal. He kept escaping anyway, he kept digging holes under the fence. And in the back of my mind I was thinking if he kept escaping shouldn't you have done something to stop him. Not wanting to get into arguments with neighbours I kept my thoughts to myself. I think they think I am mad that I have my dogs indoors.


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## cheekysquirrel

Ahhh, bad dog owners suck :-( Luckily for me, the only animals we have to deal with are the neighbours cats and chooks. The cats I like, and the chooks are usually pretty quiet. The electrician working on the units out back let his great big dogs run amok in our garden a few times though. One pooped in our garden bed, the other came up near our front door and scared my cat. Part of me wanted to call the rangers, but I didn't want to punish the dogs for their owner's stupidity.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well this morning I could hear what sounded like the two dogs next door fighting. They are both female, and both have a lot of issues relating to past poor care and a lack of training now. My neighbour loves her dog (the other dog belongs to her son and his 'family') but she just has no clue. 

For example the poor dog is so fat because she feeds it everything but a dog appropriate diet because the dog 'won't eat' kibble. The same dog is also always scratching itself. I think it is allergic to something but all my suggestions as to what it could be and what might help relieve the itchiness just fall on deaf ears. I feel like that scene out of Black Beauty: 

"Only ignorance! only ignorance! how can you talk about only ignorance? Don't you know that it is the worst thing in the world, next to wickedness?—and which does the most mischief heaven only knows. If people can say, 'Oh! I did not know, I did not mean any harm,"

Fortunately the dog on the other side has stopped barking. So I think it might have been their son's dog. Don't envy whoever is stuck listening to that all day, every day. 

Turns out my brownorum male spawned again as last night he had a nest full of fry. He must have spawned in secret because I didn't even know that there were eggs. 

My hendra male is also still tending to his nest even though I think some of the eggs got snacked on. 

I don't know what happened to my sp. wajok fry. I think they must have left the nest, but being that there were only like six, and there are so many places in that tank to hide, I am most likely not going to see any fry until I get several more spawns happening and the fry start getting bigger and bolder.


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## beautiful Betta

Sounds like things are going well fish wise, lol. The Black Beauty film always makes me cry.


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## MattsBettas

Hey LBF, I took the male ocellata out of the fry tank today, and they almost immediately went into breeding behavior- fake wraps, etc. Any way I can stop this? I don't want him to starve, and I already have plenty of fry... Lol I didn't foresee this being the issue with breeding these guys.


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## LittleBettaFish

You may have to keep him separate for a week or two until he is healthy enough to spawn. Some males will spawn again and again and again and end up losing a lot of condition. My channoides male would let himself be bred to the point of starvation whereas my unimaculata male was less likely to be harassed into spawning. 

I did all my water changes today and managed to snap a few photos of my sp. apiapi tank. 









This was part of the group eating grindals. You can definitely pick out the males. 









This is my biggest F1 female. She is at breeding size now and will be paired up with one of her brothers at some point in the future. 









One of the young males eating grindals with some of his siblings

Moving on from my apiapi, I also took this photo of 'Disappointment' my F1 brownorum male. I think I am going to keep him and his younger brother. They are the first brownorum I raised to adulthood and even if they are not what I was hoping for, I am fond of them. Disappointment spends all his time bashing up his siblings and courting his mother. Unfortunately, his newly hatched fry got eaten again, so hopefully when everyone has moved out he can actually get them to the point of free-swimming. 










I will eventually purchase another pair of brownorum to be my primary breeding stock, but Disappointment, his brother and maybe a sister or two, will always have a home here with me. 

Finally, I turned the heat in my miniopinna tank down by a couple of degrees and will be bringing it down further tomorrow. I can't see any ich, and haven't seen any visible signs of it for ages now. I'm crossing my fingers that this time it goes away for good.


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## MattsBettas

If he does end up breeding I'll try to scare him into swallowing and separate him. Honestly until I want another spawn I'll just do things like smack the tank when I see them flirting, it's better then starving. 

Love the first picture, your apiapi are one of my favorites and the plants look good- the label is an awesome touch too, that's something I would want to add in a more organized setup.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha the label is more for if something happens to me, my parents know which fish are which. 

Unfortunately, the label maker ran out of paper halfway through so my brownorum, miniopinna and rutilans green tank don't have labels. I have to get mum to go to the office supply shop and get some more refills so I can finish them off. 

Speaking of rutilans green, I did manage to snap some photos of my savages. The afternoon sun shines right through my window and I managed to get them to stay still for some blackworms. 



























The head on the left belongs to my coccina female. 

And people say wild bettas are not as 'pretty' as splendens. Pft.


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## beautiful Betta

Love the pictures, your last ones look gold and red, but as they are called green I am assuming it is green, lol.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Beautiful Betta. I don't know why the green scaling looks gold in photos. In this older photo you can see it looks more green.










They are an unusual species. They have never been officially described, and unlike nearly every other member of this complex, they seem to mouthbrood rather than bubblenest. 

They were the first wild betta species I ever bred successfully, and this is mainly the reason I could never bring myself to euthanise this group even after recurrent infections of velvet. 

Some of the fish in this group are the oldest fish in my fish room, so they deserve a good retirement. I would eventually like to get them a Mr Aqua 12 gallon long like my persephone live in, but that costs $$$ here and I can't afford it at the moment.


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## Canis

They look awesome!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Canis! 

Don't have any updates, just photos I took of my persephone males this afternoon. I really want to get this tank done up properly and get the water as dark as I can. I forgot how nice they look in the very tannin heavy water.


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## beautiful Betta

Now they look green, lol.


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## LittleBettaFish

My sp. wajok male is possibly the worst father ever. Yesterday his nest fell apart and I look into the film canister to find him tending to the eggs on the bottom. 

Then during the afternoon he managed to knock basically all the eggs out of the canister and so then had to frantically collect them all. 

Now he has a massive nest built and the eggs he did manage to collect have hatched. Once again, it is only a small spawn. 

Other than that, I think I am coming down with something so haven't been doing much with my fish. I did get some more photos of my persephone group later last night, so I thought I might as well post them up. 









Dominant female in the tank and mother to the juveniles/sub-adults in there


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## LittleBettaFish

There seem to be more fry in my sp. wajok nest so he must have collected more eggs. Because he has proven capable of getting fry to this stage, I am going to be selling the other male. Someone locally is picking him up along with some white worms tonight. 

Also selling my killifish breeding group this week. The five fry I have will stay until they are old enough to be safely sold and then they too will hopefully be going.

The person who wants to buy them actually owns almost all their brothers and sisters so I know they will have a good home with her. I have not told my mum as she likes the killifish. 

The plan today after I get all the boring chores such as grocery shopping out the way, is to start getting my 30cm cube set up. Once I move my rutilans downstairs, I will be retrieving another 30cm cube from out in the shed and setting that up as well. 

I've had a very lazy morning today so had the time to take some photos of my fish. 

Here is Disappointment with one of his sisters (only a couple of the other juveniles show adult colouration).









Here is Disappointment flaring at his mother. You can see her in the background and then one of his much smaller siblings. 









Here is my hendra male debating whether to be bribed out with grindals









Closer up shot









The second male juvenile with his older brother in the bottom right


















This is their tank showing just how much the plants have grown in. If I was ever to have a sorority of female bettas again, this is how I would have it. It takes a lot of effort to push through all that moss and watersprite roots.


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## cheekysquirrel

I can't quite put my finger on why, but I love the hendra <3


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha I don't think it's hard to tell why. He is an absolutely stunning fish. He is that perfect balance of aggression as well. I don't have any fears of him attacking the female or their offspring (not even his sons), but he also can put on a spectacular show flaring at the mirror and during courtship. 

Luckily it seems like his two sons are basically clones of him (unlike my brownorum) so they will take over breeding duties when they are older. 

The other day, I noticed one of my rutilans green males hanging at the surface. I immediately thought velvet because that attacks the gills so I had a closer look. Turns out he had an absolute mouthful of eggs/fry. There was a female loitering around near him so I think that was actually his mate. 

Normally I would have left him, but the female coccina decided to come over and start attacking him and having a mouthful, he wasn't really able to defend himself. 

So I decided I would put him in a breeder net and see if he spat the fry out. 

I managed to put the breeder net on the side and push it up against the glass capturing him. He went into the film canister and I was going to give it a few minutes before I tilted the net back up the right way so I didn't scare him. 

Well I tilt the net up and just then notice that the bloody coccina female is in the net with him! 

So then I had to try and get her out without making him stressed. 

I just had a look then and I think he is still holding. However, the coccina female is just flaring at him through the breeder net. She is about to get her butt put in a jar if she doesn't stop it. I told her last night that when they all got velvet she and her partner came very close to euthanasia and if she doesn't stop harassing my poor male that option is still on the table. 

She looked very unimpressed by my threats. Perhaps knowing that I was bluffing haha.


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## Joshaeus

Well, at least he's holding still...is this your first brownorum to mouthbrood rather than bubblenest?


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## LittleBettaFish

It's my rutilans green that is mouthbrooding, and this seems to be the normal reproduction method for them. Oddly enough, rather than the 2-3 weeks that is average for an actual mouthbrooding species, the rutilans green only hold the eggs for a few days as then the fry hatch. It's very interesting that they would choose this method of reproduction over nesting and I don't know why they do it. 

I believe only one strain/locality of brownorum actually mouthbrood. The majority bubblenest. 

I used to own a pair of mouthbrooding brownorum but unfortunately the pair died without leaving me any fry.


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## Joshaeus

Oops...sorry. Still, I hope he holds to term in spite of harassment from a certain psycho coccina female...


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I think my male swallowed some time yesterday. Either that or he spat the fry and they are hiding, but I find that scenario unlikely. The bloody female coccina was flaring at him through the net yesterday so I think perhaps that made him feel threatened. 

Speaking of rutilans green, I think I might have to individually separate my males/jar them. There has been a very noticeable increase in aggression and they are doing some pretty serious damage to each other. I am concerned this is going to cause a recurrence of velvet due to stress. Unfortunately, I don't know how to do this in a cost and space effective manner. I would ideally like a gallon/4L per male, and probably double that if they are sharing with a female, but this isn't going to be possible in their current set-up. 

I do have a 75x45cm tank that I could most likely divide up into 10 sections that are around 10L, but this was going to be used for my hendra/sp. apiapi grow-out so I'm not sure about that. However, I could then use the 60cm tank the rutilans green are in now and divide it in half for my hendra/sp. apiapi juveniles. I was going to put the brownorum in as well, but now I am leaning towards separating out my breeding pair from the main tank and leaving that as the grow-out rather than try and catch all the juveniles and fry. 

I wish I wasn't on such a limited budget. Would make things a lot easier. 

In better news, my sp. wajok fry became free-swimming yesterday. The last few stragglers were leaving the nest and heading out into the main tank where I looked in and the male was already back to showing off to the female.

I did manage to snap a couple of photos of the female before she vanished. As you can see from the tank picture, it is pretty densely planted in there.




























I also got this adorable photo of one of my miniopinna fry. They recognise me now, and start to come over when I tap on the glass.


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## LittleBettaFish

I've got water changes to do today, but I managed to get a few photos of some of my fish before I go and disturb them all. 

In breeding news, I saw one of my sp. wajok fry from what I think is the first spawn with a belly full of infusoria and looking bigger than what it was a week or so ago. So happy to see that at least one fry is thriving. 

My brownorum male spawned again with his mother. This time he sustained some damage to his ventrals and anal fin so I am going to watch she doesn't step up the aggression. She seems to prefer having the companionship of the other fish in the tank, but at the same time I am still concerned she might attack either this male or his brother. 

Unfortunately, my brownorum male doesn't realise that you can't leave your nest unattended when you share a tank with a bunch of siblings. There were heaps of eggs in the nest last night, and then this morning there were a lot less. 

My rutilans male definitely looks like he swallowed so I will be adding him back to the main tank today. I had to laugh though, as three of his siblings (I think two males and a female) have taken up residence in the space between the breeder net and the glass. I got some photos of the three of them all squashed in. 



















Then here are just some of the other photos I took









Betta sp. apiapi female 


















One of her sons









A persephone male


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## beautiful Betta

Love the photo of the Rutilans, they looked green in that one. lol. Maybe the girl was trying to get away from the boys, and they both followed, lol or maybe the three wanted some privacy, lol.


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## LittleBettaFish

I don't know what they are doing. The female keeps getting that paler line along her back that usually indicates with my coccina species that she is receptive to spawning. But I really can't see her wrapping in that tiny space. 

I decided to set-up my 3.5 gallon tank for my coccina pair. The male doesn't look very happy living with the rutilans and the female just chases everyone. It's only a small tank, so I can easily move it somewhere else if I need the space back on the bottom shelf. 

Unfortunately, I decided to use ADA aquasoil that had previously been used and then put away wet. I was just going to go with peat moss, but I thought the plants would like some extra nutrients. 

In spite of my care in not disturbing the substrate, the water is brown. It's so cloudy that in this 31cm tank I can't see from one end to the other. 

I'm hoping it settles overnight and that I can move my coccina pair over by tomorrow afternoon. 

I also just ordered two more aquarium heaters. I hate having to spend money on equipment rather than fish, but until a cold water strain of betta comes into existence, I certainly am going to be needing them through a Melbourne winter.


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## beautiful Betta

I know what you mean about the cold, I am in QLD and I still find it cold. I had my coat on yesterday when I went out. My tank heater is on mostly now. My mum in the UK was telling me that it was lovely and warm and she was sat out in the garden, it was 15C it's 20C here and I was wearing a coat to the shops. I am going to freeze to death when I eventually return to the UK.

The other thing that makes me laugh is the misconception that Australia is always warm when you live in another country. I remember watching Neighbours when I was in the UK and they always run around in t shirts, shorts, giving the impression Australia is never cold, lol.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah Melbourne is freezing during winter. We might not get snow or extremely low temperatures, but we get this icy wind that seems to blow right in off Bass Strait that chills you right to the bone. 

It gets cold enough that water in small containers will freeze over some days. Maybe if you were a lunatic, you would be running around in shorts on days like that. Not me, I was not made for cold weather. If hibernating was an option I'd already be asleep.


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## beautiful Betta

I know the feeling. It is getting harder to get up when it is cold. To my mum no doubt she would say it is lovely and warm what are you complaining about, lol.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haven't really done much except feed my fish today. Mum is working from home and the dog next door won't shut up so I kind of have to stay in my room to stop our dogs from making noise. 

Which is unfortunate, as I had an afternoon of gardening planned (mowing the nature strip, weeding the front and digging out the blackberry that has somehow sprouted in amongst our azaleas). 

The water in my 3.5 gallon tank is still sort of cloudy. I did a 50% water change, and because I couldn't catch my pair of coccina, I just put the pair of rutilans green that were in the breeder net in there. 

You can see how much damage my rutilans males are doing to each other. This is why I am considering separating them. Even my group of persephone males do not cause this much damage to each other. It's not like I haven't also provided adequate space and hiding places. They just seek each other out and fight. 



















My sp. wajok pair were putting on a show. I had the mirror up against the side and both the male and female were flaring at it. The female is very barred up. Unfortunately, I couldn't get any straight on side shots as she kept moving around. She also decided to do a poo during our photo shoot.




































You can see the lighter line down her back. I'm sure I've mentioned it before, but it usually indicates the female is ready or almost ready to spawn. 

My miniopinna fry and juveniles are growing fast. The pair haven't spawned for a while now, but this could be because of the bigger juveniles starting to develop their adult colouration. This pair were never exceptionally prolific anyway, but at least I have some F1 fish to work with. I don't know why, but their tank makes it difficult to take photos that show off their true colours. It's a shame as the male especially is lovely and they are so friendly I only have to tap on the glass and they come out. 

I got good news in that I believe both my pairs (uberis and miniopinna) are on their way to Oz in this shipment. Hoping they make it safely through the entire process (especially the uberis) and I have them in my tanks in a couple of weeks. 

Then I am going to be scrimping and saving for a pair of standard rutilans. I've decided that is going to be my next species unless livida or coccina become available.


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## beautiful Betta

For some reason half the pictures are not showing.


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## LittleBettaFish

Hmm they show for me, did you mean the most recent ones? Photobucket said it was doing maintenance so don't know if that has affected them?


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## beautiful Betta

They are there now, yes I did mean the most recent ones, but issue seems to be solved now.

I have to say you always get good pics, must have a good camera!


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## LittleBettaFish

Haven't posted here in a few days, but yes, I use my mum's Canon Eos. Without it, I certainly would not have as nice a photos. 

Anyway, my sp. wajok pair have a nest full of eggs, my sp. apiapi male has a nest full of eggs and my hendra male has a nest full of newly hatched fry. 

My miniopinna pair have definitely decided that they will remain as 'just friends' as they still show no sign of spawning. However, I do have their fry/juveniles to grow out and I am hopefully getting my second pair this month, I am not too concerned. 

My rutilans green pair in the 3.5 gallon tank seem to be doing alright. I thought the male had a mouthful the other day, but I was either mistaken or he swallowed. I did a water change today as the water was still a bit cloudy, gave them a good feeding of live blackworms and BBS, and put some more watersprite in. I'm hoping I might actually get a spawn from these two. I still have to set up a small tank for my coccina pair because they are looking really unhappy now with the rutilans. Then I have to squish in tanks for my uberis and miniopinna pairs. 

Because I had some time to burn tonight, I decided to take some photos of my persephone. They are such beautiful fish. I can't believe they were once the orphaned, velvet-ridden fry I wasn't even sure were going to make it. 













































I think this male must have eaten almost all the blackworms I put in the tank

Apart from that, I have been slacking with the fish. The German Shepherd National is this weekend, and me, mum and dad (I swear he is the best ex-husband in the world) have been running around getting things ready. Dad and I, have been biking the dogs for almost three months now and they are so fit. This will be Nike's last show before she retires because of her hips. I'm so hoping she places. It would be so nice to have that as her final hurrah.We are happy if Eos (named for the Goddess not the camera) comes in the top half of the class, considering you get the cream of each state going. Last year she was shocking. She is usually a pro in the ring but she decided that she was going to throw a fit and not work. We have a bike ride tomorrow night, the underwater treadmill on Wednesday, and then mum is off with the dogs on an interstate road trip. 

And to think she wants to add another one to our unruly pack. I told dad he'd better hope Eos's puppy is a dud show dog because otherwise we are going to be back on our bikes once it's older.


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## beautiful Betta

Good luck at the National. I had a white German shepherd. I think they are known as Swiss shepherds over here. I named her Alaska. She was a lovely girl so intelligent she was toilet trained in two days. And was such a softie with people hated other dogs though. She had to be put down because of hips and she was incontinent with age despite medicine for it. If it had been just the hips I probably would have gotten one of those carts for her back legs. It was so sad really because she was still all there in the mind. The vet said she had arthritis in her back also she was medicine for that too. Sometimes she would lose her balance trying to get in the toilet position and other times fall over going out the door. Then it reached the point you cant let her go on like that, but it is just horrible having to make that call when she was still so sharp of mind.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah Nike has hip dysplasia, or at least that is what her x-rays at 12 months said. Unfortunately, it is still quite prevalent in not only German Shepherds, but a lot of other breeds and it is something you can't really predict. I mean Nike's whole pedigree is of dogs with good hips and the rest of her litter has almost perfect hips. We just got the dud dog in hips and temperament. I tell her daily that it is lucky she is so beautiful otherwise I would have tied her to a tree in the park by now. I do think there is a brain in there somewhere. I just have to find it. 

We have Nike on daily supplements, keep her fit and lean, take her swimming once a week and do underwater treadmill once a week as well. We are hoping that she is one of those dogs that remains asymptomatic until old age. If not, she would probably get a hip replacement. 

We faced the same problem as it sounds like you did with our previous dog. She was a kelpie cross, but she had a bad back and bad knees. We did a knee replacement or whatever it is called in dogs and she was on pain medication that kept her mobile. 

However, then she got vestibular disease which affects the inner ear and was perhaps one of the most terrifying things I have ever seen. I thought she was dying when her eyes were flicking and she was stumbling around everywhere. 

Unfortunately, this exacerbated her mobility problems and even though she came happily staggering through the back door the day we got her put to sleep, she couldn't do much more than lay on the ground and that wasn't a life we wanted for her.


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## beautiful Betta

Pets give us so much joy, but at the same time when you have to make that call, it is just horrible. Alaska was 11 when she was put down. So her hips was likely a bit to do with old age. Her parents were apparently hip checked and we were told they were clear. Alaska didn't really have any issues until she reached about 9, so I guess not too bad. Alaska's eyes were quite light, not blue but a gold amber colour. People used to ask if she was a wolf, lol.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah, the lighter coloured eyes on some shepherds can make them look very 'wolf like'. I believe that the darker eye for German Shepherds are preferred because they are less unsettling to sheep when herding them. Of course most German Shepherds nowadays including my own, only see sheep if we pass them in the car. 

Got some exciting news on my imported wild betta pairs. Both my uberis and miniopinna are in quarantine. Just waiting to hear back about the final import/shipping costs and then they will be getting sent out Tuesday/Wednesday of next week. My two 25 watt heaters also arrived yesterday so now I can get my additional tanks set-up. 

I was trying to take some photos of various fry alongside their parents for an entry on my blog about parental cannibalism and of course no one wants to sit still for me. 

My sp. wajok male has a whole heap of fry that have hatched so he was in a defensive mood. Same with my sp. apiapi fry. My hendra male is fretting because his fry are becoming free-swimming and so he alternates between guarding the stragglers and attacking everyone else. Meanwhile the water in my miniopinna tank is so dark I can't see anyone unless they come up to the surface. 

I thought why don't I try my brownorum tank? There are plenty of smaller juveniles living alongside older siblings and their mother in there. 

Well because my biggest male and his mother are in the midst of courtship/spawning, they keep coming out and chasing everyone around. So it made it very difficult to get any photos that weren't blurry. 

These photos below were actually the best of the 20 odd I took. 





































Their tank is so overgrown with plants. It's got watersprite, java moss, a massive java fern, duckweed, hornwort and hydrilla. I'm too afraid to remove anything because I think most of the plants are attached to the substrate now and it is going to cause a mess if I do. 










I'm still bummed only two of the F1 fish look to be male and have lateral spots. I seriously think all the rest are female, which is going to make it difficult to offload them.


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## beautiful Betta

Great news on your fish being shipped out soon.

I love that tank, it looks amazing so natural looking, I would leave it alone. I bet the fish love it.


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## LittleBettaFish

They do like it. Just makes it difficult to do a head count on everyone as there are so many places to hide. 

My mum and the breeder of Nike set off this morning to go to the National (mum pulls the breeder's dog trailer with her Hilux) and so I've been up since 5:30am helping her after getting to bed just before 12pm. Then today I went to a car auction with my dad and then we drove more than an hour out to see another car, which unfortunately had some damage to the paint. 

My rutilans green pair spawned yesterday and the male is still holding today. I expect to see fry in another couple of days if he doesn't swallow them. 

I also got some updated photos of my set-up. 

This first photo is of my rack. Hopefully by this weekend I will have the two empty tanks on the bottom shelf filled and ready for fish, and I found a cheap 2ft light to go across the tanks on this shelf as well. 










Then this is my fish shelf where I keep all my things like buckets, live food cultures, medications and blackwater 'aids'. The tank on this shelf is my killifish tank. They are going to be getting sold some time next week, and then I will be putting two wild betta tanks up there. 










Then this is the 3.5 gallon tank for my rutilans green pair. You can see the main tank with a couple of rutilans green to the left. I'm really liking the cover these spawning mops provide. I am going to set-up my 25cm cube for my coccina pair, so I think I might just purchase a few balls of yarn, whip up some spawning mops and chuck in some watersprite/hydrilla and leave it at that. I mean it's cheaper than me going out and purchasing plants all the time. 










My hendra fry went free-swimming today, and my sp. apiapi and sp. wajok still have fry in their nest. 

I've been really slack with water changes over the past week so I have to clean out and sanitise my water aging tub and bucket, and fill them up ready for water changes this weekend.


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## Aquatail

I see a dog in picture two! ^_^ Is that Nike or a different dog?


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## LittleBettaFish

Oh that's our other dog Ares. He is staying home to protect me and the house :bluelaugh:

We got him a new toy which he has been carrying around everywhere. It's the green thing at his feet. 

Apparently the squeakers will still squeak even when punctured. Great for a German Shepherd whose hobby includes tearing toys to shreds.

Also I cannot wait until I can paint my walls white. I think I outgrew pink about a decade ago now.


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## Valkyrie

@littlebettafish if i gave you my tank parameters could you give me some advice on what wilds would be good for it? Id rather see what would be appropriate than try to change my water parameters to fit. Im in no rush with it, the tank needs to grow out a bit longer first.


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## LittleBettaFish

Hi Valkyrie, I am not an expert on all wild betta species. However, I know enough that I should be able to at least point you in the right direction.


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## Aquatail

What a brave dog! ^_^


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## LittleBettaFish

He nearly found himself abandoned at the park today as he was so naughty. I forgot he hasn't been for a walk for about two months as we have been focussed on getting the two girls fit and he is such a couch potato. 

I also found out today that there are almost 80 dogs entered in Eos's class at the National (there are usually scratches though) and around 60 in Nike's class. Hope the two girls do okay. They are showing on Saturday and Sunday respectively. 

My rutilans green male is still holding. His female came out to eat some blackworms tonight but he was not interested. Hoping to see fry in a day or two. 

I was supposed to get on top of all my fish related chores today but I spent most of the day sleeping instead. Just going to sanitise and fill up my water aging bucket, get my BBS hatchery going and then put everyone to bed. 

Still trying to get some photos of my younger fish alongside their parents/older siblings to do my blog entry on cannibalism but no one wants to behave. My miniopinna fry and juveniles are always out with their parents but the water is so dark it makes pictures impossible, which is why you don't see a lot of them. 

This is their tank. I need my torch just to see more than a few centimetres in.










I did manage to get a nice photo of my sp. apiapi female up against the label on the tank, and then my male was hanging around outside/inside the film canister as he has a nest up there. He is such a good father. I hope he passes his strong paternal instincts onto his male offspring. 



















Tomorrow I definitely have to fill up my empty tanks since my new pairs are going to be arriving in less than a week. I also have to fill up my water aging tub downstairs and change the goldfish tank. 

Also, apparently we should be picking up Bandit tomorrow. He had a big collapse earlier in the week, which the vet thinks was a flare-up of pancreatitis. However, his stomach also seemed to become paralysed and was filling up with fluid rather than passing everything through. He did have a fever yesterday but was much better today. I sort of miss him mooching around the house everywhere and sleeping on my bed at night, but it is sort of a relief not to have to be constantly worrying about him and his ongoing health issues. That probably makes me sound horrible, but it is very difficult to watch him doing well for months and months and then have some major collapse that requires a visit to the vet. 

I don't know how people with multiple elderly pets do it. I am certainly not looking forward to our current group getting older.


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## beautiful Betta

Sounds like you will be busy, Hope Bandit is alright when he comes home. And no it is not selfish, there is nothing worse than worrying if your pet is unwell.


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## Aquatail

I hope Bandit is ok! I agree with beautiful Betta, also, it would be very hard to watch his health issues. It's alright to want a break.


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## LittleBettaFish

I woke up this morning to find two rutilans sp. cf. green fry hanging vertically from some watersprite. The male had obviously spit out his mouthful and when I took a look in the film canister just now, he has put the rest in a small bubblenest. 

I find it odd that he uses both methods. He knows how to build a bubblenest (albeit a fairly pathetic one), but he chose instead to hold his eggs in his mouth for three days even though the only other fish in the tank is his female and she is not likely to eat the eggs or fry. 

At least I know after several treatments with some rather harsh chemicals for velvet, and the fact that this pair is at least 2-3 years old, they are still fertile and have had no issue with producing viable fry. 

I honestly don't know what I am going to do with a second colony of rutilans if the velvet doesn't make a re-emergence, but I didn't want to lose this species by waiting until my original fish were beyond breeding age. 

Last night I was trying to get some photos of my younger fish, but all I got was a bunch of bland coloured brownorum juveniles. I think these are all female so I am thinking of just retaining the nicest out of the lot and selling the rest in bulk for a cheap price. It just had to be that the one species I wanted more males than females of, I get the exact opposite! This was also after a feed so they do look plumper than normal.


















Probably the one I will be keeping



















I don't know why these juveniles don't show more colour. All my other juveniles do. I thought maybe it was to avoid being attacked by the older/bigger fish in the tank. 

My brownorum male has a nest of newly hatched fry him and his mother/breeding partner are defending. He looks so fierce when he is on father duties. Even if he wasn't exactly what I wanted, he has such a great personality and is more striking than most of the brownorum males I see in this country. 

My sp. wajok fry have also become free-swimming. It was quite a large spawn this time around so hopefully I will start to see more fry popping up in the tank over the next couple of weeks. 

I've been trying to get onto my dad to see if he is able to pick up Bandit today (if he can come home). I really need to get a car license so I can at least drive around with the animals/pick up things like groceries and fish supplies. Unfortunately, with my social anxiety/generalised anxiety issues it makes achieving that very difficult. I mean I can drive/ride things like go-karts, ride-on lawnmowers, motorbikes and jet skis without issue. But I just get freaked out thinking about driving a car on the actual road.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well we picked up Bandit yesterday. His visit at the vet cost my mum $1100 or so. This is why there is no way I would ever have a cat or dog of my own unless I had at least $10000 in savings. I would think Bandit would have to be at least getting into the $7-8,000 mark since the end of last year. 

He is a bit more subdued than he normally would be, but he ate some breakfast this morning and hasn't been vomiting or acting like he is in distress/pain.

The vet said that apparently the pancreatitis can sometimes cause issues with the motility of the stomach, which is probably why his was filled with fluid. I just worry that all these bouts of pancreatitis are causing damage to his pancreas and that he is going to end up with something like diabetes because of it. 

Found out yesterday that Nike came about halfway in her class at the National. I got into a big fight with my mum over it because she was saying how good it was because these are the top dogs in the country etc. I told her that I am not going to invest months of my time into biking and exercising the two girls if halfway is the best they can do. It's just not worth it. Particularly for such a useless and subjective 'sport'. I mean I would rather mum do something like obedience where you can actually improve with training. How the hell is a dog supposed to improve on the conformation they are born with? 

It's like measuring the dogs. I would think that would be the most objective part of a conformation show, but Nike measured oversized at one show and subsequently got third last (she is not oversized) but then at this National she measured at 59cm which is smaller than normal. 

Mum still wants to breed Eos this year and keep one of her puppies to show. I seriously cannot be bothered going through this all over again. I am actually glad Nike has bad hips because if I get a job this year or take up study, there is no way I am going to want to spend every morning and night biking/running dogs. I love dogs, but I don't want to dedicate every waking hour to prepping them for shows. The fish are my hobby. Showing the dogs is my mum's. She has only be fortunate with Nike that I haven't been working because there is no way if we were both working full-time we could manage three dogs, let alone the four she wants to have. 

I told her to desex Eos, desex Nike and wait until we have a property out in the country until you look at breeding. That way we have the space to set things up properly, our dogs aren't being rotated through crates, the kitchen and the backyard, and we can exercise them on our property. I see this puppy venture having disaster written all over it, but because I live here free of charge I don't really have a say in it at all. 

That was just my morning rant. I am charging up my camera today and will get some fish photos this afternoon. There was an IBC show down here in Melbourne yesterday and they are having an auction today. Fortunately for my bank account, none of the fish they were putting up for sale tickled my fancy. I think I am just going to wait and order a pair of rutilans for the next shipment in June.


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## LittleBettaFish

Mum, Eos and Nike returned home yesterday. Eos did not do very well at the show either so I am over the whole thing at the moment. 

I thought they might be excited to see me after five days away but all they wanted to see was our cat Whistler! I told mum maybe next time she needs to bring him along to the shows. 

In a bit of a fish funk at the moment. I just can't seem to find the motivation to do anything with them. I have all these juveniles/sub-adults I should be separating out but it is just going to be so much work to do so that I am putting it off. 

Most of my tanks are looking pretty crappy and for some reason the watersprite is dying off in my sp. wajok tank. However, I can't remove it because there are now so many fry in the tank. 

Good news is that my rutilans sp. cf. green fry are free-swimming. I found what appeared to be one dead fry and there was one fry that didn't seem very responsive yesterday, but I did spot some moving about in the film canister this morning so at least some appear alive and healthy. 

I decided to separate out my coccina pair from the main rutilans tank last night. Wish I had done it sooner as my coccina male is looking dreadful. I think he might have to get euthanised as there appears to be more wrong with him than just fin damage though. Right now he is in with his female so I will see how he goes. 

I have got to work out what is happening with my miniopinna and uberis pairs. I am just waiting on a reply email about the total cost for import and local shipping from the transhipper. I still haven't set their tanks up so I am going to get onto that today. 

Speaking of miniopinna, I got some photos of my female and some of the fry/juveniles. This tank makes it impossible to get good photos so these are the best I can do.


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## beautiful Betta

That's funny about the cat. How ungrateful all the exercise you gave them, maybe they just want a rest and think oh no she will get her bike out, lol.

Great news about the fry. Sorry to hear about your coccina male.


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## LittleBettaFish

The cat Whistler attacks the rest of our cats, which is why he is outside most of the day and then inside at night. The only cat he doesn't always attack is Bandit but even then you have to watch them together. 

I think sometimes he thinks he is the size of a German Shepherd. Because he gets into these big wrestling matches with Eos. He wraps himself around her neck, rears up on his hind legs and bites her ears and paws. He got in the laundry basket last night and Eos was alternating between mothering him and mauling him. 

Poor coccina male has not had a lot of luck in his short life. He came from the wholesaler absolutely covered in ich, contracted velvet, suffered through a pretty harsh treatment for that and got stuck in with my rutilans green because of it. Oddly enough, his female and my wholesaler brownorum male never get/got bothered by the rutilans. The brownorum male still lives with them and he is doing great. 

Hehe found some mosquito larvae in my outside tubs even though it is almost winter. Had enough to feed my sp. apiapi tank. I have to say if I could only ever keep one species of wild betta, I think this would be it. These fish may be the smallest betta species discovered, but they are big on personality. 



























The female



























My F1 juveniles and sub-adults 

Yes, the red is as vivid in real life on the males as it is in these photos.


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## beautiful Betta

I love there little cream edging on the fins, well it looks cream in the photo's, so striking against the red.


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## LittleBettaFish

It's white edging. I think maybe the tannins/lighting make it look cream. 

The female is probably about 3.5cm from head to tail to give you an idea of how small they are. She was maybe 2.5-3cm when I got her.


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## beautiful Betta

Gosh they are tiny, they look quite a good size in the pictures.


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## Joshaeus

So the Coccina bettas do not exceed 4 cm?


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## LittleBettaFish

Probably my biggest coccina complex species is around the 5cm mark, but this complex does contain probably the smallest species of wild betta. 

It's why I keep them. I like small fish.


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## Joshaeus

If one could get an adequate amount of water for this, do you think that a kiddie pool or other outdoor container pond would be good for Coccina complex bettas during the warmer months?


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## LittleBettaFish

Honestly I would say with coccina complex it simply wouldn't be worth it. I have a pair living in a 3.5 gallon tank and it can often be hard enough to see/find them. They are masters at hiding and are not the most outgoing complex.

I think smaller mouthbrooding species such as rubra, channoides, albimarginata or even some of the larger ones such as strohi or foerschi might be a better option. They tend to be less inclined to hide and would at least utilise the space in a kiddie pool/container pond. My coccina fish tend to just park themselves somewhere and not really move much at all unless another fish chases them.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just got word from Jodi-Lea that my fish are being shipped today so they will arrive tomorrow. I don't even have tanks set-up for them! 

I dashed out this morning to the shops and do you think I could find nice yarn anywhere in an entire shopping centre? Nope. Had to make do with some thin, puke green 'Gran's Choice' yarn from the $2 shop. I regret that I did not go to the craft shop further out, but it is a long bus ride, my bag kept setting off the security beepers at various stores and I needed some emergency bags of kitty litter. 

I've made up five mops. I had my delightful assistant Eos trying maul my ball of yarn while I was winding, because she worked herself into a frenzy watching it go around and around and around.

The two tanks still need to be cleaned out and filled up with tap water. Then I am just going to put in some peat moss as substrate, use the spawning mops as cover for the bottom of the tank, chuck in some IAL and divide the rest of my hydrilla up between the two tanks. 

With the heaters running and some rooibos tea bags the water should be perfect for the new arrivals by tomorrow afternoon. I so hope everyone makes it alive and well to my doorstep. 

Then I will be planning the importation of my next species: Betta rutilans. Hopefully I can get a pair in on the next shipment or the one after that. Once my killifish go to their new home I can use their tank for a new breeding pair. After that, my fish room will be entirely devoted to coccina complex species. 

Spotted a free-swimming rutilans green fry this morning and both parents still seem healthy. I'm crossing my fingers I finally got rid of the velvet with my last treatment and that it doesn't plague subsequent generations. 

Other than that, my water changes are due today and I have to feed everyone as I may have missed a couple of days - neglectful mother that I am.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well rushed around setting up tanks for my new pairs last night. These are some photos from this morning. The water is cloudy because I only added the peat moss to the bottom a few hours ago and it takes a while to clear. 









Uberis tank









Miniopinna tank

They should be arriving today so fingers crossed everything goes well.

From now on, I am going to be using these yarn spawning mops in all my wild betta tanks. They are cheap, provide cover, don't need any special care, and they are so easy to remove when trying to catch fish. I am now facing the task of trying to net out a whole heap of sub-adults and juveniles from my planted tanks without tearing them down. 

They don't look too bad and my fish seem to really like getting in amongst them. I'm going to leave my second shelf of tanks as is, but will be using them in my persephone and main rutilans green tank. I put a spare one in my rutilans green tank last night and I woke up to find a whole heap of fish lurking around in it. This one male seems to have claimed most of the mop for himself. 



















This lot seem to be behaving themselves more in the smaller tank. I'm hoping they at least let their ventral fins and body damage heal as that makes them look terrible. I'm going to buy some more yarn over the weekend and make up several more spawning mops in their tank so that they aren't all fighting over the one mop. The wood in their tank can be sold off as I have no use for it, and I'm hoping that the small amount of hydrilla and watersprite in the tank starts to spread across the entire surface. 

My pair I have separated seem to be spawning again or at least close to it. I saw one of the fry this morning up near the surface so I'm hoping more are in there.

I've made the decision to euthanise my coccina pair today. My male still looks horrendous and the female is now not looking the best either. I don't want to go back to having sick tanks everywhere and callous as it sounds, they are not fish I was going to use in my breeding program anyway due to quality and previous health issues. Hopefully in the near future I can actually get my hands on a nice pair of this species and finally get a successful breeding. 

Other than that, I have to catch up on the water changes I didn't do yesterday and fix up the little emersed containers of plants I have on my windowsill.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

My two new pairs arrived!! 

They are so adorable. The uberis pair are only about an inch from head to tail.

Unfortunately, they had to go on the bottom shelf, which most of my wilds tend to take a while to get used to (there is a lot of movement from me walking past and pets), but they seem to be settling in fine. 

I'm thinking now I might sell my original pair of Betta miniopinna provided this second pair are capable of providing me with viable fry. Looking at it, I don't really need two separate pairs, and I can always use the F1 juveniles from my original pair to carry on that bloodline anyway our outcross if necessary. 

I have a fellow wild betta keeper interested (she already has a number of my fish) so I am thinking I will give it another 2-3 weeks and see how I feel about it. 

Plus this way I can use the funds to buy a species I don't already have. I heard today that there may be some coccina 'jambi' becoming available soon, so I would rather get those and the rutilans. 

So wish I had done this a couple years ago rather than waste all my money on splendens. At least it has taught me how to be a very frugal fishkeeper. 

No photos of my new arrivals. They are not looking their best and I don't want to disturb them too much.


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## MattsBettas

Awesome, I'm glad to hear! Pictures are a must, as soon as possible of course.


----------



## Aquatail

Congratulations! ^_^ I'm glad they arrived safely!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. I am so relieved. It's such a long journey for them to go from Indonesia to Bangkok, then to quarantine for seven days in QLD before they finally make it here to me. 

Photos will probably be coming in the next couple of days. They don't look very spectacular at the moment so I want to give them time to settle in and colour up.


----------



## beautiful Betta

Glad to hear they arrived safely. Have they eaten yet? I usually take it as a good sign if fish have a appetite.


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## LittleBettaFish

My uberis male had a full stomach after tackling some mosquito larvae. My miniopinna male had a go at the larvae in his tank but not sure if he ate it or not. 

I just wish they stayed that small. It's sad when they get bigger even if 'bigger' is only 2 inches.


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## LittleBettaFish

Today I did water changes, replaced the cling wrap and cleaned the glass on all my tanks. I thought if I didn't do it this morning, I was never going to get it done. Having my aging buckets/tubs makes life so much easier. No running the tap or worrying about matching pH/temperature.

I euthanised my coccina pair earlier today, and emptied their tank out. Because this left a space on my bottom shelf, I turned my main rutilans green tank on its side. My rack is now completely full as you can see from the picture below. All that I want to do now, is get rid of those two small lamps on the bottom shelf and replace them with a proper aquarium light. Other than that, I think it looks pretty nice. I think I will miss having my fish up in my bedroom when my rack has to get moved downstairs. 










Top shelf holds Betta persephone and Betta sp. apiapi
Middle shelf holds Betta sp. wajok, Betta brownorum, Betta hendra and Betta miniopinna (original pair)
Bottom shelf holds Betta rutilans sp. cf. green, Betta rutilans sp. cf. green breeding pair, Betta miniopinna and Betta uberis.

Speaking of uberis, my poor male is slightly smaller than his female and so she has been mercilessly bullying him since they got here. He has some bites taken out of his anal fin, and I managed to get this photo of him while he was out eating some grindals. 










My female Betta hendra was putting on a show, so since the glass was clean, I figured I'd get some photos of her. I'm having real difficulty sexing some of these juveniles now. Some are obvious males/females, but with others it is a lot more ambiguous. 





































I've got my BBS hatchery bubbling away and that should be ready to go in a couple of hours. I was also going to see if I could catch some mosquito larvae for my sp. apiapi and new pairs. It's going to be a lot colder this week so will see how long the larvae will last in my outdoor tubs.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Just got news from the seller I got my new pairs from, that he now has coccina and the regular rutilans available! 

I of course said I'd take a pair of each. I just have to tell my mum that *cough* as I use her paypal (mine is hooked to a debit card and it seems to take 7 days to process) and it's going to be 80 USD for the both of them. Plus the $110 in import and shipping fees (which I can just pay to the transhipper with my bank account). Luckily I am selling a whole heap of fish and fish 'stuff' to a fellow hobbyist so I think I had better arrange a date for her to come and pick everything up ASAP. The killifish definitely have to go because they are taking up valuable wild betta space. 

These will be my final wild betta species until I start moving more fish on to new homes. I can't afford any further fish (the import and shipping fees are particularly crippling), and I also won't have the space for any further fish until I get my rack downstairs put up. 

I have been after (presumably) wild-caught Betta coccina for so long now. Would be so awesome if I could finally cross this pair off my 'haven't bred yet' list, along with Betta rutilans. 

I'm thinking of looking at a position for 'Night Fill' at one of the big grocery store chains here. The pay looks to be alright, I'm a very efficient and speedy worker, and having been a manager at Subway and spent a lot of my time unpacking and moving around all our deliveries on my own, I'm sure it is something I could do. 

It would be awesome if I could get work at one of the local supermarkets as I could bus there earlier on in the night and then just walk home (or area is extremely low crime). Plus I shop at both and know where everything is supposed to go. 

Since I have such a big gap on my resume due to my anxiety and some issues with chronic depression, I really need to get some work experience again. I don't think I could do fast food again as that was so soul crushing. I don't think I have the personality for retail but I have gotten fairly good at faking that I am an outgoing person (because of this people are always surprised when I tell them I have social anxiety) over the years so I could probably do it. I'm not really sure any other jobs are going to take someone with no experience, no degree, and who have a suspicious gap in their resume. 

I feel like just applying at every single pet store within bus/train distance. At least I have knowledge on a lot of different pets and pet products. It's just whether at my age (24) I would be employable and whether I could stand the customers.

My mum is talking about picking up a small car for cheap so I can at least learn to drive. It would be useful if I could at least get to the vet or pick up the groceries like a normal person my age rather than have to put all the pressure back on her. 

Ugh, I wish I could just suck it up and go out there and get things done. It's like I know where I want to be, but I just can't get there! It's so frustrating for both me and my parents.


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## LittleBettaFish

Been doing some flare training with my uberis male to build up his confidence, as well as fattening him up on grindals, BBS and mosquito larvae. He was flaring at his reflection and the end of the thermometer, but it is a bit hard to take a 2.5cm fish seriously no matter how vicious he thinks he looks.

Mum has approved of my wild betta buying plans because she knows I have been after coccina since forever.

I haven't really done much with my fish today. I fed them and am going to do water changes on my new tanks after dinner, but that is about it. 

I did however, manage to get some photos of my smaller F1 brownorum male and the female I will most likely be keeping. 


















That's the mum up top



















I also got this quick snap of one of my miniopinna fry on a rooibos tea bag.


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## LittleBettaFish

I have paid for my coccina and rutilans pairs. The next shipment into Australia is apparently on the 17th so I should have my fish by the end of the June if they all survive through the shipping process.

Got some exciting news from my mother. 

I am getting my replacement double bed soon (about 15 weeks since the original one was paid for), and mum suggested because it is going to be such a tight squeeze in my bedroom, why don't I move into the spare bedroom, and use my current bedroom for my fish. This is temporary until downstairs is finished off, but temporary in our house can mean years :mrgreen:

I am going to bring my smaller rack and water aging tub upstairs, so I can fit at least a handful more tanks in my room.

This is how I want both racks to look. Yes, I am incredibly skilled at using Paint. 










My new pairs are settling in well. Unfortunately, they don't seem to like being at almost foot level so I am going to move both tanks onto the smaller rack and have them up around knee height if I can.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Decided to swap my killifish who are up on the sideboard with my miniopinna and uberis tanks so now they are up off the ground. 

I also added a few more plants to their tanks and fed them some mosquito larvae, to hopefully induce some courtship behaviour. Unfortunately, thus far it seems like I got two wussy males. My uberis female is just so aggressive. She chases my male around non-stop and was trying to attack my miniopinna male through the glass. 

I'm thinking of isolating her in a plastic container and letting her float around the tank, sort of like what I would do with an aggressive sorority female. 

Meanwhile, my new miniopinna female has taken up residence in the film canister and will not let the male in. So now I have two film canisters so at least he has somewhere to build a nest. 

My other fish are doing well. Some of my older rutilans green fry were eating BBS and I haven't seen any sign of velvet on them. The male has his newest fry in the film canister still so they will most likely become free-swimming soon. Don't think it will take long for me to fill a 3.5 gallon tank with rutilans. 

I did manage to get a nice photo of my sp. wajok female today. She thought I was feeding her so she stayed still long enough for me to get my camera out. I added some floating IAL to their tank in a bid to coax them to spawn again. They are the least prolific breeders in my entire fish room.


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## LittleBettaFish

My pairs are settling into their new position well. They have coloured up a lot more, and seem to appreciate the extra plants. No spawning or courtship but considering they have been moved around and bothered a lot, I am not expecting anything. 

I'm going to order a couple of bunches of hornwort and hydrilla, and also some giant duckweed for my coccina and rutilans tanks. The duckweed in my tub outside has all died off now that it is getting colder and there is less sun around. 

Haven't seen much on the spawning front. But that is mostly because I need to remove all my young fish from the tanks. I definitely notice a massive slow-down and eventual cessation in breeding activity once the juveniles get their adult colouration and start behaving more aggressively. 

It's been difficult trying to get photos of my new pairs because the flash of the camera startles them (particularly my uberis pair). However, I did get these two shots of my new miniopinna male. 



















He is only 3cm from head to tail so the photos make him look bigger than what he is. 

That's about it from the wild betta fish room. I was just reading through some of my old journals from both here and another forum and I am so glad that I stuck with the wilds even if I went through all that anguish with velvet. These fish are so worth the effort and I couldn't imagine keeping anything else.


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## Hallyx

LittleBettaFish said:


> .... I am so glad that I stuck with the wilds...


Me, too. And so, I'm sure, are all of us.




LittleBettaFish said:


> .....even if I went through all that anguish with velvet. These fish are so worth the effort and I couldn't imagine keeping anything else.


Good on ya.


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## LittleBettaFish

See I knew I shouldn't have said that things were going well and that I was happy I made the decision to stick with wilds because then I lose my favourite Betta persephone female for reasons unknown. 

I suspect it was one of the other females in the tank even though there was not a mark on her. The females have been more aggressive than late, with a couple of them showing vertical stripes and some minor fin damage. 

Other than that, did water changes today on my sp. apiapi, hendra, brownorum, uberis, and my new miniopinna. My rutilans green (both main tank and breeding tank) are due tomorrow as are my other pair of miniopinna. 

For some reason, the watersprite in my sp. wajok tank just died right off. I'm not sure if it was a deficiency, some sort of problem with the water, or whether it had some of disease. It was thriving and then suddenly overnight all the emersed growth turned pale and brown. The duckweed also died off so I thought it might have been a deficiency or a problem with the light, but the globes are under a year old and all my other tanks with the same set-up and substrate are fine. 

Thus began the extremely lengthy task of removing all the dead watersprite. I actually left the roots in because my pair like hiding in amongst them. I probably managed to kill a number of fry whilst removing the watersprite. It was one of the reasons I've been putting it off, but I was afraid the dying plants would pollute the water - and it was just annoying me looking at them. 

I nearly decapitated my sp. wajok female several times because she is such a curious fish and kept following me around while I was pruning. 

This is what the tank used to look like.










This is what the tank looks like now. I replaced the watersprite with hydrilla instead and hopefully that and the remaining duckweed, will fill in rather quickly. Anything green in the below picture is hydrilla. 










My female didn't seem to mind the change. Here she is here investigating the new IAL I put in. 










These two are the worst breeding pair in my fish room. I still can't get another spawn out of them, but I suppose at least they have given me some fry to work with. 

Neither my miniopinna nor my uberis pairs have shown any inclination to spawn either. My uberis male is still petrified of his female, and my miniopinna male seems interested in everything _but_ his female. I did catch my miniopinna pair spawning but nothing came of it, so I don't know what happened there. I'm hoping that they spawn soon as I would like to get rid of my other pair, but don't want to do that until I know these two are capable of giving me some fry. 

Apart from that, here is a random photo I took of one of my sp. apiapi sub-adult males. Sadly no spade-tail. I don't know why my male did not pass his lovely caudal on, but it seems like none of the young males have it.


----------



## beautiful Betta

Sorry to hear about your female.


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## Aquatail

I'm sorry about your persephone female. SIP

Is it possible she died of old age? Was she that old?


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks guys. 

Aquatail, I doubt it was old age as she would only be two years in June and was spawning only earlier this year. Plus her siblings are the same age and none of them show the slightest sign of slowing down. 

It might have just been some sort of aneurysm or heart problem, but unfortunately I don't think I'll ever know. 

It's just sad to see one of your favourites dead, particularly when it is so sudden and there's been no sign that anything was wrong.


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## Aquatail

Oh, she wasn't that old then. I'm sorry she passed away.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well it looks like a new dominant female has stepped forward. She has been flaring and chasing the males everywhere (particularly her half-grown nephew) and is looking very plump with eggs. 

Here are some photos of her in action. 




























Then here is one of my sub-adult males. He has an oddly-shaped caudal. It looks more pointed than the rest of my persephone and so I am going to keep eyes on him to see how he develops. His sister is absolutely lovely. Definitely going to try and pair her up with an outside male. 

My new pairs are frustrating the heck out of me. They don't spawn and my uberis male is just getting continually harassed by his female. I am definitely going to separate her out today and let him not only grow his fins back, but also try and get him a bit more aggressive. They have a deadline of two months from today. If they haven't spawned by then, they will be sold. I simply don't have space for non-productive pairs. 

However, I did find my rutilans green pair spawning again. Which is a shame as I chucked a whole heap of white worms and grindals in to try and get some photos of them and now they are sitting on the bottom ignored. 

This was the best photo I could get of the female. You can see the lighter 'breeding stripe' down her back, and almost make out the male with his mouth distended in the background. 










The rest of the group are doing great. Much less aggression in the smaller tank and they are loving the spawning mops. Fins are growing back and this is the healthiest they have looked in ages. 



















Then this is the brownorum that shares a tank with them. 




























Going to go pick up some blackworms today from the fish store. Not as much option for foods now it is colder here. I am still getting some mosquito larvae, but not enough to feed everyone. 

That's about all the updates I have... for now.


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## LittleBettaFish

Moved out of my bedroom into the spare bedroom so now my bedroom can become a (temporary) fish room. 

Picked up blackworms, frozen bloodworms and some live brine shrimp yesterday. Nearly walked out with a blue marble DT my mum saw and liked. Unfortunately, the form was fairly poor (very dipped topline) but mum now plans on having a pair of imported HMPKs in her office. 

Also had some exciting news in that my new pair of miniopinna have spawned. I can see eggs in quite a large nest and even though the male seems rather lax in his protective duties, as long as he doesn't eat them, it's good. 

My rutilans green male has a huge mouthful. He is just floating at the surface looking very uncomfortable. Should see fry in a few days.


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## LittleBettaFish

Had my hands full the past couple of days with the dogs. Now we have stopped biking the two girls, I am trying to get all three of them onto a regular walking routine. Eos is easy and so I can take her for an hour and a half walk, and not be too tired by the end of it (our area is basically all hills so you get a work-out). However, because Nike is very reactive towards other dogs, I have to walk her very early in the morning while it is still dark because no one is around. 

I think just the anxiety about what happens if other dogs approach is what exhausts me. We have been working on our training with 'watch' and 'come', and I'm hoping that mum might be able to put her in obedience classes at dog club when she is less busy with work. 

Ares is incredibly lazy and his walks are about fifteen minutes long and mostly consist of him sniffing and peeing on every shrub within a 1km radius of the house. It's mostly just the mental stimulation for him. 

Fish wise, my miniopinna male has a small number of fry. I thought he'd eaten them, but today I had a closer look and they are still there. 

My rutilans green male spat his fry out and now they are hanging from the roof of the film canister. Their siblings are growing every day, and some of the bigger ones have started sparring with each other. And by 'bigger', I mean about 5mm. 

You can see one here in this picture with a stomach full of BBS. That is mum to the left. She didn't like the torch on her. 










Meanwhile, my sp. wajok pair seem to have retired from breeding. Thankfully, I have a seemingly large number of fry from their several spawnings. I got this photo of one while it was eating. 










Then here are just some photos of my hendra female, and one of the juveniles in there. 














































This is their tank, massively overgrown but they seem to like it. 










Meanwhile, this tank houses at least 15 brownorum and there is only about 5 gallons of water. Yet try to spot a fish. It's only when I put some BBS that a few of them would come out. 










Finally, just one of my rutilans green males, living it up in the main tank. 










I sold a whole heap of fish and stuff (buyer is coming Monday to pick it up), so have money for the import/local shipping fees for my two new pairs as well as a brand new 2ft light. I'm hoping to sell a couple of my bigger tanks that I don't use to put towards another 2ft light, as well as some plants and heaters. 

I can't wait until the end of June. So want to get my hands on my coccina and rutilans pairs!


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## LittleBettaFish

I got some hilarious photos today. 

To provide some background, Nike has this weird relationship with the cats. She is not aggressive towards them, but she always wants them to run so she can chase them around. While that is fun for her, it's obviously not very fun for the cats so they don't indulge her. 

Today Nike and Ares had a break-out from the baby gate in the kitchen and came in to discover Bandit asleep on my old bed (that's why there are no sheets on it). As you can see, Nike has the face for some sort of pound campaign as she always looks so sad. Even though she is always doing the most infuriating things, it's hard to stay cross at her for long as she is adorable. 









"Mum he's looking at me!"









Her 'big brother' and main accomplice Ares in the background.









This is what I call her Nike zone. Once she is in this zone, good luck getting her attention short of physically moving her. 









Ares thinking perhaps he can get a quick sniff and nip in if he goes around back.









Ares up on the bed now that Bandit has been put in the spare bedroom to get some peace. He is a wonky looking German Shepherd. He is very tall, but very narrow, his feet are huge and his topline conformation is so terrible if he was a fish I probably would have culled him. Based on his limited range of movement we think his hips are pretty crummy. I told mum that we need to start our foundation for dogs with bad hips. Poor Eos is going to have to produce a lot of puppies to provide for everyone's hip replacements :bluelaugh::bluelaugh: Maybe we need to look at the designer dog market. All we need is a catchy breed name and we are set! 

Apart from that, my fish are doing well and fry are growing out nicely. My killifish group, a pair of hendra and a trio of brownorum females are going on Monday. I am moving the chest of drawers from my bedroom out into the spare bedroom, and hopefully if it's not too heavy, will be able to move my smaller fish rack from downstairs up here. Then I can get my coccina and rutilans tanks set up. 

Knowing my luck, I'm going to fall whilst carrying it up the stairs and because my parents are both away for the long weekend, they'll come home to find me dead - possibly having been nibbled on by the cats haha.


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## beautiful Betta

Our German shepherd used to be obsessed with our cats, not in a aggressive way but more just wanting to be around them. She would actually lie across a door entrance in an attempt to keep them in the same room. They would just jump over her. Much to her disappointment, because once they were gone she would move. One male cat she constantly tried to get underneath her pawing him into position to try and mate him like a male dog would a female, although she was neutered. He was so soppy he would just tolerate her ministrations not bothered at all. She would also groom him, he wasn't fazed at all when he would be led out asleep and she would go up to him and nibble in the grooming manner on his neck. And whenever he used to come in a room he would be straight over and rub his head on her head scenting her I guess.


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## LittleBettaFish

Our fourth cat Whistler, who doesn't get along with the other cats (except Bandit), really likes Eos. She treats him like a puppy, licking his ears and bottom and crying over him. They also have these epic battles in the laundry/powder room, usually while I am in the shower or trying to brush my teeth. Whistler's favourite party trick is to lay in the laundry basket and bite her paws hard enough that Eos yelps. He has a bit of a nasty streak through him, which is why he can't be with the other cats. 

Nike is obsessed with Whistler even though he just tolerates her. She has her bed right up against the powder room door, and she sits there almost trying to inhale him through the door. Whenever she gets in with him she tries to get him to do something other than just lay in his bed with a grumpy look on his face. Sometimes I catch her just with his whole head in her mouth. I never understand why Whistler puts up with that. He is going to be torn apart by a gang of German Shepherd puppies haha. 

He gets up on the roof that looks into the backyard, and drives the dogs bonkers by just sitting there. I caught him on the side gate this morning while the dogs were eating breakfast. 

At least with dogs and cats, you are never left wanting for entertainment.


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## LittleBettaFish

Today I decided to shift my smaller rack from downstairs up to my bedroom/temporary fishroom. 

It was perhaps not the best decision (I would never live in a house that has stairs ever again), but it is done, and now it is ready to hold my uberis and miniopinna pairs, as well as my rutilans and coccina pairs. 

Unfortunately, it doesn't match my other rack and that corner of the room is really ghetto looking, but at least it means I can fit 4-5 more tanks in. 










The green bucket is my water aging bucket, and the towel covered ladder is what I use to reach the highest shelf on my big rack. 

Looks like my sp. apiapi pair spawned as there are eggs in the film canister. My miniopinna pair from Joty are also behaving quite aggressively so I think they might spawn again soon. 

I took a few more photos of my hendra female and some of her offspring. She spends most of her day chasing them all around. 




































I was trying to get the two flaring in the corner at each other. 

I also got some photos of one of my rutilans green adults. I think this is a female. The other day I noticed they weren't as active as usual. Turns out I must have knocked the heater plug and it wasn't on! I'm just hoping that the temperature fluctuation isn't enough to trigger another velvet infection. At least now I have the breeding pair and their fry as back-up if something does go wrong. 




























Finally, I managed to get a halfway decent shot of my original miniopinna male. I'm hoping I can shift this pair onto their new home in the next couple of weeks. Then I'll probably put my new miniopinna pair up on the main rack, and move the juveniles and fry from this original pair onto the smaller rack.


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## LittleBettaFish

Waved goodbye to my killifish group yesterday. The buyer owns almost all their siblings, so they are going to be sharing a big tank together. 

I'm emptying their tank out today, and then that will be where my water aging tub goes. This means that aside from the goldfish downstairs (I never really count them as being part of my 'collection'), the only fish I am keeping are wilds. 

Breeding wise, my hendra pair spawned the other day, as did my new miniopinna. My sp. apiapi male is still guarding his nest, though I suspect his fry have hatched out by now. 

The other plan for today, is to get a couple of tanks up from the shed, clean them out and fill them up. These are going to be for my coccina and rutilans pairs. Haven't heard any negative news about them from the seller, and the next shipment is due on the 17th of this month, so hoping they make the journey to Bangkok and then Australia in one piece. 

I've still got to order myself a 2ft light. I regret now I traded my really nice 3ft light for some fish last year. Now I am just going to have to peruse the classifieds on some Australian forums for any good bargains, or fork out the $$ to buy one new. 

Also got to purchase some plants to fill these new tanks. I think in the future if I have room, I am definitely going to set up a 2-3ft tank and use it to grow plants for my tanks. Thinking things like frogbit, watersprite, hydrilla etc. At least then I will know they are disease and pest free because I have grown them myself. I am always wary about getting plants from people who have kept them with fish. 

Now I just have to determine if the hose from out the front is going to reach my tub to fill it up. I think it should, but knowing my luck it will fall a few inches too short.


----------



## beautiful Betta

You want to keep an eye out on gumtree often can get bargains there. Or ebay you could find what you want second hand.

But good luck with it all.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha Gumtree seems to attract a lot of weird people. I think I am going to have to cough up the money for a new light. I've got a heap of juveniles/sub-adults I need to get rid of soon enough anyway so that'll hopefully at least pay for the new light. 

Just got back from a lovely walk with Eos. She is coming onto heat soon and so is going through her usual skittish pre-heat behaviour. She also marks everywhere (including on someone's driveway today) and spends most of her time sniffing and licking grass. Undoubtedly, she will at some point get out with Nike like she normally does around this time and engage in the 'run of death' around the backyard with her and Ares. 

I also took Nike at six thirty this morning, and she was so good. We passed a black labrador and she hackled up a bit and pulled towards it slightly but other than that, didn't lunge or start doing her crazy bark (people look at me like I am delusional when I tell them that my dog is scared not trying to attack them). Now she is retired from showing I told her that we are going to work on shaping her into a good canine citizen - even if it kills me. 

I have been watching clicker training videos on Youtube, and I am so envious of anyone who has a property to use for training. It must be so much easier to instil the basics without having to drive somewhere or worry about loose dogs coming up all the time. Here, any area that is fenced and looks good for training always has off-lead dogs around. I still remember the time we were at these soccer ovals that are always empty with Nike and some lady's staffy squeezed under the fence and got in with her. Luckily Nike just wanted to play. The lady didn't seem to understand why we were so panicked. If it had been Nike's mum back in her younger years, the dog probably would have been missing its head. 

If Eos has a puppy and we keep it, I am going to be working with it right from the start. Nike has a poor temperament anyway, but we should have focussed more on training her than showing. Even Eos did some basic obedience and Ares used to go every week for at least a couple of years. It's unfortunate that Nike was 'my dog'. She is such a challenge to work with. I think I might just strap the cats to me when I am training her.


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## beautiful Betta

OMG that sounds just like Alaska, She used to hate other dogs, she was really bad for walking, she would literally froth at the mouth barking and looking like she would kill, it was embarrassing, even had someone while walking her say you should get private lessons with a certain dog trainer in our area, and we said we had, which we had, Alaska had gone to puppy class every week and she was fine at puppy class and later when she was older we went on to more obedience training, she was top of the class she was so wanting to please. But outside if she came across another dog, she would go mad. Little dogs were generally ok, hated other German shepherds especially white ones. It was weird. I think she was a nervous dog, around other dogs. Put in a room with people kids, the kids could pull her ears, tail she wouldn't batter and eyelid. I had a picture once my in-laws took of Alaska sat on the ground with our baby nephew, he literally had her tail in both hands holding it around him. If I had have been there I wouldn't have been impressed, but that would have been for my dogs sake not the baby. They were retired so looked after Alaska in the day while we were at work, my ex used to drop her off in the morning and pick her back up in the evening, they loved having her.

Sorry gone on a bit, memory lane stroll, she was a lovely dog despite some of her character flaws.


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## LittleBettaFish

It's okay. It's like Nike. She may be the weirdest dog I have ever owned, but she is my girl, and I love her unconditionally. 

It's funny, our dog Eos hates German Shepherds. She's always telling the intact males we see at club and shows off, and doesn't like other females. However, she is fine with other breeds. She used to go out with a dog walker and run with a group of dogs before she got pneumonia the first time. 

In fish news, getting a cellophane/grizzle plakat male that was bred by a girl that lives local to me and owns Jar Fish. He is not perfect form wise (his fins mostly), but is a nice colour and seems to be very feisty. 

Mum's not into my wilds, and she liked the way this male looked in his video and photos. She stills wants a nice pair of blue grizzle/marble HMPKs, but later on, when we have everything downstairs set-up. 

I think I should be getting the new male this Friday, so going to get a temporary tank ready for him. Think I will just very densely plant it like my wild betta tanks and he can be Office Fish.


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## beautiful Betta

So you are taking a step back into the pet bred variety. Would love to see a picture when you get one.


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## LittleBettaFish

Only because it was either fancy bettas, or a pair of Betta macrostoma, and I didn't want the macrostoma (probably get stoned by a lot of wild betta keepers for saying that). 

Unfortunately, her tastes in fish tend to differ wildly from mine. At least this male is a colour we both like.


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## LittleBettaFish

Going to be moving around tanks and setting new ones up today so going to have some photos to post later on (it's only just 7am here so bit early for fish things).

I moved my uberis pair down onto the second shelf of my small rack yesterday, and they have very quickly settled in. Their tank is getting a change around today. Going to take out the yarn spawning mops, lay down some leaf litter, put in the Malaysian driftwood and java moss from my killifish tank, and then jar the female to give my male a chance to build up some confidence and aggression. 

I always thought my new miniopinna male was a rather pathetic father. The water is very dark in that tank and so I can hardly see in. Both the previous time he spawned and the present spawn only ever looked like there was a handful of fry. That was until I got the torch out yesterday and realised there were at least twenty of them! No wonder he has built such big nests. He is a super dad. Just got to work out how to move the tank over to the smaller rack without causing him too much stress. 

Unfortunately, it looks like my coccina are not going to arrive in time at the seller's place to make it to Australia in this shipment. Really disappointed as these were the ones I _really_ wanted. 

On the bright side, at least their tank will be nice and mature by the time they arrive, and the plants will have had time to grow in. I will also still be getting my rutilans so I can work on achieving spawning success with this species and cross it off my list. 

Realised I am nearly out of IAL. I am going to have to order some more, which is more $$$. Think I might order some of the low grade stuff from Bettawan as I don't need particularly nice looking leaves. Hopefully customs doesn't think it's dodgy or anything because the leaves are not completely intact. 

Looking at my brownorum tank recently, I cannot understand how my brownorum female got so big. She is huge when compared to my hendra female, and both fish were purchased at the same time, were originally the same size, and have been on the same diet since the start. I also discovered I have a juvenile female with only one ventral. The one she has is completely perfect. The other one isn't even a stub. It just never formed, and the skin is completely smooth. It's the first time I've had a wild that has presented any issues with ventral fins. Hopefully someone will want my NQR female for a discounted price. 

I also had to laugh. Lately I have been reading a lot of posts (not on this forum) about people that have been breeding X animals for years and that is why they feel free to deride newcomers as completely lacking in knowledge. 

Some people don't understand you can do something for years and still be doing a poor job. I know people who have been breeding German Shepherds for decades, but they still have a terrible eye for what makes a good dog and you look at their breeding program and there has been no success anywhere (working or show). 

I've found that sometimes people become so entrenched in their beliefs and practices, they refuse to even consider that there might be anything more that they could learn. It's like they have blinders on, and because they have been doing this since 'before you were born', they must be right. 

I am someone who is an avid reader/researcher. I don't like to rush into things, and I am like an information sponge. Therefore, I am always surprised by how lacking in basic knowledge some people are, people who have been in this hobby so much longer than me. I know I am certainly not going to be writing a phD on fish keeping any time soon, but I would have thought knowing the basics of water chemistry (such as cycling a tank) or treatment of common diseases, would be something most long-term keepers/breeders of fish should know - and I'm not talking about people who keep their goldfish in bowls. 

I see some downright harmful information handed out on various forums and FB pages and because these people are considered as 'experienced' fish keepers, their words carry a lot more weight. 

I also find bragging about one's achievements very off-putting. I am proud of what I have achieved with my wilds in the time I have been keeping them. But those achievements don't define my whole fish keeping experience. For example, I _may_ (I don't know what everyone in Australia keeps and breeds) have been the first person in Australia to breed a couple of the species I keep, but that isn't something I use as some sort of claim to fame when posting online. I personally have more respect for breeders and hobbyists, who I know are out there quietly producing and showing quality fish rather than those who have to use their achievements as a crutch to validate their existence in the hobby. 

That was just some rambling thoughts I had after being on a few dog and fish forums the other day. Particularly the dog forum where someone described conformation showing as being 'deadly serious' to them.


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## LittleBettaFish

Got some photos of my new rack. It holds my uberis and miniopinna, as well as my BBS hatchery and the two empty tanks for my coccina and rutilans. Beneath it is where I store my water aging bucket. 



















Then this is a sort of full room shot. The black tub on the bottom shelf is where I also age water. It is specifically for my rutilans green since they have had velvet and I don't want any cross-contamination going on.

It will be nice when my old bed and bedside table are gone and the dresser from the spare room is moved into the corner. I will just need a chair then so I can admire my fish. 

My uberis pair love their new home. I got a photo of them both. They are awful photos because I should have cleaned the glass first, but they seem to have no problems with the move. My poor miniopinna male had his nest destroyed and his fry sent everywhere on the way from the sideboard to the rack, but he seems to have rounded everyone up again. 









Male









Female in stress colouration 

My uberis male is doing less fleeing from the female, so hopefully he gains some further confidence and there starts to be some courtship going on. 

Also those photos make them look larger than they are. In reality I would say they are around 3cm from head to tail. They are in about 3 gallons of water and they make it look like so much space. 

I killed my Resun air pump today. It's been rattling a lot lately and not pumping as much air and I tried to open the top to have a look and just totally wrecked the inside of it. So for now I am just using my two Aqua One pumps and this cheap one I have, but I will probably have to look at replacing it fairly soon. 

Other than that, I haven't done much else fish wise. Just about to go down and hose out the 2ft tank my killifish group used to live in. Considering using it as my plant growing tank. I have the perfect spot on my sideboard for it, as well as a spare lamp. I think if I lay down some ADA Amazonia the plants would thrive.


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## LittleBettaFish

Getting my new male today at 2pm. Haven't got a tank set-up for him yet, but I am just going to pull one of the 30cm cubes out from the shed, fill it up with water from my aging tub (it's heated and had rooibos added) and just throw in some java moss and watersprite from my persephone tank until I can order some more plants. 

Will hopefully have some photos of him to add by the end of the day. 

I think my male uberis might have strung some bubbles together in the film canister. I'm going to give them some mosquito larvae and blackworms today in the hopes of inspiring some loving. 

Poor Nike is miserable. She seems to be going through a phantom pregnancy and is bloated, restless, and carrying this one toy around crying over it and guarding it from everyone else. I had to bring her upstairs to my room and she tried to dig a hole in my doona for her and the 'puppy'. 

Usually Eos is the one who gets like this in the couple of months after her heat. Nike is really bad this time around. I can't even touch the toy because she gets upset and starts crying for it. 

She's lying up next to me with the saddest face. At least once she is desexed after her final hip x-ray, we won't have to go through this again.

Also forgot to add that I ordered a 2ft light for my small rack, and a 25 watt heater for my rutilans tank.


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## LittleBettaFish

My mum's male arrived. He may not be perfect, but he is very feisty and is already flaring up a storm in his temporary tank. The blue in his fins is richer than what the photos show. 



















Going to fill the tank up to halfway and just stuff it with plants and he can just live out his days doing whatever he wants.


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## MattsBettas

I have to admit that I was kinda shocked to see pictures of a domestic in your journal. Everything's looking awesome!


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## Fenghuang

Matt beat me to it. He is one good looking fish though. All your fish are, wild and domestic.

Poor Nike. I hope she feels better soon.


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## LittleBettaFish

I know... it's really weird. I honestly can't even remember when I had a fancy splendens last. 

He is very personable and is still flaring at everything. I do have to say though that I certainly am a wild betta girl. They are just so much more interesting and I love their secretive little behaviours. Here he is 'helping' me sort of some mosquito larvae. These are his two nemeses, the syringe and the green scoop. 










I had a massive panic attack the other day. I thought my separated pair of rutilans green had velvet because the male and females both had these open wounds around their head areas. But after a closer inspection I think they were actually just fighting wounds as the male had torn fins. Since there appears to be a good number of fry from their several spawnings, I have put the back into the main tank. The 3.5 gallon just has the fry now, so I can focus on getting them to maturity without any issues. 

My uberis male is now acting a lot more dominant. He actually chased the female off this afternoon and she is much more subdued. 

I also spotted an completely independent and older looking fry in with my newest pair of miniopinna, so it doesn't seem like any parental predation is going on there. I will be over the moon if I can get my uberis pair to spawn, and have my rutilans pair arrives safe before the end of the month. Then it will just be a waiting game until my coccina arrive.

And thanks Fenghuang. I am so happy when my fish are healthy. It was such an incredibly hard time when I was battling disease every other week. The hobby is a lot more fun.

Also forgot to add, Nike is still miserable. Panting and freaking out about her toy. She was trying to dig a hole right through my bed before and I think I am going to have to sleep with her tonight because she won't settle unless she is with me.


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## beautiful Betta

He is a pretty boy.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Beautiful Betta. 

He had some blackworms this morning. Admittedly, he is not as fun to watch as my wilds. My wild betta tanks are like soap operas. There is always some drama going on. 

It seems like maybe there were some issues with my brownorum pair and poor genetics coming through. I have been looking more closely at the juveniles, and one has a growth on its head, one has only half a caudal (this is not from injury) and there is the one with the missing ventral. This has made me question whether it is worth continuing with this line. I have not had such a high number of deformities in my wilds before, and I'm afraid doubling up with a sibling cross would make things worse - and I don't know if I want to waste a nice wild-caught female on males with those kinds of genes. 

It's not all doom and gloom though. I did get some photos of my original brownorum female. She is so thick through the body. I don't know why. It's no wonder the sp. wajok male in the tank over is intimidated by her. You can sort of see the faint green spot on her side. It's faded as she has gotten older. I guaranteed her a retirement here, and I will keep the two males so she has some companionship. I will just get rid of the remaining F1 fish and use the money to put towards a new pair. 




























I have just fed everyone and my hendra female decided to eat more than she should. So now she is semi-floating until the blackworms go through. I did try to tell her that those were for her entire family to eat, not just her. 










Then some of my sp. apiapi youngsters (probably the same fish) enjoying their breakfast of grindals. 




























I am going to put a plant order in for hydrilla, hornwort, giant duckweed and either native milfoil or native ambulia. I'm considering some native vallisneria for my rutilans green tank and maybe my persephone tank as well, and also some java moss just because even though it annoys me, my wilds seem to absolutely love it. 

After that, my fish account will be broke until I sell off some fish at the end of the month. I figured mum can put some money towards her plants as a number of them will be used in Atlas's (that is what mum has called her new fish) tank.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well someone obviously doesn't mind their new tank. Woke up to find a bubblenest with a proud Atlas showing off underneath it. Looks like he is doing some further work on it after a breakfast of mosquito larvae and white worms. 



















Mum saw it and was like "He needs a girl now!". Maybe the macrostoma would have been a better option. 

It seems like the flare training with my uberis male is paying off. He is looking better than ever and the female was showing some vertical barring this morning after I fed them some mosquito larvae. 

Unfortunately, he is the hardest fish to take photos of. He is very friendly and always at the front of the tank, but never sits still long enough for my camera to focus on him and not whatever is behind him. These were the best photos I could get. I'm hoping his dorsal and anal get bigger and a nice sharp tip develops on the dorsal. I think his female may have chomped it off, which is why it is so rounded. 




























Got through all my necessary water changes at about 9:30pm last night. My rutilans green now just have a totally separate water aging bucket from everyone else so I don't have to be furiously scrubbing my hands with soap and hot water and worrying I have contaminated everyone else. 

I have to do a big change on my goldfish tank today. It is way overdue, but the water is so cold it makes my arm go numb right up to my armpit. 

Otherwise just going to potter around and start getting my rutilans tank set-up. I think my pair arrives in Oz on Tuesday or Wednesday and then it's the usual 7 days quarantine.


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## LittleBettaFish

Cleaned my goldfish tank yesterday. I haven't fed blackworms to my goldfish in months and yet every time I siphon the gravel I find a whole colony of them living in there. I wonder if they are consuming feces and uneaten food, as even when I really give the gravel a thorough siphoning, I never seem to get a lot of either in with the dirty tank water. 

Those three goldfish have to be the most boring fish on the planet. Their whole existence is based around staring at me for food, eating their food, looking for food in the gravel and then pooping out said food and causing a mess. They also splash water everywhere and uproot any plants I put in. Those plants they can't uproot, don't seem to do well when the water temperature drops right down over winter. 

Onto my bettas, I think I am _so_ close to an uberis spawn. The female is barred up and showing a prominent stripe down her back which usually indicates a readiness to breed. The male is spending most of his time near his nest and is showing off to her and attempting to lure her back to his nest rather than chase her. I fed them some mosquito larvae just now so hopefully I see a spawn in the next few days. 

The fry from my newest miniopinna pair are growing tremendously fast. I haven't even been feeding them and they are all swimming around with fat stomachs. Peat moss definitely provides plentiful infusoria for fry to feed on.

My rutilans green fry are also doing well in their nursery tank. The biggest are taking grindals now and I see them sparring with each other all the time. 

I filled up the tank for my rutilans pair this morning. Was good and didn't rush it, so didn't disturb the aqua soil like I usually do. Going to boil up some peat moss and lay this in a thin layer over the soil. On top of that will go a small litter of native riparian leaves, along with some IAL to add colour. Then I have to wait for the 25 watt heater I ordered to arrive (probably will be tomorrow) and I will be placing a small plant order to fill both this tank and my coccina tank. 

After all this, those rutilans better survive this whole process! Then it will just be a nervous wait until my coccina come in August. 

This morning I found myself browsing an apistogramma forum after reading Mahsfish's journal (curse you). It is a good thing I am broke because if I still had my job I would seriously be so overrun with fish. I am fascinated by the way the mother apistogramma tends to her brood, and I would certainly love to one day add pairs of Apistogramma panduro, Apistogramma baenschi Inka 50 and Apistogramma allpahuayo to my fishy collection. Small, fierce, brightly coloured fish that are expensive, sounds right up my alley.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just thought I'd do a quick post to say that my uberis pair are spawning! I caught them up in the film canister together so I am not going to disturb them as this is their first time and it's taken so long to get to this point. 

I fed them a whole lot of grindals and mosquito larvae last night and the male was very intent on luring the female back to his nest. He was very aggressively flaring and defending the area near his nest so I thought that a spawn might be imminent. 

I took a couple of photos of my uberis male with the mirror the other day. Unfortunately, the photos in this tank always turn out overly bright or overly dark. 



























Their tank. The wood is only temporary until I get more plants. 

My light and heater still have not arrived. Hope it is either today or tomorrow because I am sick of moving the light from my main rack back and forth. I also don't want to be putting plants into a freezing cold tank. 

Meanwhile Atlas is still working solidly on his bubblenest. It's at least twice as big now, and heaven forbid I even think of doing a water change. I suppose it is keeping him occupied. Even if there is not the slightest chance a female is going to come by.


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## beautiful Betta

All looking good LBF. Made me laugh reading about the goldfish.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha shamefully I will admit I am a poor goldfish keeper. I mean they get fed, get their water changed and their parameters are good (except the nitrates sometimes can be high), but they are still three shubunkin in a 45 gallon tank, and they also receive basically zero attention from me outside of feeding/maintenance. 

They were supposed to have their 100 gallon tank with a canister filter by now, but the renovations downstairs stalled and there's just nowhere for it to go. Plus it would be a devil to move when it comes time to put the flooring in. 

Their tank is not exactly a stimulating environment. It just has a thin layer of gravel and that is it. Wood is out due to the softness of the water here, and the fact I am already using a heap of crushed coral to get it to goldfish friendly levels. Rocks are out because the tank is way too small and I want to maximise water volume, and plants are out because they either dig them out or eat them.

They are probably about 20cm/8 inches from head to tail so they have been stunted. But then again, considering they are three, nondescript shubunkin that sell for peanuts here, there are probably worse places they could have ended up. 

Eventually they will get their tank upgrade, a proper filter and hopefully we can put in some river pebbles or something to provide them with a bit more interest. I may also experiment with pond plants to see if there is anything they won't eat. 

This is all three of them together, while this is the smallest one who has always seemed a bit 'off' since I got them. 



















I don't think my dad's fish would even fit in the original 10 gallon tank he had it in, when he brought the original group over three or four years ago.


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## beautiful Betta

That's the other problem with goldfish, they grow so fast, you start out with a tank they grow, and you think he needs a bigger tank, you buy one, they grow again, and the pattern continues, lol.


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## Fenghuang

Yeah, they could have ended up in way worse places. For minimal attention/maintenance, they look really good. I love the coloration of the right most one in the top picture. It looks like a koi we use to have.

And the tank that houses my dad's odd goldie/koi/pleco trio is barren too aside from some river stones for substrate and a piece of driftwood. They vacuumed up all the plants we tried to grow.


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## LittleBettaFish

They are very fussy eaters for goldfish. I tried to make them gel food once and they absolutely hated it even though I followed the instructions off a goldfish forum. I tried this New Era food, but they hated that as well. Omega One was tolerated but not taken with much enthusiasm. 

Instead they love NLS large fish formula and the goldfish formula. They also like frozen bloodworms, brine shrimp and mysis shrimp. I've tried vegetables like zucchini in the past, and they had a nibble but most ended up needing to be removed before it made a mess. When I have excess duckweed out in my tub pond in the warmer months I usually scoop some up and they seem to like eating that. 

I did tell mum I can't afford to feed the bettas and the goldfish - especially not with the price NLS is! So she is in charge of supplies for the goldfish and I take care of my lot. 

Mum has her heart set on vallisneria in their tank but all the times I've tried it, they just work and work at the substrate around the plant until it comes loose and then they mangle it. They are big fish and very determined and it does not take them long to wreak havoc on any plants I put in. 

Yeah the orange one reminds me of a koi as well. It's always been smaller than the other two and based on its tail, I think it is a slightly different variety. It also swims everywhere slightly tilted, and has done so ever since I first got it. 

My uberis male now has a nest of eggs he is guarding. I'm hoping he proves to be a good father and doesn't eat anyone. He doesn't seem to mind my presence, in fact as soon as he saw me looking in the tank he swam over in his usual fashion.

Atlas meanwhile had his mind blown by a water change just now. I was careful not to disturb his nest, and I replaced the two smaller PVC pipes with bigger ones that he has been in exploring.


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## Fenghuang

Anubias may be an option. They are supposedly one of the few plants that can withstand repeated uprooting and they have tough leafs so notorious plant killers like goldies and cichlids and plecos don't find them that tasty.


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## LittleBettaFish

I had considered anubias, but being from Africa originally, I'm not sure how they'd cope with the extreme drop in temperature over the winter months. Average water temperature is only about 10 degrees Celsius and probably overnight it gets even lower. 

My Betta uberis male is doing a great job with his eggs! I woke up this morning and the first thing I did was go check to see if they were still there and both the eggs and the male were still in the canister. 

Crossing my fingers I get some free-swimming fry out of this. 

Placed an order for plants. I figure at this point I will just buy enough to fill up my rutilans tank and then order some more for my coccina tank when I have money at the end of the month. 

I ordered hydrilla, hornwort, limnophila brownii, java moss, and giant duckweed. Also ordered some native riparian leaves to use along the bottom of the tank as these seem to last months longer than IAL and contain lots of sticks and seed pods etc. to give a more natural feel. 

Hopefully if I pay today they will get sent out by Monday next week. A fellow hobbyist I am friends with purchased some Amazon frogbit and was going to give me a little bit as well, so my rutilans pair should be very happy with their new tank by the time they get here. It's been ages since I've put this much effort into getting a tank ready. 

I'm crossing my fingers my 2ft light and heater arrive today and that nothing is broken. Got a 100 watt heater once and somehow the end was completely smashed even though the box wasn't even dented. 

I still have to purchase some IALs. I can get them here from an online store, but I honestly don't like the 'perfect' looking leaves. I was thinking of getting some low grade ones from Bettawan but I am not sure whether they would pass through customs who may think there is something wrong with them. 

Other than that, I have been looking into becoming sort of self-sustaining food wise for my fish. I have been researching how to culture blackworms, and also daphnia. I really want to try daphnia, but it seems like getting your hands on a starter culture is difficult. I can usually feed my wilds off mosquito larvae and live bloodworms from early summer to early autumn, but I don't want to rely so heavily on a worm based diet over the colder months as I don't feel it's as healthy for the fish. At the moment, I'm working on setting up a much bigger grindal worm culture. It's a shallow plastic tub, half-filled with peat moss. There's crushed coral mixed in to stop it from becoming too acidic, and I'm going to wet it all today and then introduce my grindals and white worms to it. At least it will save me having all these small, plastic containers sitting around, and hopefully I can get a bigger yield of worms. 

I'm rather disappointed to see that the majority of my hendra fry seem to be developing into males. Initially I thought I had only two males, but now it seems like I'm going to be struggling to even have a couple of females to retain or sell off. I wish I could figure out how to get a more even split. It not only makes selling the fish difficult as no one wants singletons, but also makes continuing a line beyond F1 extremely difficult as well. 

The mum was looking spectacular last night though. She was flaring at her oldest male offspring, and even posed for a nice photo.


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## LittleBettaFish

Good news is that my 2ft light and heater arrived today. The light is really good quality for the price, and is doing a great job lighting up my Betta uberis and Betta rutilans tanks. 

Bad news is that I put my plant order through and got a quote back from the owner saying that they were out of java moss. So either will steal some from another tank or pick up a small packet from a fish store. 

My sp. apiapi group have also been really clamped and less active than usual. I added several bags of rooibos tea along with IALs to their tank the other day, and I wonder if I didn't cause the pH to suddenly drop. I've turned their sponge filter back on (it's been off since my air pump broke) and removed the leaves and tea bags and they seem a bit happier. I'm going to do a water change I'm going to do a water change on Sunday just because with my tap water, I to let the water age for a couple of days for the pH to stabilise. 

I am really hoping that it is not velvet. I could not stand dealing with that again. 

So far my uberis male is still doing a wonderful job with his fry. I expect them to be free-swimming very soon. It will never cease to amaze me those males that are just such great fathers right from the start. I don't know if this male has spawned out in the wild before, but he's doing a better job than some of my males that have several spawns under their belts. 

Today I took some photos of my hendra group. They certainly are so much easier to photograph than my other wilds. 


















Mum (has to be tied with my sp. apiapi female for title of 'favourite fish')


















Dad with some of the kids

I also got single photo of my miniopinna female from Hermanus. You can see one of the juveniles in the background. 










Apparently anyone with DOA fish from this latest shipment should be hearing from Jodi-Lea by Sunday. I so hope my rutilans pair made it to Australia alive and well. If they aren't DOA or die in quarantine, I probably expect they will be shipped out by mid next week. Hopefully their tank is ready by then! 

Other than that, I'm going to post some photos up of Atlas over in the picture section of the forum. I don't want to clog up my wild betta journal with pictures of his big head.


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## Hallyx

Sure wish I could get one of those superfluous Hendra males from you. <sigh>


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## LittleBettaFish

Hopefully I can offload them easily enough as the poor female has her hands full keeping both them and the big male in line. He only ventured out of his film canister (it's where he lives now), for some bloodworms and she very promptly chased him back in. 

I took this photo of him today. It's not the best photo but he does look nice in it. He has certainly matured since I got him. 










Then I just took some miscellaneous pictures of my miniopinna group (Hermanus).


















Next to a frozen bloodworm for scale



















Put a layer of peat moss over the aqua soil in my rutilans tank, stuck a film canister to the glass with a suction cap, and added the heater. Essentially just waiting on the plants and fish now. 

Also re-did the cling wrap over all my tanks because it was looking a bit raggedy and I didn't want anyone getting out. 

Everyone's had dinner and have towels over their tanks (it's too stop them spooking overnight if the cats get in), and will probably do water changes tomorrow or Sunday.


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## LittleBettaFish

Filled up my coccina tank this morning and added some peat moss over the substrate. I'm going to add whatever is leftover from my rutilans plant order to the tank. I figure even if they are not going to arrive until the next shipment, this will give the tank time to mature and may mean I have to order less plants in the future. 

My rutilans tank is looking good. The peat moss has settled and the water colour is right where I want it. It's too bad I couldn't get any java moss. I'm hoping leaf litter on the bottom of the tank will suffice until I can get some. 

You can see my rutilans tank on the right. The one on the far right is my BBS. That's my new light over the tanks. It is heavy, and only a T8 but it seems to be doing a good job of lighting up my tanks. 










Today I was going to get some photos of my uberis pair as the fry have become free-swimming and last night they were looking stunning. However, they derailed my plans by deciding to spawn again this morning. I thought another spawn would be soon, but I didn't think it would be this soon! 

My sp. apiapi are continuing to look and behave normally. The original female was out today looking for food, which is always a reassuring sign. I don't know what was wrong with them, but I'm so relieved it doesn't appear to be velvet. 

Was looking through my really old journal from this section and some of the native tanks I used to run. I wish I hadn't given away the majority of the tea tree root I'd used in these tanks as it made it look so natural and it would be nice in the future if I could find space for a couple of native species. 

This was my honey blue eyes tank. 


















I also stupidly sold these guys. Now pairs are going for like the $20-40 mark. I would love a group of them again but would have to get a job first or wait until the prices came back down. They are a lovely fish and quite endangered in the wild. 










This was my spotted blue eyes tank. Unfortunately, I never got to see how it matured because I tore it down not very long after set-up.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing. These are two tanks I wish I still had up and running now. Unfortunately, my grandparents are moving out of their farm soon, which is where I got the wood and rock from, so I am trying to get up there so I can see if I can dig up some more before they leave. 

Melaleuca roots are some of the best driftwood in my opinion for aquariums, but it seems like all the good stuff is up in QLD and not found at all down here.


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## MattsBettas

You can use melaleuca in aquarium? Do you know if that provides any additional anti bacterial/viral/fungal benefits? 


As always I've been following along, just haven't said anything. Everything looks lovely, and I assure you you would have no issue offloading your hendra if I were anywhere around!


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## LittleBettaFish

Most people use branches or the root ball. 

I never had any issues with using the stuff I dug up in my tanks. But I also didn't notice that it provided any more beneficial properties than ordinary aquarium store stuff does. 

A lot of Australian people seem to use it in apistogramma set-ups as the root systems can be extraordinarily complex and it provides plenty of hiding places. I wish it was more common to find here. So hoping I can go up to my nan and pa's (their whole property is almost all tea tree) and dig up a few smaller trees/shrubs before they move and keep it in storage for when I have the space and funds for natives again.


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## William Zhong

by the way, i selling wild betta, i'm sorry for little turn out from the rules, i'm just not qualify the betta classified forum to posting my thread. thk


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## LittleBettaFish

I'm so mad this morning as it looks like after all this, I am going to have to permanently separate my rutilans green males. 

I thought they were doing better in this new set-up, but they have returned to their old ways. A couple of fish nearly have their gill flaps torn entirely off, one male has been almost scalped, and all of the smaller fish seem to be suffering from some sort of injury around the head/gill area. 

I know it's not them doing it to themselves because they are not scratching against anything. 

The plan is to use my 60cm tank, put the males into 2L soda bottles and then suction cap these to the glass. Inside I'll put moss, IALs, watersprite etc. so they feel more comfortable. Then the females will be able to swim around in the main tank. If they start fighting I will separate them out as well. I was going to find a way to put the fry in as well, as then I can fit everyone on my bottom shelf and get a heater/sponge filter back. 

They never used to be this aggressive. I used to have the whole family in a 10 gallon tank with minimal issues. It's only now the males are in the 2 years plus bracket that I am seeing such violent behaviour. It's a shame as I don't want to confine the males, but I am going to have to because someone is going to end up dead. 

Now I just need to work out how many fish I need to separate out and how many soda bottles I will need.


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## LittleBettaFish

And the bad news continues in that my pair of rutilans did not survive the shipping process. The seller is sending a replacement pair and my coccina pair with the next shipment but now I have to wait a month and stare at empty fish tanks. 

However, my uberis pair cheered me up. Fed them some mosquito larvae today and saw their fry swimming around. The male is turning into a stunning fish, but still won't sit still for photos. 




























The plants in their tank are starting to grow now they get 4-6 hours of light a day.










But still a long way to go before they are as thick as those in my hendra/brownorum tanks. 










Then this is my empty rutilans tank. This tank is going to be so ready by the time they actually do arrive that there should be no reason for them not to just get in there and spawn. 










I also saw 'Minor Disappointment' today. I actually thought the female or his older brother had killed him as he just vanished. Was glad to see this is not the case. He is a lovely fish. I think I actually prefer him over his brother. 










Mum was not happy to see him though. She always looks so 'old before her time'. I don't know why. She's starting harassing the oldest F1 female so that girl will be going to a new home in a week or two.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just looked out the window and saw my plant parcel sitting on the front doorstep! 

Opened it and took a photo to show. Wish there had been java moss available, but that's okay. I have some growing out in other tanks I can use. 










I am also purchasing some smaller java fern to go into my miniopinna, uberis, rutilans and coccina tanks. Hopefully it doesn't die on me like java fern usually does when I put it in my wild betta tanks. 

I did get a couple of photos of my miniopinna pair from Joty yesterday. It's very hard as they usually are chasing each other around and the water is so dark even with the light over the top, you can't really penetrate the gloom.









Here is the female









Here is the male telling me I should have cleaned the glass better

Going to give these new plants a rinse off (they have a few snails on them), and then add them to my rutilans and coccina tanks. Might even have some leftover for my miniopinna and uberis tanks. You can never have too many plants. Hopefully they will start to grow in nicely before the next shipment. 

The big grindal/white worm culture I put together seems to be doing fine. I think I might cover a couple of the sides as the white worms like it dark and have buried themselves into the peat moss. 

Still wanting to put together a daphnia culture at some point, and the blackworm culture has to wait until I have a bigger air pump again. 

Other than that, fish are doing well. Just hoping my whole house doesn't blow away in this wind.


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## Aquatail

I'm sorry the rutilans didn't survive shipping.  SIP


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## beautiful Betta

So sorry to hear that things haven't been going so well. I hope you get your boys sorted out. And the next pair make it through the shipping I can imagine how disappointing that must be to loose them in the shipping stage. And then the wait for the replacements.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. Things are going pretty well here, it's really only that my rutilans greens are being their usual obnoxious selves and that my rutilans died in transit that got me upset. 

Also the fact my miniopinna male from Joty decided to almost remove his female's entire caudal fin. I'm going to try and catch her today so I can give her some space and time to heal up. He is a nasty fish. I let him flare at a mirror for 5-10 minutes last night just so he could get some of his energy and aggression out. 

Did some water changes last night, fed everyone and took some photos. 

I am contemplating separating out a couple of sp. apiapi males to see whether their fins will grow if kept in isolation (I will still let them see each other as this complex seems to prefer living in groups). My killifish males always got more impressive fins when kept alone, and it will give me a chance to individually evaluate some of my older F1 males. 

I stupidly joined a rainbowfish FB group the other day and now I am firmly back on the native bandwagon. Considering picking up some blue-eyes in the next few months. There's a brackish species that inhabits mangrove swaps, that I am particularly interested in. However, I would definitely need to work out a system to keep the salinity, pH and hardness at appropriate levels. 

Most other species require only minor adjustments to the water here to be happy. 

I figure at least with natives I can go out and collect biotope appropriate material fairly easily and without needing to spend a fortune. 

Also, got some java fern sent out yesterday, so that should be arriving today. It's going to go in my miniopinna, coccina, and rutilans tanks. Any left over will be kept for my jarred rutilans green. 

I did manage to accidentally kill my really nice Fluval heater. I didn't realise the water in my aging tub had evaporated down enough that half the heater was exposed to the air. I am considering putting it in and seeing if it still works as it doesn't look damaged, but I don't want to electrocute myself. 

Anyway, enough of my ramblings, here are some photos. They are mostly of my hendra because they are just so photogenic. 









Brownorum juvenile









Original brownorum female



























Hendra F1 female. Probably will retain this female as she is quite nice. 


















Hendra male with various offspring


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## LittleBettaFish

I've decided I want to get into Australian natives again. First step in, will be a small group (they are about $10-20 per fish) of honey blue-eyes. Going to set-up a biotope style tank with Coomalie Creek hair grass, giant duckweed, lots of rock rubble, dried riparian leaves, and tea tree roots/branches. 

I'm going to build up a 'bank' out of rock, sand and ADA Amazonia as you can see in my picture below and let the hair grass grow emersed. Make it look like an actual slice of creek. Hopefully the fish might even lay their eggs amongst the hairgrass up in the shallows. 










I'm hoping I can get up to my nan and pa's, dig up a whole heap of tea tree root as well as collect a whole bucket of rocks and leaf litter, and use this in their tank. I sort of want to recreate my previous tank as my fish were very happy in there and did spawn. 

I have a list of Australian and PNG natives I want to keep alongside my wild bettas. Of course I don't have the space or funds to get them all right now, but I can hopefully slowly build up my collection over time. 

Pseudomugil tenellus
Pseudomugil gertrudae
Pseudomugil mellis
Pseudomugil ivantsoffi
Pseudomugil cyanodorsalis 

Melanotaenia exquisita (Sleisbeck NT)
Melanotaenia nigrans
Rhadinocentrus ornatus
Melanotaenia maccullochi Skull Ck
Craterocephalus stramineus

I don't particularly like the really big (over 8-9cm) rainbows, or the ones with the extremely deep bodies. Mostly my interests lay in the pseudomugil genus and with the smaller varieties of rainbows. 

A couple of these require harder water and the cyanodorsalis is brackish, so have to work out a system for water changes and maintenance before I get either of those. 

Apart from that, did some water changes on my wild tanks today. My uberis male's fins are getting bigger by the day. He has been chasing the female around who is very plump at the moment so they are probably going to spawn again. 










Then my newer miniopinna male seems to be developing a slightly spade shaped caudal. See what happens there, but he is such an aggressive fish. His poor female is always getting beaten up. I suppose at least he is a good father. 




























Had the laziest day today. Really have to get myself moving and get the house cleaned and the animals fed.


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## LittleBettaFish

Some days on this journal I feel like I am just rambling to myself. 

Anyway, been really slack these past few days and busy with other stuff so basically just thrown food at my fish and maybe had a look in here and there. 

Still got natives on my brain. I think I'm going to pick up a small group of honey blue eyes maybe this weekend or the next, and stick them into the tank I had planned on using for my rutilans. I figure it's got live plants, a filter, a heater and I might as well use it while I work on getting things together for their actual tank. 

I really don't want to get two pairs. I would rather a group of two males and three females. Preferably I would have liked three males and four females, but that's going to be all I can afford at the moment.

I also have plans for a billabong style set-up in my shallow 60cm tank. Going to put a group of delicate blue eyes in there once I have the money. Thinking lots of smaller waterlillies and plant cover with a few sticks and rocks scattered along the bottom. I think the two tanks would look awesome side-by-side. Maybe even with a couple of potted ferns or something next to them. 

In other fish news, I may be able to get a pair of Betta livida around September. Pretty stoked about that as they have been one of my 'Holy Grail' species for ages now. 

I'm thinking that will be the last addition to my wild betta collection. I've also decided that I will probably be selling off all my sp. wajok once they mature, as they have to be the most boring wilds I have ever owned. They don't do much of anything, and I rarely if ever see the adult pair. I might keep the original pair and a daughter or two, but they will not be a species I am going to focus on purposefully breeding. 

I've got another F1 hendra female I can see growing out, so going to be selling her along with two sibling males, so I can start to get rid of some of the excess males I have. Hopefully I can get around $35-40 for all three. Now just crossing my fingers another female or two emerges, as then I could sell off a few more trios. 

I still have no idea how I am going to market my F1 Betta brownorum, being that they seem to be female, a couple are deformed and none of the ones I am selling have a side spot. Probably just fish them all out, and sell them cheap to whoever wants them. 

I doubt I am ever even going to break even with wilds. Lucky I am in the hobby for the love.


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## beautiful Betta

No you are not rambling to yourself, I am always reading your updates, but I don't always have anything to particularly say that is of any real use to you. So don't like to just keep posting for the sake of saying great photo's which I always think you do have on your site. But I have said that before.;-)


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha it's okay. I know people must read it because I doubt that as much as I check up on this thread, I have viewed it 15,739 times on my own.

Since my last update, I have moved my sp. apiapi tank down onto the middle shelf of my rack, and put my sp. wajok tank on the bottom shelf next to my two rutilans green tanks. I did this partly because I wanted my sp. apiapi to get more light, but also because having them on the top shelf made it difficult to see them and to get good photos of them. 

My sp. wajok pair are pretty shy anyway so being on the bottom shelf isn't going to make much of a difference. I managed to suck up four fry from their tank while emptying it to move, and then nearly sucked up the female because she came out to see what I was up to. 

I wish more aquarium companies would produce shallow tanks. It seems like most of the aquariums that are this shape, are used for frag tanks, but I greatly prefer them over tanks that are tall and narrow. I hate any tank that is over 45cm in height and unless you have a fish that really needs all that vertical space, I think shallow tanks are so much easier to work with. I was just looking at my sp. apiapi tank and I love that fact that while it is 45cm long, it is like only 16cm high. Such a great footprint, particularly for bettas or small schooling fish. 

Hopefully I can get some photos of my sp. apiapi once they have settled down. It's been ages since I've taken anything that really shows them off at their best.


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## Aquatail

I enjoy your rambling! I don't have any wilds so it's always exciting to hear about and see yours! ^_^


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha I think that's the trouble. Not many people on this forum keep wilds. It seems like every forum dedicated to wilds is either in a foreign language or is fairly inactive, so Bettafish.com just has to get spammed with all my photos. 

My sp. apiapi group are not used to having artificial light over them again so they have been hiding unless they think I am feeding them. I managed a few quick photo of my female, but got nothing spectacular. 










Meanwhile my sp. wajok male seems to like the change. He even flared at the mirror today, something he hasn't done in quite a while. 

I put some leaf litter into my 'coccina' and 'rutilans' tanks, as you can see below. I'm not sure what to put in the rutilans tank to fill the empty space, perhaps java moss or some crypts, but for now I'm going to leave it empty as I want to put the forthcoming group of honey blue eyes in there, and I don't want them spawning and leaving eggs everywhere as then I would feel the need to use this as a grow-out. 



















The coccina tank is 30cm high, but like my miniopinna tank, it is only filled up to around the 10-12cm mark. Once the fry start getting bigger in my miniopinna tank I will be slowly raising the water level until it is equal with my other tanks. The rutilans/honey blue eye tank is a 25cm cube. 

Meanwhile I removed the spawning mop from my rutilans green grow-out. It's now been replaced with a thin layer of leaf litter and some rather scraggly java moss that came from a container outside. Hopefully I can eventually replace all the spawning mops in the main tank with a more natural looking alternative as well. 

I also want to overhaul my persephone tank. I'm thinking of lowering the water level down slightly, putting in a thick layer of leaf litter (not IAL as this breaks down so quickly), and then putting in a massive amount of hydrilla to provide more cover in the middle level of the tank. The java moss and watersprite/hornwort that are in there now already provide enough cover at the top and bottom. 

I'm hoping I can have that done by the start of August. 

Otherwise I got some photos of my uberis pair just before. The female is almost always barred up and the male is always chasing her around. It's hard to believe he was so timid. Unfortunately, the lack of surface cover, brown water, and strong light make the photos a little washed out most of the time. 

Their fry seem to be doing well though. Lots of them swimming around hunting down infusoria. 



























Fry in front of the male



















Atlas is also doing well. He just enjoys flaring at his mirror and building bubblenests. Yes, his water is as dark as that photo makes it look. I just treat him like a wild betta, minimal water changes with aged water, lots of live/frozen foods, and lots of tannins. He seems content.


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## MattsBettas

Everything looks great! I'm always here for your rambling, even if I don't say anything... Lol. Good luck with the natives, pseudomugils are some fascinating fish. 

Isn't there a pretty good wild betta forum in French? I know for sure I've used French forums before, I'm just not sure if it was for wilds. I think I've used my ability to speak minimal French more on getting fish info then in the country that has it as an official language haha.


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## LittleBettaFish

Lol yes there is a French one and I think there may be a German one too. But I can't speak or type either language, and based on how badly Chrome/Google translates their writings into English, I imagine it would be equally bad the other way around. Europeans seem to be more into the wild bettas than other countries. Most of the best information is from places like France and Germany. 

Yeah I love blue eyes. For a schooling fish they were very personable. Mine would always come over and swim around my hands, peck at my arms while I did tank maintenance. I'm so excited about having a group of honey blue eyes again. I really can't believe I was so stupid and sold mine. But I never expected them to be so difficult and expensive to replace. 

I told my dad he had to take me to my nan and pa's as their property is getting sold soon. He said he wanted to see me enrolled in a university degree. Hopefully he does take me up though. I want to get a whole bucket of rock from up there as well as dig up some tea tree root and scavenged their 300 odd acres for some nice pieces of wood off all the dead gums. 

The challenge are going to be the brackish/hard water species. I suppose I will have to set-up a water aging bucket like I have with my wilds, but have it full of crushed coral and salt.


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## Aquatail

I imagine Atlas is very happy! That fry you can see in the picture is so tiny! I also looked up some pictures of the blue eye fish you keep mentioning. There's one kind that has all these little spots on their fins. 

I hope to get a Betta mahachaiensis someday, after some of my current fish have passed on and I have a suitable tank setup for it. I remember you saying most people keep wilds for breeding, but honestly I'm not up to breeding so I'm just going to have one to devote attention to. Unless you think it'd get too lonely? Maybe I can find a poor little misfit for me to take in. Sorry, rambling about my wild dream. Seemed like the place to do it. XD


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## beautiful Betta

I have just noticed you have named your boy Atlas. That is so funny because I was thinking of calling my green sort of sick boy Atlas because it was the name or a character in a book I was reading and I thought it was fitting. How did you come by the name for your boy?


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## LittleBettaFish

There seem to be a number of not pure mahachai in this country, but that look close enough to the real deal that they get sold as such (unfortunately). Unless the seller has excess single males to get rid of, I always think it's a shame to keep a rare species of wild and not attempt to breed it. Particularly if they have been wild-caught. 

Splendens complex fish are not as gregarious as some of the other species of wilds, so keeping a male alone would be perfectly fine. 

There is a FB group devoted to wild betta keepers in Australia. You don't have to be an IBC member or anything to join, and it can put you in touch with breeders if you do ever want to take that step. 

Also the spotted fin ones are gertrudae. I've had them before and they are very popular, but honestly my favourites are the honey blue eyes/pseudomugil mellis. Unfortunately, there are not a lot of nice photos on Google of them. 

Beautiful Betta, my mum is very into naming fish using Greek/Roman deities. It's why I had a unimaculata male named Vulcan. I thought she might come up with some obscure name neither of us could pronounce properly, so I suggested Atlas as a compromise (I like simple names for pets) and so Atlas it was. 

His fins may not be perfect but his deportment is excellent. His favourite thing in the world seems to be flaring and showing off. Sometimes I forget I've left the mirror next to his tank and I'll come back 10-15 minutes later and find him still going.


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## LittleBettaFish

Was bored today so just took some photos of my various wilds. Just my hendra, brownorum, and my persephone. For fish that are so attractive in the flesh, my group of persephone take some terrible photos. I think because there are so many in the tank they are always moving around. 































































My biggest male. He is massive compared to everyone else. For some reason my young, F2 male always wants to take him on. 



























Female hendra with her daughter









Close-up of daughter









Brownorum male flaring at his mum. He never comes out any more so all the photos I got of him today are bad.



























Mum


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## Pandanke

Your fish are just beautiful! I'd never seen many wilds before, but goodness the sheen you get on some of them is amazing.


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## Aquatail

I've never bred before and I just know I'd go crazy trying to keep all the little fry alive and then I'd have a whole bunch of fish and nowhere to put them. :/ I'm hoping that someday I'll find some little misfit that maybe isn't as colorful or whose form isn't great and it can live happily at my house since it may not be such a great breeder. That's just my thought though, who knows if it'll ever happen.

That FB group sounds awesome, but I don't live in Australia.

The honey blue eyes are pretty too, I like their fins. There's just something about spotted fish that I like. Probably the spots.  If there aren't a lot of nice pictures I suppose it's up to you to show the world their beauty. No pressure, haha.


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## LittleBettaFish

Lol sorry, for some reason I thought you were in Oz. I have no idea why. There is the IBC SMP FB group if you ever are interested in pursuing wilds. 

Thanks Pandanke. That is one of the main reasons I take so many photos. A lot of people think wild bettas are like the ugly cousins of splendens, when this is just not true. 

I'm hoping to get some gertrudae before the end of the year. I have a billabong style set-up planned for them. Lots of Australian native plants submersed and emersed. Hopefully I can get a self-sustaining colony going. That is the key with blue eyes. They are only short-lived and really only breed during the first year of life, so you have to have them constantly producing eggs and fry.


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## Aquatail

Haha, no, I live in the US. Maybe I'll visit someday though. What is SMP?


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## LittleBettaFish

It stands for Species Maintenance Program. 

Going to work on my sales pitch today for getting mum to drive me to one of the two fish stores I believe have honey blue eyes for sale. Have to email the owner of one to see how much he is selling them for and whether he has more than two males in stock. His store also sells ADA products so I might also pick up a bag of aquasoil while I am there. 

Something neat I noticed from this morning, is that the Limnophila brownii/Darwin River Ambulia I recently put into my miniopinna tank, is starting to grow emersed. I'd left it floating at the surface because I know ambulia can get scraggly without enough light and it's already grown a couple of centimetres out of the water in its emersed form. 

This is why I like leaving the water level in my tanks low. I get to see some cool emersed growth. In one tank, several leaves of the java fern are now completely out of the water. Although I find java fern does really well emersed. I have a jar with some mini java fern in it, and it is thriving. 

Here are just some quick snaps of my hendra, brownorum, and sp. apiapi tanks. 




























My wilds love their tanks. Try as I might, I can never get any of my current tanks to look as overgrown. Lately, I seem to have real trouble with java fern. Whenever I introduce new java fern into a tank, it seems to get this 'disease' (based on what I have read it is possibly linked to CO2 levels) and very quickly rot away. And when I say quickly, I mean literally overnight in some cases. It's a shame as I love java fern, and it is a lot cheaper to purchase than similar plants such as bolbitis and anubias. 

I've already chucked out at least half the new java fern I got recently. In one tank it is fine, and in the other I am struggling to keep the 'disease' contained. It seems as soon as I remove an infected leaf, two more appear. The only way to stop the spread seems to be to make it completely emersed. That's why my mini java fern is now in a jar. 

I thought perhaps I might try this CO2 product I have (similar to Seachem Excel) and see if that doesn't stop it.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just looked in and discovered my original pair of hendra wrapping in the film canister, and my dominant F1 brownorum male and his mother also spawning in the tank over. 

Of course, neither pair gave me any decent photos of the actual act. Which is a shame, because they look so stunning in breeding dress.

This was the one photo I managed of the female while she was out chasing away curious/predatory sub-adults/juveniles from the nest. 










Then some poor photos of my brownorum pair.





































Then just a photo of my original sp. apiapi female and one of her sub-adult sons.


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## LittleBettaFish

Hendra male has eggs, brownorum male has eggs, and uberis male is trying very hard to get some eggs. 

You can see the hendra eggs just poking out of the film canister here.










My miniopinna pair and some of their older offspring, were also hanging around waiting to be fed, so I thought I'd take a few photos. They are much more photogenic than my other miniopinna pair. My poor female from my Joty pair has had half her caudal fin bitten off by the male. However, their fry are growing nicely. 


















Juvenile




























I may be going to the fish store in the city tomorrow if they still have the pairs of honey blue eyes available. Just wish they weren't so expensive so I could get more than a couple of pairs. Also hope I don't go there and they are really big/old fish. I want fish I am going to be able to breed from. 

Otherwise, not much else has been going on since my last post. Just about to do some water changes.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my uberis pair are in the middle of making some fry. I snapped a few photos, mostly of the female, but I don't like disturbing them too much while they are spawning. 

They already have plenty of fry from their previous two spawns swimming around. Their tank has maybe 12-13L of water in it, so I'm thinking I'm going to have to raise the water level. 

Looks like between my uberis, miniopinna, sp. wajok and rutilans green fry, I am going to have to get my BBS hatchery going again. 









In this photo, her behaviour and appearance tell me she is ready to spawn.









Stunned in this photo









Also in this photo









Waiting for the male to return



























Wrapping









Looking for eggs









Male making sure no other fish are in the nearby area


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## LittleBettaFish

Nothing much to update on my wilds. Sort of bored with my bettas at the moment so really haven't been doing much with them. 

I did however, go up to my nan and pa's farm today. It was sad because they are moving out at the end of the month and they have owned this place since I was a baby. It is so absolutely beautiful, on a clear day you can see all the way out to the bay. It's probably my last time ever there, so I really wanted to make it count. 

The lyrebirds were putting on such a performance while I was out walking around; I sort of wish I'd had more time to appreciate everything. 

As it was, I dug out a whole heap of tea tree root, and loaded up a bucket with rocks to use in my forthcoming blue eyes tanks. I figure at least this way I will have a little part of their farm for the years to come. 

This is some of the tea tree root I took home. There are a couple of bigger pieces that aren't in the photo that are still partially alive, so I will wait until they brown off and dry out before I use them in my tanks. 



















This is my bucket of rocks. I got all different sizes and some similar coloured scree. I always think having smaller rocks surrounding larger rocks always looks a bit more natural. 










My grandfather is a screen printer so he has a studio up on the farm and around 60 odd paintings/prints hanging in the house (they are all packed up now). 

There's a painting that used to hang in their spare bedroom dedicated to 'The baby who hasn't arrived - yet!!', which was actually me. It's now hanging on the wall in my bedroom here at home, as they have given it to me. Here it is below. It's not going to make me rich any time soon, but it has a lot of sentimental value for me and hopefully it is still hanging on my wall in another 24 years. Sorry for the pathetic photo, I can't get around my rack to get a photo straight on. 










So now I have my wood and rocks, I'm going to start getting a couple of tanks set-up for some blue eyes.


----------



## beautiful Betta

All looking good, what happens to the eggs when he squeezes them out? do they float or do they sink? does the male literally collect them from the floor?


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## LittleBettaFish

Do you mean with my uberis? 

The eggs fall into the leaf litter/moss/plants and then the male and female go through and collect them. 

I figure, these are similar sorts of conditions to what they would spawn under out in the wild. 

Trying out some arrangments for my shallow 'billabong' tank. It's going to hopefully hold a breeding group of pseudomugil gertrudae/spotted blue eyes. Found a really useful info sheet regarding their habitat and the type of vegetation that would be found in and around these sorts of areas so hopefully I can get something that looks relatively natural running.


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## beautiful Betta

Yes I was talking about the pair in the photo's. I was surprised the female collected them too, I thought that was it job done for the girl once the eggs have been released.


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## blueridge

Can't wait to see your spotted blue eyes!


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## LittleBettaFish

No the females will often help with egg collection. In tanks where I have multiple fish, the female will also chase away any intruding fish after she's come around from being stunned. 

I probably won't have the gertrudae for a little while. Unless the store I want to get my honey blue eyes from don't have any more in stock. 

I'm thinking 2-3 pairs of gertrudae would be nice. I like having multiple males with the blue eyes as they put on such a show when they are sparring. 

http://www.aquagreen.com.au/plant_data/Nymphoides_spongiosa.html

http://www.aquagreen.com.au/plant_data/Limnophila_fragrans.html

http://www.aquagreen.com.au/plant_data/Azolla_pinnata.html

These are the sort of plants I'm looking at getting for my billabong tank. I'm going to be laying down a base of ADA Amazonia under the sand/rock substrate so hopefully that will allow me to keep the more demanding plants healthy. 

I'm really excited about this project. I love my wilds, but they are all very much the same in behaviour, appearance, reproductive methods etc. that I want to try my hand at something different. 

I did feel slightly insane when I was in the laundry yesterday scrubbing rocks. Hopefully my neighbours weren't watching! 

In other news, my uberis and sp. wajok tanks are both infected by ich. The weather has been sort of weird here lately so I'm wondering if that has something to do with it, even though I have heaters in all my tanks. None of the fish are distressed even though it's quite a bad infection in the uberis tank. I'm just going to turn up the heaters and hopefully after a couple of weeks of high temperatures, I can get rid of it. 

I also got the news that my Betta coccina pair are going to have to come on the August shipment as they did not arrive at the seller's place in time to come on the July shipment. My replacement rutilans pair are being sent though, so hopefully they make it to me alive this time. Otherwise I think I will just get my import fees refunded and use it on some natives. 

There is a 'fish fair' on the 20th not that far to me. I have arranged to go with a fellow hobbyist (since I don't drive). Unless someone has honey blue eyes or ivantsoffi for sale, I'm probably just going to be browsing. 

Otherwise not much else to report. Did some water changes yesterday, organised the sideboard I put all my fish stuff on, and moved Atlas up onto the top shelf of my rack. Haven't had my camera out in a while to take fish photos, so might charge it up today.


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## LittleBettaFish

It's so frustrating, I just cannot find my thermometer to check the temperatures on my uberis and sp. wajok tank. I'm hoping until I can get to the store to get a replacement, that the water is indeed hot enough to eradicate the ich. 

Took a photo of my original brownorum female. She is looking nicer than usual, possibly because the male keeps flirting with her and trying to encourage her into the film canister. 



















Lumpy Head and One Ventral were out mocking me. One Ventral is very personable, and is big enough now I couldn't really cull her without feeling like a murderer. Their other ugly sister Half-Caudal was out and about yesterday. I don't know what was with the genetics of this pair, but it's certainly the most deformities I've gotten out of one of my wild betta spawns. 

I also took some photos of my rutilans green F2 fry. Every day they seem to be getting bigger, and there is much more of the red coming through the fins now. 














































At this rate I am going to have to look for a bigger grow-out. 

Sad news was that I found a dead F1 rutilans green in the main tank, and another that has been very badly beaten. The beaten one will be going temporarily into a breeder net, and I'm going to try and separate out the remaining males this weekend. The aggression had sort of settled down, but looks like there has been a flare-up, and here I was thinking the 'mouthbrooders' were supposed to be the more docile ones! 

Finally, took this picture of my (hopefully alive this time) rutilans tank. The sun comes through the window and lights up all the tanks on this smaller rack. My hydrilla and limnophila are going crazy. For now though, I'm going to put in a couple of small pieces of tea tree root, and use it as a holding tank for any blue eyes I get in the next week or so. There's all this infusoria, planaria, and what I think are copepods in there so I figure the blue eyes are going to enjoy hunting them all down. It's amazing how much life there can be in an empty tank, particularly when you start adding things like leaf litter, peat moss and live plants.


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## beautiful Betta

Sorry to hear about your Rutilan, fingers crossed for the other one making a good recovery.

Good luck with the blue eyes when you get them.


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## LittleBettaFish

Went to the fish fair/table sale today. First table I headed for was the ANGFA one that was chock full of natives. I wish I'd had more money as they had some lovely books I wanted to purchase (I've always wanted a fish room with a whole library as I love books even if the info etc. is outdated), but instead I settled on a bag of four honey blue eyes, and four rhadinocentrus ornate from Tin Can Bay. 

There were several more species I wanted, but being broke does have its advantages as I would not have had the space for them all. 

I also purchased a glass thermometer to check my uberis and sp. wajok water temperatures. Of course as soon as I come home I found the other one in my wardrobe. At least now I can safely turn up the heat without being afraid I'm going to boil anyone, and hopefully eradicate the ich fairly quickly. 

Here is a photo of my rutilans/temporary honey blue eyes tank.










I think this biggest one (they are only around the 2-2.5cm mark) is possibly a female, as one of the smaller males seems to be showing some interest in her. 










The rhads are much more skittish and have banged up their mouths from running into the bag sides and tank walls so I am going to wait until they settle down before I take any photos. 

I'm hoping I at least have one female from each group as these are both species I would love to breed.


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## blueridge

They look great. I have a random question for you, would it be ok to put snails in with wilds or do you think they would find them as a snack?


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## LittleBettaFish

What sort of snails are you talking? None of my wilds have ever shown any interest in the pond snails in their tanks. Not sure how a mystery snail would fare though as they are big enough to attract attention, and some wilds can be nastier or simply more curious than others. 

My new fish were settling in well when I finally went to bed last night. I definitely have one male in my blue eyes group as he was sparring with another one and chasing the group around. I could also see the black outline on the fins coming through. 

My rhads were also a lot more settled and were swimming around exploring and I think I spotted the biggest flaring at one of the others. 

Someone on this rainbowfish FB group said my water looked like pee (except the less family friendly word for pee). I am so used to tannins with my wilds I forgot a lot of fish keepers hate them.


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## blueridge

I was thinking of mystery snails or maybe assassin snails?, but I would give pond snails a try. Thanks!


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha you mean you actually have a tank that doesn't have any pond snails in it? Somehow the pond snails can survive my really soft and acidic water. I had big problems with them in one tank where they came in with some plants. 

I have always found bettas to be pickers. If they are curious about something they may try to bite it, and mystery snails are such big, slow-moving targets. 

Also depending on the species, you may run into issues with the shell of a mystery snail. A lot of wilds like their water soft, and I know some snails can have issues with this. 

Looks like I may have gotten four male honey blue eyes. I can see the darker outline coming in on the fins on two of the smaller ones, and the biggest one I have the photo of is sparring with the males now even though its fins are not as dark. The final one, I am not 100% certain on. It's a bit more passive and I can't really tell whether its fins are showing the black outline or not. 

So at this point, it looks like I am going to have to source another couple of females. Unfortunately the store that is selling them at $40 a pair usually wants to sell them as a male/female pair, and not two of the same gender which is frustrating. 

I put another piece of wood in their tank to give them some more cover and so far they seem content. They are still glass surfing a bit, but I find schooling fish take longer than bettas and other sort of predatory fish to settle into a new environment. 










I think I did get a female rhad though, as the two biggest individuals were flaring at 'her' and each other and displaying a prominent orange/yellow stripe down their backs. I tried to get some photos as they looked good putting on a display, but sadly they move too fast and hate the camera. These were the best photos I could get at the moment and they are not flattering...at all.


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## blueridge

Haha all of my tanks don't have pond snails, even with the live plants that I have gotten. I'm just lucky I guess? Sorry to hear about you having all males. Hopefully you will be able to find someone who will be willing to sale you females without the complication of just getting a pair.


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## MattsBettas

LBF, I have another ocellata question. Around what size should I be able to start sexing them? Any tips for when they're young? 

Oh, and how are your natives settling in? They look great in the photos!


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## LittleBettaFish

I don't really remember at what size/age I started sexing my unimaculata. It's been so long now since I've had any around. 

I usually just went by the blue scaling on the head. My unimaculata females had no scaling, whereas even at quite a small size, my juvenile males would start to show much heavier blue scaling around the head/face area. Not sure if this is the same with the ocellata. 

My natives are going well. My rhads are very shy. However, I have their new tank set-up, which should be ready for them in a couple of days (just waiting for the water to warm up and the pH to drop). It mimics the sort of environment they are found in, in the wild, and as there are less hiding places than their current tanks, I'm trying to force them out into the open. 

I picked up a bigger pair of honey blue eyes from an aquarium in the city and the group is all doing well. It's nice to be able to introduce a new pair into a tank and not have the current residents attack them. The new male was trying desperately to spawn with one of the females, so hopefully I might see some fry from them. 

My rutilans pair was DOA in Bangkok so I am going to ask for the $44 import fee back from them and put it towards more natives. 

I'm going to put in a big native plant order next week from Aquagreen, and possibly looking at a pair or trio of spotted blue eyes (if he has any to spare) or maybe some Melanotaenia maccullochi Burtons Ck. 

I still need to order some ADA Amazonia, but it seems like the two cheapest stockists are out. I could order the powder but it is like $20 more. 

I thought my uberis male was dead, but luckily I saw him today and gave him a quick feed. Both him and his female are still very sick, so I am going to set-up a proper hospital tank for them both today. 

Other than that, nothing much has been happening with my fish. I've been in sort of a fish slump at the moment so trying to muster up some enthusiasm with my natives.


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## MattsBettas

How much would two 9l bags of Ada soil fill? I have no clue haha... Relying on your judgement.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my hendra and my sp. apiapi pairs both spawned recently and that's about the only good news I have for my wild bettas. Right now my only healthy betta tanks are sp. apiapi, brownorum, hendra, both miniopinna, rutilans green adults, and my persephone. My uberis are still in a bad way, and at this point I am thinking it is velvet not ich. 

However, my rhads are in their new biotope style tank, and they are so much happier. They are getting a lot bolder with me and yesterday when the sunlight hit their tank, the two dominant males were absolutely stunning. 

Even better, was when I was looking into their still filled, but now unheated, old tank, I found two fry swimming around. Never mind that the outside temperature here has been down to the minuses, and overnight in our house has been absolutely freezing. Apparently rhads can survive in temperatures as low as 8 degrees, which probably helped. 

I also found a small number of eggs, so I removed these and put them in the container as well. I wasn't sure if they would hatch, but at this point in time I have six fry, with more eggs still to hatch. They seemed to like spawning in the native ambulia, so put some of that in their new tank. 

My honey blue eyes are doing great. I need to get their proper tank set-up, as it's too hard to see if there are any eggs or fry in the tank they are in now. 

I also should have four Burtons Creek Melanotaenia maccullochi on their way to me today, along with some azolla and limnophila fragrans. The macs will be going in with the rhads until I have the funds to get a tank set-up specifically for them. 

My camera ran out of batteries yesterday, so going to charge it up and take some photos today.


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## LittleBettaFish

Okay this is going to be a really whiny post. 

Last night I really questioned whether I still want to be in this hobby. I cannot seem to keep fish healthy long-term no matter what I do. I've tried being more hands-on, tried being more hands-off, done regular water changes, done less regular water changes, used only tap water, used only aged water, disinfected equipment between tanks, and kept each species basically in lifetime quarantine, and I still just cannot seem to get more than six months of actual enjoyment before my fish start to get sick. 

I spent about four hours last night catching and moving my uberis, my rutilans green fry, and my sp. wajok group into hospital tanks. They are all getting a two week blackout and treatment with Seachem Cupramine as I suspect it is most likely my old friend velvet that they all have. Don't know how or why they got it. Just hope it doesn't spread to any other tanks as I think that would about finish me. 

Even worse was I got really frustrated and threw one of my buckets at my bedroom door. I didn't realise there must have still been a sp. wajok fry stuck to the bucket when I threw it, and I accidentally killed it. Really put a bit of a dampener on the rest of the evening. 

I've still got my coccina and rutilans pair coming next month but at this point in time I am so close to just telling the seller to keep the purchase money and sell them to someone else. I don't know if I can face bringing home more fish only to have them eventually get sick. 

It also looks like my rhad fry have died as I cannot see them at the surface where they usually are. By now I'm really feeling like a great fish keeper. 

I did get six new rainbows the other day who are now sharing a tank with my rhads (I figure quarantine doesn't seem to stop my fish from getting sick so I might as well not bother), and they are settling in well. This is the tank they are in. The tea tree root on the right was just put in to give them a few more hiding places. I'm going to take it out eventually or find a better place for it. I also don't want the water that dark, but only had water from my aging bucket to use. 










I really don't know what direction to go with my fish. I wish I had a time machine to go back several years. I doubt I would have ever gotten into bettas if I knew that I was going to face this many obstacles. Right now I'm considering just selling off as many of my F1 wilds as I can, and getting back into killifish. I'm too attached to most of my older breeding pairs and groups to sell them, but I want to get rid of as many bettas as I can and take the time to sit down and work out what I really want out of this hobby as at the moment it's basically a money-pit that is giving me very little back.


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## Aquatail

I'm sorry you're having so many problems with your fish. Maybe having several of them in one tank is making them more susceptible to disease? They do spar and get into small fights sometimes don't they? It seems like it might be similar to sororities, where stress from altercations could weaken their system? That's just a thought from someone who has never kept wilds though, so maybe it's different.


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## Hallyx

I never use "smilies." But, sometimes, there just are no words:BIGsad:


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## LittleBettaFish

I would think that, if it wasn't tanks with fry/younger juveniles in it that seem the most affected. My adult group tanks and breeding pairs that do not have fry present seem to be the least likely affected (excluding my rutilans green group but they haven't been sick again since I finally got rid of the last active velvet infection they had). 

My persephone males spar almost constantly and yet I have not seen any disease in them since they were very young. My previous brownorum and burdigala groups/pairs have been the same. 

It's just so sporadic. I am pretty exact with the care and diet of my fish, and so I don't understand why some tanks become infected, while others don't, no matter the stocking or aggression levels. 

Also, a lot of breeders and hobbyists keep their coccina complex wilds like I do and never have any issues. I seem to be quite successful with breeding species other people have difficulties with, but then I also seem to run into a lot more problems than most wild betta keepers I know. 

It's just like UGH!!!! This hobby is so, so expensive in Australia. Particularly the cost of importing the wild bettas which can easily run close to $100 for a pair. If I had a job again it would not be so bad, but it is a lot of money to be replacing fish, purchasing medications, additional equipment etc. on a regular basis. 

I love this hobby, but God it can be so trying. 

The only fish I don't have any issues with are the three goldfish downstairs, and they are about as fun as watching grass grow.


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## beautiful Betta

Sorry to hear how you are feeling.

I am I right in thinking none of your tanks have any filters, and that you filter through all your plant life and set up. Just wondering if you could be getting water parameters spiking at times causing the stress, that's all I can think of. Probably totally wrong.

try and keep your chin up.


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## MattsBettas

I'm so sorry to hear about this. I really am. I don't really know what to say, though, besides that I really hope this is just another "down" in a hobby of ups and downs. You do everything right- it's bizarre that you experience the issues you do. 

beautiful Betta, as far as I know her tanks are filtered with sponge filters (though the biofilter would be all but gone at her pH), and the plants will also take care of it (healthy fast growing plants actually do a better job than biofilters). That, and even if she was experiencing spikes the extremely low pH would convert a ton of the ammonia into (far less harmful) ammonium. I think parameter spikes are extremely unlikely for more than just those reasons, I really think it's just awful luck. 

I second Hallyx. :BIGsad:


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## beautiful Betta

I hear you Matt, I did think it was unlikely just trying to think of possible reasons, although I think in this hobby like you say sometimes there are no reasons, just rotten luck.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah I have a whole surface full of duckweed, hydrilla, hornwort, and watersprite that is all actively growing, and I've found my wilds really don't have much of a bioload. Any time I've done an ammonia test I've never registered any ammonia. Plus since the pH is so low as Matt said, most of it would be ammonium. I also do water changes with aged water which also has a pH under 7 so there is never a time the pH would fluctuate and the ammonium become more toxic. 

At least the infection in my sp. wajok group and rutilans green fry isn't too bad. I'm hoping a couple weeks of treatment will knock it on its head. They are still eating and swimming around normally. In fact if I was not so paranoid and didn't have such a bright torch, I probably would not have noticed anything was wrong. 

I've been watching videos of fish room set-ups on Youtube for half of today, and it's really got me thinking about how I do things and how I could do things in the future.


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## beautiful Betta

That's good that you have some thoughts on how you can change things around to improve things for you.


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## Tony2632

I really hope it gets better for you. You have such an amazing looking tank and fish. 
I'm pretty much getting out of the betta faze. I lost interest after my sorority fell, but I still love the species. I'm staying in the aquarium hobby, mainly planted tanks and in the future coral reef tanks. I hate to see such a experience and knowledgeable hobbyist go.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well all my sick fish are officially in hospital for two weeks now. I wanted to give my sp. wajok and rutilans green fry some time to acclimate to their new tanks before I added the Cupramine as they were not in as bad a way as my uberis pair. Hopefully in two weeks time when I take the towels off, everyone is alive and well. 

I picked up some blackworms from the fish store on Sunday, so the rest of my fish are happy. I hate having to rely on such a worm heavy diet over the colder months. I've been gutloading my grindals and white worms on NLS pellets, but I really want to find a daphnia starter culture once I have cleared some space, as I just can't get high enough numbers of mosquito larvae over winter to feed everyone. 

Still no sign of my rhad fry, so I think they died. I think I need a paramecium culture or something as they are quite small and microworms are useless as the fry hang around the surface to feed. 

Selling off all my F1 miniopinna juveniles from my Hermanus pair. Their parents are already sold, just haven't been picked up, so hopefully I can get that tank emptied. I'm also hoping to sell however many pairs of F1 hendra I have, as well as any excess males. Then after that, will be my F1 brownorum once I do a headcount. I'll definitely be keeping my only two males, the original female, and perhaps one of the nicer daughters. Oddly, it's been the youngest male who has matured the nicest. He is a lovely rich red, darker than his brother. He would look very much like his father if he didn't have slightly shorter fins. Unfortunately, he never comes out for photos as his mother and older brother are bullies. Be interesting to see how he matures as he still has time to develop his finnage. 



















I've been a bit neglectful of maintenance on my tanks since I've been in my fish slump, but I got my 20L bucket filled up with water and rooibos last night and am going to be doing all my water changes tomorrow. I think I just have to get back into the swing of things. 

Meanwhile, the one fish who has been absolutely thriving, is my one fancy splendens, Atlas. His water is so dark, and his tank is just full of leaves and random plants I've chucked in. He has two huge bubblenests going, and I can leave a mirror by the side of his tank for half a day, come back, and he will still be racing around defending his territory. He's not at all beautiful, and he takes up a lot of space on my rack, but at least he seems happy.


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## LittleBettaFish

Took some photos this morning of my rainbowfish/rhad tank. It's very difficult getting photos of skittish, fast-moving, schooling fish, but they are getting more accustomed to my presence so hopefully in the future it will be easier. 

Because they are the friendliest (and the prettiest), I decided to focus more on the rhads, particularly my dominant male. Now they have coloured up, I believe they are the Searys Creek locality, but I'm not 100% sure. I actually am more a fan of the rhads than I am of the rainbows. Not sure how many localities are kicking around though down here, and shipping is such an added expense. 




































He is blurry, but this is my smallest rhad male. 

I have also made some changes to their tank. I added some hydrilla and native ambulia to the surface. I also don't want the water as dark, but other than that, I think it will be a perfect home for my rhads. Not sure what I am doing with the six other rainbows in with them. For now, they will just stay in there. 










In other news, I found two honey blue eyes fry in their tank when I went to do a water change. They are still in their temporary 25cm cube, so I'm hoping in the next couple of weeks when I have some more money from my fish sales, to move them into bigger accommodations. 

Bad news is that I found one of my rutilans green adults suffering from dropsy so I am going to have to euthanise him today. They are my oldest fish and have suffered through a lot, so I'm not particularly surprised when I lose the odd one or two. 

I have officially sold off a hendra pair and the miniopinna F1. I think I found another female or two in my hendra tank, so would like to get them sold as well. The first thing I am going to do once I have that money, is purchase a 6 outlet air pump again. I can't stand using multiple small ones. That way I can hook up all my sponge filters again, although this time I'm going to purchase check valves so I don't rust out my air pump. 

I checked on my uberis pair in the hospital tank yesterday. The male was still alive, and I couldn't see the female floating or anything. I put some blackworms in for them, and then put the towel back down. I'm going to check on my rutilans green and sp. wajok this morning. Hopefully no one has died in either of those tanks.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well it hasn't been long and I am already bored of the rainbows/rhads :tongue:. I remember now why I sold them all in the past. I actually put the honey blue eyes in with the rest of my rainbows yesterday, as I hoped it might make them less shy. I guess I really do prefer fish with more personality. 

I should not impulse buy while I am in a fish slump. I always end up making purchases I regret. I'm probably going to sell the Burton Creek rainbows later on, not sure about the rhads, but will be keeping the honey blue eyes. This is how the tank currently sits. You think that they would be more than comfortable given the amount of fish in the tank, and the amount of cover provided, but they are worse than my wilds. There's over a dozen fish in there and as soon as they see me, all but the honey blue eyes hide. 










My wilds are doing okay. I have been checking on my sp. wajok, rutilans green fry, and uberis pair daily. I saw one rutilans green fry with dropsy, but the others are looking good. The sp. wajok are also looking nice and healthy. I can't see any dead fry on the bottom of the tank, and the adult pair are still alive, so that at least looks promising for a successful treatment. 

Once the treatment is finished and if there is no further sign of parasites, I'm going to sell the adult sp. wajok pair, and raise the rutilans green and sp. wajok fry together until they are at sub-adult size. Then the rutilans green will be staying and probably all but one F1 pair of sp. wajok (if I get any females that is) will be sold. 

My uberis pair seem to be a bit happier. They are moving around in their tub, and I saw the male flaring at the female today. The only difficulty with the plastic is I cannot see whether the velvet is worsening or not. Also, I noticed that they both have been swimming in that sort of 'sinking' fashion, fish with swim bladder problems do. I'm hoping it's just because of stress and not permanent. I thought I saw the female swimming normally today, but every time I take the towel off, they panic. 

All three species still have about another week of darkness and heat/Cupramine treatment, so I will evaluate everyone's health properly then. My rutilans green adults looked terrible when they came out of their final treatment, so you can't really get a good indication of where they are at while they are still in the hospital tanks.

My other wilds are doing fine. It seems like the weather may start to warm up towards the end of the week so I am contemplating setting up the dog wading pond in early preparation for spring. There is still a surprising number of mosquito larvae in my outside tubs, just not enough to feed all the fish I have. 

I took this photo of my original sp. apiapi female today. I will have had her and her male, a year this October. I can still immediately pick her out of the tank, as she is the friendliest fish in it. The F1 males from this pair are stunning, just not photogenic. 










I also got a photo of my miniopinna female from Joty. She is one half of the pair that will be staying here with me. She's been very cheeky with the male lately. He has mellowed a lot since the fry started getting bigger. At least it has allowed her caudal to grow back. 










I tried taking photos of some more of my fish but of course no one would oblige. 

I believe my coccina and rutilans pairs are arriving in Australia this month. I'm half expecting the worst, considering what's happened in the past. All I can say is that for anyone who wants to purchase wilds, Joty is great to deal with. He really gives his customers 110%, and has one of the biggest ranges of wild-caught bettas. Also the quality of his stock is just superb. 

https://www.facebook.com/JotyabettaGallery

Now I have to get some aqua soil and look possibly into getting some plants or 'borrowing' some from my other tanks. I am really excited about the coccina. They are one of my favourite species from this complex. I think I will cry if anyone dies this time during shipping. 

The pick-up of my hendra/miniopinna has been delayed another week. I feel like a traitor every time I feed my miniopinna group as they will all be gone soon. Unfortunately, no one has room to keep them all. I just hope their new owner treats them well. 

I really need to organise my rack better. I've been watching Youtube videos, visiting various forums, and trawling through Google images for the 'perfect' fish room design. At the moment I'm thinking of installing a couple of large tanks at the top of each rack, and plumbing these so that I can automatically top up my tanks without needing to rely on buckets. This will cut down on the risk of cross-contamination, and make things easier if I get more fish. I also was looking at hang-on siphons for each tank, so once again I am not needing to get my hands wet and risk the chance of spreading something from one tank to another. 

I certainly would like a proper fry grow-out system and somewhere to separate out sale fish, but I just don't have the room. The best I can hope for is that our dog Eos is sterile and mum's plans for a puppy room downstairs are dashed.


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## LittleBettaFish

This has nothing to do with my fish, but is a rant based on an issue that has been bugging me for a while. It cropped up again recently, and so I thought I would discuss it here. 

What I really hate in the wild betta hobby, is the selling of 'pure' splendens complex fish that are quite obviously hybrids.

It seems to happen quite a bit here in Australia and I don't think the sellers of such fish really understand how much damage they can do to the quality and purity of splendens complex stock in this country. 

For example, I know an individual who owns pure (or as pure as one can probably find) splendens complex fish. All it takes is someone to get their hands on F1 offspring of these fish, and unknowingly cross them with hybridised stock (sadly many hobbyists don't seem to understand the importance of maintaining not just species, but also locality purity with wild-caught fish), and the purity of that line is now diluted. 

Sadly it seems like some sellers/breeders seem to take it as a personal attack when you point out their stock may not be as pure as they think. But it's bigger than that. The sale of hybrid stock as pure, is a crying shame for the wild betta hobby in Australia and other countries.

People have been called out about it, but it certainly is something that gets swept under the rug more than it should. I have certainly lost a lot of respect for a couple breeders/sellers here who have had it pointed out to them and have not addressed the issue. 

This brings to mind another issue, the seeming lack of interest in providing each wild-caught betta with not only a correct species name, but also a correct collection/locality name. 

There are already so many 'aquarium strain' wilds out there because often they are sold with no locality attached, or at best, only a very vague one. In isolated populations of the same species, there may be quite a marked difference in appearance, and it's important that these differences are preserved by not interbreeding two different populations. 

None of my fish would ever able to be used in a 'true' captive breeding program because none of them have localities attached. People think they are doing a great thing by just breeding these fish in captivity. But it needs to be more than that. I will use the Sibu and Matang populations of Betta brownorum as an example. One is known for having a very large lateral blotch, while the other is not. They should be kept and bred as separate strains, and yet I am sure that out there in some hobbyist's tank, mixed bloodline fish are breeding. 

It's a shame, and not really something I can see changing any time soon. It can however, make species identification of captive bred stock a lot harder as if there is crossing of bloodlines you may end up with offspring that doesn't resemble stock from a particular locality. 

Also, drew up a plan for my two racks. Now I just have to hope a large pile of cash lands on my lap so that I can execute it.


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## Tony2632

That is some good info. I'm interested in wild bettas, but I know nothing about them. Reason a few months back I didn't pick up any. I feel bad, I'm cross breeding male endlers with female guppies. I'm not selling my fish or labeling them a different name. I do have 3 female Endlers and would like to breed and keep the fry pure. 

Correct if I'm wrong, aren't wild bettas endanger? ?


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## LittleBettaFish

I believe unless your endlers are certified as being pure or 'Class N', it doesn't really matter that much if you hybridise them with guppies or not. I think they actually have to be traceable all the way back to whatever country it is they come from naturally to be considered as Class N. Otherwise they are just Class P and Class K. 

But I have only basic knowledge on livebearers so I am not 100% on what is condoned and what is not. 

Many wild bettas are severely endangered in the wild due to massive scale habitat loss. This is particularly the case for those species that come from peat swamp habitat. Splendens complex wilds have the added threat of hybridisation with released domestic stock ruining the purity of their species. 

I find it sad that there may be species of wild betta that have already been lost before they have been discovered.


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## Tony2632

From what I know I got them from a registered N class breeder. Since you can't find them in the wild anymore. 

You know any where I can read up on wild bettas? I'm really bored and I could read something interesting.


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## LittleBettaFish

SeriouslyFish has a lot of species profiles, otherwise there is the IBC SMP (species maintenance program) FB page. 

Unfortunately, I have found the best information is written in either Indonesian/Thai/Malaysian, or French/German. Which is great if you can read/write any of those languages, otherwise Google translate can help, although it does tend to mangle words up a bit so some of the meaning is lost. 

Just found a whole heap of very small mosquito larvae in one of my tubs outside, so got to enjoy watching some of my miniopinna fry hunting them down. It's amazing the size of the food they will tackle. I suppose in the wild they would be attempting to eat anything they could. 

I have noticed fry pop up from time to time with what looks to be broken/dislocated jaws and the mouth stays open. Since they inevitably seem to slowly starve to death I just euthanise them when I notice them, but I do wonder if it is the result of taking on oversized prey like blackworms that thrash quite a bit.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well yesterday I ordered 9L of ADA Amazonia, two small sponge filters, 10 metres of airline tubing, and a 25 packet of small IAL. I have to get my coccina and rutilans tanks set-up. I've decided to use 45cm/10 gallon tanks rather than my 30cm cubes to give any young fish produced by these pairs more space. My cubes do have the tendency to get rather crowded. 

It seems that my biggest F1 brownorum male has been usurped by his smaller brother. The biggest male now spends all his time hiding, while the smaller male has a nest of eggs and has obviously paired up with the mother. 

My sp. apiapi male also has a nest of eggs, and yesterday afternoon, I saw a pair of rutilans green wrapping in the main tank. 

I also spotted a very small F1 miniopinna in the tank housing my Hermanus pair this morning. I'm thinking I might put it in a breeder box and hang it off the side of my Joty miniopinna tank when its siblings and parents are sold, as it is much too small to go to a new home. There's also one or two of its siblings, that will be staying back for the same reason. 

I've also worked out the order for my two racks. I just need to move the persephone into a 2ft tank, and then their 3ft will be divided into thirds and used to house older juveniles/sub-adults. This is so my main breeding tanks don't get overcrowded and I don't have all my eggs in one basket. Ideally when I get another 1.5m rack, I would have two or three of these tanks going at once. 

It's been slightly warmer here, so I'm going to seal the extra shelf I have for my rack, and swap it out for the top one on my shelf when I break down my persephone tank. The top shelf is very water damaged in places, and I'm afraid it will collapse. 

So far it seems like my rutilans green and sp. wajok fry are recovering nicely. I can't see any obvious signs of parasites at present and there doesn't seem to have been any adverse effects from the treatment. I also tried to have a closer look at my uberis female this morning, and I think that there has been a definite improvement there. The 'velvet dust' over the scales was very noticeable when they went in, but I couldn't really see it today. Also their behaviour has been a lot more normal, and their fins are much less clamped. In general they just look a lot less uncomfortable. 

My only quandary with this pair is what to do with them. I am always afraid of keeping fish in my tanks that have had velvet before, but I am very attached to this pair as it was such an effort to get them to spawn. I guess I will see what happens.

I got some more photos of my sp. apiapi female. Her offspring were being their usual camera hating selves unfortunately. 




























Then my hendra male was not very impressed with my attempts to photograph him. 




























My mum also now wants to get a pair of unimaculata again. There is this strain/locality where the sides are almost completely blue and of course that is the one she wants. I am envisaging dozens of unimaculata fry again. It's like a nightmare.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just read on the transhipper's FB page that the latest shipment has been unpacked. Hopefully my two pairs were on it. That means if they arrived today/yesterday, they have to spend seven days in quarantine and will probably get shipped out the Monday after next. Gives me ample time to get their tanks ready.

My poor brownorum male is very upset at his siblings. They keep getting near the film canister and then he has to come out, chase them away, and then get back to his eggs before someone eats them. He has actually matured into quite a nice looking fish. Not as impressive as his father, but nice nonetheless. 



















I snuck in a photo of one of my F1 sp. apiapi males while they were all eating. Unfortunately, the colour washed out because of the flash and the light. 










Then this is what I think is a hendra female. But I can never tell. They look very similar until the males colour up more and develop longer ventrals. 










Meanwhile, my grindal/white worm culture is thriving. The container is about a foot long, and every day there are more and more worms. The scourers are absolutely full of white worms. I'm going to start a few smaller cultures and sell these if I can. 










Got to do my long overdue tax return next Friday. Mum was going to do hers and so she booked me in too. Best scenario would be I get some money back to use on my fish. However, this is doubtful. Just as long as I don't owe a whole lot of money that will be good.


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## LittleBettaFish

I noticed something weird yesterday when doing my daily check-up of my sp. wajok group.

Some of the fry are developing what looks like green spots on their sides - similar to those shown on brownorum. The parent stock were from Hermanus and it seems like there is very scant information available on this 'species' online. Hermanus has not bred this fish as he did not have room I believe, and I think the only other person in Australia with a pair has fry younger than mine. 

I did find one photo online on a French forum where someone's 'wajok' looked very similar to brownorum. It is very strange considering what the parents both look like. 

Meanwhile, my uberis pair are definitely feeling better. They were both swimming normally yesterday, and the male was showing a lot of colour. The female has taken up residence in the film canister and so hopefully on Tuesday when I have a closer inspection of them, the velvet is gone. 

Otherwise, not much to update. There was supposed to be someone coming around this weekend to pick up a pair of hendra and my F1 miniopinna, but I haven't heard anything back. 

I have to stain the replacement shelf for my rack since it's warmer today, and I probably should drag the 2ft out of the shed out back and give it a clean out for the persephone group. The java moss in their tank is overgrown, so I am going to steal some for my new tanks. Now it's getting warmer and the sun comes through that window more often I am going to be back to pruning the watersprite every week or so. It loves to push up through the cling wrap and encourage my fish to turn themselves into crisps. 

I'm not sure how to divide their 3ft up into three or four sections for my fry grow-outs. I was alternating between acrylic either drilled or not drilled, or some thick filter sponge, maybe somehow using that as the filters for each section. The only concern with sharing water is that disease will infect every section, but it's probably easier just to treat everyone in the same tank anyway than have multiple tanks infected like what usually happens.


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## LittleBettaFish

Bad news is that last night I had to euthanise five of my rutilans green adults, and I also found two dead fish in the tank. The fish were all suffering from dropsy. Considering their age and the fact that they have been through multiple treatments with some pretty harsh chemicals, I think their immune systems are shot. I have noticed that their wounds from fighting seem to get infected more often than any of my other fish, and a couple of them had been stuck with damaged operculum because of the velvet. 

I now have only six rutilans green adults left. I really hope in the future that I can source a wild-caught pair again. I love this species, but unfortunately, I really had my original pair at a time when I had no clue what I was doing. I fed them too much rich food, should have separated out sub-adults rather than live them together as a 'family' group, and should have been way more proactive at the start when dealing with velvet. Oh well, lesson learned. 

I also discovered a sp. wajok fry that has a misshapen head so I am going to cull/euthanise that. It's a shame as it is healthy otherwise and its body formed normally. However, it's quite a significant defect, and I won't keep or sell fish with that level of deformity. 

Good news is that my pair of Betta uberis are looking great. I moved them from their plastic hospital tub into a hospital tank so I could get a better look at them. From what I've seen, there doesn't seem to be any visible sign of velvet on them. However, I am contemplating repeating the treatment just to be 100% sure. 

Sadly my replacement, replacement, rutilans female was DOA. The male made it through, and I am assuming my coccina pair. However, there is always the risk they die in quarantine, or on their way to me. I will now have to wait until October until I can get a female. It's so frustrating. You think with how close Australia is to these countries, getting fish from them would be much quicker and easier. 

Also, why must BBS be so expensive?! I would like to get this 200g container I found online and store some in the freezer, but it's $130! I usually buy it in small amounts, but I'm sure other breeders will know how fast fry will go through this when you are feeding it daily. 

I wanted to get back to feeding my fry on BBS and small mosquito larvae rather than just grindals, but I could import a pair of wilds and set-up a tank for them at that price. 

This hobby is going to force my anxiety-ridden self to get a job again. I know it. You definitely can't be poor and in this hobby. There's so much I have to buy: live plants, air pumps, 1.5m rack, tanks, bulk IALs, and of course more wilds. I will just do what I see everyone do nowadays, set-up a GoFundMe page to fund my personal hobby :mrgreen:. I am sure I could shoot for the 'conservation of rare fish species' angle. Think of those poor bettas whose homes are being destroyed by palm oil farms. For just a few dollars, you could help them start a new life in Australia. 

I promise some photos tomorrow. Can't be bothered getting the camera out today.


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## LittleBettaFish

Caught a pair of rutilans green trying to spawn in a film canister this afternoon. My hendra pair were also out in breeding dress as you can see from my photos below. I wish the male would come out more often as he is one of my favourite fish. 



















My aqua soil order arrived today, so I set-up three tanks. Two in preparation for my coccina/rutilans, and one just in case I purchase another species before the next shipment. I put some duckweed, frogbit and watersprite in all three tanks, and will be monitoring the ammonia levels because they are most likely going to shoot up. 

Here are some photos I took of my current set-up. I wish the walls were white rather than pink, and that we had the vinyl flooring we are looking at rather than the old, stained carpet, but when the afternoon sun comes through the window it looks pretty good. 




























It's so cool having this temporary fish room. Wish it could be permanent, but alas, mum has told me in no uncertain terms that as soon as the rumpus is ready, I will have to move them all downstairs.


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## Tony2632

Wow, nice fish room. How do you keep up with all that?


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## LittleBettaFish

It's actually ridiculously easy compared to previous set-ups when I had close to thirty tanks scattered through the house, many that required almost daily water changes. 

Out of view of these photos, is a big bucket, that I keep filled with tap water and rooibos tea bags. This bucket also has a sponge filter and heater running in it. After a week of being left sitting, the water is closer to the conditions in the tank than it is out of the tap. Our tap water is some of the softest in the world, and if you just add it to the tank, the pH will crash as it comes out of the tap at about 7 and is hovering around 6 only a day or so later. 

All those tanks only receive 2-5L water changes once a week. I have duckweed, hydrilla and watersprite in all of my tanks, and this stops ammonia from building up as due to the low pH all my tanks are uncycled. 

Probably the longest part about doing water changes is when I stop to wash my hands in between tanks/disinfect equipment, and when I have to put the cling wrap back over the top of every tank. Otherwise it takes maybe an hour or an hour and a half once a week. So quite low maintenance. 

I am looking at doing a sort of automatic top-up when I move my fish downstairs. On the top shelf of each rack I'd have tanks full of water, and using the black pipe they use for sprinkler systems, I'd have it so that each tank can be topped up after a water change without me needing to use a bucket. I want to try and keep my hands out of my tanks as much as possible so I don't spread disease etc. around.

Also, I really want to get a whole heap of 3ft LEDs so that I can get rid of my mix of too short fluros. Unfortunately, LEDs that can actually grow plants are pretty expensive.


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## Tony2632

My tap water is around PH 7.5. Can you imagine running a pressurized CO2 system. Which can probably lower it even more. I know with CO2 my PH can drop to 6.6 or 6.8.


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## LittleBettaFish

Our water has basically no carbonate hardness. I have to used crushed coral in my goldfish tank because otherwise I can't keep the cycle in their tank going. My test kit only goes down to 6, but based on the species I have been breeding, I would expect that it would test lower than this if I had something like a pH meter. 

It's great because I love soft water species, and it's one reason I am reluctant to move out of this house. I don't want to end up with water that is at odds with the species I keep.


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## LittleBettaFish

My sp. apiapi are my favourite group of fish, but they are so difficult to photograph. The males always seem to move just as I get the perfect shot lined up. I think I need one of those camaflouged cameras like they use on nature documentaries. I'll be all like "I am just an innocent shrub, no need to suspect anything, carry on, carry on." 

Anyway, these were the best photos I took from today. The afternoon sun lit up their tank so it was easier than usual. 


















I think this one is a female




























Then I snuck in a photo of one of my remaining rutilans green adults.










I also discovered that the liquid part of my ammonia test kit has run out. Which is great considering I was going to test the tanks with the ADA Amazonia in them. I am going to have to pick up a new test kit over the weekend. I did add some hydrilla and azolla to two of the tanks as I know they can consume a fair amount of ammonia. 

One thing I did notice today, was that the beautiful java fern in my brownorum tank is melting. It's got this same 'disease' that I always seem to get in my java ferns and I think I've mentioned on this journal before. The leaves very rapidly develop these brown spots that spread onto any surrounding leaves. I have had a whole plant basically melt in 24 hours. Some googling suggests it is related to CO2 levels and I wonder whether this has occurred because this tank now gets a couple of hours of indirect afternoon sunlight. I managed to stop it before in one of my other tanks by viciously pruning and then dosing an excel type product. So hopefully I can do the same here as it is going to make a mess if I have to remove it, and I really liked how it looked in that tank. You can see what I mean by photo below. The dark path on the bottom of the left leaf is what I am talking about. 










I'm going to give my uberis a 100% water change tomorrow (just got a bucket of water out aging overnight) and then repeat their Cupramine treatment. I can still see some signs of velvet on the pectoral fins of the male so it's not completely gone. 

I will also do large water changes on the sp. wajok and rutilans green fry tanks and then repeat the treatment with them also.


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## beautiful Betta

Good luck with the plant sounds like you have been busy over the past few weeks. 

The sprinkler system you are planning to set up sounds great, it would make things a lot easier. I remember I had a drip type system with a pipe when I had marine, it was literally on a slow drip that way the salt level was always being kept stable with no water evaporation because I was always adding with the drip what water would evaporate under the lights.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yes, just need the rack space available to do something like that. I am only permitted two 1.5m racks downstairs and there are about 13 species of wilds in the coccina complex so that is at least 13 breeding tanks I need to fit on my racks. Plus the tanks holding my groups of fish. 

It kills me I can't use my current bedroom as my permanent fish room. It gets a great amount of natural light, it used to have a sink in it, so could very easily be plumbed again, and it's quite a decent size so I could fit three 1.5m racks plus a single 900mm rack where my sideboard is.


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## beautiful Betta

Sounds like you have it all figured out already.


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## LittleBettaFish

I still haven't heard anything about my coccina pair/rutilans male as the transhipper has been away at a show over the weekend I believe. Because of this, their tanks have just been sitting there sort of half-done. I think the ammonia is still going to be quite high from the aqua soil, so I am going to swap that out for peat moss temporarily, and use a small amount of aqua soil for the plants. The rest of the aqua soil can sit in a bucket with some water until it stops releasing so much ammonia. 

Sad news is that my java fern in my brownorum tank succumbed to that disease/deficiency I talked about on the previous page. The bulk of it died off, but I managed to save some smaller plantlets so they are now sitting in a tub growing emersed. I also put a couple in my hendra tank, on top of the mass of watersprite so they are out of the water. 

As you can see it looks very different from previous photos. At the moment I am thinking of planting an Amazon sword into a container of aqua soil and hiding it in the moss. It doesn't matter if it gets big as I want to fill up all the empty space, and they are so hardy and inexpensive. Crypts were my second choice but they can melt and I worry anubias might be infected with whatever destroyed my java fern, being a rhizome plant. 










This however, did not stop my smaller male from spawning with his mother again. Now there's less cover I did find my bigger male sitting on the bottom of the tank. I'm still not really sure how he was bested as he was always the more dominant of the two. 

Meanwhile this was my smaller male before the great java fern melt. I really like this fish as I've mentioned before. I just wish he had his brother's fins. 










Then this is one of my F1 miniopinna out of my Hermanus pair. They were enjoying the afternoon sun lighting up their tank. I certainly will miss them when they leave for their new home. 



















I have been toying with selling my native group. I know I only just got them, and I do really like my rhads but they are just so shy and every time I put my face anywhere near the tank they all go and hide at the back. 

I did find a fry today so they are obviously not unhappy, but they aren't even shy in the way of my wilds. I wonder if they have been talking to my rutilans green group. They probably think I am some sort of fish serial killer. 

Other than that, not much has been going on. I had a dead fry in my sp. wajok/rutilans green hospital tank, but both my uberis are doing fine as are my sp. wajok pair. Still seeing big green spots on some of my sp. wajok fry. It's so strange. Going to be interesting to see how they mature and whether that spot is something that stays or goes.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I shot off an email today to the transhipper and got the news my three wilds have been shipped out today and so should arrive tomorrow! 

Of course I get the email _after_ I used up all my aged water for water changes. However, I filled the bucket up again early this afternoon and the water is already very brown from the rooibos so hopefully by the time the fish arrive, the pH will have stabilised. 

I have to completely do their tanks tomorrow. I know since I am not ready in the slightest for them, they will arrive early on in the day when they usually come towards the afternoon. 

Otherwise, all I did today was water changes on six of my tanks, and some general maintenance. 

I've been busy cleaning up the house. I have been slowly working my way through weeding the front garden over the past few days. Our downstairs rumpus room also gets really damp over the winter because it is closed off from the rest of the house and never has a heater running. So today I spent several hours scrubbing the window and window frames, dusting, vacuuming, and removing cobwebs. We have so many windows in this house, and it is quite a large house. I love how much natural light they let in, but cleaning them all is a mammoth task. 

I posted about this already, but we also bred our dog Eos on the weekend. It was quite the experience. She was not very impressed with the male, and in the end we had to get AI done as he wouldn't do a natural mating. I didn't want to breed Eos, but she is my mum's dog so I don't really get a say. However, the sire is a nice young dog, so in three or so weeks we will see whether she is pregnant or not.

Meanwhile, things didn't really get better for Eos on our walk yesterday. They were doing construction on the footpath, and a lady working on the site told me Eos was a lovely male. Eos is very feminine looking and wears a pink collar so I don't know why this lady thought she was a male. 

Then when I was walking Ares down our street later on that day, this dog is roaming off-leash in its front yard. I turned and ran up the street before it could see us and Ares could see it. I hope no one had their windows open as I had a few choice words to say on people who let their dogs loose. It could have been disastrous if Ares and me had run into an unsupervised dog like that. There's a reason I walk him where dogs are supposed to be leashed. 

Nike also came into heat right after Eos. I can't wait to get her desexed. She makes the kitchen look like the scene of a murder. Heaven forbid she clean up after herself. She is so scrawny at the moment. She blew her coat and we haven't been exercising her as much as we should. She just is such a difficult dog to walk. I swear I need the chiropractor afterwards. Once it stops being so cold in the morning and she comes off heat I am going to start taking her again.


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## LittleBettaFish

My new wilds arrived safely today. I hurriedly put together a tank for my coccina pair this morning. I had to borrow some java moss, watersprite, and hydrilla from a couple of my other tanks, and the substrate is mostly peat moss which I wanted to avoid, but at least it was done for when they arrived. 

My rutilans male is currently in a hang-on breeder box. I want to get him move into a proper tank in the next couple of days. Funnily enough, I actually like him the most. He is only very small, but immediately after arriving, he ate some mosquito larvae and is now a very bright red. 

My coccina are rather disappointing at the moment. I'm hoping they settle in and colour up soon as at the moment I am not going to be taking photos of them any time soon. 

Meanwhile, my Joty miniopinna male was not impressed with his new neighbours. He came out, told them off, and then went back up into his film canister to work on his nest. 

This is what my smaller rack looks like now. 










The bottom right tank will be housing my rutilans male (and eventually pair), while the tank on the left is for whatever species I pick up next. I'm thinking maybe a pair of wild-caught Betta livida if I can find a supplier for them. 

I was considering purchasing another persephone pair sometime in the near future, but prices are exorbitantly high for them right now (think around $100). I was hoping that wild-caught Betta sp. cf. rutilans green would become available from the seller I got these newest fish from, but sadly this doesn't seem the case. There are so many different species and localities of species, that I just want to collect them all!

My sp. apiapi group are unhappy with me. I noticed the java fern in their tank was melting as well, so I had to remove it. It's been in there for almost a year, and now there's a big empty spot where it was. I am hoping the watersprite and hydrilla will grow in to fill the space. Although maybe I might plant a crypt there. 

These were just so random photos I took while I was sitting near their tank trying to convince my rainbows to come out.


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## LittleBettaFish

I've been spring cleaning over the past few days so haven't spent much time with my fish aside from feeding and water changes. 

I sold a pair of F1 hendra and all but four of my F1 miniopinna from my Hermanus group. Unfortunately, I had to completely tear apart both tanks to catch the fish. Neither group of fish are happy and the tanks are looking pathetic at the moment. 










This is my hendra tank. I had to completely uproot all my lovely watersprite and because I don't have an airpump big enough to run all the tanks on this rack off, it is taking forever for the water to clear. 

Fortunately, I made $110, so some will be going towards an airpump and new ammonia test kit, while I'm thinking the rest will go towards some Amazon swords and java moss. 

Anything left over will obviously be going towards more wilds. Obviously. 

I have a custom built starfire tank I want to sell. It was made ages ago and I used it for my macrostoma and then never really used it again. I'm hoping I can sell that for around $70-80 and I'm hoping that I might have a few more F1 hendra pairs to sell as well. Plus I have my natives that I am hoping I can get at least $40-50 for. 

I found a juvenile female brownorum with her caudal eaten almost completely off. There's just a ragged looking stub. She was floating at the surface so I put her into a smaller hospital container. I did also find a third male juvenile! I was spying at the bottom of my tank looking for Disappointment, when I saw this little fellow with a green spot on his side. So depending on how he turns out, he can either be Major Disappointment or Slight Disappointment. 

I am hoping to be rid of all the F1 females in that tank (except maybe this chewed up tail one). I also want to get rid of the original female. She is just too aggressive and based on the several offspring with deformities, I don't want to use her to cross onto my F1 males. So they are just going to be pets (thinking of investing in some Kritter Keeper style containers for them) and I will invest in a new breeding pair in the future. 

My coccina pair continue to disappoint. Their tank is perfect for them and yet they are normally pale, stress striped, and racing up and down the glass. Only the female seems to colour up fully. They are eating and I can't see any signs of disease. It's just infuriating as I know how spectacular this species can be and I waited so long for them. 

My rutilans male meanwhile is fast becoming a favourite. He is so small but very spunky and personable. He is still living in his breeder box because I didn't have any aged water to use in his tank and I need to purchase some more plants. However, he seems to like it in there, and I took this photo of him just now.










Then mum broke the news to me that I might not be able to fit two 1.5m racks downstairs because she wants a dog crate there! I'm hoping I can get at least a single 1.8m rack that is 60cm wide as then I think I could fit everyone on. We were looking at a 4ft goldfish tank, but we just won't have the space. So I'm thinking maybe a 3x2x2ft tank as this would be much bigger than what they have now, even if it is not ideal. 

I've started lowering the temperature in my hospital tanks, and have a bucket of water aging to do some water changes. I am going to keep my uberis pair permanently separated and just pick up another pair later on. I just can't take the risk with subsequent fry getting infected by a latent velvet infection. 

Meanwhile, my poor sp. wajok female seems to be having difficulty with her swim bladder. The male was bullying her relentlessly in the hospital tank so I have put her into a small container with some java moss and she was awkwardly chasing after mosquito larvae last night. Still got my green spotted F1. Hermanus who sold them to me, doesn't know why this has happened, and the other guy in Oz I knew who bred this species said he never had any with spots. So definitely going to see how these individuals mature.


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## hrutan

That rutilans male is so lovely...


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## LittleBettaFish

Yes and extremely fortunate after an incident last night. 

I was looking into my coccina tank and I noticed how red one of them was. 

I had a closer look and realised that it was my rutilans male. Somehow he had squeezed underneath the mesh grill on the outlet of the breeder box and slid into the tank. I can't believe he did not end up on the ground as I'm not sure how long he was in the tank before I noticed. 

I took the breeder box off as I think that's a sign. I got lucky once, I probably won't get so lucky again. He doesn't mind the coccina and hopefully I can get him a tank set-up on the weekend. I want to get some crypts, some Amazon swords, and steal a chunk of java moss from my persephone tank. Then I will just be waiting on his replacement female. 

In other news the weather was absolutely crazy last night. There was flash flooding in the city, we got hail that was a good 1.5-2cm across, and there was a heap of thunder and lightning. I have never seen such heavy rain and large hail. I'm so thankful my dad installed another downpipe off the gutter along my clerestory window. Last big storm we had, rain was streaming down the wall behind my fish rack and going into the power points. 

I'm glad none of our dogs care about thunder. I wonder how many poor dogs got out during the storm. I was keeping watch over the outside puppy behind us, and the annoying yapper next door. Annoying yapper repaid my concern by proceeding to bark from about 6:30pm to at least 10:30pm. And I'm not just talking a bark here and there, I am talking almost non-stop barking.


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## hrutan

Whoa. Yes, better to not risk him. If he wants to be in there he will find a way, ha.

My dog would always hide under the kitchen table in storms.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my rutilans male is chasing the coccina around even though he is about half their size. He is a spitfire. I can't wait until the next shipment when his female hopefully will come. This was him enjoying some sunshine this afternoon. Such a brilliant red - very similar to the solid red of the sp. apiapi. 










Been loving on my wilds today. Did water changes on all of my 'healthy' tanks, did some tank maintenance, and am going to give everyone a feed once I finish with my journal post. 

My Joty miniopinna group have had some changes made to their tank. It's just a tank I threw together and haven't done much with since. It has peat moss substrate I want to slowly change over to aqua soil, and has a spawning mop I want to replace with java moss once the buyer of my Hermanus miniopinna pair comes and picks them up. My male has a small number of eggs in the film canister. I don't know why he and the female have been spawning after such a long gap. I also don't know how they gave me so many fry when they only seem to produce three eggs from each spawn. 










I have to say, I love hydrilla. It is such a fast grower, it floats, it doesn't really need all that much light, and it is easy to transfer to other tanks. Now if only my frogbit would be as cooperative. 

I was trying to take some photos of my sp. apiapi group. There was an empty space left in one corner of the tank when removed their java fern. I've now filled it with a film canister, IAL, some watersprite plantlets, and some hydrilla. They are happier with that, and there's been some squabbles amongst the males as to territories. One fish who did let me take their photo, was my original female. She was scolding one of her offspring. She's such a beauty, and still so small.




























Unfortunately, my theme of blurry photos continued with this shot of my big persephone male showing off to a sister. He has the best form out of the whole group (I have mentioned in the past I was not happy with the toplines on these F1), but he is just so massive and his colouring is different from the other males. 










Here he is here in all his glory. The blue scaling/iridescence on his sides is just not as heavy or 'sparkly' as his brothers, and his body colour is a bit paler. Strange that there can still be variation even from fish that all look the same. 










I also posted about there being possible changes implemented to the import of bettas (along with cichlids and livebearers) into this country that may cause the cessation of individual imports of wild-caught wild species. This is very concerning to me. 

It's coming into force March of next year. I would love if I could get pairs of persephone, livida, tussyae, brownorum, and sp. apiapi before then. Just that it's going to cost several hundred dollars in import and shipping fees, not to mention their actual purchase prices. 

Reading through the document I don't know how the show circuit in Australia is going to survive considering it's only really gaining some momentum now. 

I love this country, but sometimes the strict quarantine/import regulations can make you scream. Particularly when it was the Government behind things like cane toads and gambusia who cause massive environmental damage.


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## LittleBettaFish

My mum dragged me along to the accountant to do all my long overdue tax returns. I was afraid I would owe a whole lot of money, but I should get a little over $2000 back once the accountant's fees are taken out. If I actually do get this much back, $800 will go into my 'normal' bank account, and the rest will go into my high interest account so I don't touch it. 

I also had a cheque for $55 from my first ever tax return back in 2008 that I never cashed. I just have to give the accountant my bank details later this afternoon and then wait for my return to come. 

If I do get that money back I want to pick up a few more wild betta pairs (namely brownorum, sp. apiapi and possibly persephone/rutilans green if I can source them), as well as some live plants and equipment for new and existing tanks. 

Other than that, I also discovered how to use the macro lens on the camera. I played around with it, but I need a heap more practice before I take anything good. These were the best two photos I managed and they are not very zoomed in. The top one is my brownorum male and the bottom one is one of my sp. apiapi males. 



















Of course no one would pose for me. Most of the time I got some lovely close-ups of caudal fins and moss.


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## LittleBettaFish

I haven't taken any photos of note since my last post. My fish are not being cooperative. 

With that said, I think I've sold my rainbows. Hopefully I can get rid of them this weekend. I want to divide their tank, and use it to house my three F1 brownorum males. 

I also want to try and sell off all my remaining F1 hendra and brownorum in the next couple of weeks. This will leave a tank vacant for a new breeding pair of brownorum, and will give my foundation hendra pair some peace. My three runty F1 miniopinna have grown since their siblings were sold, so I am going to see if the person who purchased their parents wants to take them. I think that at least two of them are males, and I have about twenty miniopinna fry in my other tank, so it's no great loss. 

I have been trying to catch my rutilans male and move him to his own tank as he is being very aggressive. My poor coccina female has half a caudal, and the male doesn't even come out. The plan is to take the tank carefully apart tomorrow and get him out once and for all. 

I think I'm going to have to euthanise my sp. wajok female. She has wasted away for some reason and looks terrible. I was hoping she would pick up, but her head is bigger than her body and it seems once they get to that point, they just don't recover. 

Meanwhile my uberis and the rutilans green/sp. wajok fry I was treating, are still showing spots on their pectoral fins. This is very disappointing, particularly with my uberis as they are lovely fish and were going to be more foundation breeding pair for this species. Now their future is uncertain as it's very difficult for me to continue to have sick fish in my fish room because this sort of stuff is so contagious and all it takes is one mistake on my behalf and it could be spread everywhere. 

In better news, a guy I am friends with on FB knows someone who is selling wild-caught Betta livida so I want to see if I can pick up a couple of pairs. Be excellent if I could finally get my hands on this species. 

I am also still waiting to get my tax return money back. I'm hoping it's as much as the tax lady estimated, as I've got so many things planned, and I would love if I could get it back before the next fish shipment into Australia is due. 

The only fish related purchases I've made recently were a couple of buckets and some jugs to help with water changes. Exciting stuff.

So basically, I am just waiting for whatever money I am owed gets put into my bank account and then this journal will be getting a whole lot more updates.


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## LittleBettaFish

Did all my water changes on Tuesday and tidied up my fish room. As usual just ignore the pink walls and crappy carpet. 



















After all my efforts trying to catch and move my rutilans male, it was actually quicker just to catch and move my coccina pair. I seriously caught them within about 30 seconds. They are still settling into their new tank (I'm thinking of getting an anubias plant to fill up some of the empty space), but they are already a lot more friendly than they were sharing with the rutilans male. 

And OMG my tax return just went through! I have like $2,200 more in my bank account. Now I can put some away for a new laptop and keep some for my fish. I've already got a list a mile long of stuff I need. 

In further good news, it's been warmer here so I've been getting a lot more mosquito larvae. I am going to stealthily set-up the dog paddle pond which is like the ultimate mosquito breeding ground. Mum hates me using it for this purpose so I have to pretend that I am cleaning it out regularly. Once I offload all my F1 hendra and brownorum, it will be a lot easier to feed my breeding pairs. It takes a lot of mosquito larvae to feed a growing group of 16-20 fish. 

I also found out it will take two months before my wild betta supplier gets Betta sp. apiapi back in stock. So I will definitely be waiting for another pair of those. 

Other than that, not much happening. I took this photo of my hendra female yesterday, and that's about it.


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## sharkettelaw1

this is very interesting journal..your fish are very beautiful too


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Sharkettelaw1. Sometimes I feel like a bit of the odd one out here. 

I sold six of my F1 Betta brownorum females today. The buyer owns Jar Fish, so I know they will have a good home. I did unfortunately, euthanise two of the remaining females. I'd been sitting on this decision for a while, but they were the sort of deformities I didn't think appropriate for potential breeding stock. The female with one ventral did go along with her sisters, as she was absolutely perfect otherwise. 

This means I have my original female (she will be retiring from breeding here and I'm not sure whether to sell her yet), my three F1 males, and the F1 female I had who got attacked and had her whole caudal and most of her fins chewed off. I actually thought she'd died after she escaped from the hospital container, but it seems like she is getting regrowth so hopefully she will heal up. 

I also found my sp. wajok female dead, so I am a bit upset about that. I thought her time was near and was actually going to euthanise her this afternoon as she just didn't improve condition wise. 

Otherwise, I did a water change on my coccina tank. They are looking a lot happier now to have a tank of their own, and are starting to occasionally show some colour. My rutilans male had his tank topped up and is now waiting on the arrival of a female. 

I fed some mosquito larvae to a few of my tanks, and just did some fish watching this afternoon. I haven't done that in a while, and it was nice with Bandit to keep me company and all the afternoon sun streaming through the windows. 

I tried to take some photos of my brownorum males, but they started fighting and then they wouldn't sit still long enough for me to get anything flattering. 




























I did notice my little F1 male is showing some excellent finnage for his size. I'm hoping he turns out as nice as his two brothers.


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## sharkettelaw1

what you do is unique..and im sorry for your loss. I know of only one other person who breeds wilds, dont ask who and what subspecies..im illiterate in that department lol. That red one is sooooo gorgeous


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## LittleBettaFish

The wilds are very interesting to keep and breed. With such a wide range of species, you get some very different behaviours between species groups. I find this group I keep (coccina) is one of the most aggressive behind the splendens complex. They are also perhaps the most sensitive as they come from some extreme environments in the wild.

Those two red males are fish I bred myself, they turned out nice, just not as nice as the father who was killed by the female. This is one of my favourite species. I love the big spot.


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## Tony2632

As all ways LittleBettaFish, you have such amazing fish. I wish I had a fish room like yours. On other note, you ever made youtube videos on wild bettas? I think it would be a great topic on youtube.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Tony. My fish room is nothing impressive aside from the fact there are a few tanks there. I'm hoping my rack downstairs will be neater and more 'planned out' (my fish room sort of grew of its own accord), as it will be a permanent fixture. 

Unfortunately, I don't have anything that is capable of taking a good quality video, and without the quality, you just can't see the true beauty of these fish. I did actually get my Nikon Coolpix running again today, but all the videos I take with that seem to come out pretty crappy. 

The buyer came and picked up my natives yesterday. This means I now have the two foot tank spare for my brownorum group. I just have to work out how I am going to divide the tank into three for the males. The chewed up female will go into a breeder box in the section with the smallest male, and I'm still not certain whether I want to keep or sell the original female. 

I ordered a four outlet air pump, three heaters, 9L of ADA Malaya, three sponge filters, 20m of airline tubing, check valves, and a 50 packet of IAL, this morning. I'm hoping they will get sent out tomorrow and arrive by Thursday/Friday of next week. 

The next shipment into Australia is happening on October 4th and my rutilans female will hopefully be on it. I'm also hoping I can get stuff sorted with the seller of the wild-caught Betta livida before then. He doesn't have a Paypal account so I am waiting on that. Otherwise it will be November before I can get them. I decided on getting two pairs as I've seen photos and they are just stunning. 

Some TLC and daily feedings of mosquito larvae and bloodworms has worked wonders on my coccina pair. The female was coloured up and showing breeding bars yesterday. The male is scrawny, but his damaged fins are healing and he isn't just racing up and down the side of the tank. They both know who I am now so come out a lot to see what's happening. 

Speaking of mosquito larvae, I just found a whole cache of them around behind or shed. A few pots have filled up with rain water and I noticed the larvae wriggling around. You know you are a fish nerd when this sort of stuff is exciting enough that you feel the need to tell everyone. 

Sadly the father of one of our dogs is gravely ill. My mum is friends with the owner and went over there today to give him some steak and some love. She took the camera over so that they can get some nice final photos of him, and so I won't have any photos to post here until the camera comes back.

He is not that old and he is such a beautiful dog, everything you could ever ask for. It does make you realise just how short a time these wonderful creatures share our lives for.


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## LittleBettaFish

I don't know what happened. One moment I was browsing FB, the next moment I ha d purchased a pair of Betta sp. apiapi and Betta coccina. The seller had only very limited stock of sp. apiapi and wouldn't be getting any in for another couple of months. I was actually going to wait but I figured there's no difference between getting them now and then really. He only had a couple of pairs of Betta coccina left as well. I wanted a back-up pair of this species as my two are starting to grow on me, and at full maturity they are a stunning fish. 

I'm hoping the seller of the Betta livida can get things moving. I am still waiting for him to set-up a Paypal account. I would rather they come in with all my other wilds as then I can combine my shipping costs. 

I think it's probably going to be around the $400 mark, maybe more, once I add in import fees. It's scary how easy it is to spend money in this hobby! 

In November, I will be looking at adding a Betta brownorum and Betta hendra pair to my collection. My mum said she would buy a pair of Betta persephone for me as a birthday present (my birthday is in December), which would be good as they are pricey. 

The other expense is going to be getting all these tanks planted. My wilds love their heavily planted tanks. I really need like half a bucket of java moss, but no one here seems to sell it in bulk for a reasonable price. I'm thinking the majority of my plants will be crypts, amazon swords, and watersprite, as they are all cheap to purchase. Then maybe some anubias in tanks where there is a need for more cover. Otherwise Malaysian driftwood is cheap and it's easy enough to move if I need to catch fish versus plants. 

Still no photos because of my lack of camera, but I was going to muck around with my Nikon Coolpix today and try and get some videos instead.


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## Tony2632

I wish you lived near me, I'd give as much java moss as you want for free. To bad you live in Australia. Yeah this hobby can get a little expensive, I spent a little over $700 bucks on my last project. I was thinking of getting a 40g ADA tank, but I'm kind of leaning towards something way bigger. 

I wanna see some videos!!! I'd love to share them with a few people around the aquarium/youtube community. Since there's like 0 vids on wild bettas. I think it's a great topic.


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## LittleBettaFish

Everyone always wants to sell java moss in small portions starting at around $7. I really need handfuls of the stuff to provide my wilds with enough hiding places, but to buy it like that would cost a fortune. I really need to find someone who is selling it in bulk and not asking a ridiculous price. I mean it's not like java moss is particularly rare or difficult to grow. 

ADA branded anything gets expensive fast. I just paid $45 for a 9L bag of Malaya. But it does a great job, and I think it's one of the best substrates for my wilds. 

There are a few videos on Youtube of the wilds - usually the big mouthbrooders like macrostoma. Normally if you type in the species name you will pull up more results than if you just type in something like 'wild betta'. I have an old video of my burdigala group eating grindals on there. 

I was very upset last night. As of now, I no longer have any rutilans sp. cf. green or sp. wajok in my fish room. My remaining group of rutilans green were getting dropsy one by one, while the F2 fry and my sp. wajok fry were slowly dying from velvet. There is nothing worse than having to euthanise your fish when you had no intention of doing so. 

My uberis pair still have velvet, but their infection is much less severe. They are both eating, and still coloured up and active, you can just see the parasites on their pectoral fins and the male has some inflammation around his gill area. I'm now treating them with aquarium salt, darkness, heat, and Seachem Cupramine. Their hospital tank is wrapped in a blanket and they are in two clear breeder boxes as I don't want them attacking each other. 

I'm crossing my fingers I can get them better as they are both so friendly. The female is always at the front of the glass or following my finger around.


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## LittleBettaFish

I'm not going to get my camera back for another week, hence the lack of updates and photos. 

Anyway, I should have a rutilans female, two pairs of livida, a pair of sp. apiapi and a pair of coccina coming in this October shipment. That's a lot of fish, and only one (the rutilans female) actually has a tank set-up. 

Today I received my final package with my aqua soil, air pump, and heaters so I can get started on setting up my new tanks. I also have ordered some live cultures of moina. Apparently they are very similar to daphnia and I am keen to see if I can't use them as an alternate food source for my wilds. If anyone has cultured these before, please let me know how similar they are to daphnia in that regard. 

The plants I have ordered are Amazon swords, wisteria, watersprite, milfoil, fontinalis moss, pennywort, duckweed, and six lots of hydrilla (this is seriously one of my favourite plants). I also picked up a couple of smaller anubias from a fish store near my house, just to see how they would go after my fiasco with the java fern. As always, I want low maintenance plants that will also quickly fill up a tank. 

Now my soil has arrived the persephone group are getting downsized. Once they are moved the mammoth task of getting all my tanks ready will commence.

In other news, my uberis pair are still in the hospital tank. The male is not looking good at all and I am concerned I may lose him. 

Sadly I have also read that the habitat of Betta sp. apiapi may already be destroyed even though they were only discovered very recently. If this is true, it will be a tragic loss for this species and I can only hope that there is enough in the hands of hobbyists worldwide that it is not lost entirely.


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## Wildbetta

LittleBettaFish said:


> I don't know what happened. One moment I was browsing FB, the next moment I ha d purchased a pair of Betta sp. apiapi and Betta coccina. The seller had only very limited stock of sp. apiapi and wouldn't be getting any in for another couple of months. I was actually going to wait but I figured there's no difference between getting them now and then really. He only had a couple of pairs of Betta coccina left as well. I wanted a back-up pair of this species as my two are starting to grow on me, and at full maturity they are a stunning fish.


Hehehehe I TOTALLY know how that is. You are looking at stuff and suddenly you have bought it. No idea how that happens. "whistles and looks around innocently" 

Sorry to hear that you had to put down those fish. I hate having to do that especially with wild species. Sometimes it is best though in the long run. I don't keep very ill fish around in my tanks either. I just don't have the time or ability to fight with tough stuff so illness is culled.


Tony -- There are lots of videos of wild bettas on Youtube. You just have to know how to look for them. LOL I have lots of videos of my wild bettas on my youtube channel. 

P.S. How much you want for that moss? "wink wink" LOL


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## LittleBettaFish

It's such a hard decision to make with particularly rare species. Species like uberis/burdigala/brownorum/hendra etc. I am less likely to attempt treatment for more serious maladies as they are much easier to acquire than something like Betta persephone. 

Sadly unless the supplier I buy most of my wilds from is able to source wild-caught Betta sp. cf. rutilans green before March of next, this species is likely going to be lost from my fish room. I refuse to buy wilds through wholesalers/fish stores (except for Jodi-Lea), and rutilans green is not something that seems to come through the hands of overseas sellers a lot. 

Yesterday I got to work sorting out some of my tanks. I filled up one of my 10 gallon tanks, and will be moving the persephone group today. I'm going to put my shallow 8 gallon tank, and three 10 gallon tanks on my top shelf, and that should give me enough tanks to house my new pairs if they all manage to survive through quarantine. I'm supposed to be getting two pairs of brownorum and a persephone pair or two in the future, so they will probably have to go on the bottom shelf because otherwise I am out of room. I already need to leave space for my potential monia culture and BBS hatchery. 

I am rather OCD with the appearance of my tanks. Not in the sense that they have to be perfect, but that they all have to at least look similar to each other. It always makes me twitchy when something like the water colour or substrate is different, or if plants aren't doing as good in one tank as they are another. The source of my annoyance yesterday, was one of my miniopinna tanks. It has always looked messy and it just doesn't match any of my other tanks in the least. I was going to remove the spawning mop on the bottom and replace it with java fern, but the roots of the floating plants had grown down into it. Instead I siphoned out as much of the peat moss and muck as I could, and replaced it with aqua soil which makes it look 100 times better. I also put in an anubias plant and a small terracotta pot, which the fry and juveniles have been busy exploring. 

The next tank to get a makeover will be my rutilans tank. Fortunately, it has not been set-up as long and the plants haven't established themselves as much. It's a lot harder when you have a blanket of duckweed and watersprite to work through. My fish love their jungles, but sometimes I wish they could be equally happy with just some PVC pipe and moss. 

That's about it for today. I have my Nikon Coolpix charging so I am going to try and take a video and see how it turns out. I think videos are the best at showing off the beauty and unique behaviours of wilds, provided the quality is high enough so you aren't just looking at a pixellated blob.


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## LittleBettaFish

Still no camera which is irritating as heck. I really hope we get it back this weekend as I want to take some photos and my journal is so boring without them. 

I've moved my persephone group into a 2ft tank on the bottom shelf. They are still not 100% settled in, but at least they are moving around and showing off/sparring again.

I'm replacing my top shelf over the weekend, and then will be filling up and planting all the tanks on it in preparation for whatever new fish make it through the import process. 

My empty persephone tank is going to be used as a temporary plant nursery until this occurs. I have it filled up with a heater and a thin layer of aqua soil. The duckweed will be sectioned off into a breeder box as it has an awful habit of getting everywhere. 

At this point, I'm not sure if I've ordered too few or too many plants, so I will have to wait until my parcel arrives (which hopefully is soon). I figure at least if I have ordered too many plants I can always use them for the next lot of tanks I will be setting up. 

My monia cultures should also be arriving today. I have set-up a small plastic tub with a heater and a piece of airline tubing bubbling very slowly. I added some Seachem Neutral Regulator since I'm not sure they will appreciate my extremely low pH, and hopefully I can keep these going long-term as I would prefer to use something like monia over the blackworms in the colder months. 

I also printed off some more tank labels and labels for my live food cultures just so everything looks nice and neat. Other than that, not much has been happening. I've been doing some fish watching and pottering around in my fish room, but no exciting news like a new spawn. 

I also tried my Nikon and it was terrible.


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## LittleBettaFish

My moina culture arrived along with my plants the other day. As usual Aquagreen (great business for those of you from Australia) gave me heaps of plants along with my culture. I think I am their biggest buyer of duckweed and hydrilla. 

I have been feeding the moina green water and they still all seem to be alive in there so hopefully they are eating it. However, they are very small. In my head I pictured something the size of brine shrimp, but they are similar in size to baby brine shrimp. So don't think they will be replacing blackworms for my adult fish. But it will be a good food source for my fry and juveniles. 

I've got one of my new tanks completely set-up and ready to go. I am just waiting for the stain on my replacement top shelf to dry fully and then I will getting to work tomorrow setting up the remaining tanks. I wish I could take some photos but the camera still isn't back!! It is driving me insane not having it. 

I am going to order a 3ft T5 light tomorrow and an extra 6500K bulb (I think it comes with two 10000K ones). I've been meaning to do this for a while as then I don't have to keep dragging my 2ft lights around everywhere. 

In good news my uberis pair seem to be on the mend. They were flaring up a storm in their little floating breeder boxes this afternoon, when I briefly took the blanket off their tank to feed them. I'm seeing much less clamping and my male's face has healed up where he scraped it trying to dislodge the parasites. They've got until Thursday, and then I will put them in a glass and check them over with my torch. I may do a repeat treatment just to be 100% sure it is gone and then I will just have them as my pets and permanently separated from each other so there is no chance of fry as their presence seems to 'reactive' the velvet in previously infected fish.

I haven't had any fry born. But I'm hoping once I get rid of all my hendra juveniles and sub-adults I will get some spawning happening in that tank again. My coccina pair still haven't coloured up fully, and the male shows no interest in doing anything but attacking the female and chasing her around. I even put in more plants and he still hunts her down. This is just a complex of evil little fish.


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## LittleBettaFish

It pains me to put these photos up, but these are the three new tanks I have set-up for my new pairs. It seem like jumping the gun a bit as I don't even know about DOAs yet, but I like to have my fish going into tanks that have had time to settle if I can. 

On the left is my Betta sp. apiapi tank. On the right are the two tanks for my Betta livida pairs. 



















This one is on my other rack and is for my pair of Betta coccina. 










My rutilans female will be going into the tank with the male.

The plants are hydrilla, Amazon swords, java moss, watersprite, wisteria, milfoil, duckweed, and a smidgen of pennywort at the surface of each tank. As usual, they are not going to win any aquascaping contests, but the fish seem to love their tanks like this, and that is what is really important. 

I will do a small water change on all of them tomorrow to remove any cloudiness, and then add rooibos. I find if I add it now while the water is cloudy it causes even more cloudiness and looks terrible. 

At this point, I just need to connect my airline tubing to my air pump, add some Prime to my water and the tanks are done. I think my pairs will be sent out at the start of next week as they are still in quarantine.


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## LittleBettaFish

All of my wilds made it safely through quarantine but my Betta sp. apiapi female. This is very disappointing, and I hope I can still replace her if news of their habitat being destroyed is true. I will just be putting an F1 apiapi female in with my male for now, but I would have liked for two separate wild-caught pairs to be the foundation of my species breeding program. 

Jodi doesn't want to hold onto them for any longer than necessary, as wild-caught wilds can be delicate. They come out of quarantine today, and then will be sent out tomorrow for delivery on Friday. Hopefully the remaining fish make it through that final step unscathed. 

I'm glad I got their tanks set-up when I did. Just need to add the rooibos and then they are ready to go.


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## LittleBettaFish

My uberis have finished their two week treatment today. The male was let out of the breeder box and has been prowling around trying to work out how to get in with the female. I had a close look with the torch and couldn't see any obvious parasites on the pectorals, so I've got my fingers crossed that the infection is gone. I'll give it another few days, then I'll do a water change and start adding substrate and plants back into the tank. 

Unfortunately, with that good news comes bad news. It looks like my brownorum group have come down with velvet now. I think it was caused by this F1 female I had who was attacked by the others. She was obviously stressed because of this, and then I think I added to the stress by doing a massive water change on this tank when I sold off the majority of her siblings. I noticed the velvet on her first, and so I think she has then infected everyone else in the tank. I was only going to be keeping this group as pets anyway so I am not as disappointed as I would be if it was a breeding pair, but I just hate how much bad luck I have with this parasite! 

Sometimes these fish could make me go crazy. I feel like my whole fish keeping experience is just one big see-saw. 

I can't take any photos of my fish with the Nikon, so I took some photos of my set-up instead. I told my mum she has to pick up the Canon this weekend as I hate not having it. 



















As always ignore everything but the racks and the tanks. Our house renovations stalled a while ago. 

I've almost completely filled up both racks. Mum was talking about a pair of macrostoma, but I have no idea where I am going to fit them.


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## LittleBettaFish

I'm going to be telling my mum she'd better go pick the camera up this weekend so I can take some photos of my new fish. It's too far away for me to catch a bus there and it's killing me I can't take photos. 

Anyway, sad news is I lost my sp. apiapi male and one of my livida females. This means no sp. apiapi survived this shipment and I don't know if or when I can replace them. I've got to contact the seller of the livida but I don't think he'll have any females left to replace my one so I will probably be out of luck there.

The rest of my fish are lovely though. My coccina male has a green spot and green sides, and my rutilans female is such a character. I moved the male into the tank my sp. apiapi pair were going into and they were flirting almost immediately. Would not be surprised to see them spawning soon. 

The livida are a bit shy and unsettled but that's to be expected. The lone male has the 30cm cube next to my hendra tank for now, but probably will be going into something smaller. The fins on these guys are amazing. Can't wait until they are fully coloured up. 

Otherwise I started treating my brownorum tank for whatever they have, and pulled out about eight very young fry. I was so surprised so they are in a big container in the hospital tank. I have to check on them this afternoon. I'm not sure if they will survive treatment. I'm not sure what male they are out of. Be interesting to see if an F1 x F0 cross throws nicer fish than the F0 x F0 cross did and whether there are any deformities in this group. 

I have all these empty tanks still. I'm thinking maybe of getting a couple pairs of killifish or some eggs. I do miss my killifish and there's something about picking the eggs and looking after the fry that is so therapeutic.


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## LittleBettaFish

Good news got my camera back. 

Better news, both my pair of Betta rutilans and Betta coccina have spawned. 

I was actually surprised with my rutilans pair because the female only has one pectoral fin (I could have sworn she had two when she arrived), doesn't eat a lot, and has some rather odd behaviours. But there are quite a number of eggs in the male's nest, so fingers crossed they eventuate into fry and my female's pectoral grows back.

My Betta livida pair are a little shy still, so I'm hoping with time they will feel more comfortable and spawn. 

If I can get all three species to spawn, it will mean I will have successfully bred all of the described species within this complex and a few of the undescribed ones as well. 

My Betta uberis pair are doing okay. I haven't seen any physical signs of velvet or any discomfort/ unusual behaviour from the pair. The male actually felt good enough to jump into the breeder box with the female so I am going to work on getting an acrylic divider cut up for their tank so they both have a bit more space to move around in. 

I lost all my Betta brownorum fry which I was expecting. Not sure how the treatment is going with the adults but I haven't lost anyone. 

I'm definitely getting killifish again. I've asked one of the main breeders in Australia about eggs/pairs, and I'm going to divide up my 12 gallon long tank into three and use a couple of my one foot tanks as breeding tanks and hatcheries. 

I took a handful of photos of my fish. They are not very good (especially since my coccina male was posing at the scratched end of the tank), but this journal is boring without photos. 

First off, some of my F1 Betta hendra. 



















Then my single Betta livida male who isn't as colourful as the male that lives with the female (this complex really don't seem to like living alone).










Then my coccina pair.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just did a water change on all my wilds except for those with fry/eggs and my hospital tank. 

They always become a lot more active and aggressive after a water change. My miniopinna fry and juveniles were doing their best to get up into the siphon today. It's hard because there are so many and while I am batting one away, another one sneaks up. 

I also noticed my uberis male has escaped from his breeder box again. Because he is such an aggressive SOB, I have a mirror up against the glass to stop him harassing the female. I've got to get a divider made up ASAP as I really don't want them spawning. They are such persistent fish bettas. If there is a way to get into or out of something, they will find it. 

Next on the agenda is feeding the hoard. I have a heap of mosquito larvae in various tubs around the backyard thanks to some recent warm weather. For such small fish they can really pack away a heap of food. 

Photo wise, I took this just before of my Betta livida pair. It's the best I've managed so far as they are usually at the far end of the tank. This doesn't even come close to how stunning the male is in real life.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my pair of Betta coccina spawned again today ... before their first lot of fry has even left the nest. 

My rutilans fry also hatched and the male is doing a great job. There are actually more than I thought as he has some inside the canister and some outside the canister under an IAL. 

I got a delivery of Fluval Stratum, airstones and airline control valves to go towards my future killifish set-ups. I've never used Stratum before, but it was the cheapest and smallest bag of soil on the site, and I really only want it to grow frogbit and milfoil. Plus I've read it doesn't leech much/if any ammonia, so I can put any breeding pairs straight into the tank. It's also a really dark colour, which proves excellent for bringing out the colours on the killifish. 

I stupidly tried to cut my own dividers out of my perspex sheet with a stanley knife. Suffice to say, it didn't work and I nearly wrecked $50 of material. I think I will (nicely) ask my dad to cut and drill some dividers for me when he comes tomorrow. I am always a bit hesitant to ask however, as usually when he does something to me or mum, it turns into a series of comedic catastrophes. 

Apart from that, nothing much else has been going on. I'm still hoping desperately that I can get in a couple of wild-caught pairs of Betta rutilans green before March 2015, but at this point it doesn't seem likely. That's really all I want at this point. I was going to get some more brownorum but I don't think I'll have the funds. 

I got a couple photos of a promising F1 Betta hendra female. She has nice form and an attitude to match. Very tempted to see what she throws with a male sibling. 



















This photo of one of her brothers isn't great quality, but I liked how he was shadowed by the watersprite.


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## LittleBettaFish

My pair of uberis are very pleased with themselves. They must have spawned as the male is guarding a nest with some eggs and the female was dancing around the front of the tank this morning. I've decided to leave them and see what happens. I suppose worst case scenario is they get velvet again and I have to treat them. 

The fact they are both so healthy is also good news because I have been experimenting with paperbark leaves in their tank. I read that another wild betta keeper overseas uses these leaves (or similar) in his tanks and I thought since we have one down the side of the house I might as well give it a go. 

In other news, my coccina fry became free-swimming today. This is a photo I got of one of the fry out in the main part of the tank.










My rutilans female who I have been a little concerned about also ate a massive amount of grindal worms this morning, so I'm hoping that she continues to eat and put on some condition as she is very scrawny. 

I then did some re-decorating of my Betta uberis tank. I still need to raise the water level by several inches but I ran out of aged water the other day. There's some java moss, an Amazon sword at the back of the tank, hydrilla, duckweed, and some pathetic looking watersprite. The smaller leaves are the leaves from the paperbark tree. I want it as full of plants as possible as I think stress was a big reason they got velvet in the first place and I don't want the male harassing the female all the time. 










My BBS eggs arrived yesterday so I put them on this morning. They are supposed to be 90% + hatch rate and I will see what I get when I harvest them tomorrow. It's been ages since I've hatched any BS so I had to go find all the parts to my BBS hatchery and get it set back up again.


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## LittleBettaFish

My rutilans fry are also free-swimming and are off in the main part of the tank. 

My uberis male extended his nest last night and I imagine those eggs will be close to hatching. Got my fingers crossed that the velvet doesn't rear its ugly head again. 

Very happy with the BBS eggs I got sent. I only used a small amount to feed to my miniopinna fry/juveniles, but got such a good hatch rate I had to feed it to several of my other tanks as there was a lot left over. 

I think my rutilans female had a disagreement with the male as he now has a wedge out of his caudal fin. She ate some BBS this morning, and is definitely acting a lot more normally than she was when I first got her. I just hope her pectoral fin grows back in, as she does have some slight difficulty with getting around. Plus I would rather know it was a cosmetic rather than genetic flaw as I went through three other females trying to get one into the country alive. 

I think I might try some of the paperbark leaves (melaleuca cajuputi to be exact) in a couple of my other wild betta tanks. I have them in with my splendens male, and he has been the most active and aggressive that I've seen him. They seem to last a while underwater and don't fall apart and cause a mess like multiple IAL will do. I would really like to try them in my livida tank to see if that can help encourage a spawn but I only have the one female and I want to be 100% certain they are safe before I put them anywhere near her.


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## LittleBettaFish

My pair of Betta uberis spawned again before the first group of fry even left the nest. The male seems to be way less aggressive towards the female this time around so I'm really hoping that keeps it a low stress environment. 

My rutilans and coccina fry are looking visibly bigger than their newly free-swimming siblings. I threw some microworms into both tanks as I would like to get a good number of fry surviving from these two pairs as my other pair of Betta coccina have died and I just have the one pair of rutilans. I think they were never really as healthy as my second pair, and the whole import process can be so tough on these fragile, wild-caught individuals. 

My livida pair are still not doing anything, so I am going to try and net the female today and introduce her into the smaller tank my other male is in. I'm hoping that he will show some interest and the smaller space will force them into interacting. My other male is beautiful, it just looks like at this point he is a bit of a dud breeding wise. 

My sp. apiapi, hendra and persephone groups are doing great. I've had the towel off my brownorum tank but I am going to have to catch them out individually in a glass to get a really good look at them. I lost the sub-adult female that had been attacked by the others. I think there is something wrong with her as her fins never regrew and all the other fish in the tank really disliked her. If they are fully recovered I will knock up some dividers for their tank, put some substrate back in, and hopefully my three males and their mum can live out the rest of their lives without any further health problems. 

I've got water changes to do today, so I'm going to take some photos this afternoon once everyone has had a tank clean and a feed.


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## LittleBettaFish

I swapped over my livida males so the male that was by himself is now with the female, and my other male is now alone. I'm crossing my fingers this pair gives me a spawn soon as I would love to have a group of Betta livida to continue working with. I know someone who has a couple pairs (from the same seller) interstate so if he managed to get a successful spawn from his, I could use his F1 to introduce some fresh blood. 

Did all my water changes yesterday. I'm thinking I'm going to purchase a pH meter and TDS meter to test my water with. I want to know how close the water in my aging buckets is to my tanks. I'm too scared to do water changes on my coccina/rutilans tanks in case I harm the fry. Although I added 2L to my uberis tank and the fry in there seem fine (now watch as I say this and they all come down with velvet).

My brownorum group are looking okay still. They are very unhappy I have not added substrate back in, but I did add some leaves and managed to wrangle my oldest male back into a breeder box so he wasn't harassing his mother or his smaller brother. 

Going to message the killifish breeder tonight on FB to discuss buying eggs/pairs some more. I still haven't cut the acrylic up to make some dividers for my potential killifish tank. I'm a bit afraid to after my disaster with the stanley knife and my dad was not keen to cut it for me. I'm going to do a test run with the hand saw and see if that's easier to use. 

I also should not have thrown out all my spawning mops. Now I have to go buy some yarn and make some more. This is the second time I've done this exact same thing. You think I would learn. 

I tried and tried to get photos yesterday of my fish but no one would play nice. So I managed two photos of my Betta hendra F1 before I gave up. 

Brother and sister fighting









Still angry at her siblings


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## LittleBettaFish

Ugh my Betta livida female is driving me crazy. First she showed no interest in my first male, and now she has torn up the fins on my second male and has him so stressed I've removed him from the tank for his own safety. 

I think I might put her in a breeder box in the more dominant male's tank, work with him and the mirror to get him really aggressive and then turn her loose and see what happens once she starts looking like she is interested in spawning and not fighting. 

I am starting to think maybe I have a young male, but she has different fins and her body is a different colour from the males so it just might be like my uberis female who bullied my male until I got his self-confidence up. 

My Betta coccina pair have another nest full of fry, while my Betta rutilans and Betta uberis pairs are all showing signs of forthcoming spawns. 

In non-betta news, I am purchasing a pair of Fundulopanchax amieti and a pair of Aphyosemion gabunense (a new import in the country). This is just the start. Hopefully I can have at least a handful of breeding pairs by the end of the year of various species. 

My dad cut my perspex dividers up yesterday while he was over fixing our pantry cupboard. They were a couple mm too short due to my incompetent measuring (not that I told him), so I am going to buy some suction caps and use them at the back of the dividers to hold them in place. It's really just so my adult fish can't get into each other's sections and mingle as some species the females are so similar you can't tell them apart. 

Took a few photos of my fish. 

This is my rutilans male under different lighting. He is so friendly, so it makes taking photos a lot easier. His female is a bit of a squirm and never sits still, but I got one shot off before she went and hide under the IAL. She is tiny, just over an inch long from head to tail. 




























She still only has one pectoral, and the male is still the main suspect in that. 

This is a blurry shot, but shows how much of a turnaround there has been with my uberis male. I'm tentatively hopeful that the velvet doesn't come back, and I've been monitoring him, the female, and their fry for any signs of the disease daily. They are such a common species, but you can't deny how stunning that dorsal and anal is. 



















Then my coccina male not looking his best. He doesn't like to leave his nest for very long and was chasing the female around so this was the best I could do. His ventrals are growing back at least. They will look nice when they are at full length again.










These are some of his fry on the rooibos tea bag near his head. I've been feeding them microworms, and am thinking of putting in some small amounts of BBS every couple of days to supplement the diets of the biggest fry. 










Then this is my livida female doing her best Jaws impersonation.. Not a very happy couple judging by the bite marks and colour on both of them.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think I'm done purchasing any further wild bettas now. Discovered my tank of Betta sp. apiapi are infected with velvet. I was stupid and touched their tank after having done maintenance on the tank of my deceased Betta coccina pair back before I realised they were infected with velvet. Looks like my miniopinna group are also sick for the same reason. 

I have to move all my sp. apiapi group into a hospital tank and cross my fingers they not only survive treatment but that I can get rid of the velvet long-term. I'm unsure of what to do with my miniopinna group. There are so many small fry in their tank that I don't know if I am going to be able to catch them all. I may just pull the plants out of their tank, remove the substrate, and use this tank as a hospital one. 

I really can't see any point in me getting any more wilds if they are just going to end up sick at some point. I don't know why velvet seems intent on plaguing my tanks. It seems so unfair that I can be so successful at keeping and breeding some of the most difficult species of wilds and yet at the same time have such a difficult time with this parasite. 

This is like a kick in the guts, and it's even worse because this time it was my own stupidity that caused the problem. I'm concerned about who else I may have infected but at this point, everyone else (surprisingly including my uberis group) looks healthy. 

So I've decided to have my wilds on the back-burner and focus more on breeding killifish again. I've purchased my pairs of amieti and gabunense and am just waiting on them being shipped out next week. 

http://www.aka.org/wak/Ref_Library/Aphyosemion/A.gabunense.htm

http://www.aka.org/wak/Ref_Library/Fundulopanchax/Fp.amieti.htm

I'm also trying to get Chromaphyosemion Ijebu Ode which looks like this (old photo of a previous male of mine).










Then I would like Chromaphyosemion Volcanum (there are two localities in Oz), Aphyosemion striatum and Chromaphyosemion poliaki. With the tougher new laws coming into effect next year regarding bettas, I wonder if killifish will not gain some new-found popularity. They are just difficult to import in small numbers, which is why we have so few species here in Australia. I really would like if I could get my hands on the two species below some time in the future. There are plenty of rarer species I would love to own, but I have basically no chance of seeing them here unless they come through a wholesaler in Germany. 

http://www.aka.org/wak/Ref_Library/Aphyosemion/A.pyrophore.htm

http://www.aka.org/wak/Ref_Library/Aphyosemion/A.ogoense.htm

So tomorrow I'm going to Kmart to pick up some green acrylic yarn, some plastic poster hangers to hold my perspex dividers in place, and some plastic containers for egg raising/fry grow-outs. 

This afternoon mum is taking me to the local aquarium to see if they have any ambulia/milfoil/cheap aquatic plants for sale. I don't want too many plants in my killifish tanks as otherwise they will use these to lay their eggs in rather than the mops, but I want something to provide a bit of cover and to help with the water quality.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just lost almost my entire group of Betta sp. apiapi. I think I grossly miscalculated the medication dosage for Cupramine and poisoned them. I am in shock. I absolutely loved those fish and to think my own error caused their deaths is just a tragedy. 

Most sad was that I lost my original male. I was so hoping he would have survived.

I pulled six out still alive, three I euthanised as they were dying, but three are doing okay. I think one is actually the original female. I so hope it is as she was my favourite fish and it would be bloody awful to have lost her. 

I don't often cry over my fish, but I was crying just before. 

This hobby can be such a kick in the guts at times. I don't even know if I can get a replacement pair of this species because I am pretty certain their habitat has been destroyed and if I can, I'm not even sure I want one.


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## MattsBettas

I'm so sorry. That's incomprehensibly awful... I hope that the three remaining fish do well.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah I am seriously just considering selling all my wilds. They are too much heartbreak for me. I don't know what I am doing wrong but it kills me that I keep losing fish after fish after fish. 

I'm just waiting for velvet to hit my Betta coccina and Betta rutilans tanks and then I think that will be it for me. I've said it in the past, but this time I just can't stand the thought of me being responsible for one more death. 

I watch my newborn uberis, rutilans, and coccina fry swimming around, and all I can think about is how long it's going to be before they become infected. Seems like if you are a wild betta in my fish room, you are going to get velvet at some point.


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## Aquatail

I'm so sorry about your fish. Swim in peace.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Aquatail. 

As of now, I have three survivors who are in a small tank. I was afraid they would jump out of the water aging bucket as I couldn't cover it completely. 

Two were feeling well enough to have a flare at each other and a bit of a circle so hopefully that means that they will make a full recovery.

I _think_ one of them is the original female but it's hard to tell. It could be a male. 

And apparently their habitat is gone, so no chance of a wild-caught pair unless the seller who was going to replace my DOA pair can manage to find some.


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## LittleBettaFish

I am 99% sure it _is_ my original female I managed to save. She was the only one that was always up front and would come when I tapped on the glass, and last night when she saw me she came over and then gobbled down some grindal worms that I put in. I also managed to save at least one male offspring, so maybe if I can get these guys back to full health like my Betta uberis pair, there is the chance I could get a spawn in the future. Would really just like if I could get at least 10-20 fry to raise up. 

They are still clamped and uncomfortable looking, but that looks to be from the velvet. I'm seriously so happy that I at least managed to save these three. I just wish my original male had survived as he and his female were such a bonded pair and he was the most stunning fish with his colouring and very pointed caudal. 

In other news I have to get my killifish tank filled up today as I think my pairs of Fp. amieti and A. gabunense may be arriving today. 

I have also got a reply from the interstate killifish breeder and he will be sending me a pair of Ch. volcanum Mile 8, as well as eggs from Ch. Ijebu Ode, Ch. poliaki and Ch. volcanum Ekondo Titi. They won't be coming until next week possibly as he needs time to collect the eggs. This will give _me_ time to sort out my tanks. 

He also said that in the next couple of years he is working on getting A. ogoense and A. pyrophore into the country. These are the two species I absolutely love so this is pretty exciting. Hopefully killifish don't find themselves facing any sort of further restrictions to their import between then and now. 

This was a photo I took a while ago of my orignal sp. apiapi male. So sad that he has gone.


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## hrutan

I am so sorry to hear of your terrible losses. What a heartbreak. My best wishes to you. Hopefully the remaining three will make full recoveries.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well the female and her son were having a sparring match outside the film canister this morning, so I think they will be okay. 

My killifish pairs arrived just before. So happy with these four. The colours on them are amazing already (in spite of the interstate journey and their rather sparse tank), and the Fp. amieti male is already trying to coax his female over to the spawning mop.

Hopefully can start getting some eggs from these pairs soon. 

My Fp. amieti male when I first let him out of the bag. 










The males meeting through the divider. 










My A. gabunense male showing his beautiful colouring.


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## LittleBettaFish

Killifish seem to be settling in well. Saw some spawning with my Fp. amieti pair. My A. gabunense pair are a little more subdued but they were eating mosquito larvae so hopefully with another couple of days they will settle in fully. I would like to get these two pairs into separate tanks, but this means I will have to try and have all my wilds on my main rack/sideboard and then my killifish on my smaller rack. I suppose at least with me being sent three lots of eggs, I will have plenty of time to get future tanks sorted. 

In wild betta news, I moved my livida pair back into the bigger tank. This time however, I put the beaten up male into a 1.5L container with a handful of plants and have it standing in the main tank as well. I thought perhaps his presence might spark some territorial aggression in the other male and encourage a spawn. I've never had fish that showed such a distinct lack of interest in each other. It's very strange. Next step will be to really darken up the water and bump the temperature up a couple of degrees (I think it's around 24 degrees at the moment). 

My three surviving sp. apiapi are still alive. In fact, they were fighting over some mosquito larvae just now. I think I am going to start their treatment again this weekend as I can't just leave the velvet untreated. This water/tank has never had any copper treatment used in it before, and this time I am going to be so, so careful with dosage. I really think this Cupramine is the best medication I've used thus far to treat the velvet as it did a great job with my rutilans green, uberis, and brownorum. I just want them to be comfortable and out of the hospital tank ASAP as they look very miserable all clamped up and covered in parasites. 

Joty, the seller I get most of my wilds off (including my original pair of sp. apiapi) has said that he will try and find me a replacement pair if possible. Depending on his stock levels I might get two just in case something happens to the first (such as dying in transit/quarantine). I've got all my fingers crossed that this is possible. I don't mind waiting until early next year as he said he had none for the December shipment. But if I could get two wild-caught pairs of sp. apiapi, that would be good. 

I've got to get a new aging bucket/tub set-up. I think I might drag in one of the 50L or so tubs I have outside. Most of my buckets have come into contact with infected fish so I am hesitant to use them until we can get either bleach or rubbing alcohol from the shops and I can give them a thorough scrub out.


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## andakin

tl;dr. I just started from the last page.

It's so cool you have killifish. I can't understand why these guys are so unpopular in the aquarium hobby. Killis are some of the most colourful fish with interesting markings.

I recently got two pairs of small killis along with some peacock gudgeons and scarlet badis.


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## LittleBettaFish

I know. They are so beautifully coloured and once they get to know you, extremely personable fish. I find them very similar to bettas in temperament. In fact, I used to 'flare' some of my previous males with a mirror. 

Hopefully I can build my killifish collection back to what it was at its peak. It's just a matter of space and finances, both of which I am extremely limited on. 

Here's some other killifish species I *love*, but more than likely will never own in my lifetime. 

http://www.aka.org/wak/Ref_Library/Aphyosemion/A.congicum.htm

http://www.aka.org/wak/Ref_Library/Aphyosemion/A.sp Oyo.htm

http://www.aka.org/wak/Ref_Library/Aphyosemion/A.ocellatum.htm

That these are the natural colours of these fish is amazing. I would dare say some of these killifish (particularly annuals) would rival marines.


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## andakin

Having just tuned in to this thread, tl;dr anything prior to this. I had no idea you had a killi collection. Judging from your photos, you must have an expensive taste for fish.

I think I read somewhere that killifish are unpopular because they lack common names. It confuses the hell out of people wanting to enter the world of killis. I have only ever seen one type of killis sold at pet stores here, and thats the least attractive of them all, the Golden Wonder.

Have you ever considered ordering killi eggs online? I want to give it a try but I don't know enough about them.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha yeah my journal is over a year now. I have had killifish in the past, just never really seriously bred anything but Aphyosemion australe gold. I've been having difficulties with my wild bettas of late, so wanting to switch track to killifish again. 

I prefer the Chromaphyosemion/Aphyosemion group of fish. So getting three lots of eggs and a young pair of fish from a breeder in Canberra soon. Probably also would like to get a pair of Aphyosemion striatum.

Yeah fish are more expensive here in Australia anyway because of our tough quarantine restrictions and a lot of species are very limited. So it usually costs me around $100 to import and ship a pair of wild bettas. Killifish are slightly cheaper as they are usually imported in through a wholesaler as you can only get them from Germany, but still can be from $50 upwards for a pair depending on species and source.

You see, I actually prefer them not having common names and I think it affords less confusion. I find scientific names are so much easier when identifying fish. Particularly because killifish are so strict about purity that they usually distinguish locality in the name, so you get a species name and then where that species has come from. Some more commonly traded species seem to have other names, but I don't hear/read anyone using them much. 

As for eggs. They are illegal to import into Australia. This is why our killifish market is so limited even though all species from the Fundulopanchax, Aphyosemion and Chromaphyosemion groups are allowed in. 

I've only ever had experience with hatching the non-annual plant spawners. Annuals are rarer here and I find the whole drying and hatching process for them to be slightly intimidating.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just picked 13 eggs off the mop in my A. gabunense tank! They are now in my hatchery container so fingers crossed they are fertile and hatch in another couple of weeks. 

No eggs to be found in my Fp. amieti tank, but I think they are actually spawning in the substrate. 

My equipment for my killifish arrived today. Got a new Sera air pump, three new sponge filters, 20 metres of airline tubing, 25 large IALs, an ammonia test kit, and 2kg of this Ista plant substrate. Stupidly I forgot to buy a gang valve, so I'm going to have to pick one up this weekend. I also want to pick up some thicker yarn to make new mops with. I don't like the colour or look of the yarn I have now. 

My two pairs will be going into individual 30cm tanks. Then I will have a 30cm left over for my Ch. volcanum Mile 8 pair and will use a couple of 45cm tanks as hatcheries/fry grow-outs. 

My wilds are doing well (or as well as velvet infected fish can be). My three sp. apiapi are still alive. Going to try start their treatment again tomorrow. But this time I am going to be monitoring them every hour to make sure they are okay and tolerating the medication. 

My miniopinna group are still infected with velvet so I am going to have to move them into a hospital tank. Which will be fun because there are so many small fry to net out. 

My poor coccina female is very frazzled. It looks like some newly hatched fry have gotten separated from the nest. They keep falling to the substrate and she keeps going down to retrieve them in her mouth and spit them up at the surface. But they can't hold onto anything so they just fall back down again and she has to go down and retrieve them once more. I thought she was eating them, but she is just being an exceptionally good mother. 

Yesterday, I took this photo of my Betta uberis pair. They have a lot of fry and seem happy and healthy. They are on my main rack now, next to my Betta hendra tank. The male didn't notice he was being followed ....










I also got my original Betta hendra male looking unhappy with one of his sons.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just sharing some photos I took of my male Betta livida before. He is obviously not fully coloured up here. That's my dud male in some of the photos behind him. 




































I love his spade caudal. My other male had his chewed up by the female so it's got to grow back.


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## LittleBettaFish

Got 30 eggs now from my A. gabunense pair. I'm sure there will be more in a couple of days. I'm already seeing eyes in a couple of the eggs, so looks like at least some were fertilised. No eggs from my Fp. amieti pair. So my new plan is to remove the substrate from their tank, paint the bottom of the tank black, and put a couple of dark brown spawning mops over the bottom for them to spawn in. They seem to prefer spawning into the substrate so I am not going to give them a choice. 

I also idiotically took a big chip out of the corner of my Fp. amieti tank when I was moving it around last night. I really need to just start using plastic containers as I don't think a single tank I own is without a chip. 

Tomorrow is the day I start treatment on my Betta miniopinna and Betta sp. apiapi. I forgot you are not supposed to use Seachem Prime in conjunction with Cupramine, so I have to wait 24 hours according to their site until it is okay to use my aged water. After poisoning my group of sp. apiapi it's not a risk I really wanted to take. 

Apart from that, not much else has been going on. My uberis, rutilans, and coccina fry seem to be growing out well, and I'm going to be adding some substrate back into my brownorum tank again and getting that set back up properly now that it looks like they are free from velvet. 

I took a few more photos of my Betta livida male as he is so stunning and a bit more coloured up here. 









I wish this was side-on, it would have been a great shot



















My male in the jar has also been gaining a lot more confidence and is more willing to engage with my breeding male. His colour is improving and his damaged caudal is healing, so I have a feeling he is going to mature into a nice-looking boy. My female is also putting on some condition now I've been pretty heavy-handed with feeding them. I'm still hoping for a spawn. Even just one would be fine.


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## autojoy

I really enjoy seeing your beautiful wilds


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## Littlefin

autojoy said:


> I really enjoy seeing your beautiful wilds


I agree! And the spade caudal does look very pretty


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## LittleBettaFish

Thansk Littlefin and Autojoy. 

I know they are not to everyone's taste here on this forum, but I think they are beautiful in a way completely different to the man-made Betta splendens.


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## Littlefin

LittleBettaFish said:


> Thansk Littlefin and Autojoy.
> 
> I know they are not to everyone's taste here on this forum, but I think they are beautiful in a way completely different to the man-made Betta splendens.


I agree on that too. Sure, man-made bettas have long fins colorful fins and lots of different colors, but wild bettas.. they might have short tails and all, but their colors are awesome! They're so shiny, they look like little gemstones to me lol


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## LittleBettaFish

Yes, they are like living jewels. The iridescence really pops in the darker water in a way you can't really see in the photos. Their blue and green eyes also seem to glow.

Today I moved my miniopinna group to their hospital tank and did a small water change on my sp. apiapi hospital tank. Tomorrow the treatment with Seachem Cupramine starts and hopefully this time I get my dosages correct and don't poison everyone. I was going to start tonight but I want to be able to supervise them all day to make sure they don't have a reaction. 

I put some substrate back into my brownorum tank, and straight away they coloured up and have started behaving normally again. God that original female is such an ugly fish though. She looks like an inmate from a female prison or something. No wonder she managed to murder her long-term partner. It's lucky her sons seem to have inherited enough of her nastiness to keep themselves out of harm's way. 

I spied on my killifish eggs this morning, and I can see lots of eyes now! Some look to be getting close to hatching. I have this feeling I am going to be inundated with killifish fry soon and I'm running out of power points to plug heaters, air pumps, and my various other equipment into. 

Also made a quick trip to the localish fish store and got some ambulia, milfoil, and two small anubias for my killifish tanks. While they seem to treat their stock well, it seems like such a generic, waste of a store. I love niche market fish, so I really like a store you can go in and find something out of the ordinary. I don't know how these sort of stores survive as they have so much competition in places like Pets at Home.


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## LittleBettaFish

This is basically how I feel at the moment. 










There's no real fish news, because my mood has been pretty low these last couple of days. Bandit our old cat has been having a rough time, and I've been worrying about him, as he is starting to reach the end of his life expectancy for his intestinal lymphoma. This coupled with the fact that I think velvet may have infected some more of my tanks means I've just not wanted anything to do with my fish at all. 

I went out for lunch today at a nearby Chinese restaurant because it's my birthday tomorrow. I swear birthdays more and more depressing the older you get. I'm going to be twenty-five, unemployed with no formal qualifications, and the only job experience was several years ago managing a Subway store. 

I did get $50 off my dad, so tomorrow I am going to drop by one of the bigger fish stores in Melbourne and have a look at what they've got in stock. I need some Malaysian driftwood so I can attach my anubias in my killifish tanks to it, then I need some live blackworms as mine all escaped into the bottom section of the fridge and died (luckily I cleaned that up before mum noticed). I also want to see if they have any killifish. I'm after a pair of Aphyosemion australe Cap Lopez, or Aphyosemion striatum. 

Meanwhile, the young dog who lives behind us and who seems to spend the majority of its life alone outside, has gotten into our backyard twice in the past few days. Luckily, it was only Eos and Ares the first time. I managed to get Ares inside while the puppy and Eos spent the next ten minutes racing around the yard until I could get the leash on Eos and get her out our side gate. Then just now he has eaten his way through the wire and was back in our yard with Eos. So we had to do a temporary fix of the fence while the puppy sat in the crate in the kitchen and then we drove him home and put him away. There was no one home _again_ when we went. I feel so sorry for him, as he is a sweet dog and absolutely loves playing with Eos. It's so sad to see him just left alone in this overgrown backyard full of dog poo and things he has destroyed. It's no wonder he wants to join our 'pack'. I think he will be lonely when we finally get a timber fence along the back and he won't be able to see into our yard any more.


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## andakin

Life is tough. I've been going through a similar episode. HBD anyway. Feel better!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Andakin. 

Good news is I have at least 50 eggs from my A. gabunense pair. I have heaps that are eyed up now, so counting down the days until they hatch.

My Fp. amieti are in the bad books. I've got to get out and buy them some brown yarn so I can remove the substrate from their tank and force them to spawn onto a mop. They continue to mock me by spawning everywhere but the mop I have offered them.


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## Hallyx

Birthdays are depressing ...for now. Eventually, when you get old enough, you get to a point when you look around and say, "Sheet! I just lasted another year....HAH! So there!" That's as good as it gets.

Happy Birthday.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha I'm worn out just thinking of the future birthdays that I have to get through.

It's like Christmas. It's so much effort. If I had my way I'd just stay at home by myself. 

I've cheered myself up doing some maintenance on my killifish tanks. I rearranged their plants, picked a whole heap more eggs off the mops in my A. gabunense tank, set up a hatchery with three 2.5L containers for my eggs/potential fry, and gave them all a feeding of mosquito larvae. Apparently it will be a good year for mosquitoes. I can only hope. 

I forgot how fast killifish can move. Especially when you've made them skittish with a tank change. 










But you can kind of see how stunning they can be when they are showing off for their females.


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## andakin

Glad you were able to keep your mind off the QLC blues.

That is a stunning photo. I'm jealous of the unique fish you own. I've been meaning to ask, what do you use to turn your water black?


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## LittleBettaFish

He is stunning. Unfortunately, he is shyer than his greedy female so I can't get any nice close-ups of him at the moment. 

I use rooibos and IAL to get my water dark. I put IAL into my tanks, and use rooibos in my water aging buckets. That way when I do water changes, the water stays a darker colour.

I used to use peat moss as substrate in my tanks which also helped, but that can get messy when all your plants grow into it.


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## andakin

What are your thoughts on having blackwater? I currently use Tetra's Blackwater Extract. I do it for the looks. I might switch to something else if there are actual benefits.


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## LittleBettaFish

My wilds won't show their full range of colour unless their water is kept dark, and I find the species of killies I keep, are also more comfortable in darker water. 

My wilds also would naturally inhabit regions with very soft water/low pH, so using the rooibos and IAL helps to bring the pH down. 

What fish do you have in the extract? I find even captive bred fish that would naturally inhabit blackwater environments in the wild do prefer a tint to the water. I personally don't like the aesthetics of perfectly clear water, so all my tanks have some form of tannins in them, except for my goldfish.


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## LittleBettaFish

Some happy killifish snaps. Only time they stay still is when they are eating. 

I love the colouring of this male. 




























This is their tank. The container of peat moss is just for them to play in. 










This is my egg hatchery. Hoping for fry soon. Ideally I would have one of these going for each killifish species I own. But probably I will just go purchase a 3-4 foot tank or tub and have everyone in labelled containers.


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## andakin

HBD again.

I agree with you that blackwater is a great look. I might stick with the Tetra brand as it's more convenient and cleaner than other methods. I try to keep this hobby as maintenance-free as possible. I don't think the extract has any effect on the ph or hardness though. I might be missing out.

My blackwater tank is currently housing a small group of Peacock Gudgeons. The goal is to have them breed them in there. You seem to have a lot of success with small egg layers. Do you have any tips? I have successfully spawned other egglayers in the past but my last batch of Congo Tetra eggs completely dissolved. Do you think tumblers are needed in general?


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## LittleBettaFish

I used to use blackwater extracts but I don't think they have much of an effect on parameters. The good thing about my water was it has basically no carbonate hardness out of the tap so it is easy to manipulate downwards and perfect for softwater species. 

I'm not sure what sort of method you utilise to artificially hatch peacock gudgeon eggs. Normally with my Australian natives and killifish I have bred, I put the eggs into a smaller container with a couple of drops of methylene blue to help prevent fungus. Then I run an airstone on low, and do small water changes every couple of days until the eggs hatch. Any eggs that look bad I remove as soon as I see them so they don't contaminate the others. 

I actually only have ever worked with a small band of fish species so I'm not really all that experienced with fish outside of wild bettas/Australian natives/killifish. 

Onto my fishy stuff, I went to the aquarium today and picked up three serves of live blackworms and some driftwood. Their fish selection was surprisingly woeful today (they had some australe gold that were not very good quality), and their bettas were in terrible condition. It's quite sad as it is a large place that imports its own stock. I think that's the last I will be going there for a while. 

I did some fiddling in my fish room today. Everyone had a feeding of live blackworms and were happy with that. My Betta hendra group has velvet for sure. Not surprising because they shared a bucket with my sp. apiapi as both had been disease free for a year or more now. Stupid me. I'm going to set-up a hospital tank for them, move them into it, treat them, and when they are better, sell off everyone but my F0 pair and two of the nicest F1 pairs. 

My Betta coccina male has been really freaking out the past couple of days. I thought he had velvet but even with my bright torch I can't see anything on him, his female, or their fry. I added some rooibos today, and he ate some blackworms, and that seems to have settled him down a bit. His female absolutely abhors the livida female in the tank over so this afternoon I removed the divider between their tanks so they could have a bit of a flare. 

Speaking of my livida, the female has coloured up immensely and is showing some very promising behaviour. She is much more interested in the male, and he has been more responsive to her. I'm not sure whether to move the male in the jar out of the tank to see if they'll breed, or if his absence will again lead to disinterest between my pair. 

I took a couple of photos as they are beautiful fish. Unfortunately, my best photo was blurry and he wouldn't pose for me again. 


















This is the female showing some breeding bars


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## LittleBettaFish

Very excited right now.

I thought I was going to go grey before my Betta livida pair spawned. They were showing promising behaviour yesterday but nothing too exciting. That was until just now when I notice the breeding male is missing (normally up the front of the tank) and the female is trying to murder the second male through the plastic jar he is in. 

Turns out they spawned sometime today and there is a small nest of eggs the male is guarding at the back of the tank. 

If I can get fry from this pair, it will mean I have successfully bred (although not as successful in the fry raising) the following species of wilds:

Betta albimarginata
Betta channoides 
Betta strohi
Betta unimaculata
Betta sp. apiapi
Betta brownorum
Betta burdigala
Betta coccina
Betta hendra
Betta livida
Betta miniopinna
Betta persephone
Betta rutilans
Betta sp. cf. rutilans green
Betta sp. wajok
Betta tussyae
Betta uberis 

Not too shabby a list. A guy I am friends with on FB who lives in QLD, is very good at finding rare species of wilds through his contacts. He already has provided me with two species I would love to try and import. I am like a moth to the flame with these wilds. They make me feel as though I am going crazy some days, and yet they never seem to leave my fish room. In fact I seem to end up with more of them every year. 

My Betta coccina pair also spawned. I guess that means the male is okay. He seems more calm with the darker water. I'm going to brew up some concentrated rooibos tea and use that in their tank. 

Perhaps the most important thing on my list is to get a digital pH meter. In fact, I may just order the $50 one I have been looking at today, and if it turns out to be crap, get a new one with my Christmas money.


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## LittleBettaFish

Finally got a decent photo of my Fp. amieti male and my Fp. female. She is starting to show some lovely, subtle colouration on her fins. The male is obviously much more brightly coloured, but I think the female killifish have a beauty all of their own. 



















Daily feedings of mosquito larvae/white worms/blackworms are making them less skittish. As my male A. gabunense is the only male in the tank, the ends of his tail are starting to grow longer. 

Still no sign of any fry. But I had my hatching dates wrong, so perhaps I will see some fry soon. 

They really like the wood I put in there. One thing I like about killifish, is that as soon as you put something into the tank, the males want to know if it's something they can spawn on/in. 

My male Betta livida is still tending his nest. The female has been getting fat on mosquito larvae so hopefully that primes her for a second spawn. My Betta coccina male is tending his eggs, and I discovered my Betta rutilans had also spawned again.


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## Schmoo

I've never commented, but I just want to say that I really enjoy reading your journal. c:


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Schmoo. I'm glad to hear there are other people out there reading this journal even if they don't comment. 

Makes me feel less like a crazy person talking to an empty room.


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## Schmoo

I'll start commenting more! I just don't know anything abot killifish or wild type bettas... ^^;


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha most don't on this forum, so don't worry. 

I was going through my killifish egg containers today, and apart from a few bad eggs, discovered a fry in one of them. So I have put some microworms in both containers as there is a lot of java moss and IAL, so I might have missed other fry, and also because it seems live foods vibrating in the water can sometimes trigger hatching.

It's so different from bettas. It's really interesting watching the fry develop within the egg and then hatch out. I've stopped collecting eggs at the moment as if the majority of these hatch, I am going to have my hands full with A. gabunense fry.


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## LittleBettaFish

So, my Betta livida pair have been consistently spawning, as have my coccina and rutilans pairs (although the bigger rutilans fry have started cannibalising their younger siblings). My uberis pair and fry seem to be doing well, and I have resumed treatment on my miniopinna and remaining sp. apiapi with Seachem Cupramine. I dosed it yesterday and was checking them every couple of hours. Their next dose is tomorrow and then on Christmas I will know if I have successfully treated it or not. 

My hendra group also needs treatment. Otherwise all my fish seem to be doing well - or as well as my fish ever do. 

I have four A. gabunense fry now and I can see some eggs that must just be days away from hatching. I think I pulled an eyed up egg off my Fp. amieti mop as well, so maybe I can get at least one fry from them if it hatches. 

Unfortunately, the next shipment into Australia for fish is February. I was hoping for a January shipment because of that new law effectively barring imports of wilds which comes into action in March. If I have DOAs on the February shipment I'm not sure what happens then. 

So until then, I am going to be working on getting my fish rack sorted and growing out my fry. 

Our old cat Bandit had to have about four or five teeth removed earlier this week. He has a large heart murmur and a number of other health problems, so I was a bit worried about him being put under. He was only expected to get one out as it was infected and there was bone loss, but while it was being removed, our vet said they poked another tooth and all this pus came out. 

However, even though he's a bit drugged up from the Fentanyl patch they put on, he already seems a lot happier. I don't know how long those teeth were like that but it must have been so painful.

Anyway, got this photo of my two bigger F1 brownorum males. They are a lot more shy now following their treatment for velvet and a massive tank change around. 










Their mum is still as evil and fat as ever. 










I would like to try and get my hands on another pair, with a nicer female on the February shipment, preferably a female with a spot. Mine had only a faint one and it faded and I wonder if this is why only my male F1 offspring have developed one. 

I know the Matang locality has the largest spots, and I would love to have a whole tank full of male and female brownorum who look like this.










I also purchased a digital pH pen finally so that should probably arrive next week. I am very keen to see what the pH in my tanks actually is, whether it varies over time due to the low KH value, and what the pH of my aging buckets is after a week of sitting with rooibos. I want to know whether it is a fluctuating pH that is causing issues with the health of my fish and fry. If not, I can rule that out as a contributing factor.


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## Schmoo

From what I've read about Australia's shipping on this forum, it seems incredibly strict... Why is this?  I'm also not trying to sound offensive or anything! >__<


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## andakin

Schmoo said:


> From what I've read about Australia's shipping on this forum, it seems incredibly strict... Why is this?  I'm also not trying to sound offensive or anything! >__<


You gain some, you lose some. There are fish and plants you are allowed to keep in certain countries but not others. Each country has their own reasons.

I don't know much about Australia but I can compare Canada with the US. The Asian Arowana for instance; it's legal to keep in Canada but not in the States. Why? Because that fish is endangered in the wild. But all of the imported Arowanas are now farm raised, documented, and microchipped. Some of these policies need to be updated to better reflect the current situation. There are also aquarium plants we can legally keep in Canada but not in the states because they take over and invade the ecosystem. Americans can keep genetically modified GloFish but we can't in Canada.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think Australia is just behind New Zealand in terms of limitations on importing live fish and aquatic plants into the country. In one of our territories, I believe you can only own fish native to that territory, anything else is destroyed. In a couple of other states, it is very expensive to ship fish there, and often you need a license or have to pay quite large fees to receive them. 

We have so many fish species that we cannot import. I believe all shrimp, including cherry shrimp, are technically illegal, but there are so many here it is difficult to police. 

All live fish also have to go through a lengthy quarantine procedure at an approved facility immediately upon arrival into the country.

We have new laws coming in next year, that will most likely effectively ban the import of individual livebearers, cichlids, and wild bettas. There is going to be batch testing on each shipment and I think it's just going to be financially unviable for any but the bigger wholesalers to import these species into the country. It's sad because for many wild betta species the gene pool is already severely restricted to a handful of individuals. I can only see this getting worse.


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## Nimble

I can understand WHY Australia is so stringent on their species import regulations. After the issue with the rabbits, I'm not surprised things are so strict.


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## LittleBettaFish

Surprisingly the Government (or some sort of authority body) actually introduced two of the worst pests into Australia: gambusia and cane toads. They have done some serious ecological damage to the country. Gambusia have encroached on so many waterways throughout Australia, and cane toads seem to be on an unstoppable march across the country.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I have six A. gabunense fry as of yesterday and I will be checking today to see if any further eggs have hatched. I do partial water changes on my hatching containers with water from the main breeding tanks as I have found this is the best way for my younger fry. The older fry are growing well. They seem capable of growing faster in a smaller body of water (containers are about 2.5L) than bettas do. 

I set-up the hospital tank for my Betta hendra yesterday. I just want to wait a few more days for the temperature and water conditions to stabilise and then I will break down the main tank and move the fish into the hospital tank for treatment.

I haven't killed any of my sp. apiapi and miniopinna with the Cupramine this time and they've had both doses. I seriously think I must have overdosed it with my sp. apiapi group simply because that is the only time I have killed a large number of fish whilst using it. I can't wait until the two weeks are up. I so hope I manage to eradicate the velvet as successfully as I have with my uberis. 

My poor livida female has been getting bullied by the male. I am going to try and get some more java moss for the bare space at the front of the tank so he can't find her as easily. If he keeps being this aggressive I think I will separate her. I can't risk losing her. 

My coccina pair have just been endlessly spawning. It's a shame as the male is stunning and I never get any photos of him because he is always in the film canister. 

I found this huge 1.5cm rutilans fry that had stuffed itself on part of a blackworm up near the surface of the tank. It is bigger than all its siblings and is going to be separated out as it will start to cannibalise everyone soon. I don't even know where Fryzilla came from as I have not seen it until yesterday afternoon. 

I took a couple photos of my persephone. I am contemplating getting a new pair of this species if possible. I really need to get another rack. I am just so out of space it's frustrating. Since my older brother gave me his laptop, I don't need to buy one of my own. So I know have like $1000 of tax return money to spend importing wilds before this March law comes into action. 



















Then my uberis male.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well darn. I had a quick check of my hospital tank and found my miniopinna male belly-up. Everyone else appeared okay and ate the grindals I put in. I am really sad about him as he was a beautiful fish and I was looking forward to putting him back in with his female after treatment and giving them some time free from their offspring. 

RIP Mr miniopinna. Hopefully you have a son as nice as you were. I wish I had more photos, but these are the best of him. His caudal developed a nice point to it as he matured and he was always a great father, albeit a sometimes abusive partner to his female.


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## SiameseFightingArt

I'm sorry about your loss


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## cheekysquirrel

Very sorry to hear, LBF :-(


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks you two. I always find it sad when I lose one of my foundation breeding stock. I really grow fond of my breeding pairs, probably because unlike their fry, I normally keep them long-term.


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## Aqua Aurora

LittleBettaFish said:


> y persephone. I am contemplating getting a new pair of this species if possible. I really need to get another rack. I am just so out of space it's frustrating. *Since my older brother gave me his laptop, I don't need to buy one of my own. So I know have like $1000 of tax return money to spend importing wilds before this March law comes into action.
> *


Are you talking about the Prospect Act or is there another species restriction law coming out? When I heard of it it was just for West Va, has it spread?


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## LittleBettaFish

I'm Australian. I'm assuming South East PA is in America, so it would not effect you at all unless you also live in Oz.


----------



## Aqua Aurora

Ah didn't realize where you were k. And yes Pa in in the states. I'd heard of an act being drafted to try to past in West Virginia (also in US) in the summer that would ban a lot of common fish like live bearers pretty much every catfish, and most if not all tetra (even ones that are easily home/farm bred not wild caught)... Never heard more about it so hoping it just fell apart. I understand trying to protect from wild harvesting fish and limiting pets being released but some of the stuff on the list was a bit redicolous.
I've heard Australia has insanely strick laws limiting a lot of aquatic species. Even some people talking about (don't know if just rumors) "the government" breaking into thier homes and pouring chemicals in thier tanks to kill an illegal species (and everything else)... Hoping that was just some urban myth sort of thing.


Will the law not allow you to keep what you have or to sell/gift offspring you e bred? Or just a "no longer importing ______" law.


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## LittleBettaFish

Nope those are not urban myths. I know of several instances where this was the case. This is why I would not risk purchasing an illegally imported fish or plant. It's AQIS I believe who comes around and will poison tanks to kill basically everything. 

No it won't impact Australian bred stock. It's just that the batch testing required will mean that individual imports of these species most likely won't be financially viable. I am not sure as to the numbers they kill and test per shipment, but I imagine only wholesalers will be able to bear the cost of having a percentage of their shipment tested. 

They were trying to pass something similar through a while back that was related to the iridovirus but that got quashed. So now this law is coming into effect. I am hoping they haven't got everything together for it to be instated in March. A couple extra months to still be able to import my wilds would be good.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Was chased out of my 'fish room' by my mother while I was trying to take photos because she's taken it over as a study while hers is being renovated downstairs. So photos will come later. 

Still no more killifish fry other than the seven I have. However, these seven seem to be thriving and are already showing their boisterous killifish nature. I found some tiny mosquito larvae in one of my outside containers, and they very eagerly hunted it down. 

I moved my hendra group into their hospital tank and am just about to start their treatment with the Cupramine. My miniopinna/sp. apiapi look unhappy but are not reacting adversely to the medication, so I'm hoping that the previous disaster was truly just a mistake on my part. Hopefully I can get this group back to their previous good health. 

I'm impatiently waiting for my new 200 watt heater and pH pen as I want to get these before I set-up my water aging tub again. I'm hoping it arrives tomorrow as my brownorum are showing a reluctance to spawn and I am using a substrate that supposedly buffers the pH to 6.5 so I am wondering if this is why. I also am curious as to what the pH is in my breeding tanks. 

I got my BBS hatchery running for tomorrow. I don't feed my fry every day. In between my feeds they pick at whatever infusoria etc. is in the tank. 

I also asked my mum about the possibility of getting rid of my sideboard and putting a third rack in my bedroom as a temporary measure until I get my rack downstairs. I have simply run out of space and there are still more wilds I want to get. Surprisingly she actually agreed. 

http://www.bunnings.com.au/our-range/brands/r/rack-it

This is the brand I'm going to be getting. I'm using it now, and I know other hobbyists who use the same thing in their fish room so I know how it copes with holding my tanks. 

I want 1800mm high x 600mm wide x 1200mm across. That way I could fit three or four shelves on and get three or four tanks on per shelf. 

I also want to set-up a grow-out for some of my wild betta fry on a completely separate 'system' from the main tanks. The way I run my tanks now, if something happens to the main tank I can lose not only my breeding pair, but also their fry. That is how I lose how species/lines of fish. 

I'm thinking of a shallow plastic tub to act as a bain-marie, and using either plastic containers or small (and cheap) tanks as the actual grow-outs. I'm going to have it so that I can do automatic top-offs on each tank with aged water, and each tank will have its own permanently attached siphon (probably DIYed from sprinkler parts) so I don't risk contamination. Having the third rack will really allow me to do this. 

My big project now is to disinfect the huge amount of buckets, plastic tubing, heaters, and sponge filters I have that have come into contact with velvet infected tanks. I was thinking very hot water and white vinegar, a good rinse, and then left out in the sun for a couple of days until completely dry. It's going to take me forever, but I can't afford to just throw it all away.


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## LittleBettaFish

Had something potentially bad happen yesterday morning.

I came into my fish room and found a fish flopping about on the carpet. I had no idea what tank it had come from, but if it was one of my healthy wilds I didn't want to put it in one of my infected tanks. So I did the only thing I could think of, and put it into one of my killifish fry containers.

Unfortunately, it turns out it was one of the sick Betta hendra. So he went back into the hospital tank ASAP, and I put some medication straight into the container. I'm hoping the fry don't get velvet as it was the container with my four largest. 

I did however, start treatment on my Betta hendra group yesterday. They seem to be tolerating the first dose of Cupramine fine, and the second dose is due tomorrow. My group of sp. apiapi/miniopinna also still look fine, and had a meal of BBS and grindals yesterday afternoon. 

I am pretty sure my pair of Betta brownorum are spawning. I had a look in the film canister this morning and they were both in there, after showing promising signs yesterday. This will be their first spawn since they were treated for velvet, so we will see what comes of it. 

My digital pH pen and 200 watt heater came yesterday. I just need to purchase some distilled water for my pH pen so I can calibrate it correctly.

These are several of the best photos I took the other day. My coccina male is absolutely stunning but he is always guarding eggs or fry so I never get a decent photo of him.



















This is his plump partner. 

Then this is my Betta rutilans female. Her pectoral fin has still never grown back so she has a rather lopsided swimming style.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I've done nothing thus far fish wise.

Instead today I got my eyebrows and upper lip waxed. My eyebrows have been waxed exactly once before, and I have been too afraid to pluck them without some sort of basic shape to use as a guideline, so they were looking pretty untidy. However, I didn't want to have them waxed too thin, as I don't want to be drawing my eyebrows on. Luckily the lady who did them liked thick brows, and she just neatened mine up. 

Sadly while my eyebrows look good, my skin is terrible. It's dry, it's sore, and it's covered in this humongous hormonal acne on my lower cheeks, chin and jaw. I'm not kidding, I think the pimple on my chin is now large enough to qualify for its own postcode. I really have to go to a doctor or dermatologist and get my skin sorted out. I'm 25 and I've got worse skin now than I did when I was going through puberty. People suffering from something like cystic acne, probably would think I am being precious, but I'm starting to get quite a bit of scarring on my cheeks, not to mention it's very painful when I get these huge blind pimples forming that take days to come to a head. I won't go anywhere outside my house without make-up on nowadays. I'm so envious of people with clear skin. I see people who absolutely cake on their make-up, eat unhealthily, and go around with greasy hair and their skin is still great. I try to eat healthy, keep my make-up to a minimum (I just use a Body Shop BB cream and mineral powder), and do things like keep my hair out of my face and wash my pillows regularly. I even cut out like 90% of the dairy I was eating because I heard that can cause skin issues. Yet without fail, once or twice a month, I have these huge break-outs that barely have time to heal before the next one begins. 

I'm very average looks wise to begin with, so it's even worse with my terrible skin. This is what I feel like most days.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQHZL9ePMKk

It's just so very annoying. Plus if you thought the conflicting information on fish keeping was bad enough, try looking at anything regarding treating/preventing acne. You get things like "This face wash cleared up my skin and now it's so dewy and soft I've become an internationally acclaimed model", and then directly below that, you get comments like, "This product burned all my skin off and now I am in the ICU with my acne worse than before". 

I'm also annoyed with our house. My mum was pregnant with me when my parents moved here. Looking back, they both agree they should have just demolished the house and built a new one. This house has never been finished the entire time I've lived in it. We finally thought it would be finished when my younger brother and his boss came down to do an extension joining our lounge, rumpus, and study. We were going to do all the bathrooms up, do the kitchen, give the house a paint inside and out, and get new flooring laid. Unfortunately, my brother and his boss did one of the worst jobs I have seen. Then they nicked off and we were left with this extension that had cost my mum quite a lot of money, but that basically had to be completely redone. 

So our renovations have been on hold for probably two years now, and our house looks even worse than before. My older brother recently came back to Melbourne, and was planning on coming over and getting things fixed up. However, after less than a week of working here, he had a meltdown triggered by a crooked door jamb (I don't think there is a single straight edge in this build) and told mum he wasn't coming back. So now we are still in renovation limbo. 

It's just crappy because I try and keep the house as clean as I can, but when the house is as tired and in need of TLC as ours is, there really isn't any point. As visitors just walk in, see the condition of our carpets and most likely walk out thinking we are a bunch of pigs. 

So this is my moan for the week. It's probably first world problems to some, but this is my journal and I'll whinge if I want to.


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## cheekysquirrel

Have you tried the MooGoo Acne cleansing cream? It's all-natural and bleach-free. I bought some for my sister in law after she had her son; she's always had acne. She said it works really well. Just a thought 
I understand the skin embarrassment. I never had acne, but I have quite bad eczema all over my arms and legs. My thighs are covered in dry scabs, and my arms are so blotchy.

I understand the house thing, too. The hardwood floors always look dirty, even when just mopped, because they haven't been replaced in forty years. We had several large mold spots in winter because the house was so damp. There are cracks everywhere, and the taps all leak. I feel no pride in my home.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think I saw someone mention that brand and on Makeup Alley which seems to be pretty harsh in its reviews, it did get a good rating. I suppose it couldn't hurt to try. I mean it's not like my skin can get much worse at this point. 

My skin is super sensitive. It never used to be, but a lot of skin care products and make-up irritate it. At the moment, the only make-up I seem to be able to tolerate is the Body Shop stuff. I used to wear this Garnier BB cream but I had to stop because the whole time my skin just felt like it was burning. I couldn't stand it for more than a couple of hours. 

Eczema is terrible. I get contact dermatitis on my hands from working at Subway in the past and doing dishes all day without wearing gloves and that is bad enough when it flares up. We used to have a girl at my primary school and she had eczema just everywhere on her body. Her skin was always weeping and sore. 

Our carpet is getting ripped up after Christmas. It stinks of cat urine no matter how often we steam clean it. I swear nothing gets rid of that smell. All it takes is one warm day and the whole house reeks. It's amazing how one 3.5kg Oriental could cause such a huge amount of damage. There are two very expensive (one is practically brand new) rugs downstairs that he has destroyed. We were looking at vinyl plank flooring because that is supposedly the best for cats that pee, but the one we want is fairly costly and they do look so fake compared to timber floors. My older brother suggested spotted gum floating flooring but I don't know how that will hold up with the dogs and the cats. 

It would be so nice to just be able to click my fingers and have a fully finished house that isn't embarrassing to bring people back to.


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## SiameseFightingArt

Wash your face before you go to bed and when you wake up. Wash it with body soap and then in the morning put lotion on your face as well. Hopefully this works for you.


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## LittleBettaFish

I cleanse and moisturise my face both morning and night. I wouldn't use soap on my face. It's dry enough already. 

Yesterday I went and got some more of the Body Shop Vitamin E range (cleanser and toner) as the moisturiser has been really good with my skin. My skin was really soft when I woke up this morning, so that was nice as usually it always feels very dry and sore, particularly around my mouth and at the corners of my nose. 

We took the old cat Bandit back to the vet today to make sure the stitches where he'd had all his teeth removed were dissolved. Everything is looking good and he has even gained a couple 100 grams to be back at 3.98kg. Our vet told us that he actually got himself a starring role in a recent talk/presentation she was doing due to him swallowing the corn cob last October. 

Even though nearly all the posts on this journal relate to my wilds, I still have Atlas my one Betta splendens. 

He has always sort of been shunted around my fish room playing second fiddle to my wilds. However, today I decided that his tank could do with a makeover. I had some plants and hardscape materials spare, so I threw together a quick scape for him. It's nothing special but hopefully once the crypts straighten up and the java moss starts to grow properly, it will look nicer. I have a handful of melaleuca leaves in there as my IAL was too big for the tank (it's only 4 gallons), and they should start to sink over the next couple of days. 

It looks a lot better in person but this post would be boring without any pictures at all. 










Atlas helped with the whole process. Nothing ever phases this fish. His form isn't great, but he makes up for that in personality. I can leave a mirror up against the side of the tank, come back in a couple hours and he will still be flaring at it. Today I came into my room and was standing in my doorway. I was about a metre away from my rack and Atlas is at the front of the tank staring at me with his beard out. He even flares at his pellets. 










I am toying with the idea of getting a nice marble HMPK male from Vivabetta on AB, or maybe even a pair. I like what I've seen of this seller's fish. Who knows. I have still got to work out what I want to get for the February shipment in terms of wilds.


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## Schmoo

I had incredibly sensitive skin when I was younger, and my acne was awful... I tried pretty much everything. I even took pills prescribed by a dermatologist. 

I used Cetaphil for a long time, until my acne was more manageable, and then I moved on to more aggressive treatments. It's formulated especially for sensitive skin. I'm also currently using a brand called Simple, which is also made for sensitive skin, and supposedly lacks a lot of chemicals/dyes/additives that other brands have that can irritate skin. Fish oil is also supposed to help. :3


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## LittleBettaFish

I have not posted here because I had a pretty crummy lead-up to Christmas. I lost my miniopinna pair and my remaining sp. apiapi. I still have eight juvenile miniopinna alive in a new hospital tank but they do not look good. 

Fortunately, my hendra group are looking good and seem to be responding to their treatment well.

My rutilans group also have velvet because of cross-contamination so I have to work out a treatment plan for them as they have quite a number of fry present in their tank. 

Then my elderly neighbour went away for a week and asked if I could look after the fish and budgie her son's girlfriend had left behind at her house. My neighbour is on a pension and means well, but is very ignorant when it comes to proper animal care. The goldfish tank is outside in direct sunlight with a bottom covered in waste and mulm, and the water and sides of the tank were green. There's also no filter on it, so I was curious to see what the ammonia level was. Turns out it was 0ppm. I wondered if the lack of feeding and the algae present was what was keeping it down. I did only a very small water change the other day as I didn't want to disturb them too much, and added some duckweed to their tank to see if that can help with the water quality.

The budgie is sick with some sort of face mite and just sits on its perch not making any noise at all. I cleaned out its cage and have been trying to tempt it with fresh fruit and seeded grass, but it really needs treatment. Sadly I doubt its condition is bad enough for it to constitute abuse, and its not tame enough that I am going to be able to treat it long-term without causing it a huge amount of stress. It's so frustrating as the girlfriend and son do this all the time with their animals. Apparently the cockatiels that came before this budgie actually died of starvation/dehydration. I never knew as they are on the side of the neighbour's double-block that I don't see/go on much at all. 

My killifish fry are growing and thriving. I think I have thirteen now at last count. My other fish/fry that don't have velvet are also doing well. My brownorum pair have started spawning again so who knows if I will get any living fry from that. 

Then today we had to rush our cat Rama to the vet because he had an abscess on his anal gland that had burst and was causing him some distress. Rama is very sensitive so of course when the vet takes him out back to flush the wound and get a closer look, his heart rate drops so much they had to have him on oxygen for about fifteen minutes until he recovered. He's now on painkillers and antibiotics for the next couple of weeks so hopefully that heals up pretty quick for him as it looks disgusting. 

At least Bandit with all his extracted teeth is doing great. He spent Christmas trying to pillage meat from people's plates. Just having those rotten teeth out has made so much of a difference to his behaviour. I hate when people have old animals with bad teeth and that let them suffer because they don't want to put them under. I would have rather had Bandit die whilst being operated on, then have to live with the pain of teeth that were literally falling apart. I can only imagine how much they must have been hurting him. 

Good news is that my wild betta supplier has both Betta sp. apiapi in stock and Betta miniopinna. I think there may be a January shipment (landing in Australia on the 6th?) so I'm not sure if he can get them onto that. Otherwise, the next one will be early February. I'm going to get two pairs of each of these species just in case I have any DOAs or something happens I will have a back-up.

I'm also tossing around getting a pair of Betta foerschi. I have a FB friend who lives interstate who has a pair from the same seller and they are stunning. It's been ages since I've owned any big mouthbrooders though. 

With four potential new pairs, it means I need to get a third rack organised, and I want to get my water changing system organised better as well. So I have a lot of work ahead of me, and a lot of money to spend getting my fish room up to scratch.

Also forgot to add thanks for the comment Schoo. I think I've seen the Simple brand around. At the moment I am using the Vitamin E range from the Body Shop and seeing how that goes.


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## LittleBettaFish

Good news is that I am definitely getting three pairs of Betta sp. apiapi and two pairs of Betta miniopinna from my wild betta supplier. I just have to pay him today and then wait for the next shipment and hope there are no DOAs. Man this side of the hobby is not cheap in Australia though. It's going to be pushing over $400 for these ten fish. Not including any additional equipment I have to buy to house them. 

In other good news, my Betta hendra do almost seem to be completely recovered from the velvet. Their fins are unclamped and they are acting very feisty and showing nice colour even in the bare bottom hospital tank. Doesn't look like there have been any fatalities at all either. 

Meanwhile apart from the one dead juvenile miniopinna I found the other day, the rest seem to already be responding to their new treatment. They were unclamped and hunting down mosquito larvae today, and hopefully they can pull through as it would be a shame to lose this entire bloodline after the cost and effort of importing the parents and rearing them to this size. 

My rutilans group still have to have their hospital tank set-up. I'm getting onto that tomorrow. So far the infection looks relatively minor as they are still eating, responding to my presence, and showing good colouration, so hopefully this is something they can easily recover from. I'm not sure how the young fry will cope so they are going to go into a separate hospital tank from their parents/older siblings. 

My rutilans female was not thrilled with the prospect of being moved. Poor unfortunate looking thing. 



















Looking at her photos you can see how hard it can be to diagnose velvet. It's only that I know what is abnormal behaviour for my fish, and have an extremely bright torch that I can spot it in its early stages. 

Meanwhile, tomorrow I am going to separate out my Betta coccina and livida females. They need a break from both spawning and their partners, so I am going to set-up 1-2 gallon containers for them inside my 12 gallon long alongside my spare Betta livida male. 

My coccina pair spawned this morning so the male has been busy tending to his eggs and patrolling his territory, but my livida male is just a jerk and has been doing nothing but bullying his female. 

This is my coccina male. I still have not managed a side-on shot of him in full colour. He's such a magnificent fish, just not great at photos. 



















Then my uberis male wanted to show off his lovely dorsal. He's officially retired from father duties and prefers to half-heartedly chase his female, eat, and stalk around the tank.


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## LittleBettaFish

With the start of the new year, I decided to get off my butt, stop just staring dolefully into my tanks, and take a more active role in the hobby again. 

Today I am going to do some water changes and do some maintenance on a couple of my tanks as they are looking shocking. I'm not sure if the tubes in my T5 lights need replacing as I seem to be getting a heck of a lot of algae lately. 

I also want to move my livida and coccina females out into these 3.2L containers I purchased the other day. They were expensive but the plastic is very clear, they came with escape proof lids, and they had a better footprint (wide and low) compared to a lot of similar sized containers. I'm going to lay down a thin layer of substrate and then stuff them full of plants and maybe drill a hole in each lid so I can fit an airstone in just to keep the water from going stagnant. Being smaller than Betta splendens means that 3.2L is quite a bit of space for my single adults, and this whole group are not very active swimmers. As long as they have a place to hide they are usually content with smaller quarters. 

My Betta hendra group looks like it might be clear of velvet. I'm going to fill up their original tank today and then give it another 2-3 days before moving the whole group back in. Then it's just my miniopinna juveniles and my rutilans group that will require treatment. 

I also found out that the next shipment into Australia is going to be on the 9th of January. I'm not sure if all my wilds are going to be on it, but this means I will have only a couple of weeks to get tanks prepared for them once I calculate quarantine and shipping time. I really wanted to get some ADA Malaya to go at the bottom of my tanks but of course the store I like to order it from is out of stock in everything but 9L of Africana. I hate the colour of Africana and I don't really want to outlay $40 on a 9L bag when 3L would suffice. My plan with these set-ups is to keep them fairly simple and low cost. A couple pieces of Malaysian driftwood in each tank, a scattering of mixed leaf litter, and some watersprite or wisteria and that's about it. 

I don't really have any photos of my fish because my tanks are so horrendous looking at the moment. This is the one photo I took of my Betta uberis male bossing his female around. 










Meanwhile, I've banned myself from looking at any apistogramma photos and forums. I am really getting interested in these beautiful fish and I have to keep telling myself I have neither the money nor the space. Sadly it seems like their import is also going to be affected by the new laws this year. I was hoping in a few years I could get some wild-caught stock but I wonder if this will be at all possible. It seems like every single fish species I like (killifish, wild bettas, apistogramma, liquorice gourami, and blue eyes) are either next to impossible to procure or cost a small fortune.


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## cheekysquirrel

Being planted and all, what kind of water change schedule would you be looking at for the 3.2L?


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## LittleBettaFish

I really don't know. I have found my wilds seem to have a low bioload anyway and with plants like watersprite, duckweed etc. I may only need to do one or two water changes a week. 

I personally would have preferred at least 4L, but my adult fish are maybe 3.5-4cm total length and very slim bodied so it's not too bad. Plus as I mentioned they mostly spend their time lurking under leaves or in their plants.


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## cheekysquirrel

Oh that's not too bad, then. I'd love to have a planted tank, not really feasible at this point in time. One day, though


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## LittleBettaFish

I rarely do water changes on any of my wild betta tanks as I find they prefer if you don't mess with the water chemistry too much. I've never done anything much with my planted tanks. Just have a light over them, a nutrient rich substrate, and that is it. They won't win any aquascaping competitions (especially not now) but my fish are happy in them and my plants usually grow fairly well. 

I'm really after some pothos again. I want to half-fill my 40L tanks and then have it growing emersed in the space between the waterline and the cling wrap. I just like the look of the roots in the water.


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## LittleBettaFish

I took some photos of my killifish pairs today. I gave them a long overdue water change yesterday, scrubbed most of the algae out of the tank and threw in some white worms for them. 

I still can't believe how long the caudal extensions on my A. gabunense male have grown. He's such a lovely fish. I wish he wasn't so hyper though. 
































































I still think the colours on some killifish species could rival that of the brightest coloured marine fish.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yesterday I did the most I've done with my fish in ages. I did some water changes, cleaned algae off the glass, gave some of my plants a trim, fed everyone, and separated my Betta coccina pair. 

Unfortunately, while I was doing water changes I didn't notice my Betta livida pair had spawned and so I managed to destroy most of the male's nest so he was not happy about that. Some eggs were lost but it looks like he got the majority back in the film canister. 

My Betta coccina pair are not happy with being split up. The female is now in one of my 3.2L containers and my male is in the main tank with his fry. While they do seem to prefer having company, I just don't want to risk that if something happens to the main tank I lose not only my fry but also my main breeding pair. At this point I'm contemplating also moving my male out into a smaller container and just leaving the main tank as a grow-out for the fry. This way everyone is separated and if I lose the fry I will still have the breeding pair as back-up. I plan on doing the same with my Betta livida pair even though I cannot find a single fry in their tank (I think perhaps they are hiding in the moss at the back). 

I was too slow to do this with my Betta rutilans group, and so now I have to treat not only the fry but also the breeding pair and hope I don't get a repeat of the disaster that was the treatment of my Betta sp. apiapi or Betta miniopinna. 

In other news, I moved my Betta hendra back into their original tank this morning. They have substrate in this tank and their colour has already improved. Once it looks like the velvet isn't going to reoccur in the next week or so, I will start setting their tank up properly instead of just the java moss and PVC pipe they have now. 










Meanwhile, I've talked my mum into a pair of wild-caught Betta foerschi over Betta macrostoma. I prefer foerschi (they remind me of a bigger Betta hendra) and I don't need as large a tank. So we will be getting a pair in the February shipment. 

Other than that, not much else has been happening. We've had some wild weather here in Melbourne. It's been incredibly humid and sticky, followed by these crazy thunderstorms. It's perfect mosquito breeding weather, but not much else.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just got back from feeding all my fish and giving them their daily look over. My Betta hendra group are definitely not liking their temporary tank. Their colour is so washed out compared to what it is like when they have more cover. 

This is what their tank looks like at the moment, and then we have a couple photos of sulking Betta hendra. 





































Then my Betta uberis male was showing how well he can stay in one spot while I have the camera on him. 




























I darkened up the water in my Betta persephone tank yesterday with some rooibos, IAL, and melaleuca leaves. The darker water really intensifies their colours and stirs up some aggressive displays and courtship behaviour. Unfortunately, because the water is so dark now, it made taking photos all but impossible, a predicament not helped by my persephone refusing to come out to the front of the tank and sit still long enough for me to get anything half decent. This was the only photo I managed. Not very flattering, but at least they seem happy enough. They are currently my oldest fish apart from my goldfish, sitting at 2.5 years old. 










Finally, this is one of my neglected A. gabunense fry. I am so bad with this group. They receive very few water changes, and sporadic feedings. It is lucky killifish seem to thrive no matter the conditions. They had a nice meal of BBS tonight, as you can see by this one's fat stomach. 










Tomorrow I'm starting treatment on my rutilans group. I wanted to get some food into them, and give them a day to settle into their hospital tank before I started with the medication. I am also going to be disinfecting my water aging tub and filling it up again. I'm hoping that by disinfecting it after every session of water changes, it cuts down the risk of cross-contamination.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think my fish were surprised I fed them two days in a row as usually they will go one or two days between feeds. 

I've been feeding my fry up on BBS of late and I have spotted some very promising coccina fry. I also have some uberis, brownorum, and livida fry, but they are more elusive. I'm hoping the majority of my rutilans fry (or at least the biggest) survive the velvet treatment and then they will be going into their own tank separate from the main breeding pair. 

So far my Betta hendra group still seem to be doing well. I think the only reason their colour is not as good and their fins are clamped at times is due to the bright light and lack of colour. This was them waiting for their blackworms today.




























Then these are two of my F1 sub-adults. 

I wondered where Mr uberis had gotten off to as normally he is front and centre. However, turns out he was working on a nest in the canister at the back of the tank and he came out once he realised I had some mosquito larvae. 










I also got a shot of my fish room. It looks so sad at the moment. Since my sp. apiapi and miniopinna groups died and my rutilans are in a hospital tank on the bottom shelf, it looks rather empty. However, I have my five new pairs on order, plus several pairs I want to purchase in February and March shipments so hopefully in a few weeks it will look a lot better. 










We're going to be pulling up all the carpet in the house soon. I think in this room, even rough floorboards would look (and smell) better than the carpet that is in there now. At the moment, we are still tossing up between a cheaper floating timber floors or much more expensive vinyl planks. The floating floor looks better of course, but I'm concerned about its longevity when faced with three large dogs, cat urine, and a dozen or more fish tanks. 

It seems everyone who attempts to finish our house ends up high-tailing it. I don't think one room in this house would be considered finished and I've lived here since I was a fetus.


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## LittleBettaFish

Today I disinfected my water aging tub, and refilled it. I'm thinking that along with the rooibos tea, I might add a stocking full of peat moss and some alder cones from the trees in our yard to help increase the level of tannins in the water and bring the pH down. 

I re-cultured my microworms, which was a very smelly job. I'd let them go too long and they were starting to go mouldy. I also set-up a fresh lot of BBS, and fed my grindals and white worm cultures. 

I started the velvet treatment for my Betta rutilans group this morning. I'm about to go check on them now, but they seemed okay when I had a look in earlier. The breeding pair were still flaring at each other this morning and ate a full meal yesterday so fingers crossed. 

My brownorum pair were spawning again this morning, so I think I'll have another lot of fry in a couple of days. I think the smallest F1 male is too big now to bother with eating the fry. Be interesting to see what genders turn out like as my F1 group was very female heavy. 

Other than that, I got a couple photos of my Betta livida female while she was at the front of the tank. I had some more but they all turned out rather blurry.



















Then this is just my Betta uberis female showing off her lovely colouring. I really like this fish, she is small but feisty.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I had a bit of a heart attack this morning when my Betta coccina male emerged with all this stuff stuck to his head. Luckily it was just aqua soil debris. He still seems to be missing the female. His colour is definitely not as nice as it was when she was in the tank with him, and he doesn't seem as confident with her gone. I'm not sure if I should reunite them or not. 

No one is liking the 3.2L containers so I'm thinking I might just get 2-3 20x20x20cm tanks (equals about 2 gallons) and use these instead. I already have one here at home, and I think maybe if my coccina pair can see each other again they will be happier. I wish I wasn't so terrified of running heat tape, as it would a lot handier to have a row of 2 gallon tanks for my separated breeding pairs than have them inside another tank to avoid running multiple heaters. However, aside from the fact I'm concerned about it burning our house down, I'm also not sure whether heat tape would be enough to deal with how cold our house sometimes gets without sending our electricity bill sky-rocketing. 

As something different today, I thought I would post a picture of one of my tanks and explain my set-up. This is my Betta coccina tank, which at the moment contains an unknown number of fry/juveniles and my male. 










The substrate is ADA Malaya. The water is coloured with IAL, rooibos tea, and melaleuca cajuputi leaves. However, I'm also looking into using alder cones from our yard as well. The temperature is around 24/25 degrees celsius, and the filtration is a sponge filter. Its purpose is simply to move the water around rather than provide any biological filtration. 

This tank receives only indirect sunlight for a couple of hours a day. The plants do the work of a filter in my wild betta tanks, and include hydrilla, java moss, Amazon swords, duckweed, milfoil, hornwort, and watersprite. I think this tank has a small terracotta pot in it somewhere for shelter, but my wilds usually prefer plants and leaf litter.

I do a 2L water change on this tank once a week with aged water that has had rooibos tea added to it. Otherwise, apart from pruning back some plants when necessary and cleaning algae off the glass, I don't do anything else maintenance wise. 

I also managed a much better photo of my livida female today. I bribed her with some grindals and she stayed still long enough for me to capture her really intense breeding bars.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I got an email yesterday from the transhipper here and she said I have ten fish in quarantine with her. So I am hoping this means all my fish survived the trip over to Australia this time around as I've had such terrible luck with DOAs lately. 

However, I think the shipment landed on the 9th, so they should be due out of quarantine at the start of next week. I have no tanks set-up for anyone, so this weekend is going to be a whirlwind of me trying to get my fish room ready. I think I may be able to fit these five pairs in without needing another rack, but for the next shipment in February a rack is going to definitely be necessary. 

I ordered 9L of ADA Malaya powder as this was all they had, and 50 small IALs. My plan at the moment is to put in the aqua soil, throw a layer of leaf litter over the bottom and pick up some Malaysian driftwood and either watersprite or wisteria from the localish fish store. I'm hoping this will serve as suitable temporary accommodation until I can find enough java moss to do all my tanks. 

This hobby is just one never-ending cycle of spending. Sometimes I almost wish I still had my crappy job at Subway because at least the pay was decent and I wasn't stuck umming and ahhing over whether to buy moss or not.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yesterday I lost my F0 Betta brownorum female. Even though I thought she was ugly and never forgave her for killing my best male, I was still fond of her. She spawned with her son not that many days ago, there was no sign of foul play, and every other fish (including young fry) in the tank is okay. I just found her dead at the front of the tank. 

I do wonder if perhaps one of her sons attacked her bodily, and caused internal injuries and that is what she died from. I guess I will never know. Hopefully some of the fry she produced with her son are female, so I can keep that line going separate from the new pairs I want to purchase in February. 

RIP Mrs B. brownorum 









In good news, all ten of my fish seemed to have survived quarantine and should arrive tomorrow. I paid their import and local shipping fees ($250 ouch), and I got the further good news my ADA Malaya and extra IALs are due to arrive at my house today so I can get their tanks fully set-up. My mum is also working from home so is taking me to the aquarium in the city to pick up some wood and plants so my fish will be more comfortable. I was getting a bit worried that they were just going to have an IAL and some PVC pipe when they finally arrived. 

Otherwise my rutilans group seem to be doing really well with their velvet treatment. The slightly lower temperature hasn't given me any bent spines in my fry, and everyone has been showing signs of improvement. Fins are less clamped, the colour is stronger in my breeding pair and their appetites haven't diminished in the least. All good signs and hopefully this means they can make a full recovery. 

My killifish fry are also doing well. I am half-tempted to move my two breeding pairs on, as they do take up a lot of space on my rack. I have a decent number of fry to go on with, and I'm not going to have time or space to be working with killifish as well as my wilds.


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## Fenghuang

Sorry about your female, but glad that your imports are coming in. Is aquatics stuff (like live plants) that hard to get in Australia?


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## LittleBettaFish

All aquarium related products (sometimes even our Australia natives) seem a lot more expensive in Australia compared to somewhere like the US. Imported livestock has to go through a mandatory quarantine period in an approved facility. Some bigger stores here import their own stock and have their own quarantine facilities, but most just purchase from the two main wholesalers. So this contributes to a higher price. The range of fish actually allowed into the country is also extremely limited. For example we cannot import female liquorice gourami. I don't understand the reasoning for that rule but it exists and so it basically cuts out an entire species of fish from the hobby here. 

Live plants aren't hard to get per se. Most pet and fish stores sell the same basic stems, anubias on driftwood and terrestrial plants. However, if you want something different, it can be more expensive, as many aquatic plants seem to have snuck into the country that aren't 'officially' allowed in. Therefore, the price for these plants is usually very high until they start to become more common. Buce is the one lately that seems to be popping up everywhere even though I don't think it was ever officially approved to come into Oz. 

You cannot just purchase plants from overseas and bring them into the country. If they catch you, your plants are destroyed and you either get a warning or a fine. 

So if you are into rarer fish/aquatic plants in Australia you are pretty much screwed. It's frustrating and if this new law comes into full effect in March, it could get a lot worse.


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## cheekysquirrel

In Western Australia you can't even buy aquatic plants from interstate, so there's that  I think it's the same in Tassie, isn't it?
Sorry to hear about your loss. Fingers crossed with the fry.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah I think WA, Tasmania, and NT are the most restrictive states/territories when it comes to keeping fish. Fortunately I live in Victoria as it is already difficult and expensive enough to get my wilds in. 

Yesterday was one of the most hellish four hours I think I've spent in my fish room. If something was going to go wrong, it went wrong yesterday. First it took me two hours and three different aquariums to find the wood I wanted. I think my mum was going to bludgeon me to death in the fish section of Coburg Aquarium if I didn't leave with something.

Then we get home from food shopping around 6pm and I get into cleaning out and filling up my tanks. That was until I hear this splashing sound and see one of my brownorum males going crazy and flinging himself out of the water and at the glad wrap. Then he went completely motionless and just floated around in the water. Since the female died I thought contamination in the water or some sort of equipment failure. So I fill up a jug with my aged water, catch this male put him in it, and immediately he goes back to normal. I then tear the tank apart, catch the two other males, put them in jugs with aged water and then have to catch the four tiny fry I could find and put them into a container of tank water and hope they don't die. 

After an hour of stuffing around with my brownorum and moving them into an entirely new tank, I came to the conclusion that I think the male jumping around was being attacked by his brother and I simply could have separated them and gone on my way. 

Then when I was trying to bring a tank up from downstairs my mum came out to show me something, so I miss one of the steps, smash my shin on the edge of the step and somehow fling my tank out in front of me so it doesn't break. 

So after I get all the tanks cleaned and filled up, I add the aqua soil. I was actually surprised by how much I like the ADA powder. Yes it is a bit more expensive but I only need a small amount and it looks a bit more natural as a substrate than the larger balls. 

Once I had the tanks filled it was time to add the wood. One piece was a bit too big so I intending on cutting it down with the saw so it fit. This was about 9pm at night, and of course I can't find the smaller saw I want (my brothers are notorious for 'borrowing' my mum's tools), so I use one of the other saws. Here I am, out in the dark of our backyard, trying to cut through what feels like the hardest substance in the known universe. Because I thought my hissed cursing might disturb the neighbours, I went inside and then proceeded to see how much easier it would be to cut through my fingers. Suffice to say I decided it might be best to quit while I was ahead. 

The tanks still look really barren because all I could get was some wood, wisteria and IALs. I still want to add java moss, watersprite, hydrilla, and duckweed just to provide that extra bit of cover for any potentially psychotic pairs. 

This is what my rack looks like now (the blanketed tank is my hospital tank) and I have another 30cm cube on my smaller shelf. 










Then I managed some photos of my coccina pairs. The female and male were both moping without each other, so I added her back to the tank and will just take some of the bigger fry out. Unfortunately, I can never get my male in full colour and full flare so he doesn't look as nice in photos as he does in real life. 














































Then I have their biggest fry. Not sure on gender yet but already very territorial with its siblings.










Finally, I have a blurry-headed Betta livida male, and his feisty partner.


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## LittleBettaFish

I waited yesterday until 4pm, worrying that my wilds were being delayed somewhere in transit (rarely do parcels from Auspost come here after 12pm). I shot an email off, and got a reply back saying my wilds were being sent out that day instead as there had been a hold-up. I was happy my wilds weren't stock in some post office or courier van, but I wish I'd known earlier as I wouldn't have rushed through my tanks on Monday night.

Of course now they are all cloudy from the tannins and aqua soil, so as soon as I finish this post I'm going to do 50% water changes on all of them so hopefully the water is a bit clearer when my fish arrive. 

Other than that, I've been a bit concerned about my Betta uberis female. Normally she is always at the front of the tank, but lately I have not seen much of her. I thought she'd jumped out somehow, but yesterday I caught a brief glimpse of her before she disappeared into some leaves. I have checked over the fry and my male and none are showing any signs of velvet. I hope she is okay. They spawned for the first time in ages, so I am wondering if it's just the male being aggressive to her. 

I really wish my Betta coccina male would come out and flare more for the camera. This is a photo I got last night and it would have been great if he'd been in front of the plants rather than behind them.










Then I just took a couple photos of my Betta persephone. I had the most awesome shot lined up. My nicest male was up front in full flare and of course my camera chose to focus on the fish behind him. Argh!




























The little female at the front of this photo was taking on everyone, her brothers, her nephew, and her sisters.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just wanted to update to say all my new pairs arrived safely this morning.

The Betta sp. apiapi pairs are absolutely tiny. Like 2cm from head to tail and maybe .5cm deep in the body. All the males look to have spade shaped caudals, and already the male of one pair has coloured up beautifully. Another pair has been a bit aggressive so keeping eyes on them. My miniopinna are also very nice. 

It's a shame the water in the tanks is so cloudy and I didn't have any further plants on hand as I think it may be a few days before I can get a good photoshoot in. 

Now the plan is for at least a pair of Betta brownorum and a pair of Betta foerschi on the next shipment in February.


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## cheekysquirrel

Glad they arrived safely


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## LittleBettaFish

I was so relieved when they finally arrived. I couldn't believe I had no DOAs. 

I thought I got a good photo of one of my males but when I uploaded it onto my computer it was blurry. But I'm going to post it anyway because I am so flipping excited about these fish. 

I did realise that I am going to need to fill the holes in their terracotta pots up. I didn't realise they would be so small and I am afraid they might get their heads stuck.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my uberis female emerged and turns out she has an infected eye on one side of her face. I don't know what caused it, but the eye seems to be healing up on its own, and she came out and ate some white worms just before. The male was following her around showing off, so if he continues to harass her, he can go into time-out until it heals up. 

This photo was of her good side just now.










Then here is Mr Macho getting ready to strut on over.










Then my Betta hendra group thought any time I went to look at my new fish I was going to feed them. They are like a pack of vultures. 



















I put all the plants back in their tank, and the extra cover has made them happier. Their colouring is still shocking though, nowhere near what it used to be. I'm hoping once the plants thicken up again and I add some rooibos to their water, they will lose the stress stripes and washed out colours.


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## logisticsguy

Your journal has given me a real appreciation for the wild betta. They are beautiful!!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. They will send me mad one of these days but at least they are beautiful.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my uberis female is recovering nicely. One eye and the area around her gill still looks a little swollen, but she is eating again, and is back to spending most of her time at the front of the tank. 

My new fish are settling in, but I can tell they are not very comfortable with their tanks given the lack of coverage. So I have ordered some vallisneria nana (going to hide this in a plastic container at the back of the tanks), hydrilla, giant duckweed, and watersprite from my usual plant source, and then am going to try and find some java moss and/or subwassertang to provide cover at the lower levels of the tanks. 

I did spot what looks to be the start of a bubblenest in one of my miniopinna tanks, but not getting too excited about it. 

Meanwhile, my Betta coccina spawned not long after I re-introduced the female to the main tank and the male is guarding a massive nest of eggs. 

I decided to sell my killifish pairs. At this point in time with the new laws possibly coming into effect in March, I want to focus only on my wilds. I have buyers for both pairs, so hopefully they will go next week. Then I have a custom built tank I want to get rid of, and I'm tossing up whether to get rid of my 12 gallon long or not as I never use it, and it takes up way too much space on my rack anyhow. 

I _may_ also be ending up with some new fish (persephone, livida, tussyae, and brownorum) in a couple of months because a close FB friend and fellow wild betta enthusiast has to move overseas. We shall see how it pans out. If it does eventuate, I am going to need to buy a lot of tanks to house them all. As well as plants, heaters, substrate, IAL, etc. 

But hopefully if I have a multiples of certain species, it will make maintaining them after this new law passes, a bit easier to do.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think one of my new Betta miniopinna pairs spawned either yesterday or early this morning. I put film canisters in their tanks yesterday and less than half an hour later, the male had a nest built. Then I noticed the female going into the canister and the male has been guarding it all today. I can't see any eggs, but the nest looks fuller so there could be some in there. 

I put a plant order in and just need to order some moss, and hopefully I can get these early next week.

I also put together some DIY siphons using 13mm irrigation tubing, plastic tubing, and some elbow joints and a stopper. I've been meaning to do this for a while, and a test run has shown they work well. The design means I won't have to worry about sucking up fish, and I don't have to have my hands in the tank as much as when I was using plastic tubing. 

That's about all that's been happening. I've just got to clean out my water aging tub tonight and feed my fish and that's it for today. 

Here are a few photos I have taken. 









Betta livida male



























Betta coccina female









One of my new Betta sp. apiapi males. He's maybe 2cm from head to the tip of his caudal.


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## LittleBettaFish

Here are photos of my two other Betta sp. apiapi males I took today. I actually like the male in the photo from yesterday best. I prefer the thicker white margin on his caudal and dorsal fin. 




























I think this is probably one of my top two species in this complex. Just their size and colouration makes them a winner in my eyes. I have heard their habitat is gone, but I'm not 100% sure. It will be terrible if it has as they were discovered such a short time ago. At least there seems to be a number in the hands of hobbyists now. 

Meanwhile my Betta rutilans group are looking like they should almost be ready to leave their hospital tank. The female has a few chunks taken out of her anal fin so I think the male has been harassing her. I think the biggest juvenile (measures about 2.5cm) may be female based on its ventral fins and anal fin shape, but I won't be able to tell until they get some colour on them.


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## LittleBettaFish

Basically nothing much has been happening here. My dog ruined my biggest mosquito culture outside and now the weather has been cooler, I have hardly been getting any larvae at all. 

Have not seen any spawning activity from my sp. apiapi pairs, and the miniopinna pair I thought were spawning, have not produced anything. However, my other miniopinna pair do have eggs, which was a surprise when I looked in today. 

I disinfected and filled up my water aging tubs. I just have to do the same for the watering cans and jugs and that will be set for water changes next week. Can't wait to try out all the new siphons I made the other day. 

I also added some plants and substrate back into my rutilans tank. My fry and breeding pair were becoming more aggressive to each other and I was seeing a few nipped fins and posturing, so I'm hoping the extra hiding places will help. 

I'm also trying to find some long fibre sphagnum moss to put over the substrate in my wild betta tanks. It means I don't need to buy as many plants to fill in the empty space of my tanks, and my wilds seemed to like it when I used it previously. It just seems quite difficult to find in Australia and I don't want to use a cheap product that has been treated/come into contact with anything that may harm my fish.


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## MattsBettas

Next time you're taking photos would you mind grabbing one of the siphons? I'm trying to limit the amount of equipment I'm sharing...


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## LittleBettaFish

This is what I based it on. He's an Australian killifish breeder and has one of the most organised fish rooms I've seen. I am hoping to do a similar reservoir system at the top of my racks when I move my fish downstairs. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oDiRw_L__uU


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my other pair of miniopinna finally decided to spawn. So I have two nests of eggs going at the moment from this species. 

Meanwhile, since I put a film canister back in my Betta rutilans tank, my male has built a nest and has spent the morning trying to convince the female to come and check it out. 



















I love how rich the red is on this species. If I wasn't so limited budget wise, and hadn't had such terrible luck trying to import this species in before, I would have purchased a pair for the February shipment. I'm not really sure how good the quality is on locally bred stock here in Australia. I'm in the same boat with Betta hendra. I owned Betta hendra that came from the wholesaler and they were definitely not as nice IMO as my wild-caught stock. 

Meanwhile Atlas my one fancy Betta splendens looks terrible. If he didn't have such an endearing personality and I hadn't purchased him from a breeder friend and promised him a home for life I probably would have sold him and put a Betta imbellis male in his tank instead. 










I'm hoping my new plants arrive soon. I'm not sure how I am going to plant the vallisneria. I think in a container of aqua soil and then hide it at the back of the tanks. I just can't build my substrate up deep enough to plant it. I went with giant duckweed this time, and I'm going to try some hornwort again. I never seem to be able to grow that plant, except for a few tiny strands of it here and there. I wish I could find guppy grass here in Oz and that dwarf water lettuce was available. The pains of living in a country like Australia. 

Of course the mail always takes ages to be delivered when I really want something. Usually my packages from this courier company arrive before now.


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## LittleBettaFish

Things in my fish room have been going smoothly of late... a little too smoothly for my comfort. I have a feeling disaster is waiting for me as I never have this much luck for very long. 

Two pairs of my Betta sp. apiapi have spawned and their eggs have hatched. I have free-swimming fry in at least one of my Betta miniopinna tanks and possibly in the other miniopinna tank as well. My third pair of Betta sp. apiapi looked like they were flirting this morning (this is my nicest male) so hopefully they spawn soon. 

My Betta coccina, livida, uberis, and brownorum fry are growing nicely. My one Betta brownorum fry still does have a bent spine but it looks to be lessening as it grows so I will see how it matures. Obviously this fish won't be used for breeding, but if it doesn't end up too badly deformed it can stay here as a pet. I thought there were issues with one of the other fry's caudal, but the remaining three actually appear to be quite normal so if there's a female in the group I will try and cross her back onto either her father or an uncle. 

I had to re-establish my mosquito tubs around the sideway after my dog kept getting into them. Luckily we've had some hot weather of late so I can see them rapidly multiplying.

I've decided to purchase and import a new pair of Betta brownorum, and a pair of Betta foerschi. I wanted a pair of Betta hendra as well, but it was 50 USD for a pair and once I tacked on import and shipping fees, they were outside my budget. There's still no real news on what is happening with the new laws, not even businesses who will be directly impacted by the change seem to have been told exactly when the changes are going to come into effect. I personally hope that it takes them a few more months to get themselves sorted so there is at least a couple more shipments that can be squeezed through. 

Apart from fish news, our old cat Bandit has been at the vet. He crashed very suddenly the other day and had to be rushed in. He was severely dehydrated and so he's been on fluids for the past two days. His kidney levels were not good, but they seem to be dropping so hopefully they return to a normal range. His blood test results should be in today. Me and mum were wondering if it was his pancreatitis playing up again as he was looking very hunched and uncomfortable before we took him in. If he is okay, he will be coming home tomorrow. 

Sadly, we are sort of getting to the point where we may have to make a decision based on his quality of life. When he's not on death's door, he has a decent appetite, holds his weight stable, mooches around the house and beats up the dogs. His coat looks terrible but that's because of his thyroid, and he is always going to be on the skinny side due to his health problems. Apart from surgery on his rotten teeth, he has been doing well. So it's a tough decision to have to make. He's sort of at that tipping point. Our thinking at this point is if he goes downhill like this again, it may be kinder to let him. It is a lot for him to come back from, and this is probably the third or so time in the past couple of years that it has happened. 

To end my post on a happier note, here is one of my Betta sp. apiapi males guarding his nest site. I was actually surprised by how many eggs one of those tiny females could produce.


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## cheekysquirrel

Poor Bandit :-( I like that cat. I hope he can come home.

Here's hoping that you can get the hendra in before the laws come into effect


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah. I do have my group here but I would have liked to added some fresh blood. 

I'm thinking we are going to need to put some water dishes/bowls along either the top of the fence or in some trees as I came down into the backyard to find a terrified ringtail possum that had been bailed up by one of the dogs behind our cubby. 

The cat was down there too and I couldn't tell if it had been injured as it seems to have disappeared in the time it took me to lock everyone up. I put a water dish down in case it was thirsty. The poor things have been doing this the past couple of summers. It's horrible because they are so defenceless, and if the dogs catch them all we can really do is take it to the local vet to be euthanised. I also don't want to have to have the dogs locked in the house 24/7 because of the possums wandering around. So I think if we have water bowls up higher it will stop them from coming down on the ground where they are so vulnerable.


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## Aquatail

I'm glad your fish are doing well, and I really like your idea for the possums, I hope it works out. I also hope Bandit feels better. It's a very difficult decision to make when the time may or may not come, and I wish you the best of luck.


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## cheekysquirrel

Poor little possums. It's not the dogs' fault, obviously, they're just doing what's in their nature. It's part of the reason that I keep my cat indoors, though I know it's not feasible for dogs. I agree, it's a good idea to have some water bowls higher up. That's all you can do, really.


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## LittleBettaFish

Sadly the possum died during the night. I was so hopeful it would survive as it got all the way up to the water bowl on the deck last night. There were no visible signs of injury or trauma I could see, so I wonder if it was heat/dehydration as a healthy possum doesn't go on the ground if it can help it. 

Unfortunately, one of our cats attempts to murder the others, so he has to be outside in the day and comes in before dark. I would have liked to have put some possum boxes and a bird bath/water bowls around the garden, but he would kill whatever came to use them. 

Turns out Bandit had a flare-up of pancreatitis. He probably won't be home for another couple of days as they want to stabilise him fully and manage his pain. 

Fish news, not really much happening. I took some photos of my Betta uberis pair and got a decent shot of my nicest Betta sp. apiapi male.





































I always forget how nice my Betta uberis pair are as they often get overlooked in favour of my rarer species. They still have some fry drifting around with them. Unfortunately algae has taken over in this tank and is currently ruining my photos. 

Just about to feed my young fish some BBS, and then I just need to add some more water to my Betta brownorum grow-out and do a quick water change on my goldfish tank downstairs.


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## LittleBettaFish

We went and visited poor Bandit at the vet yesterday afternoon. His creatinine levels (I think that is what they are called) were up again despite him being on fluids and they are doing another test today to see what is happening. It sounds like his kidneys might be failing. I think at this point he's just old, tired, and sick. 

He definitely doesn't like being in the vet. He has been pulling his tubes out and when we went he mostly stared at the wall twitching his tail. We did get a purr and a head bunt, and I cried on the way home because unless he miraculously rallies, we are going to have to make that decision no pet owner ever wants to make. 

I told mum if they say his kidneys are failing we are going to bring him home for one good day of cuddles and spoiling and then take him to get put to sleep. He's so sick, we don't want to be force-feeding or pushing fluids to wring that last bit of life out of him. 

Today I did some water changes on my tanks, fed everyone some mosquito larvae and white worms, and took a few photos. The only nice photos I got were of my Betta rutilans group. The male was looking superb and their fry seem to be growing very nicely. 





































Then two of their bigger fry circling for a fight. Not sure on genders yet. Probably won't know until they fully colour up.


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## cheekysquirrel

I'm praying for poor old Bandit. Bless his scruffy little self. I've been very lucky so far, we've never had to make that decision. To me, it's a very brave and selfless thing to do. The very idea makes me tear up and want to cuddle Remy.

I can't see the photos from my phone, but I'm sure your fish look awesome


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## Aquatail

Poor Bandit. You're making a very hard decision, but if it means anything at all, it sounds like the kinder one.

I've had to make that decision before and I'm so sorry you have to as well.

Sorry, not trying to be depressing, your fish look great as always.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well the vet rang just before and we are either going to put Bandit to sleep this afternoon, or if he is stable enough, bring him home overnight and then have him put to sleep tomorrow. At this point today seems more likely as apparently his condition has really deteriorated. 

I wish I had taken the time to get some photos the other day when he was out in the garden. I only have a few nice ones of him. 

I don't know how I am going to say goodbye to my scruffy grumpy cat. We've had him almost sixteen years and he's always been my boy. I hate having to get animals put to sleep. Even though it ends their suffering it feels like the ultimate betrayal of their trust. No matter how long they live, it's just never long enough. 










Here's Bandit in happier times with his best friend Rama. He may not have been the prettiest cat, or the cuddliest cat, but he was a good cat and I am going to miss him so much.


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## hrutan

My condolences, littlebettafish. It's never easy, even when the choices is clear. We love them so much, and it hurts so badly to let them go.


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## cheekysquirrel

I'm so sorry :-( You and Bandit are both in my thoughts. I'm sending you hugs.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. I've been crying on and off since the vet rang. I knew it was coming and I never want to prolong the suffering of my pets for my own selfish reasons. I was hoping we could take him home as he has been in there a week and I wanted to have just even a few hours with him, but if he is too frail, I know that's not going to be possible. 

I'm glad that I'm not this attached to my fish. At the rate they die I would have given up the hobby years ago.


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## Fenghuang

I am so sorry, LBF. Bandit has lived quite the long life for a cat. I know it won't make it hurt less, but even if it is time for him to go, at least you will always have those happy memories.


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## cheekysquirrel

It's OK to cry. I'll cry with you, because I am truly sad for you. But I like to think that he knows how you feel about him, and why it has to be done.


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## MattsBettas

Awe, Ashlea, I'm really sorry. I loved hearing all the various stories- whether happy or sad- pretty much since I joined this forum years ago. It made me kinda feel like I knew him in a way. My condolences. He led a long and happy life.


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## Aquatail

I'm so sorry. Bandit was an awesome cat and he was very loved. Like the others have said, it's ok to cry. When we had to put one of our cats down for the first time, it was very sudden and I spent the half hour ride home just petting her even though she was already gone.

I hope Bandit's last hours are filled with love, comfort and peace. Rest in peace.


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## LittleBettaFish

We just got home from the vet. Bandit had crashed really badly and he was barely hanging on when we got there. Me and mum said we probably should have got him put to sleep the other day when we visited him but he has always bounced back in the past. 

It's always weird how the life just suddenly goes out of their eyes when it's done. They go from living to dead in an instant. 

Unfortunately, the room we were in was really hot and I don't think I was breathing enough, so I went went out in the car park and nearly passed out when it was finished. 

Then we came home and found I'd locked Rama in my wardrobe. The other day I found him in the kitchen with two of our dogs. I don't think he's even going to live long enough to require euthanasia. 

I am sad, but now it's done I feel better because he was in a lot of distress, and it was only the painkillers that were keeping him calm. Even to the end he was a fighter, but it was never a fight he could win.


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## cheekysquirrel

RIP, Bandit, you beautiful, scruffy thing. 
I'm so sorry for your loss, sweetie. I wish I could make it better :-(


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks for the kind comments. It meant a lot to me to see the vet nurses and one of the vets come in and give Bandit a pat and kiss before we had him put to sleep. He was very much loved by a lot of people and he's certainly going to leave a hole in my heart. 

Hopefully my future entries in my journal will be more uplifting.


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## autojoy

Really sorry to hear  Best wishes to you.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well it's been a little while since I updated my journal. 

I still am missing Bandit, but in a way I feel like a huge burden has been lifted off my shoulders as his health was a constant worry. I was surprised that Rama doesn't seem to be pining for him. The only change in his behaviour has been the fact he keeps going through/over the baby gate into the kitchen with the three dogs. 

My fish have been thoroughly neglected since last week so this week I have to get everything back under control. 

On Saturday I went and picked up a bag of sphagnum moss from the hardware store. I've used it before in my tanks, and I've decided to go back to using it as cover for the lower levels of my tanks as it is cheaper, and easier to remove than java moss. My plans are to purchase some mayaca, Asian watergrass, and more hydrilla, and then combine this with sphagnum moss and IALs for my next set-ups. So far I'm testing it in my tank of Betta miniopinna that I think are egg eaters. It shouldn't harm them, but I don't want to go and kill all my breeding stock. 










This is what their tank looks like now. I also added a couple IAL and a bag of rooibos to help darken the water up. I'm annoyed that the eggs keep disappearing as they have been spawning constantly. I was going to see if it was the female eating the eggs by jarring her after they have spawned. If it turns out to be the male and with this change in conditions the egg eating ceases, I will probably sell them on. Luckily my other pair have provided me with ample fry, and they are the nicer pair. 

Meanwhile, I think my Betta hendra group might still be infected with velvet. They are coloured up and eating well and behaving normally apart from the fact they clamp up quite a bit and I thought I saw some very tiny spots on a couple of pectoral fins. So they are going to have a repeat treatment of Cupramine to see if that improves things. 

I also intend on pulling my Betta livida pair from their tank and putting them into single tanks/containers. They have a heap of fry and I think the male is really starting to get stuck into the female so I don't want her getting sick or injured. My single male used to be a very submissive fish always hiding and showing poor colouring. Well the other day I added much more cover to his tank and started showing him my Betta splendens male and his colour and aggression levels have improved, and he also built a little bubblenest for me. It's a shame the female was so hostile to him, as he has matured into a nice looking male. 

I also took a couple of shots of my Betta rutilans. This is my one pectoral female.










Then this is the biggest F1 offspring next to its father. I wish it would colour up more so I could get an idea of gender. I think it is most likely male. I only have eight fry and so I hope I at least get one female from the group.


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## SiameseFightingArt

Hey Lil I am doing a presentation at my school about organisms who had evolved and am doing betta fish (of course lol). Is it okay if I use some of your photos for the presentation? (Don't worry I will link them to here)


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## LittleBettaFish

Yep that is perfectly fine.


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## SiameseFightingArt

Thanks


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## LittleBettaFish

I have to get some photos of my fish, but for now I will give a basic text update.

Betta livida, Betta coccina, Betta uberis, Betta miniopinna, and Betta sp. apiapi tanks, all have some number of fry/juveniles in them.

I think my Betta coccina adults have been harassing their biggest offspring. I know this particular locality (Jambi) can be highly aggressive so I think I might try and separate out the biggest juveniles into another tank later this week. This will also stop predation of any smaller fry. 

I have Betta livida fry _everywhere_ and some are getting quite large. I still have to separate the pair out. I thought I'd actually lost the female as I have not seen her out lately, but turns out she was just hiding. 

I have no idea how many Betta uberis fry/juveniles I have. I usually catch them in fleeting glimpses because of how dense the planting is in that tank. The parents spawned the other day and the male has been busy with his fry. 

One of my Betta miniopinna tanks is still crawling with fry, while the other has virtually none. 

Two of my Betta sp. apiapi pairs have been spawning fairly consistently, while one pair has only spawned a few times. However, there are fry in all three tanks so I'm really not concerned. Surprisingly, while my nicest male was the late started of the three, he has been the most prolific thus far. 

Outside of that, my group of Betta persephone are doing well, as are my three Betta brownorum males (although one looks to be nursing a minor infection around his head). My four Betta brownorum fry are also thriving in their nursery tank. The one I had with the severely bent spine actually seems to be improving and as it has grown, the spine deformity has become less obvious. It's a fighter and in spite of its deformities, is the biggest of the four. So I figure if the spine doesn't look too bad when its mature, it can stay on in my tanks as a pet. If its three siblings turn out to be female, then I will pair these up with my three males as all three males are different in form and colour and I am curious to see what they throw when crossed back onto a related female. 

My Betta rutilans group are doing great. Their offspring are some of the biggest, and have been getting spoiled with near daily feedings of BBS and mosquito larvae. Still waiting on colour, although I see more and more red in the fins each day. 

I've been slack with my Betta hendra treatment, so I am going to be getting onto that on Wednesday. They are still perfectly happy and have been chowing down on mosquito larvae and blackworms, but they are not 100% so hopefully this second Cupramine treatment will do the trick. It seemed to have worked for my Betta uberis pair. 

My Betta persephone group is also still kicking around. They will be getting moved back into their 12 gallon long tank soon. I think it's a better shape for them, and there's the space for them on the bottom shelf. 

Meanwhile I was going to be purchasing some wild pairs from a fellow breeder interstate. However, there's been some personal issues here at home and I just felt that now wasn't the right time to be spending that kind of money and bringing home eight new fish. I am friends with another hobbyist here in Melbourne who was also getting some wilds, and now she seems to have hatched a scheme where she will purchase the pair of Betta persephone and Betta tussyae that were intended for me, and hand them over to me (one pair at a time) in a sort of breeding lease. If I am successfully able to get 4-5 spawns from each species, I will then hand the parents back to her, raise the fry, and depending on numbers/gender ratio I may retain a sibling pair from each species as by the time they are sexually mature I'm hoping our downstairs room will FINALLY be finished.


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## hrutan

Trading back and forth seems like an excellent arrangement. They get what they need, you get what you need...

Did I see correctly that the particularly draconian AU law for imports was delayed by another year, or was that for some other type of import?


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## LittleBettaFish

It is a very nice gesture from her. I just hope I won't kill either pair before they are able to be returned to her, as they are quite expensive and rare fish. 

The laws did get delayed under March next year. It's good news, but I feel even if the fish keeping public and the industry itself spent this time rallying against the changes, they would still come into effect. The Government has been trying to push similar batch testing legislation through for years.


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## LittleBettaFish

A took a few photos today, but none of my fish were really in the mood for posing. They were more interested in chasing down their nightly mosquito larvae. 

I have some peat moss soaking in boiling water around the side of our house (it was stinking up the kitchen) and this will be going into the 'new' Betta persephone tank. My plan is to fill a 20L bucket with water and plants from their current tank, and leave them in it so I can fit their new tank up on the shelf and get it filled. I'm going to go with a more natural look with their tank, so putting peat moss, leaf litter and sphagnum moss over a powdered ADA Malaya substrate, with the wood from their current tank, as well as some of my nicer looking tea tree roots from out in the shed. The only plants will be watersprite and duckweed. 

These were the few photos I got today.

Betta sp. apiapi male. Sadly not at full colour because he doesn't like the camera. This is my nicest male.



















One of my biggest Betta rutilans juveniles










One of my biggest Betta coccina juveniles. Unfortunately, their tank is very scratched and has a heap of algae on the glass so the photo is not good. Plus the female was chasing this one around. 










I'm happy with how all my young fish are growing out. I've been feeding BBS once a day or once every couple of days, otherwise I find the youngsters hunt down the smaller mosquito larvae that their parents miss, as well as any grindals or microworms. 

I saw a really nice looking Betta uberis juvenile out today. If I manage to get a sibling pair, they will replace their parents as my main breeding stock.


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## LittleBettaFish

After a couple of weeks of doing very little with my fish, I did water changes on 90% of my tanks and just puttered around my fish room tidying it up. Just got to sneak outside now and scoop some mosquito larvae from my tubs without the new neighbours seeing (our fence between their house and ours is only shade cloth). I don't want to have to explain what I am doing, or be made to tip my tubs out. 

My Betta persephone group are now in the 12 gallon long. A lot of their watersprite died back during the move over as it got crushed or broken while they were in the bucket, but I'm going to order a two or three bunches (each bunch contains 100 stems) of mayaca fluviatilis to float in their tank and some of my other wild betta tanks. 

After trialling sphagnum moss in some of my wild betta tanks, I've decided to go back to using java moss and other live plants instead. My wilds just seem to prefer the live plants better, but I still will put a small layer of sphagnum moss over the bottom of the tank as it does provide good cover for fry. 

So now I have to find a whole lot of java moss to fill up several of my tanks. I also want to order some peat moss, and run this in a filter in my water aging tub along with the rooibos tea to help keep the pH low. I just hope that Fishchick Aquatics still stocks peat moss, as the stuff sold at the local hardware store chain is pathetic. Jodi's peat moss is always soft and fluffy. 

I'm tossing up the idea of artificially hatching eggs from my egg eating Betta miniopinna pair. Normally I wouldn't do this, but I am curious to see if this sort of poor parenting has a genetic component, or it is simply an abnormality in individual fish. I want to see if by some miracle I can raise some F1 pairs to sexual maturity, whether they will display the same lack of paternal/maternal (I still haven't discovered who is doing the eating) instincts as their parents. 

My plan would be to remove the entire canister as soon as I see eggs, and put it into a tank filled with water from the breeding tank. I'm hoping the canister will prevent the eggs from being disturbed too much during the move. 

I know they did have at least two fry in there with them at the moment. One had a very bent spine so that needs to be culled when I find it next, but the other appeared healthy. Whether there are further fry or whether these two fry are even still alive, remains to be seen. But it proves that fertility is not the issue. 

Meanwhile my bent spine Betta brownorum juvenile seems to be looking less and less deformed as it grows. Sadly, I lost one of its siblings the other day. I have no idea why. I wondered if it was some sort of impaction or digestion issue as it had something sticking out of its anus when I saw it last alive. Meanwhile, one of the fry is absolutely tiny and has no caudal fin to speak of, and the other fins are very rough looking. I'm not sure if this is due to being bullied by its siblings, but knowing the aggression levels of this species and in particular, this line, I think it may be the reason. 

Because of this aggression, I'm going to be dividing up the tank holding the three adult males using some craft mesh. I did have one of my biggest males in a breeder box, and then my two other males loose. However, the smaller male came up the other day with a massive gauge taken out of his head, and one pectoral badly torn. So I'm not sure if he got his head stuck in the holes of the breeder box or was beaten up by the other male, but I think dividing the tank is a better solution. 

Other than the velvet in my Betta hendra tank, the rest of my fish seem to be doing okay. I never get too excited because disaster always seems to loom just around the corner. I didn't get any photos today because my tanks were still a bit murky after the water change. However, I did clean the glass and will get some photos tomorrow.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just took some photos of a few of my fish yesterday.

First up some of my Betta persephone. They are so rough looking now, but they seem to be happier with the extra horizontal space and layout of their 'new' tank. 




























Then one of my Betta rutilans offspring showing some nice red on the fins. Just got to wait for the body to catch up.










One of my Betta sp. apiapi fry with a belly full of BBS out of my nicest male










Then my egg eating Betta miniopinna male. He is not at full colour, and I didn't realise until someone on FB pointed it out, but he doesn't have bright red ventrals like my other males. I am sort of sad about that as the red is really striking against the blue body. 



















I saw a single, fat fry in their tank the other day. So hopefully it continues to grow and avoid its parents. 

My Betta splendens male Atlas was looking a bit off the past week or so. Usually he is very aggressive and spends a lot of time nesting and patrolling, but he wasn't doing much of either. So I gave him a 100% water change and a tank rescape and since then he has been zooming around flaring and making nests every couple of days. Unfortunately, his colouring is absolutely hideous now, which is why I never post any photos of him. 

I just put in an order for 100 large IAL, and still have to see if I can get some java moss and mayaca next week. This hobby is expensive even when you aren't even buying any new fish!


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## LittleBettaFish

Got my IALs delivered today. Any members who are from Australia, and do not know about the online aquarium store, The Tech Den, I seriously recommend checking them out. I ordered my leaves yesterday and they arrived today even though I didn't pay any extra for express shipping. I try to use them, and Age of Aquariums for as much of my non-livestock/plant purchases as possible. 

I'm thinking now I should have gone with the smaller IALs. The large ones are big enough that two or three leaves cover the top of my 10 gallon tanks. I'm also considering going over to my dad's house and collecting a bag of oak leaves. It's only the shape of oak leaves I don't like. Unlike the alder leaves (which don't last long enough underwater), the melaleuca leaves, and IALs, they just look out of place. But my fish do like hiding in them, and they do last a while before breaking down. 

I'm also considering trialling a bunch or two of hygrophila polysperma in my wild betta tanks. I hear it is a fast grower and doesn't need a lot of light, so I am keen to give it a go. Anyone got any comments on this? My Amazon sword plants seem to hate my wild betta tanks. They don't die but they don't grow either. They are in like this weird stasis even though they receive light and have a nice nutrient rich substrate to dig their roots into. I have no idea what happened to the few crypts I've planted. The hydrilla, watersprite, and java moss are like the Borg. They just assimilate any other species of plants I add. 

I'm convinced Amazon Frogbit does not like my covered tanks. Even when I have put it in tanks with absolutely no competition (only other plant was java moss), it dies off. The only time I got it to grow, was in an uncovered tank downstairs and obviously I can't leave my wilds uncovered. I also am reluctant to try java fern again. I really like using this plant with my wilds, but it seems to become infected with some sort of virus in my tanks and plants that have been healthily growing for months suddenly rot away in the span of 24 hours. Infected leaves seem to pass the infection on to other surrounding leaves, and then onto other rhizome based plants such as anubias and bolbitis. I literally overnight, lost a tank of anubias nana, and miniature java fern/bolbitis. If I hack back the fern to the rhizome, they will regrow but then can succumb again to the virus in the future. I have been doing some reading and other people have had the same problem, but no on seems certain of the cause (seems to move way too fast for a nutrient deficiency and only rhizome based plants are affected) or how to remedy it beyond hacking the plant back and removing infected leaves. 

Meanwhile, I got this photo of my Betta uberis male and one of his offspring. The few fry/juveniles in the tank are starting to recognise my tapping now, and come out when they hear it as they think they are getting fed. I swear Betta uberis is just a species prone to becoming chubby in captivity. The only slender Betta uberis I see, are wild-caught. My female looks like a small blimp. 



















Then here is my bag of IALs. They are in front of a 12 inch tall tank for scale. 










Also my egg eating Betta miniopinna pair spawned. I saw a small amount of eggs in the film canister. Half tempted to pull them out of their into another container. As I say that, they have probably all been eaten again by now. 

Meanwhile, I am tempted to separate out one of the pairs from my Betta persephone tank and see if they aren't too old to give me a spawn. Partly this is because I am bored, and because all the males have been busy nesting and sparring in the main tank. I am also curious because while my F2 male seems to lack a lot of the blue iridescence on the side, he and his siblings also seemed to end up with normal toplines so perhaps this deformity in the F1 group was due to their early upbringing or the harsh medications they were exposed to as fry when I was treating them for velvet.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yesterday I moved all my Betta hendra over to their hospital tank, and then this morning I added the first dose of Cupramine. I've been lifting up the blanket every few hours just to make sure no one has died, but of course all they do when they see me is rush over and want to be fed. 

I'm keeping the temperature around 28 degrees celsius as it seems these fish just can't tolerate both a temperature of 30 or above as well as the Cupramine. So hopefully I can avoid any fatalities with this second treatment. 

My fish room is in an absolutely atrocious state at the moment. Looking back through my photos, my tanks seem so sparse right now. I also was going back through the camera and deleting old photos to make room for new ones and I came across photos of my previous Betta miniopinna pair from Joty. I think they were definitely superior in appearance/personality to the two pairs I have now. I mean this is the most action I get out of my egg eating male. Especially when the light is on. 










Meanwhile I have this little male hiding out from his father. He looks like a miniature betta at the moment. 



















My male dominating the top half of the tank as always.

Then this is my smallest Betta brownorum male. I think he got his head stuck somewhere as there is a circular wound around his head near his gills as you can see in the photos. I swear these fish are suicidal. If they are not jumping to their deaths, they are searching for new ways to kill themselves. 



















I'm going to be setting up a new tank for my Betta livida pair before the end of this week. The female has some damage to her fins, and the male is just constantly harassing her. Plus I want to give their fry space to grow-out without being bullied by their parents. 

Our oldest dog Eos has also come into heat and based on her blood tests should be ready to be mated today. After the mating debacle last year, I want nothing to do with it (plus I don't want her to have puppies anyway), so I told mum I will come in the car with her and meet the stud dog if she wants, but I am not having anything to do with the actual mating itself. It sounds terrible but I hope she just absorbs them like last time. I don't want another dog, and I think the chances of Eos with her bloodlines producing a dog of any real note, is very, very, slim. She's a great dog and I'm scared something will go wrong and we will lose her as she is five now and this is getting on for a maiden. 

Unfortunately, she's not my dog, and for some reason my mum is obsessed with this idea of breeding her. I think even more so since Nike failed her hips after being so promising early on.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well to begin with, Eos was mated twice, and now I believe we wait several weeks until she is given an ultrasound to see if there are any puppies there. Poor Ares has been in lust with her the past week or so even though he is neutered and only today has he stopped harassing her. 

Otherwise, my fish are doing well. I was concerned about how my Betta hendra group would cope with the Cupramine as I added the second dose the other day, but when I lifted the towel this morning two of them were sparring and the rest of the group came swimming over for food, so it looks like they are tolerating it just fine. 

All my fry and juveniles seem to be doing well, except for my smallest Betta brownorum fry. It is still completely missing its caudal and I haven't seen any sign of regrowth. At the moment it eats and gets around okay, and I think for now I will let it be. However, if the caudal fails to develop I will most likely have to euthanise it. It's always going to be at a disadvantage to its siblings, and it's a pretty serious deformity if it was indeed born like that. With that said, my Betta brownorum juvenile with the bent spine has an almost straight topline now. There is a small dent in front of the dorsal fin but otherwise it looks perfectly normal. So this is good news as it is a real little fighter and even though its only about 1.5cm, if I put my finger in their tank, it comes rushing over. 


I took a few photos today. Sadly most look better on the camera than they do on my laptop, so I got left with only a handful. The first is how my fish rack/room looks at the moment. The only tank not in view is my Betta hendra hospital tank which is on the top shelf of the smaller rack.










I have eight species of wild betta at the moment. Almost all my tanks have fry or juveniles in them, so I don't want to add any further fish until I grow some of these out. Unfortunately, it looks like a lot of these young fish are turning out to be male, a big problem with me and this complex!










I managed to get a photo of my male Betta miniopinna where his fins weren't clamped. I am contemplating keeping this pair (they are more attractive and personable) and selling the other pair. The other pair has a heap of fry, and I would like to get a pair of Betta miniopinna again that have the bright red ventrals rather than this dull maroon colour. I'm just going to wait until the fry in the other tank are older because I know I will sell my breeding pair, their fry will all die, and I will be left with my egg eating pair and their single juvenile. 










Here is his female showing off (I suspect they will spawn again soon and this time I am determined to steal some of their eggs). 










Then this is one of my bigger Betta sp. apiapi juveniles. There are a few siblings of a similar size in this tank as well as a lot of smaller ones. It's the same sort of story in my other two Betta sp. apiapi tanks. 










This is a terrible photo of a nice fish. This isn't the father of the above juvenile, but he's the friendliest out of my three pairs. He's got a lot of attitude for such a small fish. 










Finally, this is my fish room assistant Nike looking like some abused soul from an animal shelter advertisement. 

That's about it from me. I'm still waiting on my order of plants to come. I thought they would be here today since I paid for them on Tuesday but I guess not. I really hope they come by Tuesday of next week as I _may_ be receiving a pair of Betta persephone and the hydrilla in some of my tanks is dying off for reasons unknown.


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## blueridge

Just wanted to stop in and say Thank You! For helping me with my Betta Edithae problem I was having. I finally put them back together yesterday and everyone was getting along. I woke up this morning to find them breeding. Haha go figures! :roll:


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## LittleBettaFish

Glad to hear things are working out Blueridge. Hopefully now your pair have spawned, they will be able to live together without warring. 

Recently my female Betta uberis went missing. I assumed she was dead, she had jumped (so also dead), or that she was sick or injured. After a couple of days of frantically searching the tank with a torch, she emerged from hiding sporting another swollen eye. I don't know if it's the male responsible directly or if he simply startles her and causes her to injured it, but that didn't stop her from flirting with him last night. 



















Then I managed to make my male juvenile stay still long enough to get a nice couple of photos. 



















Finally, a smaller sibling. Hoping female. 










Because my Betta uberis male is really aggressive and because the tank is small, once this F1 group is bigger, I'm going to try and move them out into a tank of their own. I would like to get a female so I can work further with this line. 

I also discovered I _may_ also be receiving a pair of Betta brownorum next week (or some time after). They are from the same supplier as my previous pair so I hope they are equally as nice. The only reason I am getting them and the Betta persephone, is because they are free of charge in a very, very, generous gesture from the hobbyist friend I mentioned before. So I have to get two tanks ready and see if both pairs survive shipping.

Meanwhile it looks like I will have to separate my Betta rutilans female from her breeding partner and offspring. I saw her last night with some very torn fins, so I will probably buy a breeder box and put her into it. I think with her one pectoral, she just isn't fast enough to get out of trouble.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yesterday I moved my Betta brownorum males and the juveniles (they are in a plastic container) into their new 10 gallon home. Unfortunately, it seems that I am missing a male. I had him in a breeder box and I think he must have escaped from it. I'm hoping I have just scooped him up with some sphagnum moss and he is in the tank, and not on my floor somewhere. 

Meanwhile, I found my other male with a _very_ nasty wound on his face. He has some fin damage, so I suspect a fight between him and the smallest male. At the moment his face is swollen and it looks like the skin is slewing off. However, he is still moving around, has good colour, and doesn't seem distressed, so I will give him a chance and see if he recovers. IME, wilds seem capable of recovering from some very horrific bodily injuries. It's unfortunate that this group is just so aggressive. I'm hoping my two juveniles are female because they are in a small container at the moment and I don't want them killing each other. 

I also caught my rutilans female and have her in a plastic container floating in the main tank. Her body condition is quite poor, so I think she was just being out-competed and bullied by her offspring/breeding partner. Hopefully separation and regular feeding will get her looking good again as she is one of my favourites. 

Annoyingly, I'm still waiting on news regarding the plants I ordered. Based on the site info they should have been here at the end of last week. They had better come tomorrow or Wednesday, as I really need to get my new tanks ready, and I also am desperate for more cover in my other tanks. 

In other news, my Betta uberis female is almost back to 100% health, and my Betta hendra group continues to do well with their velvet treatment. 

To add some colour to this post, here are some photos I took this morning.

First up, is my new Betta brownorum tank (left) and my Betta rutilans tank with my female in the plastic container on the right. If it turns out I only have two Betta brownorum males left, I will divide the tank into three, and eventually release the two juveniles into one of the sections. At the moment I can't raise the water level because of the juveniles, but once they are in the main tank, I will be bringing it up level with the waterline in the Betta rutilans tank. 










Then this is just a random shot of my Betta miniopinna male. 










My Betta coccina tank in all its algaefied glory. 










The female










My male practising his vertical flaring skills










A male juvenile










I don't think it's coloured up despite its size because once you colour up, you start to attract the attention of the dominant pair.


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## LittleBettaFish

Somehow one of my Betta brownorum males got into the breeder box with my injured male. My injured male looks extremely stressed. I have no idea how long his brother was in with him, or whether they fought again, but I'm annoyed at myself for not putting a lid on the breeder box. I suppose I didn't expect my other male to jump in with him. That smallest male has turned out to be as aggressive as his mother. Why can't my Disappointments just get along?!

Also, while my juveniles were eating I decided to take out their container and check their progress. I had a very close look with my torch, and it looks like the fry that I thought was only missing its caudal, is also completely missing both its dorsal and anal fin. These three young fish were born into a tank that still contained traces of Seachem Cupramine. There were a few spawns that took place, and the majority of the eggs turned to mush and did not hatch. I am seriously wondering if the copper in the water is responsible for the deformities in two of the three. I did some quick Google searching and it seems that copper and other heavy metals can effect skeletal development. At the moment I think it's kindest just to euthanise the fry with the missing fins. I'm sad because it is eating and cruising around and doing everything an otherwise healthy fry would. 

In happier news, I took some photos of my Betta persephone while they were putting on a nice display this evening. 














































The male on the left is my F2 male. Unlike most of my F1 males, he has a really nice topline, but his colouring is much paler and he lacks the blue iridescence on the sides. He spends most of his time skulking on the bottom of the tank, and was disturbed by the appearance of one of his uncles. 



















I didn't notice until I uploaded this photo that what looks like my F2 male is spying through the IALs. 



















F2 male again


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## LittleBettaFish

My Betta uberis female was feeling well enough to spawn with the male. Her eye isn't fully healed, but she's stopped hiding and gone back to her usual friendly self. 

My Betta coccina pair also spawned, as did my egg-eating Betta miniopinna. I was going to pull the eggs from my miniopinna tank, but I think I will do that next spawn as there are only about four eggs left. 

My Betta hendra group has four days left of Cupramine treatment. At the moment they are looking and seem to be feeling, great. I might leave them in the treatment for a few days longer, then do a small water change, and slowly start to set their tank up normally. I noticed the one difference between my fish that I treated successfully for velvet (uberis, rutilans, and brownorum) was that I didn't get rid of the remaining Cupramine in the water. Last time, I did a 100% water change with my Betta hendra group once the treatment was finished. This time, I'm just going to leave them in their hospital tank, and do partial water changes over the next few weeks. 

My rutilans female already looks so much better now she is out of the main tank. She's been getting fed white worms and blackworms to put on some condition, and help her fins heal. The male and her offspring have been loitering outside the container. She wanted out this morning to be with the male but she won't go back with him until I can get them their own tank, and get some definite genders on their offspring. 

My Betta brownorum male was alive but hiding yesterday. He is still hiding today so I am going to remove all the sphagnum moss as I cannot keep eyes on how he is recovering with it in there. Hopefully I don't find him dead, as the wound did seem to be healing cleanly. 

I'm shooting an email off to the company I purchased my plants from. It's been close to two weeks now and no plants. I also think I may need to purchase a new heater. I want to divide my 36cm tank and put my Betta livida pair into it. I was going to split a bigger tank and house my third male alongside them. However, I am sort of afraid to have all my breeding stock in one tank in case something happens. I also seem to only have one Betta livida juvenile. I know there were more fry present in the tank. I really hope they are hiding, as my juvenile looks suspiciously male and I really need another female. Only a very small number of this species in this country and at the moment it seems like I may have the bulk of them. 

Otherwise, my Betta sp. apiapi fry/juveniles in my three tanks are growing well, as are the Betta miniopinna fry. Fingers crossed for some balanced sex ratios, but that's unlikely. I wish these fish were more like my Aphyosemion Australe, who gave me basically a 50:50 gender split. 

I can't shake the feeling something disastrous is going to happen. Nothing ever goes this well for me, for this long. I actually enjoy being in my fish room again, rather than dread looking at tanks full of sick fish.


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## LittleBettaFish

I'm just wondering because I am bored, and because even though I get a lot of views, I hardly get any comments compared to blogs relating to Betta splendens, is there anything anyone wants to know about my wilds, or just keeping wilds in general? 

Otherwise, I have some good news in that my egg eating Betta miniopinna male actually has eight fry still hanging from his nest inside the film canister. They should be free-swimming in a day or two provided they aren't eaten. I've got my fingers crossed. It would really be great if the egg/fry eating stopped and I could get a couple of spawns out of this pair. 

I also spotted another Betta livida juvenile eating BBS last night, so I think there must be more in there. The tank is very densely planted and is a 10 gallon turned so that the smaller end is facing outwards, which is why it's next to impossible to see how many young fish are in there.


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## MattsBettas

I read everything you post, and love and really appreciate your journal... I often just don't have anything to say! It definitely doesn't go unnoticed...


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha yeah I guess by the number of views (they can't be all me!) people read, but sometimes I feel like that crazy person talking to themselves in the corner.

I have been talking to my hobbyist friend, and apparently I am getting a pair of persephone, a pair of brownorum, and a pair of tussyae. It was thought the tussyae were dead, but then they got found alive so now they are getting sent to me too. If all three pairs arrive alive, I will be at my absolute limit. Both racks will be full, and my sideboard already has two tanks on it. 

I also emailed the business I ordered my plants from, and he is sending them tomorrow, so they should arrive Wednesday. Tomorrow I'm going to fill up my tanks, and I think I may see if I can't pick up some driftwood as well. I am most excited about the persephone, as my group is getting on in age. Eventually I would like to add another pair, but it's a matter of whether there would be any available, and whether I have the space and funds.


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## Aquatail

I always read your posts and I love your pictures and hearing about your fish. ^_^ I just don't want to clog your journal by saying it every time.


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## LittleBettaFish

It's okay, I will accept any and all flattery haha.

Bad news. The brownorum pair I was getting have died. I think whenever the next shipment is, I will just import a pair of brownorum in.


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## BettaLover1313

I read your posts whenever I log in, and I really enjoy the pictures you get of your bettas.


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## Fenghuang

I read all your journal posts. I just don't think I have anything interesting to say, that's all. xD

Sorry to hear about your brownorum pair. That must be very disappointing.


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## LittleBettaFish

It is a bit disappointing. But brownorum are not too difficult or expensive to source, so at least it wasn't the tussyae or persephone. 

Meanwhile someone posted photos of their new Betta sp. wajok up on a FB group I am on, and I am losing an internal battle with myself as to whether I should order a pair myself. I never actually raised my Betta sp. wajok fry to maturity, and my sp. wajok female was really odd looking and I ended up with fry that had green spots on their sides. 

I would have the space for them, so I might enquire about a pair for the next shipment into Australia..... I just won't tell my mum. Luckily most of my fish are small and red so she can never tell the difference. 

I took some photos of my fish but most turned out dreadful as my tanks have a lot of algae on the front glass and need a good scrub. Water changes are due tomorrow so I will do it then.

First up is my Betta livida female showing off her vertical bars. She colours up like this almost constantly. She's also very long, and I would put her around the 5cm mark. At the moment she's still my only livida female, so I always worry about her. 



















Then this is a bad shot of my biggest Betta livida juvenile. I'm actually not sure what gender it is. It's anal fin is very straight, and the ventrals sort of look more like what I would see on a female than a male. I'm crossing my fingers it is a female, because she will be shacking up with my other male as soon as she is sexually mature. 










Then one of my favourites, my Betta uberis juvenile male. He is so feisty in spite of his small size. I'm sure he is probably going to eat his newest siblings as soon as they become free-swimming. It's very much survival of the fittest once the juveniles reach a certain size. Anything small enough to fit in their mouths, and slow enough to catch, gets eaten. Then they reach adulthood and they completely ignore the fry, even if they are not their own. 










My Betta hendra group finish their two week treatment tomorrow. I'm going to be so happy to get that blanket off them and give them a proper inspection.


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## LittleBettaFish

I was feeding my wilds just now, and I managed to get some photos of 'Zig-Zag' my deformed Betta brownorum juvenile. It had some pretty horrendous topline issues early on, but they have gradually improved until there's now just a small dent in front of the dorsal fin. Zig-Zag is obviously not ever going to be used for breeding purposes, but after being forced to euthanise so many of my young fish because of velvet, I was happy just to let it go on being perfectly imperfect. Its bent spine has had no effect on its health, and it is actually the same size as its normal sibling.

Sadly, its sibling with no fins has not improved, so I will be euthanising that. I definitely suspect the Cupramine was responsible for these deformities, but I will likely never know for certain. 

Zig-Zag not looking its best. 










You can see the dent here just in front of the dorsal. It's really remarkable how greatly it has improved. I never thought it would straighten up to this degree.










Zig-Zag on the hunt for some more mosquito larvae. Looks like a contortionist fish here.


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## LittleBettaFish

My Betta hendra group finished their treatment today. As they were in a bare bottom hospital tank with clear water and only PVC pipes as cover, they were quite stressed when I removed the blanket. I added a thin layer of substrate, several handfuls of sphagnum moss, and a couple of IALs just to make them feel more comfortable. All of which will be easy to remove if they require another round of medication. 

This group has always been my favourite to photograph, so I snuck a few shots after I fed them. 














































My original male is not having any photos taken until his ventrals grow back out as someone has bitten them half off. 

It's a remarkable turnaround considered they were completely covered in velvet and very sick when they went in. I still think Seachem Cupramine is an excellent medication when treating this parasite. It seems that it's more the higher temperature (30 degrees plus) that affects my fish more so than the medication (unless I accidentally overdose).


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## LittleBettaFish

Last night, I spent a couple of hours madly rushing around trying to sort out some containers for my new fish, which I was told were coming today. I partially filled one of my tanks, added a heater, and then put the containers into that. Since my plants still have not arrived (I am going to be extremely angry if they show up half-dead on Monday because they can't be delivered tomorrow, I just threw in some sphagnum moss, IAL, and film canisters in to make their containers a little less bare.

My friend dropped them off earlier this morning, and apart from some torn fins on the tussyae pair, they all look in relatively good health. The Betta brownorum pair are so tiny, and I actually have two juvenile persephone that I am secretly hoping turn out to be male and female. I caught them all some mosquito larvae not long after their arrival, and they all readily ate that. 

With the pair of Betta tussyae, I now have ten species of fish from this complex. I also am going to have to find some space to separate out my Betta livida pair and my Betta coccina juveniles. I wish my mum would just let me have that bedroom as my fish room. I mean we are two people living in a four bedroom house. Surely one spare bedroom is enough?


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## LittleBettaFish

All my new arrivals are still alive and kicking today. I was most concerned about my Betta tussyae pair, but it just looks like a case of torn fins. Unfortunately, it looks like it is going to be a while until they get into their tanks as I am still waiting on my plants. 

At this point I am starting to get angry. It's 17 days since I ordered them, and I ordered them before the cut-off for same week delivery. I've been pretty patient and have been polite in my emails, but they didn't arrive yesterday at all, and they were supposedly going to be sent on Tuesday. So now with the holiday on Monday, the earliest they will arrive is Wednesday. I cannot find a phone number, but I sent an email again last night. I have ordered hundreds of dollars worth of plants from this business before without issue so I don't know what the delay is now. 

Anyway, today I spent most of the afternoon organising my fish room. I had all this old and broken equipment, which went into the bin. I realised I seemed to have an issue with hoarding buckets. So now I have only three 10L buckets in my fish room, and the rest are in the shed. Apart from my food cultures, everything fish related is now in my wardrobe. It looks much neater and leaves the possibility of me being able to squeeze a couple more tanks onto the bottom shelf of my sideboard if necessary. 

Sadly I have made the decision to euthanise my injured brownorum male. He is not recovering and looked very bad earlier today so I have my container of water in the freezer and will be doing it tonight. Good news is that my 'missing' Betta brownorum male made a reappearance in the main tank. He must have been hiding in the sphagnum moss when I moved them into this tank. 

Plans are to purchase a couple of heaters, some airline tubing, and some java moss and peat moss. I'm still tossing up whether to buy some wood to go in the new tanks, but it's so expensive. I have to sell one of my tanks, so perhaps I'll use the money from the sale to go towards the wood. 

Also I want to get some Brazilian pennywort and let it grow at the surface of my tanks. I wish we had more options for floating plants here. I really like dwarf water lettuce and salvinia, but I'm sure at least one of these is a noxious weed so unfortunately I can't get my hands on them.


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## LittleBettaFish

This morning I did water changes on my new fish. I added some java moss to the jugs holding my Betta tussyae, and the container holding my Betta brownorum female because there wasn't much cover and they were not 100% comfortable. However, everyone seems to be settling in well, and they have been scoffing down mosquito larvae. 

This is where they are living at the moment. 










Meanwhile this is my new Betta persephone male. His colour is extremely washed out at the moment. I can't wait to get him into a tank and see what he looks like coloured up. 



















Unfortunately, I euthanised my Betta brownorum male and deformed fry today. I was hopeful my male would recover, but he was struggling and I thought it was for the best. The fry was never going to be normal, and I was only going to get attached if I waited any longer. 

In other news, apparently my plants were sent on Tuesday when the seller said. I contacted him Thursday night when they had failed to show up, and he has no idea what has happened. I just hope if they show up next week and are dead/dying, I am able to get replacements without having to pay for them again. 

To close off my post, here is a cute photo I took of my Betta hendra tonight.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well after waiting today and yesterday for my plants, I think they are pretty much MIA in the mail. The seller has no idea what has happened either so he is re-sending my order today, with some extras because of the late delivery. Hopefully the plants arrive tomorrow. I am still waiting on a heater so I can set up all three new tanks, but with the plants, I can at least get my pair of Betta persephone into their tank. 

The rest of my fish are doing well. All my young fish are growing out nicely, especially my Betta coccina and Betta sp. apiapi fry/juveniles. My Betta livida male is guarding a new nest, and my egg-eating Betta miniopinna pair have been flirting. This time I am going to swipe their eggs and artificially hatch them. They also have the bent spine fry I have to catch and euthanise. I think the only reason it has survived this long is because it only has one normal sibling to compete against for food. 

Sadly the weather is cooling down here in Melbourne and is heralding the end of daily feedings of mosquito larvae. This is where I wished I had something like daphnia to tide me over the colder months. I hate having to rely on frozen foods and blackworms/grindals/white worms. I really don't like feeding a worm based diet simply because it does tend to add bulk to my fish. 

Meanwhile I am trying to find a source for some cheap java moss or subwassertang. I want to phase out the sphagnum moss in some of my tanks, and use it in the tanks I will be setting up this week. I can find golf ball size portions for around $5, but I really need like a basketball size portion. Also still looking for Brazilian pennywort, but everyone only seems to sell the smaller variety. 

I think I also need to replace the tubes in two of my light units, as they are over a year old now. I swear this hobby is just one unending expense. The purchase price is definitely the cheapest part of owning a fish. 

Also, we are taking our dog Eos to get an ultrasound on Monday/Tuesday to see if she is pregnant. She doesn't seem to have gained any weight, but it's only been four weeks since the mating. I'm so nervous. She is such a great dog, and I'm worried something will go wrong. She's only five and I couldn't imagine losing her. I don't want to be left with nutty Nike and ugly Ares as our only two dogs haha.


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## LittleBettaFish

My plants arrived this morning, making me realise I need way more plants to fill up all my tanks. I miss having my wild betta tanks overflowing with greenery. I think my fish miss it too, as with the exception of my Betta uberis, Betta livida, and Betta coccina tanks, they just don't show as good a colouration as previous fish have. 

I hate the fact I can't grow java fern long-term without it unexpectedly melting overnight. The same thing happens with bolbitis. The anubias only seems affected if it is sharing a tank with either of these plants, but it would cost several hundred dollars to buy the amount I require. 










This is my big rack at the moment. I think I am going to have to bite the bullet, and buy a 3ft light to span the tanks on the bottom shelf, especially the Betta persephone tank as the plants are struggling. 










This is the tank belonging to my egg-eating Betta miniopinna pair. Their tank already had a lot of cover, so I only added a small amount of mayaca fluviatilis and duckweed to it. 










This is going to be my new Betta persephone tank. As you can see, there is still a lot of work to go into it. I need to install the heater and sponge filter, and add some IAL/rooibos to colour the water. The bottom of the tank is bare, so I have some sphagnum moss soaking just to provide some temporary cover. Hopefully this can be replaced with java moss and some other plants. The glass panel is in there because this is what I use to pour my water onto. 










This is one of my Betta sp. apiapi tanks, and you can see why the fish don't show their best colour. It's much too open. I'm either going to put java moss or sphagnum moss down on the bottom of the tank to provide more cover until the mayaca fills in more. There's also some watersprite growing at the surface. 

I think I might swing by the fish store near my house and see if they have any watersprite and milfoil in stock. Otherwise I'll order some online. I really am going to try and track down some Brazilian pennywort, as it reminds me of Amazon frogbit, which hates my tanks. It just seems like no one stocks it here, which is sort of odd. 

Anyway, still waiting on my remaining heaters/equipment to come, so I can set-up my Betta tussyae/brownorum tanks. Then I will just be sitting on my fish until some of mine get big enough to sell.


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## LittleBettaFish

There's been no sign of my heaters and airline tubing so hopefully they arrive on Monday. However, I'll fill up and plant out the remaining two tanks just so they are ready to go when the equipment finally does arrive.

Meanwhile, my Betta persephone tank now has some sphagnum moss, a sponge filter, and heater added. I have some torn up IAL steeping in the kitchen, which will go on the bottom of the tank for added cover, and I chucked in some Cajeput leaves as well. 

This is what it looks like at the moment. I'm going to tint the water with the IAL 'tea', and I'm going to put some peat moss into a stocking to help keep the pH and softness super low. Hopefully by the time I am done, it will be enough to encourage them to start breeding.










My egg-eating Betta miniopinna pair are flirting like crazy, so I suspect there will be eggs soon. I just hope I don't stress the male too badly by removing them. Ugh, this pair would be perfect if they just had the red ventrals of my previous pair and didn't eat their eggs. They have lovely form but the male is the biggest wuss I have met. He follows the female around everywhere and no amount of coaxing can get him to flare at the mirror or another male. 



























He thought he was getting fed here. It's really hard to get a photo of him where he isn't acting submissive, or posing oddly. 

Meanwhile, my Betta uberis male has claimed the entire top left corner of the front of the tank. No one dares go anywhere near him, so the female and the fry/juveniles hang out in other parts of the tank and only come out to feed. For such a beautiful fish he always takes a bad shot. This was the best I could manage. 










Then just one of my Betta sp. apiapi males. I still have lots of work to do on the three apiapi tanks. I don't know if my females will ever look as nice as my original girl colourwise, but I'm going to try and make it happen. 










So plans for this weekend, are water changes, setting up my two new tanks, and ordering a plethora of watersprite and java moss. I also need to clean the algae out of my Betta coccina and Betta uberis tanks. It is seriously taking over. My Betta coccina tank receives a lot of sunlight on one side so it's just green slime everywhere. At least my fish don't mind.

Oops forgot the picture of my smallest Betta hendra female (or at least this is what I suspect 'she' is). She is feisty as anything and is the one I'd like to use as a sibling cross. 










Maybe with this big brother


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## bullseyejoey

Wow awesome!


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## Fenghuang

You are so modest about your tank setups, but I honestly always looked up to them. They look so natural and like you took great care to make your wilds feel at home.

I like the pictures of your hendras playing in the sphagnum moss. They look so lively.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Bullseyejoey. My fish are a bit of a different flavour to most of the bettas on this site. 

My tanks used to be a lot nicer to look at. But I lost a lot of my plants when I had several tanks infected with velvet, and also for some reason, my java fern always seems to die off. It will be thriving one day (often having been established in the tank for weeks or months), and then all of a sudden develops these brown areas of decay and in 24-48 hours, I can lose an entire tank of it, as well as any other rhizome based plants in there. 

It's very frustrating as I like to use java fern in my wild betta tanks, and anubias is so expensive by comparison. 

Hopefully with the watersprite and moss I have coming next week, I can get my tanks back to their former glory.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I just introduced my pair of Betta persephone into their new tank and they have been busy exploring and gently flirting. They coloured up almost as soon as they hit the water, and the female is showing very strong vertical barring. I'm going to give them a big feeding of mosquito larvae and hope that they like their tank enough to spawn. 

Meanwhile I managed to drop the biggest juvenile on the floor while I was trying to move it into the same container as its sibling. I've decided I will float their container in my group Betta persephone tank until they get bigger. If they are a breeding pair, I will have them in their own tank. If they end up being either both males or both females, I will use them to cross onto one of the parents, or a sibling if I manage to get any fry out of this pair. 

I'll try and get some photos of my Betta persephone pair once they have had some more time to settle in. I hate chasing fish around with the camera when they are already feeling a bit stressed and they are such beautiful fish, I don't want to do them an injustice. I think it's actually been since 2012 that I have had a non-related breeding pair of this species in my fish room. I so hope they spawn. I know they can because they have the two juveniles to prove it, but this species can be so tricky to firstly encourage a spawn, and secondly not have it end in eaten eggs.


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## LittleBettaFish

My new heaters and airline tubing arrived yesterday, so today I am going to be setting up the tanks for my tussyae and brownorum pairs. I'm just going to use the rest of the water from my aging tub, and cut it with cold tap water. Then the fish can go in tomorrow once the temperature has stabilised. 

My Betta persephone pair are not as coloured up when they first went into the tank. The male in particular does not seem very comfortable. I think I might remove the sphagnum moss and leaf litter, and put a layer of peat moss over the substrate. Then I'll add the sphagnum moss and leaf litter back in, and put some java moss over the top of this. Then hopefully, the roots from the watersprite and mayaca will provide further cover once they grow in. 

Meanwhile, one of my Betta sp. apiapi females has coloured up the most I've seen since she arrived. I'm not sure if it is the new plants or the rooibos I added, but she's been solid red for a few days now. I managed to get a couple of photos of her and her male. He's been chasing her around so it was hard to get her sitting still with her fins unclamped. The male just seems to enjoy pulling ugly poses. 




























I actually think this female has the nicest form out of the three pairs. She's certainly got the most personality. She's always at the front of the tank when the male isn't chasing her around. 

All my other fish seem to be doing well. It is getting a lot colder here so my stocks of mosquito larvae are dwindling. Because I'm now relying more on whiteworms/grindals/blackworms and frozen foods for my fish, I'm spacing their feedings out more, so they have a day or two of fasting. At the moment, breeding is only a priority for my three new pairs. I definitely have enough young fish growing out at the moment from my other pairs that I don't need to add to their numbers. 

That's about all that's been up on my end. It's been quiet in my fishroom...a little too quiet. I'm half expecting everyone to come down with velvet.


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## artemis35

> My fish are a bit of a different flavour to most of the bettas on this site.


Well, I for one, really enjoy seeing pictures of your fish and tanks.

The longer I have only VT females and king males (PK), the more I like the look of the wilds. Honestly, many of the really heavy-finned male bettas I see lately just look "odd" to me. Definitely not my cup of tea anymore. I certainly don't begrudge others having them (and I really _do_ enjoy looking at pictures of all bettas), but I don't think that I, personally, will ever own a long-finned betta again.

Also, I am a big fan of the heavily planted, "jungle" style tanks. I can appreciate the "look" of the fancy aquascaped tanks, but for actual use with a betta, give me the "where the heck is my fish" tons of plants look :lol:


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Artemis35. 

I have my one plakat male, but my heart is really into my wilds. I'm not a fan of the seemingly bigger and bigger fins getting bred onto these fish. I often wonder how some fish with excessive finnage fare as they age, as it seems like a lot of weight and drag. I'm not surprised fin biting is as common as it is. 

Wilds have their own beauty. There are so many species that are covered within this genus that often get overlooked in favour of Betta splendens. Even inside the splendens complex, you have B. stiktos, B. imbellis, B. smaragdina, B. mahachaiensis, and B. siamorientalis. They might not be as flashy or garish as the fancy Betta splendens, but their beauty is like that of a wolf compared to a dog. It's as nature intended them to be. 

My wilds look their best in heavily planted tanks. Sometimes I think I spend more on things to put in my tanks, than the fish themselves, but it is worth it to see them in full colour.


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## LittleBettaFish

My poor Betta sp. apiapi male. I didn't realise when I was taking the photos that he has a small nest of eggs that his juvenile offspring are trying to do their best to get in and raid. 

Here he is on patrol.










Against troublemakers like this.



















Meanwhile I was really worried I only had one Betta livida juvenile, as I only ever see the biggest one out at the front of the tank. However, after sticking a light over their tank, I can see I have enough at least a handful of varying sizes. 

This is the largest, and I think perhaps female.










Second-in-command



















Then one of the really small fry. I would hide too in this tank. 










Betta livida are so rare in this country. I don't really know anyone else who has Betta livida in Australia, or at least anyone who has an online presence. I'm going to try and build up my numbers as best I can. I have my spare male to use as an out-cross with an F1 female since he is the same locality. This was my dream species for so long due to their scarcity in the wild and in the hobby, and so I want to try and have several breeding pairs/groups in different tanks so I don't lose them all if something goes wrong - as is usually the case with my fish!


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## artemis35

> I often wonder how some fish with excessive finnage fare as they age, as it seems like a lot of weight and drag. I'm not surprised fin biting is as common as it is.


I, too, wonder about how the heavy-finned fish will age. 

Due to the extensive inbreeding done to quickly produce such fish (due to demand), I fear for their overall genetic hardiness and/or longevity. Already we hear about the very "delicate" nature of rosetails, dragonscales seem to be much more susceptible to disease (blindness and tumors), and the double-tails have all of their own issues due to their shorter bodies.

And the rampantness of fin biting is kind of alarming to me. 
Almost like it is an instinctive response to finally being physically pushed too far beyond the limits nature ever intended? I don't think that I have ever heard of a female or plakat betta being a fin biter?




> Sometimes I think I spend more on things to put in my tanks, than the fish themselves...


I can so relate to this 
Plants are just as addictive as bettas!


I wish that wilds were more available (and less expensive) here in the states. I would love to try raising some of my own.
Until then, I will just admire your fish. And, that last picture with the really small fry was like a "where's Waldo" picture for me. I literally looked for about two minutes before I found it :lol:


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## Hallyx

artemis35 said:


> I wish that wilds were more available (and less expensive) here in the states. I would love to try raising some of my own.
> Until then, I will just admire your fish. And, that last picture with the really small fry was like a "where's Waldo" picture for me. I literally looked for about two minutes before I found it :lol:


I know, I know --- me too.

There are some wild breeders here on the forum. I got my B.ocellata from WildBetta. Is that right, LBF? You know of others, too, I'm sure.


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## LittleBettaFish

I found the longer I kept wilds, the more I prefer fish that are as close as possible to their natural state. If I am really after a colour kick, there are always killifish. I absolutely abhor any fish that have been bred for certain physical deformities such as a shortened body. I also don't like hybrids, especially with species where pure specimens are rare. I'm finding I don't even like artificially created colour morphs any more. I think this is the first step of me becoming a fish snob. 

Sadly I can't get a lot of plants that I want here. I would really like to use dwarf water lettuce or salvinia as surface cover, but one is unavailable and one is a noxious weed. 

I did get an email back from my query about java moss, peat moss, and BBS eggs. The seller has all three, so I'm going to pay her today and hopefully I shall receive them by the end of the week. 

To import wilds into the country is massively expensive, and I prefer to use wild-caught fish as my foundation pairs. Not only do we have to pay sellers in USD, which is higher than the AUD, but then there is an import cost of around $23.50 (it went up from $22 I believe) per fish for smaller wilds, and one of around $35 per fish for larger wilds. Then I have to add in local shipping from the transhipper to me, which is around $25. Betta sp. apiapi cost me 90 USD to buy, so you can imagine how much my three pairs must have cost me! It was only that one pair was free as a replacement for a DOA pair. 

I think there are a few breeders/keepers on this forum, but most don't seem to be as active as me. I did find many of my fish seem to have taken over Google images when you do a search for that particular species. I knew I took a lot of photos, but I didn't think that much! 

Sometimes, a part of me is glad wild bettas are not as commonplace as Betta splendens. I feel like this means they are more likely to find themselves in the hands of serious hobbyists/dedicated breeders. I am usually very particular about where my wild bettas go once they leave my fish room, and I doubt any Betta sp. apiapi or Betta livida will be leaving here until I can get a successful F2 breeding. 

My poor Betta livida fry was getting harassed by everyone. There are a few smaller ones swimming around. Fortunately, they are fast enough and large enough to get away from any cannibalistic older siblings.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yesterday, I introduced my Betta brownorum pair to their new tank. They have coloured up more than my Betta persephone did, and have been following each other around/going in and out of the film canisters so that is a good sign. No photos, as the java moss did not show up and they have been swimming around with clamped fins because there isn't much cover in the tank. 

For that reason, I haven't put my Betta 'tussyae' (I really can't tell if they are tussyae or livida at this point) together. Because they had such tatty fins when they arrived I am concerned this might mean they will be aggressive towards each other. There aren't nearly enough hiding places in the tank for that, so for now the male is in the tank, and the female is in the plastic jug, but in the tank so I don't have to run an extra heater. 

My Betta persephone male is being aggressive towards his female so they are definitely going to have java moss added to their tank once it arrives. He also still hasn't coloured up, which is a shame as this is such a beautiful species. I think he wants more cover and the water darker. 

The rest of my fish are doing well. I think Zig-Zag my crooked spine Betta brownorum juvenile may actually be a male! It's hard to tell because the horizontal striping goes right over where the lateral spot would be, but on both sides, that area looks darker than the rest. 'His' sibling isn't showing the same marking, so I think that one might be female. I was hoping they would both be females, but now it looks like I am going to have three males again! Watch now as Zig-Zag turns out to be the only male as spectacular as his grand-father. I will definitely be using his sister as breeding stock. I will probably pair her up with my biggest male. He is much more mellow than his smaller brother, who seems to have inherited his mother's nasty streak. It's like a fish soap opera in that tank. 

So far only one or two of my Betta coccina juveniles are showing a blue lateral spot. I definitely want to try and squeeze a tank in for them, so I can separate them out of the main tank. I think without the presence of the adult pair, they are going to colour up marvellously. It would be great to have a wide selection of females to choose from for once. 

My Betta livida and uberis 'families' are also doing great, and it turns out, one of my other Betta sp. apiapi pairs spawned when the male pictured in the posts above did. I give the fry in both tanks a very dismal chance at surviving once they leave the nest. They have a hoard of hungry siblings waiting for them. 

I am still struggling to sex my Betta rutilans juveniles and sub-adults. I would like to get the adult pair into their own tank again but it's just a matter of space and money. I'm short on both, and I'm running out of places to plug my heaters into. 

Our electricity costs can be insane here in Melbourne. I'm really worried how high the bill is going to be over winter as my heaters will be on so much. 

Anyway, enough writing. I took some photos of my Betta hendra tank tonight. My male is showing signs of regaining his former glory. He is probably one of my most 'famous' fish. I have seen photos of him when he was younger posted in a number of places. Him and his female really do seem to be a bonded pair. He has several daughters, but I've only ever seen him spawn with one of them. Every other time it has been with his original female, and she follows him around the tank chasing off the rest of the fish in the tank. They've been flirting a lot lately, but I am not going to put a film canister in because there is still copper in the water and I am afraid there might be deformities with the fry. One of their sons is an absolute ripper. I definitely want to use him, and this tiny but feisty female, as breeding stock in the future. 


















My replacement male fighting with his mother









That is her on the left









Original female









My male pondering what happened to his good looks. He still looks really nice when he flares and has his fins more open. 

Then this is my biggest Betta miniopinna fry from my 'ugly' pair. They are definitely getting sold in the next few weeks. Their fry all seem to be growing out well enough, and I could do with some extra fish money.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I've been thinking it for a while, but after speaking to the original owner of my Betta tussyae pair, we have come to the conclusion that they are not Betta tussyae, but likely his Betta burdigala. I've had Betta tussyae before and the colour and body shape was different to my previous fish, and fish pictured online. 

I'm sort of disappointed because I really would like to have had Betta tussyae again. As I would rather focus more on the rarer species of wilds, I doubt I am going to hold onto them. If they are gone, it frees up a tank I could use for another pair of wilds (at this point likely Betta persephone), or for some of my young fish. 

Here is the troublemaker in question.










In other news, my parcel containing my peat moss/java moss/BBS eggs arrived at 6:30pm tonight. I paid for express shipping and the satchel it came in said 'guaranteed overnight'. It being Monday here, I am wondering if perhaps it got stuck in the post over the weekend. Thankfully there weren't any fish in there. 

I've got some peat moss soaking in hot water, so hopefully that will be ready to go into my Betta persephone tank tomorrow morning. 

I also think my new Betta brownorum pair spawned. I have not seen the male out at all, and there are bubbles visible in the back film canister. Fingers crossed I get some fry out of this pair after the disaster that was my last foray into breeding this species. 

Because temperatures have been struggling to reach the high teens here in Melbourne, I'm noticing a dramatic drop-off in the numbers of mosquito larvae in my tubs. Especially larger larvae. Today almost everyone got fed frozen brine shrimp. Many of my fish (especially the young fish) have never had frozen foods before, so it was fun watching them try this new food out. The brine shrimp and bloodworms I have in the freezer at the moment has some pretty bad freezer burn. So I think I'll pick up some replacements this week. 

Finally, I thought I'd share a couple of photos of my Betta rutilans male. 



















He was probably least enthused about the frozen brine shrimp. However, he did get stuck into it once he saw the juveniles/sub-adults eating it. His female is still being kept separate and has finally regrown her fins and regained her condition. I think unless I can get her and the male into their own tank, I'll leave her separated. She just can't compete against her unruly offspring.


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## LittleBettaFish

Today I sent a sibling pair (or at least I hope it is) of Betta hendra off to their new home. Their new owner lives about fifteen minutes away and is the breeder of Atlas my plakat male and owns/has owned my fish before, so I know they are going to a good home. 

I think I might try and move a few more of them on. I could do with some extra cash, and I would ideally like to whittle their numbers down to the original pair and then the sibling pair I plan on keeping. My original pair are still showing an interest in breeding, so even if the sibling pair turned out a dud, I'm sure I could get fry from them again. 

Yesterday afternoon, I overhauled my Betta persephone tank in the hope the male might show some interest in breeding and colour up. So far nothing seems to have changed, but it's only been a day. I might add some IAL tea to their tank to make it even darker.

I added the rest of the java moss to the Betta brownorum tank, and they seemed happy enough with that. Male still seems to be guarding a nest, so crossing my fingers for fry. 

Meanwhile, I am worried I am going to lose my Betta rutilans female. I have no idea what is wrong with her, but earlier today I found her upside down at the bottom of the container. I thought she had died until I saw her move. I tested the ammonia and it was 0ppm. Her appetite has been excellent, there's been no change in behaviour, and her colour is still really strong. Fins aren't clamped and I haven't seen her scratching against anything, or seen any indication of external parasites with my torch. 

The rest of the fish in the main tank are perfectly healthy. 

I put her into a breeder box with the water level much lower, and at first she just sat on an IAL at the surface breathing heavily. She is ignoring the mosquito larvae I put in, but she has moved off the leaf and gone to the other side of the box. She doesn't look in distress, just her respiration rate is faster than normal. 

I said my fish room has been quieter than usual. I knew all my good fortune would run out eventually.


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## LittleBettaFish

My male and female Betta rutilans are both alive. The female doesn't seem to be 100%, but she has been moving around and I'm going to try her with some mosquito larvae to see if she still has an appetite. 

I don't really have much to write about today. I just finished giving my water aging tub a scrub with hot water and white vinegar, and now I have it refilled and ready to go. Some of my tanks haven't had water changes in them for 3-4 weeks now, so I want to get them done on Tuesday/Wednesday of next week. 

My plan was to put a stocking of peat moss in there along with the rooibos, but the peat moss is very fine and started leeching out through the stocking and into the water, so I'm going to purchase some Eheim Torf Pellets and use them instead.

I also did a much needed water change of my goldfish tank. Changing out 60L of water manually with a bucket and siphon is pretty backbreaking. They also have run out of pellets so I threw them in some frozen krill this morning. I suppose I will have to pick up a tub of NLS large fish formula this weekend. 

Otherwise, the rest of my post is going to be about my Betta uberis male. He was looking very nice this morning so I took the opportunity to get some photos. You can really see how dynamic his poses are! The black thing is the film canister where he builds his bubblenests. 



























That's his female in the background.



















Betta uberis is not my favourite species, but this pair are two of my favourite fish. Unfortunately, it looks like all their fry are going to be male. Not sure what I am going to do with them all, as one male Betta uberis is ornery enough. Poor female. I hope there is at least one daughter in there to keep this line going.


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## LittleBettaFish

My female Betta rutilans is looking much better. There also doesn't seem to be any lasting damage done to the male. I had a closer look at him today and the wound is only shallow and healing cleanly. He was coloured up and trying to get at the mosquito larvae in the female's container so I think those are both good signs. 

I have definite eggs in my Betta brownorum tank. He built the most pathetic nest. It's seriously only big enough to hold the eggs and that is it. His female moves way too fast for me to get a decent photo of her. This was the best I could manage under the lights. 










I still have some work to do on this tank, but it will wait until the fry are free-swimming. 

My male hendra is still guarding his nest. I can't see any eggs in it, but he's been incessantly guarding it for a couple of days now and no one is going anywhere near it. So I'm not sure what is going on there. 

I'm having one of those days where I look at my tanks and think "ARGH" because they look terrible. My mum put my debit card in her bag the other day, so as soon as she returns with that tonight, I'm going to be ordering a whole heap of plants. I can't find Brazilian pennywort here, but Cardamine lyrata looks very similar and can be grown floating so I'll use that as a substitute.

I've also decided I want to try apistogramma at some point in the future. Apistogramma panduro would likely be my first choice. I have a two foot tank, sand, a whole heap of IAL and melaleuca root, and floating plants. All I need to buy is the fish and I could have a tank set-up. But then I really want another pair of Betta persephone. Decisions, decisions. 

To wrap up my post, here is a photo of my Betta miniopinna pair. This male is so docile. I have tried increasing his aggression levels using the mirror like I did with my Betta uberis, but he refuses to even look at it. I'm hoping that the one breeding quality offspring they have managed to produce is a male so then I can back-cross him onto the female.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just sharing photos of some of my youngsters. They are mostly Betta coccina. So far I think I have one male. The rest look to be female as the biggest juvenile is the only one that shows a blue spot like his father. 














































This is one of my Betta livida juveniles. I'm going to be moving my biggest juvenile who I _think_ is female, into a divided tank with my spare Betta livida male. If she does turn out to be female, I'll introduce them as soon as she is large enough to hold her own. Hopefully, I can get a second group of Betta livida going. 

Then this is Zig-Zag my brownorum juvenile. He's still small but he's been fighting with his sibling lately. This group is so feral. I blame their mother. 










Also, because I almost never show photos of my plakat male Atlas, I thought I'd post this one up because he's put so much effort into it. 










He had a complete tank overhaul the other day and in the process, I destroyed his previous bubblenest, so he had to make a new one. 










Finally, here is my Betta rutilans male. The small white mark on his back is where he got himself stuck in the breeder box hole.


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## LittleBettaFish

Sadly, I lost one of my Betta persephone juveniles in a way which was 100% avoidable, so I'm pretty cut up about that. 

Otherwise, things have been going okay. The brownorum eggs have hatched and the male is doing an excellent job tending to the fry. My 'supposed to be tussyae but really are burdigala' male also built a nest in one of the film canisters and has been coloured up and flirting with a receptive looking female. My persephone male has also coloured right up and has been showing off to the female more. I'm hoping to eventually coax them into spawning. Especially since I lost one of the juveniles and the remaining juvenile looks male. 

The heater in my brownorum group tank wasn't doing the job properly, so I'm using my spare heater in their tank. Because of this, I'm going to order another two or three heaters. I want to set up a tank for my young coccina, and possibly my rutilans pair now they both seem to have made a recovery.

One fish I don't post a lot about in my journal, is my single Betta livida male. His female died coming to Australia, and I never bothered to replace her because of the cost of importing and shipping. I did try him with my livida female, but she attacked him so badly I had to remove him from the tank for his own safety. Now he lives in a 2 gallon tank next to my plakat male. He's the only one of my wilds to take pellets, and he flares at a mirror just as well as any Betta splendens. He is who I want to cross with a daughter from my livida pair. I thought if the female is younger than he is, there is less chance of her dominating him. 

For some reason he doesn't show the green colouration on his body like my other male. That may be because he is more submissive, and lives by himself. 



























That is his tank on the left, and Atlas's tank on the right.


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## LittleBettaFish

Not much been happening with my fish. My burdigala pair have fry and I did some water changes today. 

However, yesterday we drove almost two hours to visit my mum's breeder friend and her puppies. 

We have three dogs. Ares who is too badly conformed and oversized to show, Nike who has hip dysplasia which ended her show career, and Eos who mum has been trying to breed, but who has thus far failed to carry any puppies to term. 

While I detest it, mum enjoys conformation showing, and as she doesn't have any show dogs at the moment, she mostly tags along and helps her friends out with their dogs. Because of this, her breeder friend has very kindly offered to give mum a puppy to show. 

The breeder has two litters, and there are two female puppies she has picked out as potential choices for us. One is 'Red Collar Girl' and the other one is 'Little Dark Girl'. There was a beautifully conformed female puppy (sister of Little Dark Girl) who was very feisty and who I would have taken home, except for the fact she has a crooked tail so it rules her out of being competitive in shows. She maintained eye contact almost the entire time I was in the pen with the puppies, and seemed very switched on. I told the breeder she has to find this puppy a good home as I think she will make someone a great pet. 

Out of the two puppies, I preferred Little Dark Girl. She has a beautiful face with dark eyes and a nice broad muzzle, and just had more presence IMO than the Red Collar Girl. I like my dogs with a bit of spunk, and she had that in spades. Her favourite past-time at the moment seems to be leaping up and snapping at your face when you bend over, while the rest of her siblings hang off your clothing and skin with their teeth. I forgot how bitey German Shepherd puppies are. It's like being mauled by a pack of adorable sharks. 

After they stopped trying to eviscerate me, Little Dark Girl fell asleep on my lap with all her siblings curled up around me. She really stole my heart when she started wagging her tail while she was dreaming. 

She was also the pick of another breeder friend whose kennel has produced several National winners/placers. So unless she suddenly becomes hideous in the next couple of weeks (they are six weeks at the moment) she will be coming home with us. Her show name will be Hot Damn Funk, and her pet name will be Clio to go with our Greek Mythology naming theme. 

Me and mum are going to build a small dog yard down the back of our block and put gates up to divide our backyard into sections. German Shepherd females can be aggressive towards other females, so it is likely Clio won't be able to run with Nike or Eos once she is a certain age either. Hopefully in a few years we will be able to move onto a bigger block where we can have proper dog runs built and more space for everyone. 

I was angry when mum wanted to get a fourth dog, but she wears you down after a while and it is her house and I do live here free of charge aside from helping out with gardening/housework/the dogs, so it's not like I have much of a say anyway. Plus seeing the puppies the other day did do a lot to change my mind. 

Dealing with Nike's fear issues and lack of tractability, I'm hoping that we can get a better foundation on Clio. All the puppies seemed to be very bold (the breeder showed us how she throws a metal bowl at their yard fence and they just want to get after it), and we are going to enroll her in a mixed breed puppy class as well as the German Shepherd specific one. I told mum Clio has to pass at least level one of obedience classes at the club because Nike is the only dog of ours that hasn't done any formal obedience classes and I think it didn't help. 

So a lot of work ahead with four German Shepherds, but hopefully we can manage it. I did tell the breeder I think mum is deluding herself if she thinks she can give Clio back if she turns out to be a dud show dog. The breeder agreed. Mum is such a softy. After spending the afternoon with the puppies yesterday, I don't know how any breeder does it.


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## LittleBettaFish

It's been a while since I've posted anything, and that is because I think I am slowly getting bored of keeping/breeding wild bettas. I've barely done anything with my fish in the past few weeks (apart from feeding obviously), and I just find my interest in them waning. All my fish are healthy and I have young fish growing out in almost every tank, which should be making me ecstatic, but it's not. 

I think it's worse because I just don't have space to keep anything but my wild bettas at the moment, and the majority are so similar in size, colour, and behaviour that it's like I just have the same fish in every tank. 

I'm not going to go crazy and sell off a whole heap of fish like I usually do, because that inevitably ends with me regretting it. However, I think I will be easing back on the number of species I want to maintain long-term.

Anyway, in other news, we are picking up our puppy this week. It looks like it will be 'Little Dark Girl' coming home with us. She has good lines, and just has the presence and personality for the show ring IMO. The other day mum went up to help the breeder wash a couple of her dogs for a show, so I spent the afternoon in the puppy pen. The Little Dark Girl followed me around everywhere, fell asleep squished up on my lap, and brought me a stick that had fallen into their pen. I really hope that this is the one we bring home or else I might cry. 

So far whatever puppy we bring home, will have a lovely leather show leash, a fluffy tug toy, and a pink soft toy that you can put a plastic bottle into. Mum has ordered a crate, which hopefully arrives before we pick the puppy up, otherwise we are going to build a small pen in the kitchen. We have a big deck out back so we are going to fence a portion of this off, so the puppy can be out during the day. 

Unfortunately, toilet training sucks during winter. That's the one thing I'm not looking forward to. I'm also nervous about how Nike will handle a puppy. Knowing Nike she will either become obsessed with it, or hate it (she has disliked/been scared of puppies since she was a puppy). Other than that, I will be counting down the sleeps until we can go and pick her up. Hopefully this time, mum gets a nice dog that doesn't have bad hips, and I can have a dog that doesn't go around thinking she is a cat.


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## Nismo83

nice collections of wilds.. and your tanks do give me an idea in setting up my next tank for the Occellata.


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## LittleBettaFish

Definitely put a strong lid over the top of it. That whole complex are notorious jumpers. My unimaculata group would jump out if I was too slow with getting the food through the lid.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> Definitely put a strong lid over the top of it. That whole complex are notorious jumpers. My unimaculata group would jump out if I was too slow with getting the food through the lid.


Thanks. I will take note of it. Guess will be purchasing a new tank tomorrow late morning for setup. Can't bear to put the cherry shrimps colony in dangers


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## LittleBettaFish

What's this? Oh, just the tank I am going to be setting up for a group (thinking between 5-10 fish) of Pseudomugil gertrudae. I know I have gotten in and out of natives before, but this time I am sticking with them. I want to do something different and I'm going to have patience this time rather than rushing in headlong like I usually do.

At the moment I only have substrate and some small rocks, whose arrangement I think looks pretty natural. 

The breeder we are getting Clio from, has a property in the country with lots of gum trees and fallen branches. I noticed some interesting pieces on her 'burn' pile when we were up the other day, so on Sunday when we go to pick Clio up, I'm going to have a look through for some pieces to use in this tank. 

I'm going for a billabong look, so there will be lots of leaf litter, and either Nymphoides spongiosa, or Nymphoides indica as the main plants. I'm still tossing up whether to add Australian hairgrass or Blyxa aubertii to the tank, but I probably won't. 

I need more substrate but I will order that, when I order my fish and plants. I also am trying to sell one of my pairs of Betta miniopinna and once their tank is broken down, I can put this tank up on top of a rack rather than on the bottom shelf. 

I ideally would like Pseudomugil mellis, Pseudomugil tenellus, Pseudomugil cyandorsalis, Pseudomugil ivantsoffi (I believe they are in Australia) and Pseudomugil sp. red neon (have seen one store in Australia selling this). Along with different Rhadinocentrus ornatus localities as I prefer these over rainbows and I don't need to fiddle around with making my water harder. Of course I have neither space nor funds for the majority of these fish at the moment, but it is a future plan as I ease back on working with my wilds. 

Speaking of wilds, I took this photo of my egg-eating Betta miniopinna pair. This is the pair I am keeping, simply because I like them better. 










Otherwise, my wilds are doing well. My pair of Betta brownorum are breeding up a storm, my Betta hendra male seems to have snuck a spawn in, and the rest of my young fish are growing out well. 

Still no sign of a spawn from my Betta persephone pair even though they have one of the best set-ups in my fish room. 

It's been freezing here the past few days so my mosquito larvae tubs are yielding very little. I'm sure the electricity bill is going to be astronomical. Australia certainly doesn't make it easy to keep fish.


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## Nismo83

nice wilds. could be due to the water that is why they Persephone are not breeding yet? meaning need some frequent water change. some fishes require water change (of same parameters) just like in nature. just my 2 cents thoughts.


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## LittleBettaFish

No I think something is wrong with the female. I have bred persephone before and conditions should be perfect for them. I'm going to remove the female and replace her with an F2 female of my own breeding. I just have to be careful as my group of persephone have had some issues with toplines.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> No I think something is wrong with the female. I have bred persephone before and conditions should be perfect for them. I'm going to remove the female and replace her with an F2 female of my own breeding. I just have to be careful as my group of persephone have had some issues with toplines.


I see.. can't wait for the updates


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## Nismo83

sad day today, found one of my albi female dead in the tank. left with 2M 1F. and if monitoring them now. =(


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## Fenghuang

Excited to see the development on that rainbow tank. I love the small rocks.

My first wilds came in yesterday, a handsome pair of copper smaragdina. Female is feisty, flares at all the other inports and takes pellets readily. Male seems to be a bit of a wimp though. But the female is only half his size, so hopefully the match will be amicable.


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## LittleBettaFish

That's a shame Nismo. Any sign of what she died from? I would be surprised if the other fish in the tank killed her as usually this complex is very docile. 

That's good news Fenghuang. Just remember, keep a tight lid on them both. I know I sound like a broken record, but I have been keeping wilds a while now and it still astonishes me just how small a gap they can fit through. 

I had a submissive Betta uberis male. His female bullied him mercilessly, so there was no courtship or spawning occuring. I started flaring him daily and built him up on live foods, and you wouldn't even know he was the same fish. So if you find your male lacks confidence when/if you put them together, using a mirror may help. 










I picked up a couple of branches to try out in my blue-eyes tank. I've been playing around with one of the branches. I always want my native tanks to look as natural as possible. This is what I have put together thus far. Unfortunately, it comes across as very flat looking. I do have another branch that has lots of finer branches coming off it, but I think that would look better in a longer tank so I don't have to cut it down. 

This is the detail on the branches. They are simply dead gum tree branches. I figure gums grow along most bodies of water here so it would be expected their branches would fall into the water and provide habitats for fish. 










Hopefully I can have some fish in this tank in another couple of weeks. 

In very good news for me, we picked up Clio from her breeder last night. We got home very late, but she handled everything very well, including meeting our big male who just wanted to put her head in his mouth. I was really worried about how Nike would handle seeing her. Nike was actually really good. We put Clio in her crate, and let Nike approach her when she felt comfortable. Nike gets a little overwhelmed when Clio licks/nips her face, but she hasn't growled or snapped at her. I swear Eos was sulking last night though. She just went in her crate, turned her bum to us all, and started sucking on her giraffe toy. I did tell her, we wouldn't have brought Clio home if Eos had gotten pregnant. Her puppies would have actually been due yesterday if the mating had been successful. 

Clio has a really good temperament. It's a big change for her, and she's handling it very well. Although the cats have all given her a bit of a scare as the breeder's cat had very little to do with the puppies. 

Only thing I am not enjoying, is toilet training in the freezing weather we have been having. Having a puppy in the warmer months is definitely a lot easier.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> That's a shame Nismo. Any sign of what she died from? I would be surprised if the other fish in the tank killed her as usually this complex is very docile.


I am not able to find out what happened. Probably died yesterday while I'm out. Cuz I still see her swimming on Friday night when feeding. This morning was covered by mould. When I saw it. At first I tot is the cardinal tetra


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## LittleBettaFish

Always sad to lose one. Hopefully it wasn't anything contagious. 

It's been a couple of days since I've even looked properly at my fish. So tonight I was having a look around while I was feeding everyone. I'm really surprised by how big my Betta coccina F1 are now. My male F1 is almost big enough to spawn and starting to draw attention from the original pair, so I am going to try and get a separate grow-out going for them this week. 

Meanwhile, war has been declared in my Betta uberis tank. There is only a small number of juveniles, and at this point, I'm thinking the majority are male. They spar with each other constantly, and even try to bully the original male and female. The biggest is a terror, and is going to get put in his place by the original male soon. 

My egg-eating Betta miniopinna pair were showing off tonight. The male has been trying to coax the female into the film canister so I think he must have a nest back there. 

I took a few shots of them just before. They were only quick snaps and I haven't cleaned the glass or anything, so they are not perfect. 




























They have one normal juvenile and one hunchbacked runt I can never find to cull. It's such a shame they eat their eggs/fry. They are such a lovely pair.


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## Zippy2014

They are beautiful. I like the wild type, they are so sleek.


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## Fenghuang

LittleBettaFish said:


> That's good news Fenghuang. Just remember, keep a tight lid on them both. I know I sound like a broken record, but I have been keeping wilds a while now and it still astonishes me just how small a gap they can fit through.
> 
> I had a submissive Betta uberis male. His female bullied him mercilessly, so there was no courtship or spawning occuring. I started flaring him daily and built him up on live foods, and you wouldn't even know he was the same fish. So if you find your male lacks confidence when/if you put them together, using a mirror may help.


Will do. Thank you for your advice. He seems to have really coloured up after the first day and built a bubble nest in his QT jar yesterday, so maybe not a wimp after all. I like these them a lot already. They really are stunning.



The rainbow tank looks like its coming along splendidly. I think the tree branches look nice. Is sexing your fish difficult? I can tell the different between my smaragdina but some of your wilds look very similar.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Zippy. Their 'sleekness' is part of the reason I keep them. 

Fenghuang, when my fish are adults it is very easy to tell the difference between the sexes. In most of the species the female looks very different in body shape/fin size/colour to the male. However, when they are that sort of juvenile to sub-adult size, it can be more difficult. I'm having real trouble sexing my Betta hendra F1 correctly because it can be hard to tell what is a young male and what is a female as the colour and fin size is very similar. 

Wilds do get very personable. All mine come to the front of the tank when they see me. It's what I like about bettas. They are very interested and curious about their surroundings. You make one change in their tank and they immediately have to go and check it out instead of hiding in the corner like some fish do. 

So far I have had zero luck with my persephone pair spawning. I think I am just going to divide a small section of my main persephone tank for them to go into, and put my coccina F1 group into the persephone tank as it is all set-up with plants and would be perfect for them. I thought maybe having some competition through the divider would encourage my persephone pair to spawn. Otherwise they can just live in the main tank and stop taking up so much space on my rack.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> Always sad to lose one. Hopefully it wasn't anything contagious.


yeah.. I am still feeling sad.. I gave them the best care out of the 3 tanks of wilds. my Chans are still doing good in office except for 1 male that is like moody... 

ur fishes are nice. I confirmed a pair of macs yesterday. it will be arriving Monday next (25th May).


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## Nismo83

LittleFishBetta, do you use salt for your wilds? Was told by a friend wilds dun do well in salt.


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## LittleBettaFish

Sometimes having two males and one female is better for breeding purposes anyway. Stops the males being over-bred and losing condition. So losing a female is not as bad. 

I personally don't use salt for my wilds. Only wild species I know of that lives in brackish water naturally is Betta mahachaiensis so I don't think there's any need to use salt in their tanks.


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## LittleBettaFish

I have literally done nothing with my fish in the past couple of days because we've been busy with Clio. I forgot how much work a puppy is. 










Anyway, this is Clio. Usually both ears are flopped down, but this morning, one decided it wanted to stand up. 

Because Nike is very fear-aggressive towards other dogs, we didn't want the same thing to happen with Clio. Nike was socialised early on, but more with German Shepherds than other breeds, so last night, we took her to a puppy class at the vet we go to. 

Clio did great, although the class itself was very dry and boring. I think it was a vet nurse who took it, and it was basically just her talking to us for half an hour and then unsuccessfully trying to get puppies to sit and drop (I was so close to grabbing a treat and showing everyone how to do it properly). The puppies didn't even get a chance to meet and greet, which was basically the only reason we took her there. Hopefully there will be more time for that in the next two classes. 

I thought Clio would bark at everything, but she was actually the most confident puppy of the five. We had to sit in the waiting room for ages, right next to a Saint Bernard and she handled herself well. Much better than Nike anyway. I got asked to take her outside when we first took her to the vet as she wouldn't stop barking.waiting. 

The content of the presentation was pretty poor IMO. It was a lot of information to take in, in a solid chunk, and I think would have been much better broken up with opportunities for the puppies to play as they basically sat on the floor doing nothing for a solid half an hour. There was also some content I didn't agree with. We got advised not to play games like tug-of-war with powerful breeds like German Shepherds, or at least not to let them win. I think this is utter rubbish. Games are supposed to be fun for dogs. My dogs aren't going to rise up and usurp my position in the household because I let them run off with the tug toy. If there were, they've been plotting it for a long time because Ares is seven years old and I've been letting him win since he was a puppy. 

A miniature schnauzer was on the mat next to Clio, and it was like the ADD corner. Everyone else was sitting quietly, while these two were wrestling with each other. We had to get Clio's rope toy out in the end, as being a German Shepherd puppy, she wants to put everything in her mouth, including the schnauzer's collar, and the instructor's shoe. She was the only puppy that sat during the 'sit' demonstration, and I think that was mostly because Clio is already very good with sitting. We've been working on sit, drop, wait, and watch. She's much easier to train than Nike ever was, as she is very switched on, and extremely food, toy, and praise motivated. 

Toilet training is also going really well. We take her out at 4am to go to the toilet as she can't hold all night, and she's only had a few accidents in her crate and in the kitchen. 

She adores Ares and he seems to like her. He rumbles when she licks his face, but he brings her his toys and follows her around. Nike is still petrified of Clio and I doubt I would ever let Nike run with any dog but Ares anyway as she is such a nutcase. Eos is getting used to Clio now. She does growl at her every now and then when Clio pushes the boundaries, but hopefully once she starts growing out of her nippiness they will be able to play together. 

I absolutely love her temperament, and I just hope that she works out in the conformation ring. Otherwise I told mum we are keeping her, because she is just such a great dog.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well we had a bit of a panic with Clio yesterday. At around 4am, she had diarrhea, and then she was lethargic and not wanting to eat her breakfast. After she ate her breakfast, she vomited about half of it back onto her bed. 

We took her into the vet as soon as we could get an appointment. We were thinking parvo or something like coccidia. However, the vet thinks it was just a bad reaction to her worming tablet, and today she was back to her normal feisty self. 

Last night I was also feeling sick for some reason and after feeling dizzy and nauseous all evening, I ended up vomiting into the toilet. I haven't been sick like that for ages and I forgot how crappy it is. 










Anyway, today I have been working on the hardscape in my rainbowfish tank. I've decided to use some of the melaleuca roots I had down in the shed, and I think it came out alright. I've just scattered some paperbark leaves around on the substrate to see how it looks. Now I'm debating what plants to put in. Originally I was going to go with Nymphoides spongiosa, but I'm starting to lean towards Vallisneria nana, provided I can get the very thin variety like I've had in previous tanks. But I think the Nymphoides spongiosa would give it more of a billabong feel. 

Anyway I believe Dave, the man who runs Aquagreen where I get all my native fish and supplies is off overseas. So I will have some more time to plot and plan.

Otherwise, I took this photo of my Betta uberis male while he was waiting to be fed. Obviously you can tell from his condition how starved my fish are.










Then I think this is a son. It seems like all their offspring are male, and being uberis I'm not sure how I am going to get rid of them. 










Then this is my Betta coccina F1 male, and what I believe to be an F1 female. This group is _definitely_ getting separated out before the end of the week.



















Apart from that, I've got heaps of Betta burdigala and Betta brownorum fry growing out. I've been dropping microworms in every so often to keep them fed. I also got off my butt and got through my long overdue water changes. 

I am still also trying to sell my spare Betta miniopinna pair. This is why it sucks to keep fish that really only appeal to a small number of hobbyists. I also don't post fish (too much stress and too much effort as I don't have a car) so that further limits who buys from me. 

I also am experimenting with re-sizing my photos so they are a little larger than previously. So this is why they are bigger.


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## Nismo83

Nice update.. Too bad I am on another continent otherwise I will drop by your place. One of my betta kakis is going to pass me his trio of persperphone after my trip back to Bangkok next month.


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## LittleBettaFish

Betta persephone are lovely. Make their water really dark and you will see the best colours. Too many people seem to keep them in clear water, and they look pretty crap until they spawn. I prefer to have my fish look nice all the time. 

I found Betta persephone the hardest out of this complex to breed. It seems you have to have everything right for them to want to spawn and for them to leave the eggs alone.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> Betta persephone are lovely. Make their water really dark and you will see the best colours. Too many people seem to keep them in clear water, and they look pretty crap until they spawn. I prefer to have my fish look nice all the time.
> 
> I found Betta persephone the hardest out of this complex to breed. It seems you have to have everything right for them to want to spawn and for them to leave the eggs alone.


Thanks for the tips. I will take note.


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## LittleBettaFish

Gah I forgot how time-consuming having a puppy is. Lately I feel like I am spending most of my day in the backyard taking Clio to the toilet! 

Our main goal this week is to start getting some basic commands into her. So far she is very good with 'Sit' and 'Watch', and I am working on 'Drop', 'Stand', and 'Wait', as well. She's very food motivated and quick to learn, so that does make it easier. 

Haven't really been doing much with my fish. I took a few quick snaps just now, but nothing particularly spectacular as I need to clean the glass on some of my tanks. 

This is my Betta hendra female. The water in their tank is so dark with rooibos at the moment. Definitely not her best side! 










Then this is my biggest F1 Betta uberis. In the first photo I tempted him out with a pen, and in the second photo he was copying his father and chasing off one of his siblings. 



















Then finally, this is one of my Betta sp. apiapi males. You can see how the red colouring changes under different lighting. There are so many young fish in this tank. I'm not sure what I am going to do with them all. I'm praying for an even gender split, but if not, I'd rather the majority be female as that makes living together a lot easier.


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## LittleBettaFish

I haven't posted in my journal in ages. Just been busy and haven't really had much of anything to talk about. 

Yesterday I sold my pair of Betta miniopinna. I broke down their tank, and moved their nine juveniles into the tank with my egg-eating pair. You could almost see my male wondering where all these other fish had come from when they only had the one juvenile before. 

With the miniopinna gone, I then had room to set-up a tank for my spare Betta livida male and my F1 (hopefully) female. I'm using my shallow 45cm tank, and I'm going to fill it with wood, java moss, and some watersprite, and fingers crossed I end up with another breeding pair of this species. There are a couple more juveniles and fry in the tank with the parents and it would be great if I could get a sibling pair as well. The tank has substrate, water, and a few IAL in it at the moment. I just have to wait until the pH has dropped before I can introduce them to their new home. 

In other news, this is now my new Betta persephone tank. On the left-hand side are two males (one has a problem with his swim bladder) and two or three females (including the one I was given earlier this year). Then on the right-hand side I have the male I was given earlier this year, along with one of my homebred females, and the male's juvenile offspring that somehow managed to get through the divider. The female that came with this male seems to have some sort of underlying problem with her swim bladder, which was putting a dampener on any spawning activity. However, now he's with a different female, I'm hoping I can get a successful spawn. I still need to raise the water level, add some peat moss over the substrate, darken the water, and add some more plants. However, they seem happy with their new tank and have been busy exploring and sorting out their pecking order.










Meanwhile, when I was sucking on the siphon to empty their old tank, I got a mouthful of tank water. This wouldn't have been too bad if I had not spotted the decomposing body of one of their number drifting around on the substrate! 

The original plan was that with my persephone pair in with the rest of the group, I would move my Betta coccina juveniles and sub-adults into their old tank. However, after seeing the number of young fish in the tank, I decided to net the parents instead. The female allowed herself to be caught very easily, but I was _this_ close to tearing the tank apart trying to catch the male. It's only that this pair is quite bonded that I went to all the effort. Otherwise, I would have just put her in with her son. Now they are away from their predatory offspring some of their fry might actually have a chance at surviving. 

Unfortunately, I had to kill my Betta rutilans female this afternoon. I am very heartbroken as she was one of my favourite fish and I had planned to separate her out with her male as soon as I had the space. I have no idea what was wrong with her. Last night she had what I would call some sort of seizure. It was like a repeat episode of when I found her floating upside down. I thought she was going to be dead this morning, but she seemed to make a marginal recovery. However, this afternoon she was upside down again, and it started looking like her body was covered in lint. It was a hard decision but I didn't want her to suffer unduly. There is one juvenile that is her spitting image, so I'm hoping this is a female that I can eventually pair up with the male. 

But that's really been my only bit of bad news. The rest of my fish are doing well. My Betta sp. apiapi F1 are starting to colour up, and I am starting to be able to sex them. The majority of these young fish will be sold/traded/given away, and I likely will only be keeping an F1 pair from each of my three pairs. 

My Betta uberis juveniles are all looking male. There's been a whole lot of fighting going on in this tank so they are going to have to be separated out into a 'nursery' tank soon. One of the smaller juveniles may be female and I am crossing everything because I really want to keep this line going. The original male has a nest of fry he has been guarding at the back of the tank. I don't like their chances at survival with all their cannibalistic siblings hovering around. 

I still haven't set-up my Australian biotope/billabong tank because I believe the owners of the place I get my supplies from are still overseas. I also need to order in an extra sponge filter and some airline tubing as I've run out. I really would have loved to have gone with honey blue-eyes in this set-up, but they still are rare as hen's teeth, and are bloody expensive when you can find them. So I'm going to stick with spotted blue eyes. After doing some research and going through field surveys done by the ANGFA, the plants I will be using are blyxa aubertii and limnophila brownii (which will be allowed to grow emergent). This should give me a fairly accurate representation of the type of habitat inhabited by these fish in the wild. 

After seeing a video online of some Rhadinocentrus ornatus, I've already got ideas for my next biotope style tank. It's going to be fine pool sand with a scattering of peat moss and leaf litter, planted with Australian hairgrass and maybe a few gum tree branches for good measure. Now i just need to find the space.

Hopefully I will have some more photos later this week to share. I know my posts are pretty dry and boring without them.


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## LittleBettaFish

I took some more photos just now while I was feeding everyone so I thought I'd share. 

It looks like I need to set-up that Betta uberis nursery ASAP. You can see the chunk that's been taken out of the caudal of the juvenile in the photo below. One of the smaller juveniles also has a sizeable chunk missing from his caudal. 










Although I honestly don't know where they learn all these bad habits from....




























My male's fry must have either been eaten or become free-swimming because he's stopped being a recluse and has now retaken his position as alpha of the tank. His biggest son did think of challenging him once while I was snapping photos, but quickly reconsidered after receiving 'the look'. 

Meanwhile my Betta coccina pair have settled into their new tank. They have been flaring at their new neighbours (my Betta uberis) and the male has started work on a bubblenest in the film canister. Hopefully it won't be too long before I get my first spawn in this tank. 

This is my female just cruising by to see what I'm up to. 










I also moved my spare Betta livida male into his (temporary) new bachelor pad this morning. He has been living in a 20cm cube, and you could really see him enjoying having the extra space to explore and patrol. I just need some more java moss and watersprite and I think that tank will be perfect for a breeding pair of Betta livida. 


Then here is someone don't share many photos of, on my journal. It's Zig-Zag, my deformed Betta brownorum juvenile. You can see the slight indentation in his spine just in front of his dorsal, and the tiny green spot starting to form on his side. He will never be a breeding quality fish, but it's amazing how much better he looks considering his spine looked like a concertina fold when he was younger. 










Finally, this was just a quick snap I got of one of my Betta rutilans sub-adults. They hate my camera and this isn't a particularly flattering angle, but it was the best I managed after fifteen minutes of contorting myself, so I thought I had better share it. 










At the moment I'm deliberating whether to sell a pair of my Betta sp. apiapi. I have three pairs, two pairs with lots of fry and one pair with only a handful of fry. The intention was to sell one of the pairs with lots of fry, and my less fruitful pair could then move into their tank with their own fry. The main reasons being that I am literally running out of space, and I have sort of lost interest in Betta sp. apiapi. I was really fond of my previous pair and their offspring, and I find myself comparing them to my current lot and finding the current lot lacking in both looks and personality. 

With that space cleared, I could then set-up my Betta uberis nursery tank on the rack, rather than have it squished into some corner of my fish room. I also wouldn't be running anymore tanks than I am at the moment. Which is something I have to be mindful of, as it's cold here in Melbourne and I don't doubt our electricity bill will be $$$.


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## Nismo83

Nice update. api api is it from Jakarta?


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## Aqua Aurora

Sorry for the loss of your rutilans gal :c
How much so you sell your pairs for (plan to sell the apiapi pair (and possibly fry?) for)?


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## LittleBettaFish

Nismo, I believe Betta sp. api api is from Bagansiapiapi in the Riau province. But I am not 100% certain. At the moment, they are the smallest species of betta. 

I was really sad about my rutilans female. I had a feeling something was wrong with her a few days prior as her appetite seemed rather poor, but then she deteriorated very rapidly overnight. She was a stunning little fish even with her missing pectoral fin and I will be very cut if I only have males in my F1 group. 

The hobby as a whole is much smaller in Australia than it is in America. Wild bettas are very much a niche market, and add to this the fact I don't ship, and it can be difficult to move fish unless I sell them very cheaply. I will probably sell the adult pair for around the $80-85 because they cost a fortune to import and they are a proven breeding pair. However, people seem to only want breeding pairs when they purchase wilds, so I may have to end up giving some of my excess Betta sp. api api juveniles/sub-adults away, particularly if I have an uneven sex ratio.


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## Nismo83

I was told by Hermanus there was a wild betta species that is going to extinct in Indonesia. I may be wrong on the type. In singapore, the wild betta scene is also small and quiet. People here seems to only want rare fishes and cheap in cost. A pair of Mac is 200-250sgd now. And can get even lower if from Sarawak instead of Brunei or local bred. 

Was the female an old fish already?


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## LittleBettaFish

On his Facebook page Betta4ever, he did mention that Betta sp. apiapi was in trouble. It does seem you can still get wild-caught stock, but I think their habitat is very vulnerable to destruction. 

Our costs are very expensive here in Australia to import fish. I have to add almost $50 onto the cost of a pair of wild bettas because of import fees. All fish that enter Australia have to go through quarantine in a proper facility. Unfortunately, when you sell home-bred fish, most hobbyists won't pay anywhere near as much as what the original pair cost. 

I am also very particular about where my fish go. I don't want to just dump off my wild bettas at a fish store where they may get sold to someone who does not know what they are doing. 

The rutilans female was not that old. Certainly not old enough that I would think her death was due to old age. I was actually going to put her into a separate tank with her male as soon as I had space as she was looking so good.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> On his Facebook page Betta4ever, he did mention that Betta sp. apiapi was in trouble. It does seem you can still get wild-caught stock, but I think their habitat is very vulnerable to destruction.
> 
> Our costs are very expensive here in Australia to import fish. I have to add almost $50 onto the cost of a pair of wild bettas because of import fees. All fish that enter Australia have to go through quarantine in a proper facility. Unfortunately, when you sell home-bred fish, most hobbyists won't pay anywhere near as much as what the original pair cost.
> 
> I am also very particular about where my fish go. I don't want to just dump off my wild bettas at a fish store where they may get sold to someone who does not know what they are doing.
> 
> The rutilans female was not that old. Certainly not old enough that I would think her death was due to old age. I was actually going to put her into a separate tank with her male as soon as I had space as she was looking so good.


yes. I agree with you on where our fishes go. 

probably due to internal parasites. it may be due to food or sth. One of my Albi male has such a bloated stomach that I tot he has dropsy. I isolated him and he is back to normal after few days. now he is in a partition 2 feet tank with a channoides female.


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## LittleBettaFish

I don't think it was internal parasites simply based on her condition/behaviour prior to death. But it was certainly nasty and I'm hoping that it wasn't caused by anything that could be passed onto the other fish in the tank. 

Anyway, this is my main rack as it stands at the moment. As I have an empty space on the bottom shelf, this will be where my Betta uberis nursery tank goes. Otherwise, on the top shelf are my Betta sp. api api, Betta livida, and Betta coccina juveniles/sub-adults. On the second shelf is my Betta sp. api api, Betta miniopinna, Betta uberis, and Betta coccina breeding pair. Finally on the bottom shelf are my Betta persephone, Betta brownorum home-bred group, and Betta rutilans. 










Obviously I need more lighting. If I can sell off some more fish, get rid of a couple of tanks I no longer use, and get my tax return back, I will definitely be putting the money towards two of these. My top shelf doesn't need any light because it receives natural light through the clerestory window. However, my bottom two shelves are just too dark for the plants to grow. 

http://www.theaquariumshop.com.au/s...p Aqua Pro Z Series White LED Light Z-30 90cm

Speaking of plants, my tanks are still not as nice to look at as they were in earlier photos, but the plants are slowly growing in, and hopefully once I get some more watersprite and java moss, they will look better. My goal is to eventually have all the sphagnum moss in my tanks replaced with live plants. 

On the fish side of things, I took these two photos of one of my bigger Betta sp. api api juveniles just now. It's starting to show some colour, and I would wager that it is a male. I'm still not as impressed with these F1 as I was with my previous group. The bodies on both my F1 fry/juveniles, and the three wild-caught pairs, seem to be much shorter than my original pair, which makes them look rather stumpy. Therefore, I think a whine is warranted. I WANT MY OLD PAIR OF BETTA SP. API API AND BETTA MINIOPINNA BACK!!! 



















Apart from that, I'm going to message the person who gave me the pair of Betta burdigala and see if they want them back or if they want me to sell them. It's not a species I am interested in keeping/breeding, and they are just taking up valuable space on my rack. I thought about it today, and I am not particularly attached to them, so it really won't matter if they go. They do have a whole lot of fry in their tank so I'm not sure what to do with them. I'll probably just grow them out to a size where I can sell them, and then advertise them cheaply as a group. Saves me having to bother sexing them, and ending up with excess fish because I have too many males or anything like that. 

And that's about it for today. Last night I finally got around to sticking a few more posts up on my blog. It's been going since January 2013, and surprisingly I still get the odd comment every now and then. I suppose when one lurches from one disaster to the next, there is always something interesting to talk about.


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## Nismo83

nice setup.. I am in the middle of DIY my own LED light for my macs' tank


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. I definitely want to change all my lights to LEDs. They last a lot longer, and our electricity costs are quite high in Australia. I think LEDs would be better than running my T5 fluros. 

Looking back through my old photos I can definitely see my original Betta sp. api api pair were longer in the body, and had shorter ventrals than my current fish. I think this is why I don't like my new pairs as much. I wish I could find a Betta sp. api api female to match the one I lost.


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## Nismo83

Maybe you want to contact Hermanus? I know he has some. 

You can consider buy LED strips and modify your existing light? I will create a journal when I do it after my holiday


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## LittleBettaFish

Unfortunately, I cannot afford to buy any more wild bettas. I don't have a job at the moment, and importing a pair of wilds into Australia can easily cost a couple hundred dollars. I would rather spend that money on my current fish, or something like new lights for my rack. 

If I'd had the money, I would have imported a couple pairs of Betta persephone, a new pair of Betta miniopinna (with the red ventrals instead of the blue like mine have) and try and find a pair of Betta sp. api api like my original pair. However, I just don't have the money or space to do this. I live with my mum and I only have two racks for my fish, both of which are full.


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## Nismo83

I see. Understand the money part. I too experience it before


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## LittleBettaFish

Well it seems like my Betta coccina pair are content with their new home as they have spawned. The male built a monster nest, and is tending to it in one of the film canisters. 

Meanwhile, my Betta uberis pair have been chasing each other around. The female is very plump and barred up, and the male has been putting on a spectacular display. Unfortunately, it was only after I uploaded the photos to my laptop that I realised the majority were blurry. It's hard to tell on the small screen of the camera. This was the best photo I took, and it's not even that good. Hopefully they don't spawn tonight, and I can get some more photos tomorrow. 










It didn't help that the half dozen juveniles and sub-adults kept flitting in and out. This is one of the smallest juveniles. But it seems to hold its own against its siblings. 










Then I managed to get some more photos of Zig-Zag. Sadly, I think Zig-Zag's sibling is also male. Even though it is lacking a spot, its ventrals are very thick and it's been chasing and sparring with Zig-Zag. So it looks like this line has ended. A bit of a shame really. Luckily my other Betta brownorum pair just seem to be churning out spawn after spawn so I should have some F1 fish to play with. 




























Finally, my Betta persephone pair are showing very promising signs. The male has been pursuing the female who is showing quite a bit of interest in him. I've got my fingers crossed for this one. I would love to have some fry after so long, and this time raise them without overfeeding them excessively fatty foods. 

Otherwise, nothing else really happening here. I have to disinfect and refill my water aging tub tomorrow, do a very belated water change on my goldfish tank, and do some more work with my (empty) Australian native tank.


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## LittleBettaFish

To start my journal entry off, this is my Betta brownorum male. Unfortunately, his head is somewhat out of focus but he looked nice otherwise. This is the side with the bigger lateral dot. The other side has a much smaller one. 










This male is unrelated to Zig-Zag and my other brownorum. However, they are from the same seller, and likely the same locality given how closely he resembles my original wild-caught male in colour and form (this seems to vary wildly between the various brownorum localities). I'm hoping to be able to continue this line through the offspring his female and him have produced thus far. Aggression was a big problem with my other group, as well as deformities in the F1 group, and in the F1xF0 cross, so hopefully the same thing does not happen here. 

This is the breeding tank. I would remove the sphagnum moss, but the fry are still too small and I don't want to stress them out, or accidentally kill any of them. So for now, the sphagnum moss stays. I will however, be making the water darker with some rooibos, and adding some watersprite. 










Meanwhile I've been doing some basic training with Clio. She knows sit and drop, but I want to incorporate a clicker into our training sessions and get her doing some more advanced stuff and learning to focus on me and enjoy training unlike our other dogs who just wander off or look like they are being tortured during obedience sessions. I still don't know how these people manage to get their puppy in position, click, and then treat, without tripping over themselves, confusing their puppy, or dropping treats everywhere. I'm so clumsy, and Clio has the sharpest puppy teeth and no concept of 'gentle'. My poor thumbs are all scraped and scabbed where she's scratched them taking the treats. 

She's all legs at the moment. We took her to dog club yesterday for more socialising and at first she wouldn't stop barking and trying to back out of her collar. Then as soon as she made friends with a 12 month old male, she was like hell on wheels. I had to banish her from the younger puppy group because she plays so rough and while all the other puppies were sleeping, Clio was racing around everywhere. So instead we played with some of the older puppies, and adult dogs. She just did *not* stop. Apparently the sire is known for throwing some full-on puppies, but it's better to have a dog with some get-up-and-go when it comes to showing as that way they tend to get the judge's attention. Some of the classes can have as many as 70 dogs in them, so you don't want to fade into the background. 

I also shouldn't watch videos on Youtube. I see all these trainers with GS puppies that are Clio's age and they are so advanced training wise. Yes they are going on to do schutzhund and other sports, but it would be nice if I could get Clio doing some of this stuff. At least she is highly food motivated. As soon as she knows I have treats she just sits there staring at me.


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## Crossroads

I can't believe I never subbed to this. I love your wilds and if I had time and space, I'd love to keep and breed them, particularly to help save the species that are in danger like sp. api api.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Crossroads. Sadly many of the species I keep are in danger of extinction, because of the rampant development going on in their countries of origins. I think one of the big problems is the development of palm oil plantations. 

The locality of Betta persephone I keep (Ayer Hitam) is extinct in the wild I believe. Which is a shame, as there don't seem to be many purists in the wild betta world, and you end up with localities being crossed, producing aquarium strain fish, and losing the unique characteristics of that particular locality.


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## Crossroads

That's such a shame :c hopefully one day I can afford the time to keep wilds and help keep the populations from dying out.


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## Nismo83

Ur updates are nice. Am currently back to my in-law place in thailand. I agreed with u too much urban development and selfishness of human, future generation will have to see animals and others in digital world


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## LittleBettaFish

Yes it is very sad. I mean once these habitats are lost and species start to become endangered and extinct, you will never get that biodiversity back. 

Sometimes driving through the suburbs here, I think that perhaps every house/residential property should have to have a garden consisting solely of native/indigenous plants. So much habitat has been destroyed or fragmented by development, native species quickly get out-competed by introduced pests and even native species that are advantaged by human activity. Imagine how much native habitat could be restored if something like this came into effect.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yesterday afternoon, I took a few quick photos of my Betta hendra group. I was going to get more but then my camera ran out of batteries so that needs recharging. 

This is my original male. He is the one in my display picture. Age, velvet, and sharing a tank with a group of rowdy males, has left him looking a bit ragged. The aim is to get rid of all his sons except for the nicest, and give him and his female a tank of their own again. 










This is his female. These two are very bonded and I've only caught him spawning with a daughter once. Every other time is with this female. 










This is the male I'll likely be retaining. He is almost as large as his father.



















I've decided on the Betta sp. api api pair I want to keep. Now I just need to find new homes for the two pairs I will be selling. It was a tough decision. One male is very friendly, but not as nice form and colour wise as my other male, who is more shy. Then the shy male's female is not as nice as the female belonging to the friendly male. However, after seeing the offspring from the shy male and comparing them to the offspring in the other tanks, I decided to retain shy male, and the friendly female. All of my sp. api api tanks are in desperate need of some attention. I will be condensing the offspring of the two pairs I sell, into a single tank, and then I will be picking up some java moss, water sprite, and maybe some java fern (I am determined to get this bloody plant to grow), and overhauling both tanks. 

The sale of my two pairs will then hopefully leave me with enough money to overhaul my Betta hendra tank, which is also in dire need of a make-over, and any leftover plants can be distributed through my other tanks. 

Other than that, I really have to find a larger tub to age my water in. The one I have now is only 20L, and I can only do water changes on about half of them. I have a 200 watt heater running in there, so I can obviously use a much larger container. 

On the agenda for today, is to disinfect and refill my existing water aging tub, fill up my Australian billabong biotope, and order the fish and plants for this tank (they won't arrive until next week). I also have to move my plakat male into a smaller tank as he needs to go from his current position, and I only have space to fit a 2 gallon tank.


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## Fenghuang

*browsing the Wild Bettas section on Aquabid*

"Hm, some of these betta pictures look awfully familiar..."

http://www.aquabid.com/cgi-bin/auction/auction.cgi?fwbettas&1435173755


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## LittleBettaFish

Lol yes. I found that a while back. The seller just keeps putting the same advert back up.

Photos of my Betta hendra show up a lot on Google images, which is where that seller stole it from. 

I haven't bothered contacting them about it. 

It's a good thing my male can't get online. He would see himself looking young and beautiful.


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## Fenghuang

I was admiring a betta coccina listing that seller has. They didn't mention anything about whether the auction was for the fish pictured or not. I would have never have thought to question it until I stumbled on your fish picture. Looking at all their listings now, there doesn't seem to be any consistent photography style, so I guess none of the fish are actually theirs.

You should start charging people to use your pictures! Lots if people seem to like them.


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## LittleBettaFish

Betta coccina (especially the Jambi strain) are probably my favourite wild betta species. A lot of wild betta sellers don't take photos of their fish or even put any photos up at all. I think this is likely because they tend to look fairly uniform in appearance. 

Got some really exciting news. I was checking my persephone tank because I noticed a bubblenest in the canister on the side with my homebred fish, and there are a whole heap of fry being guarded by my biggest F1 male. Hopefully they survive. I don't think the other adults will harm them, but I have the juvenile on the other side of the divider and I worry he might eat them. Not too bad an effort for a pair of three year old fish! Now my other pair just need to do the same and I will be happy. 

Meanwhile, I think I have found homes for my Betta sp. api api pairs, and I will likely be giving the pair of Betta burdigala back to the friend that gifted them to me. Their tank will be used for my Betta uberis grow-out, and so if there are any burdigala fry in there, they can just grow out alongside my uberis group. 

I also found some eggs in my Betta hendra canister. It's only been in there a few days. They certainly do move fast! 

My plan is to try and offload all but one Betta hendra male, and keep only the two F1 females, my original pair, and the nicest F1 male. Then I will separate both groups and hopefully get fry from both. I also want to get rid of all my Betta rutilans group excepting a female F1 and the original male. I think I do have one female as there is a brown bodied fish with red fins and a different body shape to the others. Their tank needs a major overhaul as there is broken IAL everywhere, and I might move it to the middle shelf once I get rid of my Betta sp. api api pairs. It would be good if I could continue this line after losing my original female.


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## LittleBettaFish

Speaking of Betta coccina, today I took some photos of my one and only F1 Betta coccina male. I think he is a cracker of a young fish, and I am chafing at the bit to get him and a sister into a breeding tank. You can see the green irridescence starting to come through on his sides. His ventral tips are actually black (one way of distinguishing between Betta coccina and Betta livida), but for some reason the camera flash turns them green. 





































Four years ago I purchased a group of Betta coccina as my first ever wilds. I was always unsuccessful in breeding them and subsequent Betta coccina purchases, so I'm glad to finally have some young fish swimming around my tanks.

The parents have also been spawning non-stop since being separated, so fingers crossed for more males there. 

Then finally, I thought my male Betta hendra had lost his fry as he leaves his nest a lot to lurk, and I worried one of the other fish might have snuck in and eaten them. However, I should have known better than to worry with a protective father like this. Today I found fry hanging from the nest, and all the other fish in the tank staying far away.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just sharing some photos I took of Clio today. She is such a feral. Her favourite hobby is biting, and biting hard at the moment. Especially bare feet. 

Mum has enrolled her in a mixed breed puppy class at a local obedience club, just so she can learn to be around breeds that aren't German Shepherds, and learn to work with other dogs without becoming distracted by them. We are also going to start teaching her showing related skills, such as standing (specialist shows are different to all breeds in this regard), letting the judge check teeth, walking/trotting around cones, and learning to be called by a double-handler while in the ring. I think she will start doing show class soon at the German Shepherd club, which is always fun with young puppies. You tend to get more bouncing around than actual trotting. 





































Poor Nike is still petrified of Clio. I have never met such a nutty dog as Nike. It's a case of the lights are on, but nobody's home. It's why the only dog she's allowed to be around is Ares.


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## Hallyx

I'm not a dog-person. But that is a such a beautiful animal. Intelligent-looking, too.


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## LittleBettaFish

She's like a supervillain. She uses her intelligence purely for evil. 

She's going through a real fugly stage at the moment. Her legs are like stilts, her wither has dropped, her croup is weird looking, and when she runs with her head down she looks like some sort of hunchback. It reminds me of when a dog club acquaintance said that we should sell Nike when she went through a similar stage. Then Nike got fifth out of a class of 20 dogs at the National, and it was nice to be smug for a while. At least until she got her hips x-rayed anyway.


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## Aqua Aurora

I'm just starting to read from the front of the journal instead of most recent so pardon my asking if its covered and I've not hit the page yet:
I'm thinking of trying smaragdina copper (not decided yet just looking at into atm), have you kept this breed? I'm trying to find out if they only do well in a mated pair or if a solo male in a planted 5g would be comfortable. Whats the smallest tank size you've keep a solo adult wild in that didn't look like the fish was cramped? Do you feel they are happy alone or really prefer sharing the tank with their own kind for company and to get some bong-chika-wow-wow?

Also gl with the pupy! Don't let her in the fish room.. chew on the wrong cables and "[censor]!" x.x


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## LittleBettaFish

I've never had smaragdina, but I did have a pair of very closely related Betta stiktos. I think the temperament of splendens complex fish can vary wildly from species to species, and from individual to individual. Some are very mellow, and some are extremely aggressive. My wilds are from a different complex, but I have some pairs that try to exterminate each other on a regular basis, and some pairs that are so bonded they almost seem to get depressed if I separate them. 

My stiktos pair shared a 5 gallon tank without issue, and would regularly spawn and do whatever else it is these fish do. With that said, I would probably advise a 10 gallon tank for a pair of Betta smaragdina. If I kept this complex again, I would definitely use a 10 gallon tank. I think a single fish would be content if anything from one gallon upwards. I've never found my wilds to be especially active. They seem to carve out a small territory within the tank and then stick around this area. 

I think a single male could be content by himself. However, I personally like to keep my wilds in pairs because my interest is in breeding. 

Also Clio is not allowed anywhere near my fish room. She's not even allowed out in the kitchen without supervision because she tries to gnaw on everything, including my flesh.


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## Aqua Aurora

LittleBettaFish said:


> I've never had smaragdina, but I did have a pair of very closely related Betta stiktos. I think the temperament of splendens complex fish can vary wildly from species to species, and from individual to individual. Some are very mellow, and some are extremely aggressive. My wilds are from a different complex, but I have some pairs that try to exterminate each other on a regular basis, and some pairs that are so bonded they almost seem to get depressed if I separate them.
> 
> My stiktos pair shared a 5 gallon tank without issue, and would regularly spawn and do whatever else it is these fish do. With that said, I would probably advise a 10 gallon tank for a pair of Betta smaragdina. If I kept this complex again, I would definitely use a 10 gallon tank. I think a single fish would be content if anything from one gallon upwards. I've never found my wilds to be especially active. They seem to carve out a small territory within the tank and then stick around this area.
> 
> I think a single male could be content by himself. However, I personally like to keep my wilds in pairs because my interest is in breeding.
> 
> Also Clio is not allowed anywhere near my fish room. She's not even allowed out in the kitchen without supervision because she tries to gnaw on everything, including my flesh.


Thank you very much for your input! Going to go dig around and read some more. Mmm fresh flesh. Good luck with training!


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## Hallyx

I had a "guitar" smarigdina for a short time. The most beautiful fish I ever owned -- among the most beautiful I've ever seen. He's in my album -- won the photo contest one month.

Not very social, which I understand from talking to others is typical for the complex.

But, if you're looking to breed them, you have other more important considerations.

Mine disappeared. I have no idea what happened to him. I noticed food building up in his tank, so I took the tank apart trying to find him. Couldn't see how he could have jumped out, but I looked everywhere on the stand and the floor. No sign of him. I'm still at a loss <sigh>


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## Aqua Aurora

Hallyx said:


> I had a "guitar" smarigdina for a short time. The most beautiful fish I ever owned -- among the most beautiful I've ever seen. He's in my album -- won the photo contest one month.
> 
> Not very social, which I understand from talking to others is typical for the complex.
> 
> But, if you're looking to breed them, you have other more important considerations.
> 
> Mine disappeared. I have no idea what happened to him. I noticed food building up in his tank, so I took the tank apart trying to find him. Couldn't see how he could have jumped out, but I looked everywhere on the stand and the floor. No sign of him. I'm still at a loss <sigh>


Oh no no no, I don't want to mess with breeding, too much work for my lazy arse also no place to grow out fry. Just want a nice lil' fish to hang out and look cool and come out once in a while to say hi (or more realistically "wheres my food!?!?" Thanks for the info about your splendid complex (is that the right term?) sorry he went missing on you :c I'm pretty good about lids, have DIY ones on all the betta tanks to minimize gaps, less jumping and evaporation potention that way ^^


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## LittleBettaFish

The only shy wilds I've had, are sick fish, males with nests, or wild-caught fish that are freshly arrived. My wilds are extremely friendly, even fish I have not bred myself. As soon as my fish see me, or hear me tapping on the front of the tank, they come rushing over. I actually have to physically hit them away when I am siphoning the tank because otherwise they just hover around and get sucked up. 

http://redwinebettas.weebly.com/blog/february-28th-2013

Here is post I wrote on my blog about shyness, and how to make your wilds more friendly. 

Honestly, the best lid for a wild betta is cling wrap. I lost dozens of fish before I started using it, and I have not lost one to jumping since. If you have even the smallest gap in your lid, it is not a matter of if, but when, your wilds will jump.


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## Hallyx

I've been using cling-wrap for years. The back half of my tanks' tops, including the heater and filter cords, are covered in towels to give an overhanging, marginal vegitation feel -- and I like what it looks like lighting -wise.

I mentioned before that he was very sociable when I first got him, jumping energetically for food and coming out whenever he saw me. Slowly, over the next few weeks, he become more shy and reclusive -- to the point where I just gave up and left food for him, my invisible fish.

Sorry to take up so much room in your journal, LBF.


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## LittleBettaFish

I forgot to reply to this. I wonder if he was sick. Usually when my fish have velvet, I notice that they start to become more reclusive and spend more time hiding than previously. This is almost always the first indication that something is wrong.

Been doing basically nothing with my fish. Half my tanks have water changes planned for today, and I will do the other half of them in a week. 

All my time has been swallowed up by the dogs. Clio is such a whirlwind of energy. Apparently her sire has thrown some very 'energetic' puppies, and Clio only sleeps to recharge her batteries before she goes off to find more trouble to stir up. 

She's starting to look more adult now. Her fur is weird because in places the adult coat is coming in, and she's also starting to lighten up on her shoulder and hindquarters where she will eventually be tan. At the moment her eye still seem pretty dark, which is good. I hope her face also stays relatively dark, as I love the look of a dark faced German Shepherd. 

I took a few photos today while she was out in her puppy play pen on the back deck. The silver tap is over the roof of the kennel to keep the rain off as it needs to be waterproofed. 


















This was my mum practicing getting her to stand. I don't know what happened to her hindquarters and right front leg in this photo. 


__
Sensitive content, not recommended for those under 18
Show Content









I call this the 'hip dysplasia sit'. Very flattering photo. 









Then finally, here is the beautiful and nutty Nike helping out in the fish room.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well, haven't posted anything here in a while, but that's because I really haven't had much to share. 

Clio is still as feral as ever. She went to dog club on Sunday and _would not stop_, until we put her back in the soft crate in the car. Then she fell into a coma and didn't wake up until we got home a couple hours later. 

Nike's breeder has eleven puppies from Nike's litter sister. She invited mum and I over to see them, and they were so cute. Nike's mum and Nike's half-sister kept trying to get into the whelping box with the puppies as well. I think it's just Nike that is the crazy one out of that family. She's like that relative you lock away in the attic.

Yesterday, I finally did some of my water changes. I have to sanitise my water aging tub today, and then I will do the rest of my tanks on Friday/Saturday. I think I need to buy a bigger water aging tub. It only allows me to do about half my tanks before I run out of water. We are going to the hardware store today, so I might have a look around for something that is around 50/60L instead of the 20L I am using now. 

Not much has been happening fish wise. My Betta hendra, Betta coccina, Betta burdigala, Betta brownorum, and Betta persephone, all seem to have nests of either eggs or fry. 

However, perhaps my most exciting news this week, is that my F1 Betta coccina male spawned with one of his sisters the other day. He went missing and I panicked thinking he had jumped out. Then I found this clump of slimy black algae floating at the back of the tank, and he'd built a nest under it. My intention has always been to separate him and his sister out, but perhaps I might have some F2 Betta coccina fry pop up, if they can manage to avoid being eaten. 

I really need to flog off my two Betta sp. api api pairs, my F1 Betta uberis juveniles, my spare F1 Betta hendra males, and my group of F1 Betta rutilans (excluding the original male and an F1 female if there is one). I was also hoping to get rid of the Betta burdigala pair before I end up with even more fry from them. 

I also have two tanks that need to be sold. Ugh I hate selling (or attempting to sell) fish related paraphernalia. Buyers seem to take forever to get around to picking stuff up, and they are always inevitably late. I also have no idea how I am supposed to get rid of my male Betta hendra and Betta uberis. I think I'm going to struggle even if I offer them free to a good home. My Betta uberis males are too aggressive to live together for much longer. 

Anyway, here are a couple of photos I took yesterday after cleaning tanks. The first is of my wild-caught Betta brownorum male. 










Then second is what I think may be a female F1 Betta rutilans. I have obvious males, and compared to the males, 'she' is less red in the body, and has smaller and thinner ventrals. There's another couple in there that are potential females. My intention with this group was to sell them cheaply as an unsexed group. I really only want to keep the original male and a daughter as this isn't a species I am particularly interested in.


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## andakin

It's a sad world when you can't find takers for wild bettas.


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## LittleBettaFish

Most people want them in breeding pairs. I always end up with more males than females, and I don't ship (I find the whole process too stressful to be bothered for the price I ask), so it does limit who I can sell/give my fish to. 

I don't want to just drop them off at a fish store because every coccina complex species I have seen in fish store tanks look like crap because they really need a special set-up to feel comfortable and show some colour. 

Plus I feel I owe it to my fish to find them a better home than a fish store tank.


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## Strawberry12

LBF, I have a question and maybe you can help  I know wilds are a bit more picky when it comes to water quality, does that mean my super hard pH of 8 water just kinda screws me over in terms of what wilds I can own/potentially breed? Or would I have to have some sort of RO system with tons of IAL? I've never messed around with this before, but I adore wilds. it's a whole new world of fish for me! 

(also, I want to find your blog, could you PM me? thanks so much)


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## LittleBettaFish

I _personally_ prefer to see wilds that require soft/acidic water kept in soft/acidic water, and wilds that prefer harder water kept in harder water. I think they show the best colour, behaviour, and are easier to breed when kept in conditions that they have evolved over how ever many years, to survive in. However, I know hobbyists who keep and breed some of the less fussy species of wilds in harder water (since the majority of wilds do prefer water that is soft-neutral). It really comes down to personal choice. Captive bred stock is also likely to be less sensitive than wild-caught stock. 

Betta simplex, Betta mahachaiensis, and I think one or more of the species from the unimaculata complex can do well in harder water. I would certainly not try and put any of the fish I keep into hard water. But the smaller mouthbrooders and the splendens complex seem to be more robust. 

Also my blog is Redwine Bettas. It's on Weebly. I used to have it in my signature but then I wasn't sure if it was allowed. 

As an aside, I also took these photos of some of my Betta sp. api api. This is the pair I will be holding onto. The female looks to be the most similar in appearance to my previous female, who was the absolute favourite in my fish room. The male is also really nice. However, he seems to have lost his spade shaped caudal. 









Female









Female showing size comparison to my finger (I have really small hands)









Male F1









Female approaching male. I think he has a nest somewhere as he is being elusive. 

I did a water change on their tank yesterday with water that had been aged and had peat moss, IAL, and rooibos extract added. I also threw in some more IAL, and rooibos, and everyone has coloured up very nicely. Their tank is one I plan on purchasing some java moss and watersprite for.


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## Strawberry12

Thank you for your advice! I'm a ways off from getting them, but i'm super excited


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## LittleBettaFish

No worries. I am very passionate about the wild side of the betta hobby, and I always am willing to offer advice etc. if I can. 

There simply so many beautiful and unique species within the betta genus, and they barely ever get a mention on this forum.


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## Strawberry12

yes, the wild side of things is like a whole different world! oooh Betta mahachaiensis are lovely, I would love a pair of those. Now just to figure out how to rearrange things so I have room for another tank...


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## LittleBettaFish

Just watch out for potential hybrids when it comes to the splendens complex. I've seen fish sold in Australia as one thing, when they were clearly not pure.


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## Strawberry12

Duly noted. And when in doubt, I'll ask you!


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## LittleBettaFish

Someone has taken my puppy and replaced it with a monster. 










Don't let those innocent brown eyes deceive you. Her pedigree may say otherwise, but I'm fairly certain she is part piranha. As evidenced by the photos below. 



















Unfortunately, the weather has been so foul that we've hardly been able to take her anywhere. She went for a run and a sniff at a fenced oval yesterday, and then embarrassingly got frightened by a magpie that was scared off by her barking. It was fun standing out in the pouring rain at 11:30pm last night trying to get her to go to the toilet. Having a puppy in winter is the worst. 

Nike meanwhile, prefers to rug up during the colder weather. 



















No real news from the fish room. Just been watching all my bubs growing up. Looks like I have more males than females in all my tanks except my Betta coccina and possibly my Betta livida. Which is frustrating because not only are they difficult to sell, but they are also usually aggressive little sods.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I got off my lazy butt and took some fish room photos today. 

First up is some of my Betta brownorum. The female below, is one half of the new pair I received earlier this year. Funnily, she has a small spot on one side (which you can see in this photo) but not on the other. I have so many fry swimming around this tank. I have been feeding them BBS every couple of days, in the hopes of rebuilding my once great Betta brownorum empire. 










Then this is my F1 male. He is out of my now deceased brownorum pair. He is responsible for the death of one older brother. His other brother had some sort of seizure and died, which was unfortunate as those two were much better quality than this male. This always happens to me. My best fish die young, and my culls live forever. So far, he has been living somewhat peacefully with his two nephews. Poor Zig-Zag has been getting bullied, and his brother is missing half his caudal, so once they get bigger I'm going to be dividing the tank into thirds. 










This is Zig-Zag's brother. I thought it was a female at first because it doesn't have a spot, but now I'm fairly certain it is male based on its body shape and fins. This means this particular line ends with these three fish. I had a lot of issues with deformity with my F1 fish and then with Zig-Zag and a sibling I had to cull (which may or may not have been related to the use of a copper based medication). Aggression has also been a big issue with this group, so I'm hesitant to try and use a female F1 from my other pair as an outcross. 










Next up is my Betta burdigala male. He's a stunning fish, just not what I wanted. Of course this species breeds like rabbits, so even if I get rid of this pair I now have a whole heap of fry I am going to have to grow out. I still wonder what happened to the Betta tussyae pair I was supposed to get. 










Up on the IAL, you can see one of the above male's fry. He chases his female so she is rarely out in the open. 










My Betta sp. api api fry/juveniles/sub-adults are all growing nicely. It looks like I have So. Many. Males. It is going to be hard deciding which F1 pair from each pair is going to stay here with me. Main thing I will be looking for is body length, and whether the males exhibit a spade-shaped caudal. This is one of my bigger juveniles. 










Then this is my Betta uberis male regretting his life choices. His sons still don't dare take him on, but they are fighting among each other, and causing some pretty significant damage so I am going to have to work out what to do with them soon. It's a real shame I did not end up with a more balanced gender ratio. 










Finally, this is my Australian biotope tank that has been sitting empty for weeks now. I've got the hardscape where I want it, and I was going to order the fish and plants this week. Unfortunately, the weather turned nasty so I will probably do it next week if the business owner thinks they will survive the trip. It will most likely be housing Pseudomugil gertrudae, but I did read that a sort of localish fish store has some Honey blue eyes/Pseudomugil mellis in stock. Mum said she can drive me there on Monday after we take Clio to get her final shots. I'm not sure if they will still be in stock, what price they are, and how old they are (you really need to breed them in the first year or so as they are only short-lived), but if they are still in stock, and I can get a pair or two for a reasonable price, I'll probably go with them over the gertrudae. 



















I've got some aquasoil under the substrate in places, but looking at it now, I think I need to build up the substrate more where I am going to be planting. The plan is, to put in some blyxa aubertii on the left-hand side of the tank, and see how it goes. If it carks it, I'll chuck in some vallisneria nana or native hairgrass instead. Otherwise all it needs is some leaf litter (and obviously a filter and heater and to be filled up) and it's done. 

I have a whole heap of Australian biotope ideas after spending time browsing the site surveys on the ANGFA site. Just not the space or money to set them up.... yet. I definitely want some rhads again. They are cracker fish and they really love my soft Melbourne tap water. This time I will be prepared with food cultures that are small enough for tiny rainbowfish fry to eat.


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## Nismo83

nice updates. =)


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Nismo83.

Today, after taking Clio to the vet for her final shots, my mum drove me to a nearby aquarium that I haven't visited before. It was very impressive. Took up a big floor space, and there was a lot of higher end brands such as ADA and CADE. Best of all, the tanks were sparkling clean and the livestock looked very healthy. Definitely a store I would visit again. 

My mission was actually to see if they still had any honey blue eyes for sale as they'd posted on their FB page a few days ago about having some in. Unfortunately, by the time I got there, there was only one obvious male, and what looked likely another less colourful male, left. It's a shame as the price was decent and I could have purchased a small breeding group. Alas, it was not to be. So the hunt for honey blue eyes continues. They had heaps of spotted blue eyes and threadfins in stock, but I'd rather get my spotted blue eyes from Aquagreen as they are $10 cheaper per fish, and that way I can combine postage with the plants I am ordering. 

I've decided to sell my Betta miniopinna group (the egg eating pair and juveniles). I want to focus on my Betta persephone pairs, and the plan is to move one of the pairs into the tank occupied by the Betta miniopinna group. It will be sad to see them go, but they were never as nice as my previous pair, and their egg eating means they aren't valuable as breeding stock, unless you want to artificially raise the eggs and I don't really believe in that. 

I would love if one day (before the restrictions on importing bettas come into place), I could have a pair of wild-caught Betta miniopinna with the bright red ventrals again. That would probably be the only species at the moment I would seriously consider importing. 

Speaking of my Betta persephone, I'm starting to see a number of free-swimming fry in their tank now. These are mostly from my three-year-old F1 pair, because I think the juvenile is eating the fry on the other side of the divider. 

All my other fish are doing well. Been a bit slack with feeding them, so I have to set-up my BBS hatchery for the young fry, and give the adults and juveniles a good feeding tonight. 

Otherwise not much else going on. I suppose my journal is rather boring when things are travelling along as they should.


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## andakin

I'll admit to some envy for the tank you have set it. It's clean looking.

Good luck finding that particular fish. Honey Blue Eyes/ Spotted Blue Eyes/ Furcata/ Gertrudae, they all look very similar to me.


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## LittleBettaFish

It won't be so clean looking once I have it filled and planted if any of my previous tanks are anything to go by. I have to collect some leaves from the paperbark down the side of my house, and scatter them on the bottom of the tank. My previous natives have enjoyed picking through leaf litter, and it encourages infusoria for any fry that do manage to survive in the tank.

I really like the smaller Australian natives. I like some rainbows but they seem very prone to myco and prefer harder water. My water is extremely soft and I'd rather not have to fiddle with it too much. 

Although with that said, I eventually would like a group of these in the not so distant future. I have to find some mangrove wood to do a biotope style tank with. 

http://www.aquagreen.com.au/plant_data/Pseudomugil_cyanodorsalis.html


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## Crossroads

LBF, I have been putting some thought into wilds and I was curious about some things.
First, what is the smallest tank you'd recommend for a pair and thier possible offspring?
Second, I have 8.0 pH tapwater, but with driftwood and IAL and such I can drop it to 6.0 which it where my South American 20g is sitting. What complexes would you suggest? Are there any that fit my water parameters that would benefit from being bred in captivity so the region isn't lost forever? 
Anything particularly more difficult about wilds (minus thier insane jumping skills) that makes them more difficult than splendens?

Pity I can't ship you mangrove wood, I have a place downtown that sells it, spider wood, mopani, all kinds of wood. I actually have a beaaautiful stump looking piece of some kind i dont remember which, that just wouldn't fit in my 20g but would looks amazing in a 40g.


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## LittleBettaFish

If you can drop the pH down to 6.0 and keep it there, you could keep the majority of wild betta species. However, as someone whose foray into wild betta keeping started with the coccina complex, I personally would not recommend them until you have more experience. There's nothing worse than killing a particularly rare species of fish through ignorance. 

Probably the best place to start is either with the splendens complex or with the albimarginata complex. The species from these two complexes are incredibly easy to keep and breed, and are much more forgiving of any mistakes you might make. Betta splendens are at risk in the wild due to hybridisation, so that could be an option if you were wanting to do your bit for the conservation of a species. Betta stiktos is also one of the rarer species from this complex, although like with Betta splendens, it can be difficult to find _pure_ specimens. Some hybrids can look uncannily close to the real thing. 

Betta channoides and Betta albimarginata are docile, striking, and endearing little fish that will breed like guppies. These are a favourite of many wild betta keepers/breeders, and for good reason. 

I'd probably recommend a 10 gallon tank as a minimum for a breeding pair. I personally think wild bettas show their best colours in densely planted tanks with low lighting, dark substrate, and tea coloured water. Some people's wilds only colour up when during courtship/spawning. I want my fish to look their best all the time. 

Diet can be an issue with wild bettas. Most wilds can be transitioned over to dried foods. However, some individuals will literally starve themselves because they will never recognise it as food. So in some cases, individuals may have to be fed exclusively on live and frozen foods. I personally only feed my fish live and frozen foods as they are frequently fighting and spawning, and so they need to be kept in peak physical condition to cope with these demands. 

Also, apart from the splendens complex, most species of wild bettas prefer their water cool, so from low to mid 70s rather than high 70s to low 80s that most keepers of Betta splendens recommend. 

Hope that helps answer some of your questions.


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## Crossroads

LittleBettaFish said:


> If you can drop the pH down to 6.0 and keep it there, you could keep the majority of wild betta species. However, as someone whose foray into wild betta keeping started with the coccina complex, I personally would not recommend them until you have more experience. There's nothing worse than killing a particularly rare species of fish through ignorance.
> 
> Probably the best place to start is either with the splendens complex or with the albimarginata complex. The species from these two complexes are incredibly easy to keep and breed, and are much more forgiving of any mistakes you might make. Betta splendens are at risk in the wild due to hybridisation, so that could be an option if you were wanting to do your bit for the conservation of a species. Betta stiktos is also one of the rarer species from this complex, although like with Betta splendens, it can be difficult to find _pure_ specimens. Some hybrids can look uncannily close to the real thing.
> 
> Betta channoides and Betta albimarginata are docile, striking, and endearing little fish that will breed like guppies. These are a favourite of many wild betta keepers/breeders, and for good reason.
> 
> I'd probably recommend a 10 gallon tank as a minimum for a breeding pair. I personally think wild bettas show their best colours in densely planted tanks with low lighting, dark substrate, and tea coloured water. Some people's wilds only colour up when during courtship/spawning. I want my fish to look their best all the time.
> 
> Diet can be an issue with wild bettas. Most wilds can be transitioned over to dried foods. However, some individuals will literally starve themselves because they will never recognise it as food. So in some cases, individuals may have to be fed exclusively on live and frozen foods. I personally only feed my fish live and frozen foods as they are frequently fighting and spawning, and so they need to be kept in peak physical condition to cope with these demands.
> 
> Also, apart from the splendens complex, most species of wild bettas prefer their water cool, so from low to mid 70s rather than high 70s to low 80s that most keepers of Betta splendens recommend.
> 
> Hope that helps answer some of your questions.


This is splendidly helpful actually!
Their food actually wouldn't be too difficult since I already feed primarily frozen.
Heavily planted, dark substrate and teawater is no issue either.
You're basically describing a darker water, lower light, lower temperature version of my S. American tank.

I'm really, really in love with channoides already just visually. Are wild splendens as aggressive as the hybridized cousins we buy in stores? Would watching over a tank of them be like babysitting a sorority?

I by no means want a set it and walk away tank but I'm also considering the future when I go back to working 50+ hours weekly. I don't want a tank I have to monitor every minute of the day. 

Would my best bets be albimarginata or channoides to start since albimarginata is docile? I find albimarginatas to be quite striking as well. I don't know. As much as I love splendens, part of me wants to start with something....visually different? I don't know how to explain it.


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## LittleBettaFish

I believe it can vary as to whether fish from the splendens complex can tolerate each other long-term. My pair of Betta stiktos shared a 5 gallon tank, and there was absolutely no issue. The male would only chase the female away if he was defending a nest of eggs/fry and generally the only damage done was during courtship. I have read that Betta splendens can perhaps be more aggressive, but I have also seen people successfully keeping breeding pairs of Betta smaragdina/imbellis/mahachai together. 

Success will really depend on the individual fish. With that said, I do find wilds tend to be less unpredictable than their ornamental counterparts. I've only had a couple of incidents in the past four or so years where a fish has seriously injured or killed another fish that it has been sharing a tank with. 

Albimarginata/channoides are pretty popular and commonly kept wilds. I doubt you'd regret it, if you decided to go with either species as your first choice.


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## Nismo83

Albi and channoides are cute. But I prefer channoides more due to its shape. Albi is longer


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## LittleBettaFish

I liked the look of channoides better as well. It's been ages since I kept either species, but I still do have a soft spot for them as they are such personable fish.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> I liked the look of channoides better as well. It's been ages since I kept either species, but I still do have a soft spot for them as they are such personable fish.


Haha maybe I can poison you again. Hopefully.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha I'm working on downsizing my wild collection to focus on only a few species. I want to get back into keeping and breeding small Australian and PNG natives. 

I could never give my wilds up completely though. I want to mainly concentrate on breeding Betta coccina, Betta brownorum, Betta persephone, and Betta sp. apiapi.


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## Nismo83

I see. My Ocellata is still brooding and now I am wondering how to keep them once he releases the fries. Need to get one or two tank more.


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## LittleBettaFish

That is one reason I stopped keeping the larger mouthbrooders. You need fairly large tanks to house all the fry and young fish. Because my unimaculata pair were always good parents I used to just leave my fry in with them. 

Just been toodling around my fish room this morning. I took a few photos, but sadly the majority were not worth posting up. It seems like whenever I get the perfect shot lined up, another fish swims into view, which then makes the camera focus on that fish instead of the one I am really after. Then by the time I get my camera focused again, the fish I was trying to take a photo of, has moved. 

First up, is one of my F1 Betta rutilans sub-adults. I believe this is a female and probably the one I will be hanging onto when I sell the rest. She's a savage critter. Half her caudal is gone because she's been fighting with her siblings. 










Then we have one of my Betta sp. api api females. I am quite fond of this female. I was initially going to sell her and retain one of the others, but I'm still considering holding onto her instead because she is so nice. Only problem is that she's rather bonded with her male. Unfortunately, he's not as nice as the male I want to keep, but I feel mean breaking them up. 










Then this photo was supposed to be of the male but the cheeky juvenile at the top swam into view, so we have dad, mum, and the bub. 










For some idea of how small this species is, both of the adults are about 3.5cm from head to tail. 

Finally, my Betta hendra group were looking stunning yesterday and I was all prepared to take some photos of them this morning. So of course my male decides to build a nest up in his canister overnight, and now everyone is hiding from him. I'm not sure if there are still free-swimming fry in the tank. I haven't seen any, but I put some BBS in there last night and hopefully there's a couple kicking around. 










I'm just about to drain the tank my spare Betta livida was in, and replace it with my Betta rutilans tank. They are on the bottom shelf of my main rack at the moment, so the plants require artificial lighting. On the top shelf of my smaller rack, enough natural light comes through the window that even in winter the duckweed, watersprite, and mayaca will grow. 

Then I'll be filling up my Australian native tank. Frustratingly, I think the weather is still a little cold overnight for me to feel safe having fish shipped, so I think I am going to have to wait for my spotted blue eyes.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> That is one reason I stopped keeping the larger mouthbrooders. You need fairly large tanks to house all the fry and young fish. Because my unimaculata pair were always good parents I used to just leave my fry in with them.


yeah... I will be making some changes to the tank again, so that the Ocellata will be in 2ft tank.. as for the channoides I am trying to build a colony..where I will keep 3 pairs and the parents... probably will put the rest to fish shop if they survive under me. luckily my Macs are not breeding yet.. otherwise I will really collapse.


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## Crossroads

I went and looked at the blue eyes(spotted and honey) and WOW! Those fish are GORGEOUS!

I think I've decided on channoides as my first. When some of the group of domestic splendens I currently have pass on, I think I'll convert my other 20g long to a channoides tank. I have a place downtown I might be able to sucker into taking them that takes excellent care of their fish. Might be worth talking to them and seeing if they'd take wilds.


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## LittleBettaFish

A colony of channoides would be nice. You definitely will be up for a lot of work if your macrostoma do eventually breed. 

I have always liked the blue eyes. Unfortunately, it's basically impossible to get species from PNG here, and there are several PNG blue eyes I would *love* to get my hands on. 

These are another favourite of mine, Rhadinocentrus ornatus:

http://rainbowfish.angfaqld.org.au/Rhadino.htm

I think channoides is a good choice for your first wild betta species. Be warned, it's very easy to get hooked on this side of the betta hobby haha


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I _finally_ got around to filling the tank for my blue eyes. I think it's been a couple of weeks, and even my mum started asking me if I was ever putting fish in it. 

The large rocks are only there to hold the wood down until it is waterlogged. Hopefully they will be able to come out in a couple of days. 










I have some melaleuca leaves soaking in a jug of water and once they are no longer floating, I will scatter them over the bottom. 

I also will boil some IAL to make up a weak tea and add some of this to the tank to darken the water slightly. I just feel it makes the whole tank feel more natural when there's some colour to the water. 

Then it will just be a matter of ordering the plants and fish, and sticking them in. The pH will be too low for the tank to cycle, so the plants will be in charge of keeping the ammonia down like in my wild betta tanks. Still think I will be going with Blyxa aubertii (hopefully I don't kill it) and Limnophila brownii, as these appear to be two of the most commonly found plants in the spotted blue eyes habitat range. I might also chuck some giant duckweed in there as well, as I prefer to have some floaters and they will help suck up excess nutrients. In one survey done by the ANGFA, this was also found in one of the habitats so at least it will be a fairly accurate biotope.


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## Crossroads

LittleBettaFish said:


> A colony of channoides would be nice. You definitely will be up for a lot of work if your macrostoma do eventually breed.
> 
> I have always liked the blue eyes. Unfortunately, it's basically impossible to get species from PNG here, and there are several PNG blue eyes I would *love* to get my hands on.
> 
> These are another favourite of mine, Rhadinocentrus ornatus:
> 
> http://rainbowfish.angfaqld.org.au/Rhadino.htm
> 
> I think channoides is a good choice for your first wild betta species. Be warned, it's very easy to get hooked on this side of the betta hobby haha


Ohhh that rhadinocentrus <3 
I don't think I could ever keep texas natives they're all massive xD
The Rio grande cichlids would be nice but they'd need space like an oscar.

And I'm not adverse to getting hooked on wilds >>;


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## LittleBettaFish

Rhads are nice. I regret I sold the four I had, but that's typical me when it comes to this hobby. Get a fish, get bored with said fish, sell fish, and almost instantly regret selling said fish. The wilds are really the only fish I've stuck with consistently. 

Most of the Victorian natives are either fairly ordinary to look at, or something I have no interest in keeping/don't have the facilities to keep. I would love to live up in QLD where I could do some serious puddle exploring. There's so many cracker Australian rainbows and small natives, but you hardly see them in fish stores here. It's all guppies, goldfish, African cichlids, and neon tetras. 

I've been working out how many spotted blue eyes I want to purchase. They are $6 each but I also need to buy plants, some various dry goods, and add about $25-36 for shipping. At the moment I'm thinking six blue eyes, either three males and three females, or two males and four females. These fish are not long-lived, and are only at their breeding prime for a short period of time. Therefore, the goal will be to have a self-sustaining population. Hopefully I can then do the same with honey blue eyes as soon as I am able to snag myself a group of them. 

I did want to share a story about the resilience of mosquito larvae. This past couple of weeks we've been having some fairly cold weather, with temperatures getting below zero. In one of the smaller containers that there had been mosquito larvae in, a thin layer of ice formed over the surface. I was therefore surprised to see larvae still moving around underneath this ice. It was pretty active too, for how freezing I imagine that water must have been.


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## Crossroads

I did end up finding SOME small Texas natives but most of them are kind of introduced. Like guppies, sailfin mollies, amazon mollies. I think I may stick to S. American fish and bettas lol. They make me the happiest.

Seems all of the gorgeous fish are terribly short lived. For instance, some killifish...

No wonder we have mosquitos so bad here if they're surviving that kind of stuff!


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## LittleBettaFish

I think we have a lot of gambusia down here. A terrible little fish that has caused an immense amount of damage to our native fish populations. 

There is a species of blue eyes, which is only found in a handful of springs in a remote area. However, they are now being threatened by gambusia that have somehow found their way there (I would think due to flooding). 

I like apistogramma. From time to time, I have toyed with the idea of keeping a couple species, but I've just never had the money or space.


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## Nismo83

nice tank setup..


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Nismo. Hopefully it will look a lot nicer once I get the big rocks out and put some plants in. 

I just wish there were more photos of Australian aquatic plants growing as they would in the wild. I'm struggling to get a sense of how the plants I have selected, would look if they were growing together in the wild.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> Thanks Nismo. Hopefully it will look a lot nicer once I get the big rocks out and put some plants in.
> 
> I just wish there were more photos of Australian aquatic plants growing as they would in the wild. I'm struggling to get a sense of how the plants I have selected, would look if they were growing together in the wild.


understand what you going thru' but u have been doing a good job. unlike me.. I always screw up setting a new tank.


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## LittleBettaFish

Had a busy day in the fish room. I moved my Betta rutilans group into a new tank on the top shelf of my smaller rack. The move was pretty easy. All I did was transfer the water from their old tank into the new tank, threw in some handfuls of aquasoil (I find this method makes the water less cloudy), and then added the plants and fish. 

Of course as soon as we go into a new tank we _immediately_ need to start fighting because it's not like we've been living together since we hatched out of our eggs. 

I gave them some white worms and they ate those, but we are still a little cautious and are hovering around under the leaves. 



















Then this is what their new tank looks like. I think I might add some anubias to it, and I'm hoping now it receives some sunlight, the watersprite will start to grow a lot faster. 










Then I did some work of my Betta brownorum tank. This is the tank that holds Zig-Zag and my two other males, not the tank that holds my breeding pair. I'm adding some more water and possibly some more wood tomorrow as this line is so aggressive. 










I _almost_ took the perfect photo of my Betta coccina male in full flare. I hardly have any photos of him as he is either in his film canister or has his fins all tucked up. So I am posting this photo anyway even though it's blurry. The fins on this species are just spectacular. 










Finally, this is just a photo of my Betta persephone male. This is the male I received earlier this year. He's been very happily spawning with my F2 female since his female died. Like my Betta coccina male, I can never get any nice photos of him. I need to purchase more moss and watersprite for this tank, and the water should be darker, but in all the time I've owned him, this is the best photo I've managed. 










I also took both rocks out of my blue eyes tank, and the wood is staying in place. The water is cloudy but I have been clearing it up with water changes, and the wood is developing some slime, which hopefully will go away with time. Otherwise, the tank is ready to go. I just need to wait until the weather improves to order my plants and my fish.


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## Elleth

Love your betta coccina male.  I keep thinking I've subbed to your thread, but apparently I haven't yet. Well now I am! Lol!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Elleth. My Betta coccina are my favourite species in my fish room. Both this male and his son get a real green sheen to their sides that unfortunately the camera hasn't caught here.


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## LittleBettaFish

Today mum took the car to get a service. There's a fish store near the dealership, and as I needed some live blackworms I suggested we drop by on the way home. 

I got my blackworms, some very healthy looking water sprite.... and also this feisty marble plakat male. 










As I hadn't been expecting to purchase a new fish, I had to quickly throw a tank together. He's on the bottom shelf of my main rack next to Atlas. 

He is smaller than the photo shows. Unfortunately, this was the best photo I could manage. He kept tucking his ventrals up and persisted in racing around the tank. He certainly is quite a confident fish, as he was eating and flaring within minutes of being released into the tank.

He's actually my mum's fish as she liked him, and paid for him. However, as I don't like the style of names she chooses, I decided on 'Maverick' as it was the first word that sprung to mind when I looked at him. 

Maverick is the first Betta splendens I've had since I got Atlas in the middle of last year. 

Otherwise not much else to report. I added some of the newly purchased watersprite to my Betta rutilans, and Betta persephone tanks and hopefully it does well. I really want to turn my Betta persephone tank into a jungle to give the fry the best chance of survival. One of my Betta persephone pairs was flirting earlier in the evening, so I threw in some blackworms to see if I can't coax a spawn from them in the next day or so. I have a few fry floating around in there of various sizes, but if the gender ratio ends up as skewed as it has been previously, I will need a large group to provide me with an adequate number of females.


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## SiameseFightingArt

Wow, he's beautiful for a pet store betta  There always seems to be those diamonds hiding among all the cups huh?


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## LittleBettaFish

This store didn't use cups or small containers, which was nice. They had a small barracks set-up, and all of the fish looked very healthy and active. There was also a sign indicating that Betta splendens were tropical fish and required warm water, and also that they needed a minimum tank size of 9L (or just over two gallons). 

He's not the best form wise. But his colour is very striking and he has an attitude to match my current plakat male. 

This is a photo I took just before. 










This is Maverick's tank on the right, and Atlas's tank on the left. 










Then this is one half of my Betta persephone tank with the new watersprite. There's still a lot of empty space on the bottom of the tank, which is why I would like to get some more java moss or even subwassertang.


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## Elleth

What a cutie! And that's awesome that the store had that information posted about them. All the LPS near me are worse than the closest Petco. Which... Is saying something. :/


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## LittleBettaFish

There's less than a handful of fish stores, which don't make me wince when I see how they display their bettas. I not only hate seeing them wasting away in dirty cups, but I also hate seeing them put into sales tanks with wildly inappropriate tank mates. You go in, and there's some chewed up long-finned male being harassed by a tank full of tetras as well as being buffeted around by the filter current. 

I was just feeding everyone, and decided to take some photos. I've been struggling to decide between which Betta sp. api api pairs (especially the females) to sell, but I think I've made up my mind. 

The female below is the one I think I will be keeping. She looks the most like my previous female (just shorter in the body), and is the most personable. I thought she was going to explode with the number of white worms she managed to fit in. 



















I'm hoping once I sell my other two pairs of Betta sp. api api, and can move her into a heavily planted tank, she will show more colour. Their present tank is very open, and as a result she only shows her full colour during courtship. I also want to kick all the young fish out into a single tank as they are getting to a size now where they are starting to become more aggressive. 

This was the female I was almost going to keep. She's nice, but she's not as friendly and I prefer friendly fish as it's easier to keep track of their health. 










Then this is my Betta brownorum male eyeing off some blackworms. I swear I never see this fish unless he is eating. Otherwise he just stays in his film canister tending to spawn after spawn. 










My Betta persephone seem to like their new plants, and the fact I added some rooibos last night. This is what the whole tank looks like now. Definitely needs more plants, but both pairs are happy enough. 










This male isn't one I've bred. He came from overseas and then was owned by a hobbyist in QLD, before coming to me. 










These two are fish I bred. The one on the left is my F2 male. He is a beautiful fish, but he has problems with his swim bladder and can't swim properly so obviously not a breeding candidate. The one chasing him, is his father. He is three-years-old, and very stocky. He chooses not to pose for photos although I almost got him tonight with the camera. 










I picked up an API pH test kit earlier today. I was curious about whether the sand in my blue eyes tank was going to drastically raise the pH. The pH in the tank seems to be around 6.8, which is lower than the tap water (7.6 was the closest match on the chart), but higher than the pH in my wild betta tanks. So I will be keeping close eyes on the pH level to make sure it doesn't come up too high. I've never used this sand before so don't want to harm my fish. 

Having tested my tap water, I can see why my previous bettas must have had issues when I was doing 100% water changes. My tap water has almost no carbonate hardness, and drops very rapidly down to 6.0, which is as low as the test kit will read. It could potentially be lower, and likely is, based on the species I have breeding in my tanks. Undoubtedly, going from 7.6 down to 6.0, and then back to 7.6 when I changed the water out must have been incredibly stressful. 

I do wish this weather would warm up though! I really want to get my spotted blue eyes and plants, but overnight temperatures seem to be hovering around 5-7 degrees Celsius.


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## LittleBettaFish

Today I realised we hardly have any nice photos of the dogs, so since it was such beautiful weather, me and mum headed out to the fenced oval near our house with the dogs and the camera. 

We got some good photos, and some terrible photos. Clio has no withers at the moment and runs on the forehand with her head down, so it doesn't make for particularly flattering photos. 

First up we have my girl Nike. Looking at her movement it's hard to believe she has such terrible hips. This is why I scoff at BYB who say their dogs have not been x-rayed but have never shown any problems with their hips. Sometimes the dogs with the worst hips can look completely sound. 




























Then this is our oldest girl Eos. The dog in the background of the jumping shot is Ares. 



















Then finally this is Clio and me. You can see she looks all kinds of awkward at the moment. Especially when she puts her head down. Then she starts shuffling along like some sort of hunchback. Ignore me. I think this is the first time I have been in a photo since graduating high school, and that was years and years ago. 










I also have a few fish photos to share as well. 

I am sad this photo did not turn out better as it would have been great. This is my Betta persephone male showing off to the female. 










Then this is one of my Betta burdigala fry. It's one of the biggest I've seen so far.










Last but not least, this is one of my F1 Betta sp. api api males.


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## SiameseFightingArt

I just love German Shepards <3 Also I would love to see those setups one day in real life. Lucky for me I guess that my sis is going to Australia so I'll tell her to pick some boys up for me XD


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## LittleBettaFish

I like German Shepherds, but they aren't my favourite breed of dog. I told mum once she hits a certain age she's to stop accumulating them as I don't want to inherit a whole pack of geriatric German Shepherds haha. 

One thing I do get sick of, is reading about/being told all show line German Shepherds are crippled and can't do anything but trot around on their hocks.

I mean, look at this crippled dog. It's disgusting. 










Sadly my tanks don't look as nice as they used to. I used to have a whole heap of java fern and watersprite. I think my java fern suffered from some sort of disease as I lost every plant in multiple tanks within a matter of days/weeks a while back. Even plants that had been vigorously growing for over a year. I lost the watersprite following treatment for velvet, although this is starting to grow back in from new stock and the few plants that managed to survive. 

I took this photo of my Betta persephone tank the other day. I was spying on the fry swimming around and thought it was an interesting perspective. Of course there is always cling wrap over the top of the tank when I'm not doing anything with it.


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## LittleBettaFish

My F1 Betta persephone male is incredibly elusive. The film canister he uses as his nesting site was at the back of the tank, and so he spent most of his time lurking around back there. Yesterday, seeing that he had no eggs or fry in the canister, I decided to move it towards the front of the tank so I could keep a closer eye on him. 

The reason I am posting, is that just before, I managed to get a couple of quick photos of him. This male and his sister, are the oldest fish in my fish room at three years of age. They were from my first successful spawning ever, from a pair of Betta persephone, so you can imagine at the time I was pretty stoked. I am fairly certain he is also the father of my two F2 fish, and he is also now the father of a growing brood of fry. 

I don't know how he ended up so stout. None of his brothers were this thick through the body. 










In this photo, the male on the left is his son. 










This is a better photo of his son. Unfortunately, he suffers from issues with his swim bladder, which rules him out of breeding duties. However, I have paired his sister up with my other male and they are spawning regularly. 










I think he is doing very well for his age considering he spawns with his female on an almost weekly basis. There don't seem to be any issues with deformities in the fry that I have seen thus far, and hopefully they can produce a large enough number of F2 fish that I can keep my line going. 

Lastly, this is my Betta hendra male. He is the fish in my display photo and in September, will be two years old. His ventrals both got bitten off by one or more of his sons, and they are very slowly growing back in. I hope they can get back to their original length as he looks kind of odd with them being so short.


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## Nismo83

Just wonder, how long do you on the lights per day for your tank? Your plants are very healthy.


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## LittleBettaFish

It depends. Some days I have them on for six or more hours, some days I don't even turn them on at all, and some days they are only on for a couple of hours before they go off. 

All the plants I use can grow under low lighting, and when it's not overcast, the sun comes through my top and side windows and this helps provide additional light for the plants.


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## Nismo83

I see....will be setting up a semi planted tank for the macs when I move to new apartment using ADA Malaya soil..  trying to gather information =)


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## blueridge

LBF you keep Betta Hendra don't you?


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## LittleBettaFish

Yes, why?


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## andakin

Just a curious question about hendras. Do the males display breeding stripes too?


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## LittleBettaFish

The males can show vertical barring. Vertical barring doesn't just indicate readiness to breed. I find with my wilds it seems to be used to show a lack of aggression/threat and submission. My young fish often show vertical barring when in the presence of an older sibling/adult.


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## andakin

I've always called the vertical bars, breeding stripes. I guess the words aren't interchangeable.

I recently just read an article on hendras and saw the photos. The vertical bars on the males are stunning. Here is the link if you haven't already seen it.
http://www.reef2rainforest.com/2015/03/27/friday-photospread-betta-hendra/


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## LittleBettaFish

I've seen that article before, and I personally don't think in the majority of photos, either of those fish are showing the _true_ beauty of this species. 

The female in particular looks pretty drab when in actual fact they are almost as attractive as the males.

It rankles some people, but I will always say that this complex of fish looks best in dark water. I notice when the water in my tank goes clearer, the fish start to show poorer colouration. 

This is my wild-caught male looking pretty close to his best.

http://redwinebettas.weebly.com/uploads/8/3/0/5/8305998/4738907_orig.jpg

Then this is my wild-caught female. 

http://redwinebettas.weebly.com/uploads/8/3/0/5/8305998/9905160_orig.jpg


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## andakin

I will agree that your female looks far better than what is shown on that website. The one there is colorless and looks like it's displaying stress stripes.

Not to take anything from your hendra, I really like how that other fish looks; mainly because of the pronounced vertical bars.

Now another question, I notice that yours look more green than blue. Is it because of the darker water or is it because this fish come in different colors?


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## LittleBettaFish

I have never seen a hendra look _that_ blue before. They can look 'blueish' under certain lighting, so I do wonder if there was some editing that went on, and creative use of lighting/flash to get that particularly vivid colour.


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## sharkettelaw1

I love reading your journal.. Its very interesting and informative


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## blueridge

Now that I have kept my Betta Edithae for a while and have been doing pretty good with them, I thought I would expand my wild betta collection. So I was wondering if a 10 gallon aquarium would be suitable to house a pair? Also have you ever bought off of aquabid?


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Sharkettelaw. 

Blueridge, a 10 gallon should be fine. However, they are only small fish and can be elusive (although all mine are extremely friendly), so I would probably only fill the 10 gallon halfway. It's what I do with my own 10 gallon tanks. 

My suggestions for keeping this species, are to stuff the tank with plants, use a dark substrate, and make the water extremely dark. It's a point of contention among some wild betta keepers/breeders but I personally find the fish show the best colouration and more natural behaviour in these sorts of set-ups. 

Keep in mind, the coccina complex of wilds are probably the most sensitive in regards to water conditions. They like a low pH (6.0 or less) and soft water. Betta hendra are probably one of the easier species in the complex to keep and breed, but some pairs can be fussy and won't breed if the conditions aren't to their liking. 

They also may not take dried foods. Then again I only feed my wilds live and frozen foods as I feel it helps keep them in breeding condition, and helps them recover more quickly from injury, than a diet of pellets would. These fish are capable of spawning once or twice a week for months on end without stopping. Their spawns are not as large as that of Betta splendens, but they are extremely prolific if they like your water, each other, and the tank.

Also, I have never purchased off AB. I either go through Hermanus or Joty for my wilds. If you are looking at the pair of Betta hendra from Raven_Water19 be aware that the photos they use are not photos they have taken. I just noticed now that at least they aren't using my photo for their fish like they were previously.

Edited: Not sure if you've seen it before, but this is my blog http://redwinebettas.weebly.com/ It covers all my experiences with keeping and breeding this complex. If you go in the menu bar under 'Wild Betta Articles' I do go into detail about set-ups and care.


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## blueridge

Thanks for the info LBF! I'll take a look through your blog! I guess I'll stay clear of Raven_Water19 then. I don't want to purchase fish if I'm not looking at a real picture of them. I sent Joty a friend request on fb so I'm hoping I can get into contact with him. Thanks for helping me out!


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## LittleBettaFish

Most sellers of wild bettas tend not to have photos of the actual fish you are purchasing. It's frustrating as some localities of the same species can look extremely different, and even some individuals from the same species where there is only one locality can vary in appearance. 

I have never had any issues with ordering or purchasing from Joty. He is so great to work with and the fish he sources are of excellent quality. The majority of my breeding pairs in my fish room are from him. 

On an unrelated note, I took this photo of one of my F1 Betta sp. api api males flaring at his mother. He has so much attitude it's no wonder someone has removed half his dorsal fin. Sadly, I don't think it will grow back.


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## blueridge

Yeah I have definitely learned about that, with the pictures. When I ordered my Edithae they showed a picture like this:









When in actuality I got one that looks like this:









I'll definitely contact Joty. I would love to own a pair of betta hendra's. I think they are so gorgeous! Also your little male is too cute with his attitude!


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## Nismo83

blueridge said:


>


nice photo taken..


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## LittleBettaFish

Adolescent male bettas are such jerks. Backstory is that I have a sub-adult Betta persephone male who I received as a juvenile a while ago. He shares a section of my Betta persephone tank with his father and my F2 female. 

He has reached breeding size, and has since developed some serious attitude. He keeps pestering my female and I think I'll have to find somewhere for him to go before he hurts her, or is put in his place by his father. 




























Then this was a quick snap I got of my favourite Betta sp. api api female. I keep telling her that some day she will go into a nice planted tank with my nicest male. She looks so crappy in this tank with all the young males harassing her.


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## blueridge

Nismo83 said:


> nice photo taken..


It is a nice photo, but sadly I didn't take it. I got it off google. Just trying to show some of the different varieties of betta edithae


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## LoveMyBettas

I've enjoyed reading through this thread & seeing all these beautiful pictures!!  Your fish are beautiful!! 

I seen some wilds on eBay & they truly are amazing I may have a couple for myself in the future, but not real soon & i don't know if I'd ever get to breeding, although from what I have been reading they are the "trending" thing They certainly are beautiful!!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. I try to do my best to make my journal interesting for those reading it. 

I've personally found that the popularity of wild bettas comes and goes. An interesting article or photo will come out, and a whole slew of hobbyists will pick up keeping/breeding these fish. Then after a while they get bored, and move onto whatever has caught their fancy. 

Many people don't take that next step, and become _dedicated_ wild betta enthusiasts. I've been keeping and breeding wild bettas for five years now, and that is still a very insignificant amount of time compared to some. 

This is an issue as it can cause certain localities and species to become lost in the hobby. I've sold fish to people who sound keen, only to have them drop off the face of the earth within a few months with no idea of what happened to my fish. Another example, is that I once sold a number of sibling pairs, from a locality that no longer exists in the wild. I'd raised those fish for more than a year, and sent out some of my better females. Sadly, all but one of those pairs were confirmed dead following a heatwave, and I have no idea what happened to the fourth pair. It's lucky nothing happened to my remaining fish and I now have some fry a year or more on to ensure that this strain isn't lost in Australia. 

As such I've come to the conclusion, if you only really want a pet, and breeding is secondary, don't go with threatened/rare species, or those that are wild-caught. Go with something relatively common, and captive bred. 

I've never seen wilds come up on ebay before. What species were they?


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## LoveMyBettas

I agree! I think that if you are keeping (or interested in keeping) threatened species, it would be good to try & help propagate the species. If I got into them, I would definitely be interested in trying to keep the species going if I came across rare/threatened species. That probably would not happen, but per circumstance, if it should, I would. Because i love the fishes i get. I would want to keep them going & educate people about them. That is TERRIBLE you lost so many  I'm sorry the people that took them do not sound like they were very caring, or responsible in what happened with the fish I don't live in Australia, but I love Australia & the rich diversity of wildlife you have there. I'm all for educating the "public" about wildlife & responsibility & all that. What better way to help then keep a threatened species going??? 

These I'm not sure, but I thought I read they were one of the wild bettas

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Wild-Copper...74220f6&pid=100005&rk=1&rkt=6&sd=291526744292


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah they are a wild betta species. I'm still not sure whether the copper Betta smaragdina occur in the wild or whether that is some sort of hybridisation. 

Australia has some spectacular and unique fauna and flora. It's just unfortunate importation of fish into the country is very costly and restricted. 

Just been playing around taking photos of some of my fish tonight. 

First up are two of my favourites. I don't post many photos of them because they refuse to pose for me, but it's my wild-caught Betta brownorum pair. 














































They've spawned dozens of times but for some reason, this is the only juvenile I can spot lately. Hopefully it hasn't been eating its smaller siblings. 










My poor Betta hendra matriarch has to put up with a lot of testosterone. However, she holds her own, even when her son is bigger than she is now. 




























Then this is her midget daughter. I don't know what happened to this female, all the rest of her siblings grew but she is only about an inch long. Perfectly formed and coloured, just small. 










Finally, here is a photo of my wild-caught Betta rutilans male. I am still sad I lost his female as they made the sweetest pair. I really should sell off the rest of his offspring, and pair him up with a daughter. 










Meanwhile, this is what naughty puppies get up to when left to their own devices.


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## LoveMyBettas

They are gorgeous!! I wish I lived in Australia! I would LOVE to catch a pair of my own & breed them to help sustain the species!! That is an AWESOME adventure you have been taking! I am glad that I am able to share it here with you in your journal. I think those wilds you have are SO gorgeous!! The look is just amazing. I mean, i love my bettas, but you can tell they are bred out for the colors, etc. Where these, just have that natural wild beauty!! )))) Thank you for sharing more photos!


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## LittleBettaFish

I wasn't sure if you meant you wanted to catch wild bettas in Australia. We don't have wild bettas here, only a feral population of escaped Betta splendens up in Northern Territory. Wild bettas come from Indonesia, Malaysia, Cambodia, and Thailand. 

I personally prefer fish that haven't been altered from their natural form. They may not be as striking as fish selectively bred for colour, finnage, or even body size and shape, but I enjoy watching fish whose appearance and behaviour has been shaped by nature and not by man.


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## LoveMyBettas

OOOH I misunderstood LOL I thought you had said you had caught some there in the wild LOL (I guess i should have realized, knowing that they are from Thailand & such :O

They are very beautiful - as you said - i the natural, unaltered state There is just something awesome about them being as they are naturally


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha I wish there were wild bettas here. It would certainly be a lot easier and cheaper to source them then. 

The majority of my foundation breeding pairs _are_ wild-caught, but I have imported them in from Indonesia. 

I prefer wild-caught for my foundation breeding pairs, as then I know the fish are from the same locality (appearance can vary wildly between fish of the same species but different localities). Captive bred fish can be a mixed bag unless the breeder has kept their line pure, and I find a lot of people have their wilds fatter than I personally think is healthy for the fish (I know because I did so in the past).


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## LoveMyBettas

))) Yes, definitely would be much easier to catch your own I think I just misunderstood (I misread what ya said & didn't realize. So you purchase the breeder pair from someone who has caught them wild? That's really awesome!

How many times have you bred yours? Do you sell them locally? I love that blackish male up there (betta hendra??) He's beautiful! But really, they all are))


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## LittleBettaFish

I buy them from a man who runs a betta/fish business in Indonesia. I believe he gets them from people who've either collected the fish themselves, or suppliers who have received fish from collectors. 

My wild betta pairs live together and they will generally breed once or twice a week until their oldest fry start to show adult colouration. Then breeding will slow, and tends to only resume once their offspring are at adult size.

I take a sort of 'survival of the fittest' approach to raising my fry. I feed sporadically, and allow the bigger fry to cull the smaller fry. I find this way I tend not to end up with deformed fry because they just can't compete against their normal siblings. Only time I tend to get deformities are when there are only a small number of fry produced, such as with my egg eating pair. 

I usually end up with around 12-15 young fish per tank. This is preferable for me, as I only sell to other breeders/hobbyists and I don't need to be churning out hundreds of fish. 

The species of wilds I keep require very specialised conditions to thrive and breed (very low hardness/TDS and a pH of around 6.0 or lower), and they can be shy. So while beautiful, they often have a limited market. 

The black/green male is one of my F1 Betta hendra. I'm quite proud of how he has turned out.


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## LoveMyBettas

Your male Betta hendra is beautiful!! )) But they really all are  I love the look of the tank & everything!! Very satisfying, beautiful job you have going!!!  I thank you for sharing them!!


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## blueridge

LBF I'm curious as to what size tank you keep your Betta api api in? I didn't see it mentioned (or I over looked it )


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## LittleBettaFish

I have three pairs. Two pairs are in 10 gallons half-filled, and one pair is in a seven gallon half-filled. They also all have a heap of juveniles, sub-adults, and fry living with them.


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## Nismo83

Nice colony of api api


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## blueridge

Thanks LBF! They sound prolific xD


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## Wildbetta

blueridge said:


> Yeah I have definitely learned about that, with the pictures. When I ordered my Edithae they showed a picture like this:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> When in actuality I got one that looks like this:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> I'll definitely contact Joty. I would love to own a pair of betta hendra's. I think they are so gorgeous! Also your little male is too cute with his attitude!


I am not sure who you got your edithae from but I would not recommend buying wilds from them again. Not a good thing when the seller can not post a picture of the correct species when you go to buy them. The first picture you posted is of a betta falx and the second one you posted (the one that actually looks like your fish) is a betta edithae. Two totally different species of wild betta.

LBF -- your journal is as always entertaining with lots of nice photos of species that are rare and difficult to keep.


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## LittleBettaFish

I've found all wilds are prolific if your water conditions are to their liking. I've only had issues when the male or female have been egg eaters, and they usually get the flick from my fish room because I only want productive fish and I don't really like to keep the offspring of fish on that have been crap parents in case it's genetic.

Thanks Nismo83 and Wildbetta for the kind words. I don't do anything special. I'm just lucky Melbourne tap water is so great for rearing wild bettas.


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## blueridge

Wildbetta said:


> I am not sure who you got your edithae from but I would not recommend buying wilds from them again. Not a good thing when the seller can not post a picture of the correct species when you go to buy them. The first picture you posted is of a betta falx and the second one you posted (the one that actually looks like your fish) is a betta edithae. Two totally different species of wild betta.
> 
> LBF -- your journal is as always entertaining with lots of nice photos of species that are rare and difficult to keep.


Thanks for the concern! I won't be buying from them again, and I guess I got lucky in getting the right pair from him.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haven't been doing much with my wilds apart from watching them, feeding them, and doing a few water changes. 

Today I took some photos of my 'supposed to be Betta tussyae, but are really Betta burdigala' pair. They are a lovely pair and I was tossing up whether to sell them or not, but I need the space and I worry I'm going to end up with a tank of males that I won't be able to sell. 

The photos are blurry because they were moving around a lot. They also decided to randomly wrap during the middle of the photo session. Obviously the excitement was too much. 














































Then this is one of their biggest fry. 



















See if you can spot the fry in the below photo. 










My two Betta persephone pairs have been spawning constantly, and I am really happy with the number of fry I am getting. I do have a couple of larger fry, but most are around the size of the fry in the photo above. 

Otherwise, not much else has been happening. It's still freezing down here overnight, so I haven't risked ordering any blue eyes at the moment. Which is frustrating as I have this tank just sitting there ready to go.


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## Nismo83

you are always updating.. you keep all the fries with the parents?


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## LittleBettaFish

It's because I have no life outside of my fish haha Also, my laptop and camera are in my fish room, so if I notice my fish doing something interesting, I stop and snap a quick shot. 

I keep all the fry with their parents. I don't have space for separate tanks. Fish from the coccina complex tend to be good parents and won't harm their fry. I usually won't keep egg or fry eaters in my fish room because I don't believe in artificially hatching eggs. 

Just to finish my post I have a few more photos to share.


















My Betta hendra matriarch









Betta coccina F1


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## LittleBettaFish

Did some show practice with Clio at the fenced oval near our house. I think she's turning out to be a nice looking girl. She has such a lovely dark mask. I might cry if she loses it, as I've always wanted a German Shepherd with a dark mask. 














































Even if something happens and she can't be used for conformation showing, I still think we will have a lot of fun with her as she has such a great personality.


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## Nismo83

Nice German. Wish I can keep dogs again. But limited space over here in Singapore.


----------



## Aqua Aurora

HOLY CRAP SHE'S GROWING FAST!! That's the same pup that liked to go CHOMP a shot time ago and was not allowed out of the kitchen?!


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## Zhylis

Oh man, she's adorable. All legs and ears!


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## LittleBettaFish

Yes that is the adorable little Landshark. She's about five months now, and only stands a few centimetres shorter than our smaller girl. She still isn't left alone much unsupervised because she's teething and is more beaver than German Shepherd at this point. 

You can always pick which puppy she is at dog club because she is usually dragging herself around on the ground like some sort of canine worm.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I've got my Betta burdigala pair, my Betta miniopinna group, and my Betta rutilans group on hold after advertising them for sale. It was a difficult decision to make, but I need the space, and these were the fish I was most comfortable with letting go. Of course my Betta burdigala pair decided to celebrate my decision by spawning and providing me with yet more fry. 

I assume they will all be going sometime next week, and then I need to get onto the buyer who was interested in two of my Betta sp. api api pairs so I can get them gone and condense all my young fish into a single tank and my remaining pair into another. 

I thought I lost my microworm culture the other day. I'd let it go too long and it going hard and moldy. I thought they were all dead, but today I had a look at the new culture and I can see some movement so hopefully their numbers increase enough that I don't have to buy a new culture. 

I think I'm going to have to get a new grindal worm starter culture. It looks like my white worms have basically out-competed them, which is surprising considering I've always found white worms less resilient than the grindals, particularly over summer. White worms can be a bit fatty, so I would like to have another option for live foods than just those and blackworms until the warmer weather comes around. 

Otherwise, all my fish are doing well. My fish room has been drama and disease free for so long now I'm starting to get concerned. I never have a run of luck this good. 

I had my camera out tonight, and got a few quick snaps of my Betta brownorum pair. I can spot two larger juveniles in the tank, but I'm hoping there are at least a few more smaller fry hiding in the moss considering how frequently these two spawn. 

I like how the male's spot is larger on one side, than it is on the other. 



















They just had a meal of frozen brine shrimp/bloodworms, hence the fat stomachs. The female was chasing the male around, so I think they are going to spawn again soon. 




























These two are definitely two of my favourites. Fortunately, they are so much gentler with each other than my previous pair.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my Betta brownorum male is guarding a nest of eggs. For some reason the female spends most of her time loitering around film canister and the male very rarely chases her away. I'm not sure if she's aiding in defence of the nest, waiting to be fed (as this is the 'feeding corner') or waiting to spawn with the male again. 










Then I just took a couple of photos of my rack set-up. 



















Once my Betta rutilans, burdigala, miniopinna, and two pairs of sp. api api are sold and gone, I can move all the tanks from my smaller rack onto the main rack. I want to have all my wilds on the main rack, and use the smaller rack to hold my Australian blue eyes species. 

Just ignore how crappy the house looks in those photos. I think it's falling apart faster than it can be patched back together. I swear as soon as this house is finished, (it's only been 25 years and counting) it will then go and burn to the ground. Probably once I've amassed some giant collection of rare and valuable fish. 

On the blue eyes front, I've decided I might order the plants and dry goods first, and then order the fish once the weather has warmed up. It's still been single digits overnight, and I worry that's too cold for them in transit. I will have to pay shipping twice, but at least then I can get the plants established and give the tank some time to mature (I've got white slime over all the melaleuca at the moment) before I add the fish. 

I know patience is a virtue in this hobby, but I am not a patient person! 

I'm hoping we start getting some warmer weather again soon so that I can start harvesting larger numbers of mosquito larvae again. I still think it's one of the best foods for my wilds, and I know my Australian natives love them too. 

That's about it from me. I'm a pretty boring person. Sometimes I think my fish lead more exciting lives than me.


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## andakin

I counted 17 tanks. Impressive! It must be back-breaking to maintain or view the tanks on the bottom rack.

Cheer up. I'm sure your life is more enjoyable than a fish trapped in a glass box.


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## LittleBettaFish

It's actually not too bad because I only change out about 5 litres. It's high enough off the ground that I can use a siphon and get a decent flow going. 

I have to do all the grunt work in my fish room like draining and moving tanks. I'm only small and there have been a few hairy moments, like when one of 10 gallons on the top shelf still had some water and fish in it, and got stuck to the stain I used on the shelf. 

Unfortunately, this rack and the tanks were sort of thrown together without any planning or preparation. There's a lot of things I would change about it if I could get in a time machine and go back a few years. 

I definitely would have brought the bottom shelf up to around the level the bottom shelf on my smaller rack is.


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## LittleBettaFish

I still think my F1 Betta coccina male is on the nicest fish I've ever bred. Sadly, like his father, I rarely see him out and about because he is forever guarding eggs or fry at the back of the tank. 

Last night however, I managed to snap a few photos when he ventured out to eat some frozen brine shrimp. 










This is his sister and the dominant female in the tank. She was showing breeding bars and a prominent stripe down her back which indicates her readiness to spawn. 




























I believe that this fish on the right is also male. It is coloured like a female but the body shape and fins look more like what you'd see on a male. I wonder if I separated it, whether it would develop richer colouring away from the dominant male. 










Showing off to his sister again. These two have formed quite a bonded pair. Their parents are the same. When I removed the female from the tank the male almost seemed to fret until I put her back in with him. 










I really enjoy watching my wilds interact. It's astonishing just how subtle communication between them can be. Sometimes all a dominant fish needs to do, is stare at a subordinate to chase it away. 

In other news for some reason my new microworm culture is growing mold in it. I wonder if the oats were bad as I've never had this happen before. So I will be starting up another culture today using some oats purchased only a couple weeks back. 

I also had an accident with my Betta hendra tank last night in that I managed to tip out a film canister of fry while looking for my original pair. They were almost free-swimming anyway, so hopefully they sort of bob around and the male spots them. 

This is probably about the hundredth time I've done something like this. It's no wonder my males always look at me suspiciously when they have eggs.


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## blueridge

LBF I just wanted to pop in and say thank you for recommending Jotya! He was wonderful to work with and the fish are amazing ^.^ Also I didn't realize just how small they were going to be.


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## LittleBettaFish

No worries. I've purchased the majority of my wilds through Joty and never had any issues. He's always been quick to remedy DOAs and always has quite a selection of quality stock. 

I imagine the Betta sp. api api will be tiny. They are the smallest species in this complex that's been discovered thus far, and wild-caught fish always tend to be smaller than captive bred stock. 

You'll have to share some photos once they are settled.


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## blueridge

Yes, he was excellent! And was always checking to make sure I understood things and that I received them. I see why you purchase from him! 

The Betta Sp. Api api are definitely tiny! Probably less than an inch or 1/2 an inch. I think the Hendra a kind of small too, especially compared to my Edithae pair. I'll definitely get pics once I get my hands on a camera, although they won't be as good as yours xD


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## LittleBettaFish

Well today I sent two of my wild-caught Betta sp. api api pairs to their new home. I kept the female that most closely resembled my original female, the nicest male, and (for the moment) the F1 fry, juveniles, and sub-adults from all three pairs. However, I definitely think I will keep a pair or two from this group, and sell the rest. I'm sure it won't be long before I have more fry from my remaining wild-caught pair now that they are on their own. 

Tomorrow, buyers will be coming to pick up my miniopinna group, my burdigala pair, and my rutilans group. Once these fish are gone, I can move my hendra and brownorum tanks onto the main rack. This will leave me with the following list of species: Betta sp. api api, Betta brownorum, Betta coccina, Betta hendra, Betta livida, Betta persephone, and Betta uberis. I'm still tossing up whether to sell my Betta livida trio. I could do with the cash, and they aren't really my favourite fish. However, I don't want to do so, unless I have a female or two in my F1 group. I know I have a definite male, but I'm not sure on the gender of the biggest juvenile. Fins say female, colouring says female, but body shape is rather masculine. I think I'll try and get a photo and put it up on the FB group I am co-admin of to see what other breeders think. 

I'm not getting out of wilds, just consolidating my collection down to the handful of species I am especially interested in, as well as fish that have a guaranteed home for life with me (my Betta uberis group and my three brownorum males). 

Otherwise, not much else has been happening. Still way too cold to get my spotted blue eyes shipped, so that tank is sitting empty. Oddly I have what appears to be hydrilla randomly sprouting in a couple of places. My fish all seem to be doing well, although the pH in my goldfish tank has dropped down to around 6.4 and I think it's affecting the cycle. I threw in a stocking of crushed coral to help buffer the pH back up to above 7.0. Unfortunately, this is the bane of having soft water. 

I've been really slack with photos lately. I've been busy with other things (mostly relating to the dogs), but I did get a couple of snaps of my F1 Betta sp. api api in their new position on the top shelf of the rack. In trying to catch the two pairs earlier today, I broke down one tank, and tore apart another. Fortunately I was able to keep this tank intact and simply move all the remaining fry and juveniles into it.


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## blueridge

Your sp. apiapi are looking good, LBF! Does your adult female(s) sp. apiapi have clearish fins in certain sections? My gal does, and it almost looks like she has a butterfly pattern going on. Wish I had pictures to show you.


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## LittleBettaFish

Sometimes when they are not fully coloured up, their caudals and other fins can look clearish in places. 

But otherwise all my females of this species have had solid red caudals. 

Yesterday the remaining wilds I was selling went to their new homes. Talk about a hectic day in the fish room. I was catching fish, bagging fish, tearing down tanks, moving tanks, and moving fish. The end result is that this is what my main rack now looks like. This rack now holds my entire collection of wild bettas. So let's hope it doesn't collapse or anything! I've taken the shelves off my smaller rack as they need to be replaced due to water damage, and then this will be dedicated to breeding groups of spotted and honey blue eyes. 










I completely broke down my old uberis tank, my rutilans tank, and my burdigala tank, and moved the plants from these tanks into some of my other tanks. As some of these fish have had velvet in the past, the plants only went into tanks of fish that have also had velvet. This means I only need to purchase java moss for my sp. api api tank, and also my F1 coccina tank, as this needs to be completely overhauled as algae has taken over everything. 

So here are some photos of a couple of tanks with their new plants. 










One half of the persephone tank 










The other half 










Something unexpected that happened yesterday was when I was catching my miniopinna pair and their five or six offspring. I caught everyone easily enough and had them in their bags, when I noticed something moving around in the tank. Turns out there were more young fish than I'd originally thought. However, since I wanted to move the uberis group into that tank and didn't want to destroy it hunting every last fry down, I figured they could share a tank with my uberis group until they were at a sexable size. 










Stepping away from wilds for the moment, yesterday I discovered the first ever bubblenest Maverick has ever made here with me. 










However, the bugger has made it his goal in life to refuse to have any nice photos taken of himself. This was the best I could manage. 










Finally, I'm just going to end my post with some photos of my F1 sp. api api. I love when they are at this size. They start developing some serious attitude.










Fairly certain the fish below is female










This is 'Half-Dorsal'. I think it was due to injury, but it could be a deformity he was born with. 



















This is Half-Dorsal's mum. I thought I lost her and the male last night. There was a small tear in the cling wrap and they were nowhere to be found. But fortunately, they must have just been hiding in their plants as they were out and about this morning.


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## blueridge

Oh ok thanks! Your guys are looking nice! ^.^


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## LittleBettaFish

Just sort of been lurking on the forum these past few days. Nothing much has been happening with my fish, and everyone's doing well. 

I was taking photos of some tanks I have up for sale today, so I thought I might as well take some photos of my fish and share them here. 

First is my F0 Betta coccina pair. Still have not taken a single in focus photo of my male in full flare that truly shows off his colour. 










This is his female. She's been very coloured up and showing breeding stripes all day so I expect they will spawn again soon. 










One of my F1 Betta hendra males. 










My brownorum female. 










Then here are some photos of various fish from my Betta uberis group. 














































Apart from that, not really much to share.


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## LittleBettaFish

Ugh, I'm hating the new BBS eggs I purchased. My previous eggs were able to be harvested around 18-24 hours. These new eggs seem to take closer to 48 hours. This is even with the heat turned up to 32 degrees celsius. 

My Betta livida male is in trouble. He managed to get out of the jar he was in, into the main tank with my breeding pair and their four offspring. I was sure he would turn up seriously injured or dead, However, it looks like he is staying at the opposite end of the tank to my breeding pair. There's no way I'm going to be able to catch him without tearing the tank apart, so he can just stay in the main tank unless there's fighting. Probably nicer for him, than being in a 2L jar anyway. 

Otherwise, I took some photos of my Betta sp. api api pair. My female has really coloured up since being moved into this new tank. They had some mosquito larvae last night, and I'm hoping to see a spawn from them soon. 

This is my female.










There was some disagreement here.










Here is my male.










This is their tank. It's much too bare for my tastes so I want to purchase some java moss and maybe some anubias or java fern for the bottom, and some watersprite to go up the top. The tank on the left is where all my F1 Betta sp. api api are housed.


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## Nismo83

love your updates as always..=)


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Nismo. 

I took a couple more photos of my Betta uberis. The male is just spectacular. He was so small when he arrived here from Indonesia, it's still amazing to think it's the same fish. He's definitely boss of the tank nowadays. 










This is one of his sons. He's very 'shiny' compared to the other young males. Unfortunately, he was also very difficult to get a photograph of as his eldest brother kept chasing him off from the feeding corner. 










Because of the soft tap water, I'd been having issues with the pH in my goldfish tank. It was down to around 6.4, which was starting to effect the beneficial bacteria. I chucked in a stocking full of crushed coral and after testing the water yesterday, the pH is back around 7.0. Crisis averted. 

Meanwhile I've just had these random shoots of hydrilla growing in my spotted blue eyes tank. They just showed up one day. I'm not sure if there was hydrilla in the substrate or stuck to the wood when it went into the tank, as everything was sitting dry for ages before I added water. 










I'm still waiting for the weather to warm up before I order my fish. The melaleuca roots/branches are still covered in slime/fungus, so I would sort of like that to clear up before I add fish anyway as it looks unsightly. 

My Betta livida males still seem to be living together without any serious incident. I think I'm going to sell all three next week or the week after to another hobbyist who has a pair and a spare male of the same locality as these. Then I will just keep my four F1 juveniles. 

It's weird. I searched for Betta livida for so long and never thought I would own a pair due to their endangered status in the wild and scarcity in the hobby. Yet I don't really love them as much as I expected. Now I've kept them and bred them, I find they aren't really my favourite species.


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## Nova betta

Wild bettas are so beautiful in a different way! I have been stalking this thread today.


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## Nismo83

For buffering pH it may be good for u to introduce aeration through a container with coral chips or similar if you u see stand what I mean. I wish my tap is soft.


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## LittleBettaFish

I have some crushed coral in a stocking in one of the internal filters. Unfortunately, it wasn't enough to get the pH high enough. I didn't have room in any of the other filters to add another stocking, so I had to put it on the bottom of the tank. Hopefully one day I will eventually have a large external filter for this tank. 

Yesterday, I was very excited to discover my Betta sp. api api pair had spawned. While I was replacing the cling wrap, I noticed a small nest at the surface and it looked to have eggs in it. Be interesting to see what the fry out of this pair look like as I thought they were the nicest of the six fish. 

Today, my Betta uberis pair surprised me by spawning right at the front of the tank. Unfortunately, my camera was running out of batteries so I couldn't take my time and get some really great shots like I wanted. But here are a few of the better ones. 



















I had to laugh. I don't know if my largest F1 male picked up on the fact that his mother was ready to spawn through pheromones in the water, but he has built himself a small nest at the opposite end of the tank. 


















































































This photo shows the eggs coming out of the female after a successful wrap. 










I use this stripe on the female's topline as an indication as to when they are ready to spawn. If they present with this stripe, a plump belly, and prominent ovipositor, and vertical barring, I know a spawn is imminent. 










Otherwise, my Betta coccina male is guarding a nest of eggs, and I'm fairly certain one or both Betta persephone males are as well. 

We've had a few warm days recently, so my mosquito larvae numbers have been increasing. We're expected to hit twenty degrees over the weekend, so hopefully the mosquitoes are out and breeding. 

The night time temperatures have been slightly higher as well, so I think in another couple of weeks I will be able to order my spotted blue eyes and not risk them freezing to death.


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## dannifluff

I am very interested in setting up a wild betta tank next year. It would have to be something like Betta Imbellis though since I am very limited by my water parameters, so just subbing for hints and tips! Either that or a Malawi Cichlid tank since I wouldn't have to do any messing with my sucky water at all.


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## LittleBettaFish

If your water is hard/alkaline, Betta mahachaiensis would probably be a better option than Betta imbellis as SeriouslyFish has their preferred pH range at pH: 7.0 – 8.5. Otherwise, the mouthbrooding Betta simplex is also an option. 

http://www.seriouslyfish.com/species/betta-simplex/


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## dannifluff

Thanks LittleBettaFish! Yes it is annoyingly hard & alkaline, and while my Betta Splendens have adapted to it, if I want to do a community I know I need to try and make sure the water conditions are as good as possible to prevent stress/illness spread. But I know that lowering pH etc is generally much harder and more doomed to failure than raising it, so I want to try and aim for species that will be comfortable in my tap water. I'll definitely look into those you mentioned. It's not until next year so I have plenty of planning time.

While African Lake Cichlids may be the obvious choice, and I have lots of friends who keep them in this area for that reason, I really do love the heavily planted/blackwater look with smaller, more natural-coloured fish.


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## LittleBettaFish

A lot of rainbowfish and some species of blue eyes are also options for harder water, provided you can source them.


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## dannifluff

Thank you! Lots of research for dannifluff


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## LittleBettaFish

My Betta uberis male's eggs hatched. He has them corralled in one corner of the tank and no other fish are allowed near them. Somehow they manage to 'cling' to the few bubbles that are left of his nest. 

Here is a terrible photo of them. I think this is their second day since hatching. 










This is just a photo I took of this one uberis juvenile that is just really shiny compared to his siblings. I'm not sure if it's an age thing, but he is very striking. 










Then I got a photo of one of my surprise Betta miniopinna fry that managed to avoid being sold. I'm not sure how many of their siblings there are. I'm hoping my young uberis don't bully them as the uberis are pretty aggressive. I just fed them some BBS before taking this photo, which is why its stomach is so big and orange. 










Otherwise, not much else to report. I have to clean the glass on my tanks and take some photos when they aren't looking like bloated ticks.


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## LittleBettaFish

The afternoon sun was streaming in through my fish room window so I thought I would take the opportunity to get a few photos. I used the manual focus setting on my camera this time as the auto focus kept trying to focus in on the plants rather than the fish! 

First up are some of my favourites, my Betta hendra group. 

In this photo I couldn't tell if it was my original male or his son, as they both look so similar. 










The female in this photo is my original female. She was not happy with whoever it was flaring at her. 










Then here she is with her smallest daughter. She has another much larger daughter, but I rarely see her. I think the mum doesn't tolerate her presence as much as she is large enough to be a potential breeding rival/threat. 










Then here is just the smaller daughter by herself. I am seriously contemplating splitting this group up, so I have my original pair in one tank and the F1 group in another. The original pair are such bullies and their presence really causes a supression in the colour of my F1 fish. 










Also someone has a ventral fetish and keeps biting everyone's ventrals off in there. 

Then here is my Betta uberis male keeping watch over his brood. They are almost free-swimming now. Although I don't hold much hope for their long-term survival in this tank. There are so many predatory young fish lurking around. 










Speaking of predatory young fish..... 










Otherwise, I spent a large chunk of today with Clio at dog club. We didn't go to our usual club, but she handled going to a new place with a whole heap of strange dogs exceptionally well. Especially considering some male snarled and lunged at her as soon as we arrived. She is still such a worm though. She gets on the ground and writhes around and everyone sits on her head. 

Meanwhile Nike our other dog is having a phantom pregnancy. She would have had puppies around this time if she got bred on her most recent heat, so she's been whining and carrying her usual 'puppy' around all morning. I finally took it off her, as otherwise she obsesses over it for a week or so and I can't stand her incessant crying and need to be with someone during that time. You would have thought I went and locked her actual puppy in the wardrobe the way she looked at me. 

I'm also considering a complete re-do of my (future) spotted blue eyes tank. The longer it sits empty, the more I look at it and want to change the hardscape. I think I might take the wood out, and add some larger rocks instead. After another look through the field surveys for this species, I think I definitely want to go with blyxa and either a native ambulia, or a native milfoil. 

Of course we keep only getting fine weather on the weekend. As soon as it gets to the days when I can actually receive my fish, the temperature plummets. 

My other goal that my mum doesn't yet know about, is setting up a container pond outside for some honey blue eyes. I know they can survive outside almost year round here in Melbourne, and supposedly they are much more prolific in a pond environment than a tank one, so I would be keen to have a small group indoors, and try a pair or mop of eggs in the pond outside. 

I think I will have to set it up down the side of my house though as otherwise the possums get into any emergent water plants and Eos our dog uses the tubs as her own personal bathtubs.


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## LittleBettaFish

I haven't posted in a while because there really hasn't been much to share. I'm trying to cut down the numbers of wild bettas I am keeping/breeding as it costs a fair chunk of change to feed them and keep their tanks heated. Now I've kept/bred basically every species in this complex at some point, my focus is just going to be on the species/fish I like best. My passion for wilds has sort of been stuttering along for a while now, which is a shame as my fish are doing the best they have in years. 

Anyway enough doom and gloom. Yesterday, I took some quick photos of my fish after giving the glass a clean. First up is my Betta hendra matriarch. She has a lot of attitude, but she is still one of my favourite fish. Trawling back through my emails, I will have had this pair for two years in a few days time. Hopefully they've got a few more years ahead of them yet! 










I have around seven adult fish in this tank. The majority are young males like this one. 










However, I very rarely see them, because my female barely tolerates their presence in the tank. As evidenced by this photo. It definitely gets a lot worse when the male is guarding eggs/fry at the back of the tank as the female is very protective and only lets her adult offspring out to eat and breathe before chasing them back into the plants. You've really got to admire her spunk, considering some of her sons are as big or bigger than she is now, and I think one of her daughters is the same size. 










Then I have my big Betta uberis male. He likes nothing more than to pose for a photo, which is why I take so many of him. He's just got a lot of presence. When you look at that tank, all you see is him surveying and patrolling his 'kingdom'. 










Next up is 'Shiny'. He's growing very nicely, and as his name implies, is still _very_ shiny. For being one of the smaller fish in the tank, he has a lot of attitude. There's an IAL at the front of the tank and he shares this territory with his oldest brother... or at least until his older brother notices him lurking around. 



















Apart from that, not really much to report. I did discover a single F1 Betta coccina fry, after giving up hope I was ever going to find a living fry in that particular tank. The pair have been spawning regularly and I do spot very young free-swimming fry, but never any larger fry. I know this pair are excellent parents, and even the female has very strong maternal instincts. I was also providing food for a time in the form of microworms and BBS, but I stopped when nothing seemed to be eating it. I did have some utricularia gibba growing at the front of the tank and even though I don't think it was responsible for the lack of fry, I've removed it just in case. 

My Betta livida group are going to a new home in a week or two, and I am in a hurry to find a nice pair of F1 Betta sp. api api to retain so that I can get rid of the rest. I'm also still tossing up whether to keep only my bonded F1 pair of Betta coccina or keep the whole group. I only have space to keep them in the same tank, and in a group setting, the survival rate of fry is extremely low. This pair are proven breeders so there's no risk of ending up with egg eaters or low hatch rates. However, I have such issues with male heavy spawns, and this group does seem to contain a few females, so I don't want to be getting rid of the only female Betta coccina either breeding pair will produce. 

Otherwise, water changes are due tomorrow. I haven't done them in an embarrassingly long time on some of my tanks, so I'll be doing half tomorrow, and then the other half in a week from now. I also have run out of frozen food so I want to pick up some bloodworms and spirulina enriched brine shrimp. I also have to try and find some java moss. My sp. api api male has really been hounding the female as there is no cover on the bottom of the tank. My female's pretty docile, so I don't want her getting bullied. 

My spotted blue eyes tank is still sitting empty and will have to remain empty for at least another week. We've been having this really warm weather on the weekends and then this really crappy weather during the week. I'm so sick of the cold. Bring on spring already!


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## LittleBettaFish

Did some water changes today. My wilds love when I do water changes. I have to hit everyone away from the siphon with my hand (especially the kids), and then afterwards everyone is all revved up, so there's a whole lot of squabbling that goes on. 

To the shock of my Betta brownorum and Betta uberis I also raised the water level in their tanks so everyone is busy exploring and sussing things out. 

I am terrible with doing regular water changes. It's a good thing my tanks are all teeming with plants. I definitely am a hypocrite in this regard as I always tell people to do weekly water changes and some of my tanks haven't been touched in at least a month. 

In fish news, I have confirmed that my Betta sp. api api pair are successfully spawning because there are fry everywhere. They are pretty big fry too considering I haven't been feeding them. I'm going to put in some microworms later today and I suppose I'm going to have to buy some more BBS because I certainly do not have enough to feed my ravenous hoard of youngsters. Although I'm considering switching some of my older fry and juveniles onto frozen BBS to save myself some money. 

I also discovered that I have more Betta brownorum fry than I originally thought. I only have only ever seen three young fish, but two more popped out while I was doing water changes. I have no idea how they can hide themselves so well in a tank that holds such a small volume of water, but at least this is good news. 

This was the female eyeing off a piece of wood she thought was food. 










This is her biggest offspring. All my bubs are looking a bit lean at the moment because they are waiting for their BBS. These newest eggs are frustrating me with how long they take to hatch (36-48 hours) compared to my previous eggs (18-24 hours). 










This is one of the smallest fry in the tank. Not a great photo as my camera was in an obnoxious mood today. 










To wrap up the photos for today, this is my Betta coccina female. I swear my male has made it his goal to be as photographed as few times as possible. He's a lurker so he's been lurking around the back of the tank checking out the IAL I put in there. I'm really crossing my fingers that there is more than just the one fry I've seen so far in this tank, as these two produce such high-quality offspring. 










Otherwise my plans are to tear down and rearrange my spotted blue eyes tank. I want to remove the melaleuca root and add some larger rocks instead. I'll probably scatter some broken pieces of melaleuca branch over the substrate to give it that 'creek bed' feel, but I think I'll save the wood for when I get my hands on some honey blue eyes again. 

I also am experimenting with some alder cones I collected from the alder trees in our backyard. I have four or five cones in with my two plakat males. I want to see how much of a tint it gives the water and whether it has any adverse effects before I use it for my wilds. I have used them before without issue and I know they are hugely popular with shrimp people, but knowing my luck I'll chuck them in one of my wild betta tanks and everyone will die.


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## Isabella15

Subbing


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I completely tore down my spotted blue eyes tank yesterday. I was using two different substrates in that tank, washed play sand, and this coarse almost gravel like sand that came from the NT. I had put aqua soil under the substrate but it had gotten mixed in with the coarser sand. I didn't want to have to go and buy more of this sand as it adds to the freight cost, and I was also worried it would roll about in transit and squash my spotted blue eyes. So to solve the problem, I got out my trusty colander, and went about squishing every granule of aqua soil I could find so that I could just rinse it away through the holes in the colander. 

Insane? Maybe. Effective? Most definitely. 

Anyway, I just finished feeding everyone (white worms and mosquito larvae for the adults and microworms and BBS for the youngsters) and gave the glass on all my tanks a clean, so I snapped a few photos from today. 

First up is one of my Betta persephone males. This is the one I was given, not one I have bred. Unlike his son, he is extremely elusive as he is almost always guarding eggs/fry. However, I spotted him slinking about the front of the tank after everyone had finished eating and managed to get a quick shot. 

I notice his usually aggressive son is never anywhere to be found when his father is around! 










Next up, is Zig-Zag. He should have been culled, but he never let what used to be quite a severe deformity hold him, so now he just gets to live out his life bunking with his homicidal uncle, and his grumpy brother. 

He almost looks normal nowadays aside from the small dip in his topline. 



















Then these are some photos of my tanks. I'm still not 100% happy with how they look. I need more watersprite, and I want to find some Asian watergrass as I love how the roots look growing down into the java moss. 

These tanks are all 12 inch cubes to give an idea of scale, apart from the Betta coccina tank, which is a 10 gallon. 

Betta hendra (holds around 7-8 adult fish)









Betta uberis/miniopinna tank (holds a breeding pair of uberis, plus their juvenile/sub-adult offspring as well as some miniopinna juveniles that escaped being sold)










Betta brownorum tank (holds a breeding pair and at least five juveniles). You can actually see the female at the front and the male towards the back. 










Betta coccina tank (holds a breeding pair plus maybe some fry)









Then this is just a photo of my wild-caught Betta brownorum male. Life in captivity has made him chunky even though I try not to overfeed. 










Otherwise, I'm going to the fish store some time today to pick up some supplies. Unfortunately, the bettas are never particularly well cared for at this store, so I try not to linger too long where they have them displayed, as otherwise I find it really hard to walk away without pity purchasing one.


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## LittleBettaFish

This hobby sure is expensive. I spent nearly $50 yesterday on three (very small) clumps of java moss, and three packets of Hikari brand frozen foods. 

As usual, the betta display was saddening to see. The males were very listless, and the majority were clamped up and sitting on the bottom of the jars. There were some nice HM and plakat females in the main display tanks, but these were all very ratty looking because they'd obviously been fighting among themselves. It's a shame, as this store does get in some decent quality bettas. However, there's a definite drop in form and health the longer fish remain unsold, and then no one wants to buy them because they look so poorly. 

Apart from that, there wasn't anything else that caught my eye in any of the other tanks. I also try not to support this store if I can help it. Not only do I not agree with how they keep their male bettas, but the service is also terrible considering they employ more staff than any other aquarium I've been to. 

Otherwise, my Betta sp. api api pair were very happy with their new java moss. I think I might pick up some anubias or java fern to fill in some of the remaining empty space. 

This is what their tank looks like now. I didn't realise when I took the photo you can see the two of them at the front of the tank. 










Then this is my female cruising around. She's almost impossible to take a photo of, as she never stays in one place for very long. 










Finally, this is a photo of the tank my Betta sp. api api youngsters are living in. It's actually a 10 gallon tank, I just couldn't fit it longways on my rack. 










I'm hoping the youngsters will take to eating the frozen BBS. They take frozen bloodworms and brine shrimp, so hopefully this isn't too different. 

I was tempted to buy some frozen daphnia yesterday, but every time I've tried it, my wilds have hated it. I also tried mysis shrimp, and the only fish that would ever take that were my goldfish. 

And that's about it for today. My fish related plans for the day are to disinfect and refill my water aging tub, and sort out the scape for my spotted blue eyes tank. I think I will hold off filling that until I get the shelves on my smaller rack replaced as otherwise I will just have to drain it to move it. Then I will just be praying for some warmer overnight temperatures so I can get my fish and plants shipped.


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## Wildbetta

Hardly any of my wilds will really eat frozen mysis or daphnia either. Some of my juvies for my bigger species will eat it but only for the short while before they realize what it is. Then they kinda turn their noses up at it. LOL


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## LittleBettaFish

These spoiled fish! Sometimes it's a pain for me feeding only live/frozen foods. It's great over the warmer months because they basically live on mosquito larvae and bloodworms from my tubs outside, but in winter I'm limited to feeding frozen foods and live foods like white worms and blackworms, which I find tend to make my wilds fat. 

I want to try live daphnia. It's hard to get here, but a hobbyist friend has a culture going, so I'm wondering if I could get some from her. I did have a moina culture, but it crashed/died due to neglect.


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## Nismo83

Wildbetta said:


> Hardly any of my wilds will really eat frozen mysis or daphnia either. Some of my juvies for my bigger species will eat it but only for the short while before they realize what it is. Then they kinda turn their noses up at it. LOL


My macs love them. But not the channoides.


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## LittleBettaFish

I put my spotted blue eyes tank back together this morning. It's just rocks now, instead of the melaleuca root, and I think the only plant I'm going to use is Limnophila brownii. I'm too worried I'm going to kill the blyxa, and it's $8.00 a plant. Maybe in the future I might add some native vallisneria or hairgrass. It's not going to be an exact biotope, but at least it will give the feel of a NT creek. 



















I've only filled the tank up halfway because I wanted to see how the rocks looked with water on them, and I'm going to have to drain it in the near future to move it over to my smaller rack. 

I also managed to take a photo of my plakat male, Maverick, with his ventrals down. Normally he likes to pretend he has no ventrals when I have my camera out, but today I was too quick for him. 










My Betta coccina and brownorum females also came out to see what I was up to. My Betta coccina male must have a nest somewhere because he's been flirting with the female all morning.


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## LittleBettaFish

Stepping away from talking about my fish for the moment, our German Shepherd puppy Clio has been keeping me busy. I think she's six months or so now, and there's not much difference in size between her and our smallest dog. 



















As you can see, she's still a real character. At dog club she gets on the ground and just slithers around like a worm. I think it worries some of the other breeders and show people as a few of them have told me to pull her off the ground when she does it. But it's just how she plays, and since she doesn't do it in the show ring or anywhere else I don't really care. 

We took her to meet my dad's dog a couple of days ago as we want her to get used to other breeds of dogs outside of German Shepherds. He's some sort of pitty/bully breed dog and because he's very 'happy-go-lucky', we figured he wouldn't frighten her. At first she hackled up and barked at him, but Porter never reacts, so after a few seconds of sussing him out, she just wanted to race around and play with him. 

I also took her for a walk around the street the other day and she was so much less reactive. I think she was going through a bit of a fear period before, as while she barked at a couple of people (a man watering his garden and a woman getting out of a car carrying things), she didn't get obsessive over them and was happy to move on. 

Her first show is this weekend. It's in Canberra, so it's about an 8 hour or so drive. The show goes for two days and I believe it's under two different judges. We aren't expecting miracles, as she is only young, at an awkward stage in her growth, and there will be much older and more put together dogs in her class. My mum's been doing daily show training with her for the past five or so weeks now, and she also does a group show training class on Sundays at club. So hopefully she doesn't get in the ring and behave too appallingly. 

Apart from that, here is a photo I took of my Betta hendra female in breeding colours. 










My Betta hendra tank is next to my Betta uberis tank. The other day my Betta hendra male was desperately trying to attract the female's attention with a pretty spectacular display. Unfortunately for him, the female was much more interested in the uberis male who was putting on a display for _his_ female. I felt a bit sorry for my hendra male as he was obviously very confused as to why he was being ignored!


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## LittleBettaFish

Not much to report from my fish room. Been busy with dogs and housework. 

Because my mum is going to be interstate at the dog show, I'm going to have the house to myself from Friday morning to Monday night. It's going to be great, except for the fact it's going to be hot, and it's magpie breeding/swooping season, so I'm going to be up at like 5am trying to walk everyone before the sun comes and I become a target for irate magpies (seriously they seem to hate me even when it's not breeding season). People always go on about our dangerous crocodiles, sharks, and snakes, but after being bailed up by a pair of angry plovers in the reserve near our house, I reckon it's the bloody birds you have to watch out for! 

I haven't taken any photos of my wilds. They were refusing to cooperate, so I took some of stumpy Maverick instead. 



















He looks even stumpier with his stomach full of brine shrimp. 

Then this is what he and Atlas's tanks look like at the moment. The java moss was just thrown in there, so hopefully with time it starts to attach to the wood/rock. 










Then this is Atlas's bubblenest. Atlas will be two next month, and he looks awful, which is why I never take any photos of him. His breeder was over the other day (she's a hobbyist friend of mine) and she said his brothers also seem to have aged rather badly. However, even though he looks like death warmed up, he is as strong as an ox. He has these marathon flare sessions with Maverick that go on for several hours, and he is constantly patrolling his tank and building bubblenests. He is definitely the most territorial betta I've ever owned. Sometimes I'll even catch him flaring at me when I'm not even standing anywhere near the tank. 

It also looks like I can finally order my spotted blue eyes. It's going to be hot next week and the night temperatures are staying in the high teens/low twenties, so I'm going to order everything tomorrow, and hopefully they will get shipped out on Monday/Tuesday. I'm so excited. I'm going to also have to buy some yarn to make spawning mops, and also work out a system of hatching the eggs/raising the fry if they do successfully spawn.


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## LittleBettaFish

It's water change day today! This is what my water aging tub looks like after it's been sitting for about a week with rooibos and a stocking full of peat moss in it. 










I have a heater running in this tub, so it's always at the perfect temperature for water changes. Makes it so much more convenient. 

I was also busy taking some photos of my wilds earlier this morning. 

First up is one of my Betta hendra males. I'm fairly certain this is an F1 male and not my original F0 male. My camera hates this tank so I have to use manual focus, and then the males are always showing off behind the plants so I might get a photo of someone's caudal or their head but nothing else. 



















Then my Betta uberis tank. I know I take a lot of photos of them, but they are so friendly and there's always some drama unfolding in their tank. 

This is my big male telling his sub-adult son in the background to get away. 










Then that's his female in the background of this shot, telling the same son, the same thing. 










Then there was a bit of flirting going on here. 










One of the young males. Could be Shiny, could be someone else. 










The original female/mother of the hoard. She's is the sassiest fish ever. You think in a tank full of testosterone she would get bullied or harassed, but she's always bossing everyone around. 










These following photos came out a little blurry, but they were quite funny so I included them. 

Backstory is that my male Betta brownorum rarely has his fins fully open. It makes him look ugly in photos, and I have no nice ones of him flaring like I do with my original males. I thought using a mirror would get the reaction I was after, but he was not impressed.

Firstly, he eyeballed the mirror. 










Then he was wondering if I was going to stop whatever it was I was doing and feed him. 










Then he realised....there was no food coming. 










Finally, this is my emersed native watersprite I have growing in a jar on my shelf. It's growing excruciatingly slowly for some reason. I'm not sure if it's developing roots or what but it only has one new frond emerging. It receives a heap of afternoon sun and is sitting in ADA aqua soil so should have enough nutrients. 










Apart from that, mum left with Clio to head to the show in Canberra. I hope she does well, but conformation showing can be so subjective and it seems like some judges will love your dog, and others won't. Clio's fit, we've been working hard on getting her working properly in the ring, and really at this point, all she can do is her best and it will all depend on what the judge thinks/likes.

Also I forgot to add that it looks like I won't be getting my spotted blue eyes any time soon, or at least until the overnight temperature is over twelve degrees Celsius. It looks like there's only one day next week when this will be the case and I don't want to risk it.


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## Aqua Aurora

Is your emersed cup lidded? its good to vent some fresh air in emersed setups for the plants or they just have stale air and run low on co2. The pain (at least for me) is getting the right balance of fresh air going in without it being too much and reducing humidity. I find just pulling the lid off for a few minutes each day helped.. but I forgot sometimes >.>'
Btw love the fish photos and the derping dog face.


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## LittleBettaFish

You know, I was just thinking the same thought after I posted this. The jar is sealed with cling wrap and I have been slack in letting air in. I used to do this a lot more regularly with previous emersed set-ups. I might just poke some holes in the cling wrap to let some air in.


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## Nismo83

Malaya contains less nutrients than Amarzonia


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## LittleBettaFish

Yes. That is why I use it in my wild betta tanks because there's essentially no ammonia spike. 

What I'm probably going to do, is swap the aqua soil out with propagating sand, which I've used successfully in the past, and provide nutrients to the plants with one or two clay root tabs. 

Speaking of plants, I am a real lover of all things Australian. I live in a bushy suburb of Melbourne and when I was younger, we had these two magnificent gum trees growing at the back of our block. Sadly, both of these had to be cut down after they became sick and started dropping branches. This left us with only two smaller gums, one of which the possums seem determined to kill by eating all its leaves (I keep telling mum to put up some possum guard). My suggestions to plant more native trees and shrubs around the garden have largely been nixed. 

So imagine my delight when I found what appear to be eucalyptus seedlings that had sprouted in several pots. This is a photo of the largest seedling. It's produced several new leaves since being potted, and has grown a lot taller. Now I just need to find a way to poison the exotic, deciduous tree we have growing at the front of our block, and replace it with a gum tree instead. 










While the plants in the actual garden are doing well, the plants in one of my wild betta tanks are not doing too great. I always joke that I have every species of algae growing in my tanks. However, I think in my Betta coccina tank, I'm actually growing algae, more so than I am growing plants. I'm not sure why the algae got so out of control in this one tank, but it doesn't bother my fish. I'm not going to bother to do anything about it, because this tank will ultimately be torn down and whatever plants I can salvage will be kept, and the rest will be chucked. 

Surprisingly, this is the better side of the tank. The slimy looking chunks are algae. The other side of the tank is just this giant sheet of algae. I'm surprised my fish can even navigate through it. 



















I also just snapped a few shots of my fish while they were enjoying an afternoon snack. 










I really like this F1 Betta hendra male. I'm seriously considering separating him out into a tank with one of his sisters. 



















My Betta brownorum pair arguing.










One of my sneaky Betta miniopinna fry. At least my uberis don't seem to be bothering them too much as they are not especially aggressive and they are quite shy compared to their boisterious tank mates. 










I also discovered some more Betta coccina fry. They were looking a little lean as I haven't been feeding this tank, so I threw some microworms in for them. Of course the male decides he would rather eat the microworms than the mosquito larvae I painstakingly caught for him. I'm sure he will be sated after he eats several thousand of them. 

Meanwhile Melbourne weather has been lovely at the moment, and my tubs are absolutely teeming with mosquito larvae. I just have to keep remembering to cover the tank I have inside where I pour all my spare mosquito larvae in, as otherwise I end up with all these mosquitoes in the house and an especially irate mother.


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## Nismo83

Nice. How I wish I can relocate. High rise building and limited land in Singapore means I can't do much like what you are doing. Unless I rent a pond space in the sub-urban area.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha while we have more land than some people, we don't have nearly as much land as I would like. Growing up, my now deceased grandfather had a 1000 acre farm, my other grandparents had a 300 or so acre farm, and my mum's partner at the time had a 300 acre property. It kind of makes the quarter acre block we live on feel very restrictive. 

I loved the feeling of being able to walk for ages without listening to traffic roaring past or running into any neighbours.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> Haha while we have more land than some people, we don't have nearly as much land as I would like. Growing up, my now deceased grandfather had a 1000 acre farm, my other grandparents had a 300 or so acre farm, and my mum's partner at the time had a 300 acre property. It kind of makes the quarter acre block we live on feel very restrictive.
> 
> I loved the feeling of being able to walk for ages without listening to traffic roaring past or running into any neighbours.


That is huge. i would love to try staying in such place for a while


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## LittleBettaFish

Yes I have a lot of fond memories about all those places.

My mum's partner's property was in the most beautiful place. It was surrounded by temperate rainforest full of towering trees and these ferns that were taller than I am. It also had a creek running through the property with a small 'waterfall' we used to climb up.

I wish I had been into the hobby back when they were still together because I could have found a lot of stuff like wood, rocks, and plants to use in my tanks.


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## LittleBettaFish

Not much to say, just sharing some photos of my Betta hendra female. My wild-caught male just finished taking care of one batch of fry, but judging by her breeding stripes I think another spawn isn't too far off. 










With an adult son. 









My original male checking if I've got any food. 


















Then I managed to get a photo of one of my Betta brownorum fry. Sadly, none of these fry seem to be showing any signs of developing spots on their sides. I'm still not sure whether this is a genetic or environmental trait. Both parents have spots, so I would have thought this would have increased the chance of their offspring also developing spots.


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## Nismo83

Is it because they are still young?


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## LittleBettaFish

I'm not sure. It can be difficult to tell when they still have the horizontal striping, but usually I can see a darker line through this where the spot is developing. 

It seems that even if the parents display these lateral spots, there's no guarantee that their offspring will. I do sometimes wonder whether there's also some environmental influence. 

Speaking of brownorum, here are my male and female being their usual greedy selves and waiting to see if I am going to feed them. Never mind they gorged themselves on mosquito larvae last night. 



















Then some more hendra shots. I've actually decided once I sell my Betta livida group, I am going to split this tank up. My original pair and the smallest female will stay in this tank, and then I'm going to divide up one of my other tanks and move the remaining males into that. My nicest F1 male will be paired up with my third female in this tank, and hopefully they will spawn. 




























I'm also starting to suspect, what I thought was my original female, is actually one of her daughters! The other day, this tattered looking female came out to get some food and it's made me wonder. Now I'm not sure if the female I have been taking photos of all this time is actually my wild-caught female at all. 

At least I know this is definitely my original male (the one in my display photo) and not just one of his sons. 










I also took a couple photos of Maverick. He has a bubblenest at the back of the tank and has been uncarded with Atlas for a day or so now, so it was difficult getting him to stay still. 



















Finally, this is (depressingly) where my spotted blue eyes tank is still at. I think I'm almost ready to add some fake fish and plants because it doesn't look like I'll be getting the real thing any time soon. I also don't know how I managed to take such a bad/blurry shot of an object that isn't even moving haha


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## LittleBettaFish

For the first time in ages, I was almost able to feed my entire fish room of fish, with mosquito larvae from my tubs/buckets outside. We've been having a spell of warm weather, and it's been perfect mosquito breeding conditions. 










I think mosquito larvae are definitely my wilds' favourite food, and I just feel they are a more natural, and healthier, food source than blackworms and white worms etc. 

I don't have any wild betta photos to share today. However, in a few days, my plakat male Atlas will be turning two years old (I actually found where his breeder had recorded his conception and hatch dates). 

I didn't share a lot of photos of him, because his form left a lot to be desired. However, nowadays he looks even worse because he has these stubby ventrals, and large chunks missing from his anal and caudal. I'm really not sure what has happened. I almost wonder if it's from him biting them. 

However, there is certainly nothing wrong with his health. He is constantly on the move, patrolling, nesting, and flaring at Maverick and whatever else comes into his line of sight. He even rounds up his pellets and flares at them. 

Anyway, here is my Atlas. He will never be a looker, but he's definitely got personality plus.


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## LittleBettaFish

I've taken a _whole_ lot of photos, so I thought I'd just dump them all here for anyone reading this journal. 

First up is my three year old Betta persephone male. 










This is where he lives, but good luck finding him unless he's chasing someone around or coming out to grab some food. 










Second, is my Betta hendra (again). I believe this is my F1 male and not my wild-caught male. 





































Third is my Betta uberis male. I think this is his standard pose. 










Fourth are some of my Betta sp. api api. 














































I'm also extremely frustrated that next week the overnight temperatures aren't even reaching double-digits! All the warm overnight weather continues to be over the weekend. I think I'm going to be in a retirement home and still waiting for these spotted blue eyes. 

I've got my fingers crossed I can at least get a couple days soon, where my fish aren't going to potentially freeze/perish in transit. 

At least when they finally do come, I will have lots of mosquito larvae for them.


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## Nismo83

I am getting addicted to your bubble nest wild bettas.. I think I will be overloaded again.. Persephone looks good.. I may want to get one pair and play around... since I already got the coccina in my office.. =)... I am addicted to your updates.


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## LittleBettaFish

I have owned other species of wild betta in the past, but the coccina complex definitely are my favourites, which is why I've stuck with them so long even through all the bad times. Some people don't seem to like these smaller bubblenesters because they think they are shy, but even my wild-caught fish are as friendly as my Betta splendens, and as soon as they see me, or hear a tap on the glass they all swim to the front of the tank. 

Betta persephone are very nice. I personally think they are one of the more challenging species from this complex to breed. 

Just don't overfeed them on too rich a foods. That's why my Betta persephone male in the photo above is so thick in his body. I overfed my first wilds on blackworms and they were all very fat compared to my current fish.


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## Fenghuang

Wow, I don't know at one point you got more domestics, LBF, but that koi sure is a looker! And everyone else is still looking good!


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## LittleBettaFish

I've just got the two, and no plans on getting any more haha. I've also cut down on the number of wild betta species I'm keeping/actively breeding to just a handful of my favourites.

Instead I am going to branch back out into keeping Australian natives, and _*this*_ time, I am going to give it a proper go at breeding them. 

Just have to wait until the weather warms up overnight so I can get my first group of breeding fish.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> I have owned other species of wild betta in the past, but the coccina complex definitely are my favourites, which is why I've stuck with them so long even through all the bad times. Some people don't seem to like these smaller bubblenesters because they think they are shy, but even my wild-caught fish are as friendly as my Betta splendens, and as soon as they see me, or hear a tap on the glass they all swim to the front of the tank.
> 
> Betta persephone are very nice. I personally think they are one of the more challenging species from this complex to breed.
> 
> Just don't overfeed them on too rich a foods. That's why my Betta persephone male in the photo above is so thick in his body. I overfed my first wilds on blackworms and they were all very fat compared to my current fish.


yeah.. usually I will fast mine over the weekend as they are in the office.. I have lost a couple of channoides over the weekend due to poor water (I guess). while the ocellata are eating like pigs.. the channoides are little worse.. I am not sure the coccina I bought are coccina or livida.. them have two golden bar across their top and bottom of their eyes.. but they are lovely though regardless what they are. waiting to offload the channoides or the ocellata and then I can keep one more bubblenest type.. hahah


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## LittleBettaFish

Coccina have black ventral tips, and livida have green. A very easy way to tell them apart, otherwise they can look very similar.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> Coccina have black ventral tips, and livida have green. A very easy way to tell them apart, otherwise they can look very similar.


Should be coccina. Given their price. Haha


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## LittleBettaFish

Yes, also Betta livida seem to be much harder to find in the hobby than Betta coccina. 

Well I checked the overnight temperatures for next week, and looks like it will be warm enough to get my spotted blue eyes shipped without the risk of them getting too cold. 

So with that in mind, I went to the local hardware store, and picked up some replacement shelves for my smaller rack, and then I spent the afternoon sealing them with a water resistant stain. This is the result. 










The tank on the right is going to be where I chuck any eggs from the main breeding tank. I'm going to have peat moss and leaf litter on the bottom, and maybe put some native vallisneria in towards the back and let that just drape over the surface. Hopefully the peat moss and leaf litter will provide enough infusoria and similar microorganisms for the fry to eat until they are big enough to take microworms and BBS. 

Unfortunately, I'm going to have to drain the breeding tank and slip something under a couple of the uprights as the tank has a noticeable slope. 

Otherwise, things have been going well with my fish here. 

My Betta sp. api api pair have been spawning non-stop. 

This is the male's nest in the film canister, a fairly impressive size for a fish from this complex. 










Then this is a terrible photo, but in the left corner, there is a young fry from this pair. The fry in this tank are growing extremely fast and there seem to be a decent number of them too. At this point I'm hoping that they aren't going to be _all_ male. 










I'm overrun with Betta sp. api api at the moment with the rapidly maturing F1 group, and then these young fry. 

Then there are the pairs that just didn't give me as many fry as I anticipated/hoped for. Such as my Betta brownorum. 




























One of the handful of fry/juveniles that I have from this pair. 










Then finally, just a couple photos of my Betta hendra female was she was out posing. They were supposed to get a water change the other day, but unfortunately, I ran out of water in my aging tub before I got to them. So they're scheduled for a water change next week, and I put some rooibos and IAL into their tank just to darken up the water until then. 



















Plans for today are to disinfect and fill up my water aging tub, condense all my mosquito larvae tubs into one large tub as my mum has made threats to tip them all out, and make a background up for my spotted blue eyes tank. 

I also have to order some IALs, and some BBS cysts as well.

Then hopefully by early next week, I will have a little breeding group of spotted blue eyes in my tank, and I can start planning to add some honey blue eyes to my set-up.


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## Nismo83

Care to share on your keeping parameters for api api? I ordered a pair from Hermanus but won't be arriving this year yet as he still have no schedule to come Singapore yet. I heard that it is very dedicated.


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## LittleBettaFish

Same as all my other coccina complex wilds. Very soft and acidic water (I would say pH of 6.0 or less and an extremely low carbonate hardness) and a temperature of around 25 degrees Celsius. The colour of the males/females are also best when the water is kept dark with IAL/peat moss/rooibos.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> Same as all my other coccina complex wilds. Very soft and acidic water (I would say pH of 6.0 or less and an extremely low carbonate hardness) and a temperature of around 25 degrees Celsius. The colour of the males/females are also best when the water is kept dark with IAL/peat moss/rooibos.


Low pH not a problem but measuring KH may be a problem. 25degree? Erm. Hrmph. It will be a challenge


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## LittleBettaFish

Some people keep their coccina complex species warmer (I'm assuming keeping the tank this cool is the issue?), but I've always preferred to keep them at mid to low twenties. 

I find this complex definitely do seem to be much more fussy when it comes to water conditions than a lot of the other wild bettas.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> Some people keep their coccina complex species warmer (I'm assuming keeping the tank this cool is the issue?), but I've always preferred to keep them at mid to low twenties.
> 
> I find this complex definitely do seem to be much more fussy when it comes to water conditions than a lot of the other wild bettas.


yeah... only my macrostoma is in 25deg to 26deg variation with the help of the chiller.. 

to keep 25deg will required to use a chiller.. normal room temperature will be easier.. I hope they are not that sensitive as compared to mac.. anyway I had lost a fair bit of my channoides fries..


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## LittleBettaFish

I don't think they are _that_ sensitive. 

That's a shame about your channoides. Any idea what happened to them?


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> I don't think they are _that_ sensitive.
> 
> That's a shame about your channoides. Any idea what happened to them?


I think something to do with the water. I have since moved them to my Ocellata grow up tank. Hopefully no more casualty over the weekend. Did a wash on their old tank. wI'll let go the Ocellata. Any one? Haha


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## LittleBettaFish

I think you're a bit far for most of us on this forum haha 

Ugh, had my bright lights on over my tanks while I was feeding everyone tonight and looks like at least one of my Betta hendra (the female in the photo above) and my persephone fry and adults have velvet. 

Luckily I've still got plenty of Seachem Cupramine left. It's also lucky I always leave those tanks until last when I feed/do maintenance and never touch any of my other tanks afterwards because otherwise it would be through all my tanks by now. I've learned that lesson. 

And just when things were going so well. I should have known it wouldn't last for very long.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> I think you're a bit far for most of us on this forum haha
> 
> Ugh, had my bright lights on over my tanks while I was feeding everyone tonight and looks like at least one of my Betta hendra (the female in the photo above) and my persephone fry and adults have velvet.
> 
> Luckily I've still got plenty of Seachem Cupramine left. It's also lucky I always leave those tanks until last when I feed/do maintenance and never touch any of my other tanks afterwards because otherwise it would be through all my tanks by now. I've learned that lesson.
> 
> And just when things were going so well. I should have known it wouldn't last for very long.


Velvet maybe the water was a bit cold. 

Yeah I am in SE Asia. Shd b a few of the far away forumer


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## LittleBettaFish

Both tanks have heaters and it's warmer here now anyway so I doubt it was the cold. I just seem to have issues with velvet and my wilds. Which is part of the reason I'm becoming less involved in keeping/breeding them. 

Got an email with a tracking number for my spotted blue eyes. It's overnight shipping so they should be here tomorrow. Their tank is ready, I just need the plants and dried leaves that are coming with my fish to make it perfect for them. 

Yesterday I had to drain the tank, and partially dismantle my rack as it was on so much of a slope I was worried it would damage my tank. I got out my trusty spirit level, and using some squares of carpet under three of the legs, I've got it as level as I can. 

Other than that, I was forced by my mum to condense all my mosquito larvae tubs into one large tub. Unfortunately, I forgot about all the spiders that would be under the full tubs, and inside the empty tub. So it probably wasn't the wisest decision to go down in bare feet. 

After much cursing and spilling of water on myself, I now just have the one tub for my mosquito larvae. With the warm weather, I've got a nice number of mosquito larvae and bloodworms. These will be the ideal conditioning food for my spotted blue eyes. 

Other than that, I took some photos today of some of my wilds. My Betta brownorum pair are close to spawning so I had a very short amount of time to get the camera focussed and a photo taken before they went back to chasing each other around. 




























Then I took some photos of my Betta uberis group. You can see just how many young males I have in this tank. It was a _very_ skewed sex ratio. I still also have a few Betta miniopinna fry swimming around in there. 




























Then just a photo of my sp. api api male who decided of course to pose right where there was a mark on the glass.


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## Nismo83

nice... I ordered two pairs of Persephone.. they will be arriving in early November.. I also got IBS and purchased 3 altum angels... =) will set a thread for them


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## LittleBettaFish

Nice choice. I probably would have purchased another pair of persephone if it wasn't for the cost of importing them into Australia. Are they from Hermanus or are they from another seller? 

I have good news in that my group of spotted blue eyes _finally_ arrived this evening. I only ordered six, but I think I counted about nine of them, as the seller very kindly put in some extras. Sadly I did have to euthanase one of the larger fish as there was something wrong with it (perhaps trauma during transit), but all the others are doing well. They went straight into the tank (I will confess that I never bother acclimating fish) and everyone seems to be settling in. In fact a couple of them have already had a go at the mosquito larvae I put in. 

I am not happy at all with how I've placed the plants. It looks a little contrived and I want a very natural feeling tank. But I don't want to disturb them while they are still settling in, so any changes will have to wait. 

I also have some leaves soaking and hopefully by tomorrow they will be waterlogged enough that I can add them to the tank without them floating around. 

I also got a shrimp (looks like a Darwin Red Nose Shrimp or something similar) in the bag with my fish. I feel bad for this shrimp because the tank was only filled a couple of days ago and there's nothing for it to graze on. I'm also not sure about how 'shrimp safe' the water is. I have a terrible track record with shrimp. I think the longest I've kept them alive was about a day. As it's already swimming about rather erratically I really can't see it surviving for very long. However, if it does manage to survive, I've heard shrimp like to graze on alder cones? Is this true? I have a whole heap and I could put a few in at the back of the tank where they won't be seen. 

I'll try and get some photos of my spotted blue eyes tomorrow. They are surprisingly nonplussed by my presence. I was expecting them to be a lot shyer. Although now I've said that, tomorrow they probably won't come out from behind the sponge filter.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> Nice choice. I probably would have purchased another pair of persephone if it wasn't for the cost of importing them into Australia. Are they from Hermanus or are they from another seller?
> 
> I have good news in that my group of spotted blue eyes _finally_ arrived this evening. I only ordered six, but I think I counted about nine of them, as the seller very kindly put in some extras. Sadly I did have to euthanase one of the larger fish as there was something wrong with it (perhaps trauma during transit), but all the others are doing well. They went straight into the tank (I will confess that I never bother acclimating fish) and everyone seems to be settling in. In fact a couple of them have already had a go at the mosquito larvae I put in.
> 
> I am not happy at all with how I've placed the plants. It looks a little contrived and I want a very natural feeling tank. But I don't want to disturb them while they are still settling in, so any changes will have to wait.
> 
> I also have some leaves soaking and hopefully by tomorrow they will be waterlogged enough that I can add them to the tank without them floating around.
> 
> I also got a shrimp (looks like a Darwin Red Nose Shrimp or something similar) in the bag with my fish. I feel bad for this shrimp because the tank was only filled a couple of days ago and there's nothing for it to graze on. I'm also not sure about how 'shrimp safe' the water is. I have a terrible track record with shrimp. I think the longest I've kept them alive was about a day. As it's already swimming about rather erratically I really can't see it surviving for very long. However, if it does manage to survive, I've heard shrimp like to graze on alder cones? Is this true? I have a whole heap and I could put a few in at the back of the tank where they won't be seen.
> 
> I'll try and get some photos of my spotted blue eyes tomorrow. They are surprisingly nonplussed by my presence. I was expecting them to be a lot shyer. Although now I've said that, tomorrow they probably won't come out from behind the sponge filter.


I got it from someone else in Malaysia.. the price is more attractive. let me see what I can do next year if I am visiting Australia. =)


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## LittleBettaFish

Surprisingly my shrimp is still alive this morning. I have zero experience with shrimp but it seems to be a little calmer today and it's been busy picking at the substrate. There's leaf litter in the tank now, so maybe this will help provide it with some food. 

I moved the plants around this morning. I couldn't help myself. I think the najas looks better in the one spot between the rocks. I still want to add another plant species or two to the tank, but I have to wait until Aquagreen has more plants in stock. 

This is what the tank looks like at the moment. The water is cloudy, and the leaf litter needs to 'age' a bit to look more natural. Otherwise I'm not too disappointed with how the tank turned out. 










My blue eyes are still a lot more confident than I was expecting, especially considering I just ripped apart their tank before. Even with the bright light on, the majority of the group are swimming around, and they don't go to the back of the tank as much when they see me. They seem to be enjoying picking through the leaf litter. I'm going to toss some more live bloodworms and mosquito larvae in for them this afternoon, and hopefully I can start to see some breeding activity happening soon. 

They are hard fish to photograph, and I had to get out the macro lens to get any decent shots. 

If you can believe, these two were the best photos out of a whole bunch I took.


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## blueridge

LittleBettaFish said:


> Surprisingly my shrimp is still alive this morning. I have zero experience with shrimp but it seems to be a little calmer today and it's been busy picking at the substrate. There's leaf litter in the tank now, so maybe this will help provide it with some food.
> 
> I moved the plants around this morning. I couldn't help myself. I think the najas looks better in the one spot between the rocks. I still want to add another plant species or two to the tank, but I have to wait until Aquagreen has more plants in stock.
> 
> This is what the tank looks like at the moment. The water is cloudy, and the leaf litter needs to 'age' a bit to look more natural. Otherwise I'm not too disappointed with how the tank turned out.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> My blue eyes are still a lot more confident than I was expecting, especially considering I just ripped apart their tank before. Even with the bright light on, the majority of the group are swimming around, and they don't go to the back of the tank as much when they see me. They seem to be enjoying picking through the leaf litter. I'm going to toss some more live bloodworms and mosquito larvae in for them this afternoon, and hopefully I can start to see some breeding activity happening soon.
> 
> They are hard fish to photograph, and I had to get out the macro lens to get any decent shots.
> 
> If you can believe, these two were the best photos out of a whole bunch I took.


Love the new fish LBF! Are the native to Australia? They look similar the the Eastern Mosquito fish that I just collected.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yes these are Australian natives, but I think this species can also be found in PNG. However, there can be quite a variation in appearance between the different localities/varieties. Mine are from the top end of Australia. 

I haven't had this group long but they've settled in really well. I moved my desk near to their tank and have been tapping on the glass before feeding them so that they associate me with food. 

I'm going to buy some yarn at the store today to make a spawning mop, and then hopefully I can start collecting eggs from them. They only live for two or three years and they have a very short window in which they will be at their most fertile, so you have to keep continuously breeding if you don't want to lose them from your fish room. 

My next purchase will likely be Honey Blue Eyes. They can be hard to find and expensive, and I've had them on and off in the past. But now I'm moving away from the wilds, I would like to make a serious attempt at breeding them. 

These were some of the first Honey Blue Eyes I owned.


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## Nismo83

I got to say this.. I really like your setup. the biotope is superb.. will you be willing to design one for Persephone? =)..like always I am waiting for your photos all the time.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. I try to emulate the natural habitat of the fish I keep as much as I possibly can. I just personally think they show better behaviour/colouration this way. 

Unfortunately, much as I would like to have all my coccina complex species in 'true' biotope style tanks, the majority of photos I've seen of their habitats seem to be of large puddles with a thick bed of leaf litter. Any plants that are growing, are growing emersed. 

I have had thick leaf litter in my tanks instead of plants such as java moss, but much as my fish liked it, it was simply too difficult if I needed to do any extensive maintenance, or if I had to catch fish for sale or to separate them. The whole tank had to be torn apart and then it would make a stinking mess. 

That's really the only reason I don't make their tanks more natural looking.

Also I will try and get some more photos of my wilds tomorrow. The camera is nearly dead today.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


>


I really like this.. i guess i have to go through your thread from start again to get my head cracking for the Persephone tank


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## LittleBettaFish

That was one of my older tanks. This is sort of what it looked like (I never really took a 'full tank shot' of it). 










This was my previous spotted blue eyes tank. It was smaller than the one I am using now, and the fish were a lot shyer because I didn't really put the effort into making them friendlier. 










I just put a spawning mop into my spotted blue eyes tank. They were a bit scared at first, but now they are investigating it, and hopefully they might lay some eggs in it.


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## Nismo83

simply stunning


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Nismo. Maybe not stunning, but my fish at the time seemed to like them. 

It seems my spotted blue eyes are enjoying their tank. I was a bit concerned that I hadn't seen my males really showing much interest in the females. In fact my biggest male seemed to be fixated with the second biggest male and just spent all of his time following him around. 

However, I threw a spawning mop in yesterday morning, and yesterday afternoon when I got home, there were 14 eggs I could find in it. 

So then I had to hurriedly throw together something to hatch the eggs out in. I think it takes a couple of weeks for the eggs to hatch, and I really have to hope that the eggs don't fungus between now and then. 

This is where the tank is sitting at now. I have to go on a 'wood collecting' expedition to find some nice branches to put into the tank. I also want to get some more plants. Other than that, I am happy with how it looks. 










These fish move so fast, but I did manage to get a few in focus shots. Unfortunately, I have yet to catch my males with their fins fully extended, as they are shyer than the females. 





































Unfortunately, I found my shrimp dead this morning. I had to do a water change for my fish, and even though I aged my water a couple days beforehand, I'm not sure if there was an issue with the water chemistry or if something else happened. This is why I don't do shrimp. They just die in my tanks. I'm honestly surprised it even lasted as long as it did. 

Apart from that, my Betta hendra and Betta persephone tanks are still infected with velvet. But otherwise, the rest of my fish are doing well. I have to order some more BBS cysts, some IALs, and I also have to find some thin vallisneria to go into my next native set-up (which will serve as a grow-out for my spotted blue eyes fry).


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## Nismo83

Nice update. I am not good with BBS. Always unable to get good hatching. I am using fresh water fairy shrimps. Must easier for me.


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## LittleBettaFish

I find that my success with hatching BBS really depends on the brand of eggs I am using. I have purchased eggs that say they have a 90% or similar hatch rate, and then I have struggled to get more than 50% of the eggs to hatch. 

The eggs I have now have a decent hatch rate, it's just that they take longer (around 36-48 hours) to hatch compared to the previous brand/variety I was using, which took around 20-24 hours to hatch. 

Well, I think my love affair with wild bettas is drawing to a close. I know I've said it before, but I really find my passion for keeping/breeding wilds is dwindling. I'm enamoured with my spotted blue eyes, and I have a keen interest in Australian flora and fauna, so I figured working with Australian and (some) PNG species in my fish room, is the logical step to take. 

Unfortunately, it's a lot more difficult taking photos of the blue eyes. They don't stay still for very long, and the males move even faster when they are sparring or courting a female. 

I took a whole heap of photos this afternoon, and this was the best I could manage. 

First up is one of my smaller males. This is how the males look most of the time when they are swimming around. 










Then this is my largest male with his fins erect. As you can see, they look quite spectacular. 










So far I still just have the 14 eggs, but I'm hoping there will be more eggs in the mop this afternoon, as the males have been hounding the females. 

Otherwise, my Betta persephone group seem to be handling the Cupramine treatment fine. I didn't raise the temperature as I found when I did this in the past it caused a lot of stress for my wilds, and some of the younger fish ended up with damaged swim bladders. I probably have lost the majority of the fry in this tank, but I do have one plump juvenile that is swimming around, and the remaining fish all have very healthy appetites, which hopefully means that they won't lose too much body condition during treatment. 

The rest of my wilds are doing well. Not really much to report. I haven't taken any new photos because their tanks need cleaning. Water changes are tomorrow, and then I will try and get some photos on Friday. 

Moving away from fish related topics, I found another eucalyptus seedling growing in a pot on the deck. I've now replanted it with the two smaller seedlings I have, while my larger seedling is going to need to go into a bigger pot soon as it has shot up in the past few weeks. I'm still working to convince mum that I can be allowed to plant them in the garden somewhere. I told her it's going to take more years than we plan on staying at this house, for any of them to grow large enough to be a nuisance. 

I'm slowly convincing her to incorporate more native trees and shrubs into our yard. I did get permission to turn a corner of the backyard into a haven for this pair of small birds that often visit. We have a species of bird here called 'Noisy Miners'. They are very aggressive and territorial, and thrive in suburbia. They often chase my little pair of birds around, so I want somewhere that they can safely hide. 

Finally, Clio has her second show coming up this weekend. It's a two day show, and there are two different judges for each day. There's apparently 18 in her class, but some might scratch on the day of the show. There's also going to be a number of very nice dogs going up against her, so I have no idea how she will do. She was 6th out of 13 dogs the first day of her first show, and then 9th out of 12 dogs (the same dogs excluding one) the second day. You really can't tell where you are going to place under some judges. It's one of the reasons why I hate conformation showing. It's just so subjective.


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## Nismo83

it is sad to hear that your interest is dwindling.. maybe is a burnt out. just maintain them. you are my inspiration for the small bubblenest wilds.. I am going to the LFS now to get some accessories and related to set up the new tank


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## LittleBettaFish

I think it's also because the market for the sorts of wilds I keep, is fairly small here. I don't want my fish going to fish stores as they simply do not do well in this environment. Plus I get such male heavy spawns and everyone always wants to buy in pairs so I end up with tanks full of fish that I can't get rid of and this means spawning stops between the original breeding pair. 

I don't have my own house and I am not the one paying the electricity bill (which is fairly high living in Australia), so I can only keep a certain number of tanks. I simply can't just keep adding more and more tanks to hold the fish I can't sell.

At least with the blue eyes, I don't get as attached because they are less 'individual' and it's not just hardcore hobbyists that want to keep them. 

What tank are you setting up now?


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> I think it's also because the market for the sorts of wilds I keep, is fairly small here. I don't want my fish going to fish stores as they simply do not do well in this environment. Plus I get such male heavy spawns and everyone always wants to buy in pairs so I end up with tanks full of fish that I can't get rid of and this means spawning stops between the original breeding pair.
> 
> I don't have my own house and I am not the one paying the electricity bill (which is fairly high living in Australia), so I can only keep a certain number of tanks. I simply can't just keep adding more and more tanks to hold the fish I can't sell.
> 
> At least with the blue eyes, I don't get as attached because they are less 'individual' and it's not just hardcore hobbyists that want to keep them.
> 
> What tank are you setting up now?


I see.. that is always a problem when there is not enough female and cannot continue the line. I always keep at least 3 pairs in the past when I am doing show betta so that I can always breed or cross breed. one thing about wild betta is they usually breed only with one female instead of like splenden where they can breed with any once conditioned properly. Mayb you can consider offloading some. hopefully someone will be able to continue what you are doing. 

I am setting up a new tank for Persephone. I have some left over ADA Malaya soil. Brought a DW and a BW, some java moss. Today just bough some lava rock and cactus cone.


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## LittleBettaFish

I find my wild betta males aren't especially picky when it comes to who they will breed with. I had three pairs of sp. api api, and when I sold two pairs, I put a male and female together that hadn't been together before. Once they settled into their new tank, they very quickly started spawning. 

However, I do find if I have a breeding pair living alongside their offspring, the male will almost always choose the original female to spawn with, rather than one of his daughters. That may simply be because the older female tends to be dominant over her daughters. 

My wild-caught Betta coccina pair are probably the only one of my pairs that I would say are anywhere close to 'bonded'. 

I took some photos of my wilds today. Mostly my Betta brownorum because they are the only fish that actually stay still long enough for me to get the camera focussed. Annoyingly, I couldn't get any photos of my pair flirting with each other. 

First up is the male. For once I actually got some ones of him with his fins open. 



















Then this is his biggest offspring (there's only about five juveniles in the tank). No lateral blotch. Travesty! 










Then this is the female. The male was chasing her around so it was hard to get a decent shot of her. 










Next up is my Betta coccina pair. The female just sits at the front of the tank waiting to be fed so she was easy to photograph. 



















The male however, is definitely much more elusive. This was the best I could manage as he beat a hasty retreat back to his film canister (I think he's guarding eggs or fry in there). 










I actually found several more fry from this pair when I had a look in their tank with my especially bright torch. They seem to be looking fairly healthy considering I have hardly thrown any food in for them. Once I get some more BBS eggs I will start to feed them more regularly now I know it's not just the adult fish eating it. 

Then this is one of their adult offspring. This is the one that I'm never sure if it is male or female. It isn't coloured like a male but its fins are different from its sister. This one will be getting put up for sale with four of its siblings next week. This way my sibling pair can raise some fry without them being eaten by everyone else. 










Otherwise, my Betta persephone group all still seem to be alive. I'm not sure how the fry are tolerating the treatment, but I removed the film canisters from the tank just in case my pairs spawned. I'm still not sure if what happened to Zig-Zag and his culled sibling was from being exposed to the copper medication when they were developing, but I didn't want to risk ending up with any further deformed fry, as it's fairly depressing having to sit there and cull them. 

I think my spotted blue eyes are the slackest group of fish ever. I haven't seen any further eggs. I did a water change yesterday and gave everyone some frozen brine shrimp this morning, so I might put the spawning mop back in and see if anyone feels in the mood for some spawning. 

I've been trying to get down to the large 'park' (it covers several hundred hectares and a lot of it is bush) near my house to get some wood for their tank. There are several clumps of tea tree that are long dead down near the river, and the branches would be perfect for this tank. However, I have to pick a day when I'm not likely to get myself bitten by a snake.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I have successfully hatched some of my spotted blue eyes eggs. It's difficult to get a correct headcount, but at this point it looks like at least seven eggs have hatched. However, I only have six fry as one has died. 

I didn't have any food on hand for them, and it was a public holiday yesterday so my parcel was delayed. However, it arrived early this morning, and it seems like at least some of the fry are eating the Sera Micron. I also received 25 grams of Ocean Nutrition BSE, which I'll be feeding the fry once they are big enough. 

At the moment they are living in a 2L plastic container with some peat moss, leaf litter, and live plants. However, I will be setting up a grow-out for them once they are at an age and a size that makes it safe to move them. 

Still haven't collected any further eggs from my spotted blue eyes. But I've been a bit slack with feeding them because I've been busy, and also there's been a lot of changes made to their tank because the najas disintegrated and I had to remove it. I think at this point I'll just replace it with vallisneria nana. 

At this point in time, I'm going to have to set-up a hospital tank for my persephone and hendra groups so I can get the velvet treated. I think I might just divide up my Mr Aqua 12 gallon long so I can treat both groups together. 

It's just so frustrating considering I've treated both groups in the past for this parasite. 

I'm still waiting to hear back from the interested buyer in regards to my livida group. There's a lot of aggression in that tank and my F1 juvenile female is now blinded in one eye. I don't have the space to separate them, and I just want them gone before something happens and they become unsaleable. 

I also need to put up my Betta sp. api api group for sale, as well as the spare Betta coccina juveniles. I just know it's going to be a nightmare catching all those api api as there's dozens of them in there. 

I did have a lucky break yesterday when I discovered I'd left half my Betta coccina tank uncovered overnight. I'd lifted the cling wrap up at the back of the tank, and had forgotten to put it back down. Luckily, neither fish had jumped out but I would have been kicking myself if they had as these are two of my favourites. 

Our puppy Clio also had a mixed day of showing on the weekend. She has an issue with one of her ears sticking out to the side at the moment (she's going to the vet to get it checked out and then it will be taped if nothing is medically wrong), and on the first day her ear was stuck out the worst I've ever seen it. She's also a lot gawkier than some of the other puppies, and she presently has no withers and so looks like a bulldozer with her head down. 

On the first day she came 12th out of 14 puppies, which was very disappointing. 

On the second day we decided if it was raining we would scratch her. However, since it was fine, we kept her in, and this time under a German judge she came third out of ten puppies. They were ten of the same puppies that had been in her class before, and most of that ten had placed above her the day before. 

This is why I dislike conformation showing. Some days you really can't pick what a judge is going to place, and sometimes it all comes down to whose dog it is, and who is on the other end of the leash. 

At least Clio had a fun time going around after her class getting pats and playing with dogs. She's got such a great personality. We always call her 'Crazy Clio' as she's always up to something mischievous. 

Because of her ear, we aren't going to show her until next year, and that's if the ear fixes up with taping. If not, she'll just join our family's NQR German Shepherd pack as a pet.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I moved both my persephone and hendra groups into hospital tanks as their condition was deteriorating. I actually thought I'd lost one or more of the adult persephone, but when I emptied their tank I found not only was everyone still alive, but I also had a small number of fry/juveniles. This was surprising considering that they were completely covered in velvet and have hardly been getting any food. 

I've completely blacked out both tanks with a thick blanket, and added the first dose of Cupramine. The only thing I don't do when medicating my wilds for velvet is raise the temperature. I found it caused a great deal of stress, and lead to SBD in younger fish being treated. 

My spotted blue eyes are doing well. I'm ordering a couple of bunches of vallisneria nana to replace the najas tenuifolia that died in their tank, but otherwise they seem happy. 

Their fry are all still alive. There's 8-9 that I can count. I collected 14 eggs and there was one definitely dead fry, so I'm not sure what the actual number of fry is. 

I have them on Sera Micron at the moment, which they all seem to be eating, or at least I think they are based on their fat stomachs. I'm waiting until the runts/youngest fry grow a little more until I move them into a larger container. These are the only spotted blue eye fry I have, so I don't want to kill them. 

Apart from my persephone and hendra, the rest of my wilds are doing well. I took some photos earlier today, so I thought I'd post them up. 

First up is one of my Betta miniopinna juveniles that managed to avoid being sold with the rest of the group. They are still sharing a tank with the uberis, and I've seen at least two of them in there. At least the species are easy to tell apart. 










Next are two of my Betta brownorum juveniles. 



















Then here's my F1 Betta brownorum male out of my now deceased pair. He's still sharing a tank with his two nephews. 



















I also managed to get two shots of my sp. api api male. The fry from this pair are starting to show some red colouring on their fins. Hopefully they aren't all male. 



















Finally, here are my Betta coccina pair. Both fish were trying their best to look as unattractive as possible. 



















And that's about it. Not much in the way of fishy news. I have to get off my butt next week and put the fish I want to get rid of up for sale, and chase up the person interested in my livida group.


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## Nismo83

I live your api api... but I guess I will not be keeping... getting overloading now.. lol


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha it's very easy to get overloaded, especially with wilds because they breed so frequently. 

At least coccina complex species only need small tanks.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> Haha it's very easy to get overloaded, especially with wilds because they breed so frequently.
> 
> At least coccina complex species only need small tanks.


yeah.. I agree with you.. soon my occellata will be all gone.. guess my altum will be coming to my office haha


----------



## LittleBettaFish

That's a bit sad about the ocellata. The wild bettas have a lot of character and you get fond of them. 

Last night I added the second dose of Seachem Cupramine to my hospital tanks and while my hendra seem to be doing okay , my persephone group are not looking as good. But it's so difficult to know whether this is because of the medication, or because the tank has been blacked out as none of my wilds are fond of that part of the treatment. 

My spotted blue eyes fry are like blimps. They've been gobbling down the Sera Micron. The largest fry are about double the size they were when they hatched, so I figure they must be getting enough food. I will be curious as to what gender ratio this is with this group. While my wilds give me predominately males, when I kept Aphyosemion australe the sexes where very evenly split. 

Unfortunately, I can't get any photos of the fry until they move into another container. However, I did get some in focus photos of the adults. They certainly are not as obliging as my wild bettas. 

This is my largest male. 










I thought this might have been one of the females. 










This male is quite pale coloured compared to the other fish in the tank and his fins are a bit tatty because I think he's been sparring with the largest male. 










This is my smallest male. However, in spite of his small size he's extremely feisty. 










Here they are saying: "Mum put the camera down and feed us."










"No seriously." 










"FEEEEED US!!!"










Then this is their tank. Once I get some vallisneria nana, I will be removing the melaleuca root and replacing it with some eucalyptus branches I'm going to scavenge from the park near my house. I found some promising looking pieces on a walk with the dogs today. I just have to go at a time when I'm not going to pick up a snake instead of a stick. 










While I'm talking about the park, I wanted to share something cool that happened today. This park is fairly large; I think it's just over 100 hectares in size. It's full of huge gum trees and lots of revegetated bush so there's always lots of wildlife there. 

Well the other day when mum and me were walking the dogs, I could hear a group of cockatoos screeching in that way that you just know means something is up. I'm trying to find out what they are upset about, when I spot a wedge-tailed eagle perched in the branch of a dead gum.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wedge-tailed_eagle

That was pretty cool, but today on our walk with the dogs in a different area of the park, we spotted a pair of wedge-tailed eagles circling very low over the treetops only metres from us. 

It's one of those sights that you feel almost privileged to have seen. I really love wedge-tailed eagles. There used to be a pair that lived up at my grandparents' old farm, and you'd see them soaring around over the paddocks and bush. 

Meanwhile this is the little gum tree I have been growing from a seedling. It seems to be healthy and growing, although some bloody caterpillar has been munching on its lower leaves.










I also have four smaller seedlings growing in another pot. Now I know what a gum tree seedling looks like, I've been scouring through the pots in the garden as this is where they seem to sprout. My mum has been hoping that my seedlings would die as she doesn't want me planting them, but I told her they are living just to spite her. 

We also took Clio to the vet yesterday in regards to her ear. He said her ears are beautifully clean, there's nothing wrong with the cartilage, and there's no infection or blockage going on. He thinks it's just the placement of the ear itself, and a weakness in the muscles holding the ear up. He thinks while the placement will never be perfect, it should improve with time so she stops sticking it out the side. He didn't want to tape it as then the muscles will weaken. 

Even if her ear never fixes up, how could you not love this cheeky little face? 










Woops didn't realise how big my gum tree seedling photo was. I must have forgotten to resize it.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> That's a bit sad about the ocellata. The wild bettas have a lot of character and you get fond of them.


they are not dying, I am giving them out.. =) don't get me wrong.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha, no I knew what you meant. I just find it sad to let fish go to new homes. I get attached, especially when they are fish I've watched grow from fry to adult.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> Haha, no I knew what you meant. I just find it sad to let fish go to new homes. I get attached, especially when they are fish I've watched grow from fry to adult.


haha. ok. well that is the plan for now, even giving free is not easy. 6 will be going to my Bruneian friend, 4 to a Singapore guy and another 4 to a thai guy. will see what will be left. 

sorry for going off-topic on your thread


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## LittleBettaFish

Nah it's fine. You're like the only one who replies to it haha. Makes me feel less like I am talking to myself.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> Nah it's fine. You're like the only one who replies to it haha. Makes me feel less like I am talking to myself.


I am always looking forward for your update everyday..


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## LittleBettaFish

Well today is one of those 'not particularly exciting' updates. 

I spent most of yesterday and almost all of today ripping up the carpet in the lounge and dining rooms of our house with my mum. Obviously, this didn't leave much time for fish related activities. 

I managed to get a couple of decent snaps of my spotted blue eyes. The first photo is of one of my females and then the second photo is of my largest male. 



















I also took this photo, which is of my spotted blue eyes 'hatchery'. It sits inside a larger tank that is partially filled with water and has a heater running to keep the water in the container warm. The plants are in there to make the fry feel safer, and to help with water quality because of the small volume of water. 










Then this is a not very good photo of some of the fry. You can see how the size of one of the biggest fry (to the left of the photo) compares with the size of one of the smallest/youngest fry, which is in the corner of the container. 










Other than that, not much else to report.


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## Aqua Aurora

I've really enjoyed the looks of your more natural tanks (wood and leaf litter with just some plants.. no fancy aquascaping you have to spend a lot of time trimming to look a certain way) very tempted to redo one of my tanks in a similar fashion.
Gratz on fry! I have blue eye gertrudae (Pseudomugil gertrudae)as well but no fry (I do nothing to help keep fry alive) I've seen some activity under the forground plants though.. possibly spawning attempts.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Aqua Aurora. I personally prefer natural/biotope style set-ups to manicured tanks. My spotted blue eyes spend all their time picking through the leaf litter looking for food, and darting in and out of the melaleuca. 

I will be adding some vallisneria nana to this tank and changing the wood, but otherwise it will stay as it is. I've also got to get a new spawning mop for them as I cut up theirs to use as cover in my hospital tanks. 

If your tank is densely planted, you may get some fry cropping up. I have had it happen before with my honey blue eyes and my rhadinocentrus ornatus. 

I'm hoping just to get enough fry to keep a sort of self-sustaining population because they have such a short period of time in which they are most productive, and such a relatively short lifespan.


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## Aqua Aurora

Eeeehhh I think its planted enough eggs might make it but once tiny fry swim up above the substrate plants (downoi and hydro japan) they'll get eaten by the adults.


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## BettaBoy11

Subscribing!!!


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## LittleBettaFish

The other day, I moved my spotted blue eyes fry into a proper tank. They were quickly outgrowing the 2L container, and the plastic was difficult to see through.

All I did was very carefully pour them out into the tank, and I have been gradually increasing the water level with water from the main tank.

This is what their set-up looks like at the moment. The tank they are in is a 25cm cube, and they'll stay in that until they are big enough to warrant another move. 










Otherwise, not much news regarding my other fish. My persephone and hendra groups are still being treated for velvet. They've been tearing each other up a lot as there's not much cover in the hospital tanks. So hopefully they don't kill each other before treatment is finished (another five or so days). My youngest persephone female is looking like she might not survive the treatment. She had a growth on her jaw before going into the hospital tank and she's been rather sluggish and disinterested in eating. I'm hoping she pulls through, but I'm not really hopeful. 

Apart from that, my F1 Betta coccina male hatched out some fry the other day. Although I think his younger/smaller siblings ate them once they became free-swimming. 

I took a photo of his father. Unfortunately, his green iridescence has faded as he's gotten older, and the camera flash further washed it out. All you can really see now is a green spot. In real life, his colour is also much closer to burgundy than the photo shows. 










Then I got a photo of my brownorum female. Her five offspring are so big now, and they all come rushing to the front whenever I tap on the glass. Still no signs of any green spots on them though. 










I've also decided I'm going to flick my current Betta sp. api api pair, and just retain a pair from my F1 group. My current pair are the least friendliest fish I own, and most days I'm just staring into an empty tank. They can be sold along with the remaining F1 group, as soon as I have enough bags on hand to put everyone into. 

I took a few photos of some of my F1 fish the other day as well. Most are at, or approaching breeding size, although there are still a few runts in there. 



















This last one, is one of the most recent fry from my current pair. They seem to be growing well, and are starting to show some red in their fins. As I've never had fry from this pairing before, it will be interesting to see how they turn out.


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## Nismo83

have you tried salt treatment? I am wondering how come it is so long for the velvet


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## LittleBettaFish

I personally found aquarium salt to have very little effect on treating velvet. I've had the most success with Seachem Cupramine and blacking out the tank. 

I wasn't sure if this is what you meant by 'how come it is so long for the velvet?', but the Seachem Cupramine treatment is 14 days. 

Velvet is harder to get rid of than ich. It can use photosynthesis, and I believe it can also sort of hide in the gills of the fish so you think they are cured and then they become infected again.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> I personally found aquarium salt to have very little effect on treating velvet. I've had the most success with Seachem Cupramine and blacking out the tank.
> 
> I wasn't sure if this is what you meant by 'how come it is so long for the velvet?', but the Seachem Cupramine treatment is 14 days.
> 
> Velvet is harder to get rid of than ich. It can use photosynthesis, and I believe it can also sort of hide in the gills of the fish so you think they are cured and then they become infected again.


The treatment is 14days. I had not use sea hem product before. I did use malachit green before if I am no mistake. Usually I just use heater and also oxycure salt.


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## LittleBettaFish

If only the velvet I got was as easy to treat. Velvet has taught me a very valuable lesson about quarantine of new fish and not sharing equipment between tanks. 

Well news from the fish room is that my persephone and hendra have finished their velvet treatment (they actually finished a few days back but I only just removed the blanket from over their tanks today). It looks like most of my persephone juveniles/fry have made it through the treatment, and it's obvious by the behaviour of my fish that everyone is feeling much better. 

Because of that, I spent the morning setting up tanks for them, using whatever plants had managed to survive the two weeks in a plastic container. 

This is the persephone tank. This time, instead of a divider, I'm using two 4L/1 gallon breeder boxes to house my oldest (and most aggressive male), as well as my F2 female whose survival I was unsure about. While the growth on her jaw has cleared up, she's blind in one eye and this puts her at a disadvantage. 

This will leave my swim bladder affected male, my 3.5 year old female, the male I was gifted earlier this year, and his adult son, in the main part of the tank, along with the handful of fry/juveniles. 










Then this is my hendra tank. 










I'm debating whether to only keep the original pair from this group and sell the rest of the males and females once I'm 100% certain the velvet is gone. Because of the number of males in the tank, it's a fairly high-stress environment, and I don't want the stress to trigger another outbreak of velvet. 

I just basically have to wait until tomorrow when the temperature of the tank has stabilised, and then everyone will be getting moved across. 

This is what the main rack in my fish room looks like at the moment. My goal is to have all my wild betta tanks consolidated onto the two lower shelves. I'm hoping I can fit five tanks on the middle rack if I squish them in closer together. It will just make changing the cling wrap more difficult. 










Of course, this will all depend on whether I am able to get rid of a fair chunk of my collection first. 

The rest of my fish are doing well. I got a couple of photos of my spotted blue eyes with the macro lens. They aren't very good, but they are difficult fish to photograph. 



















Then we have an even worse photo of one of the fry. They dart around so quickly, and they aren't as friendly as my wild betta fry tend to be. I still can only see six or seven of them, but sometimes I wonder if I'm just counting the same fry multiple times!


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## LittleBettaFish

My persephone and hendra groups are doing okay. My persephone juveniles keep getting into the breeder boxes, but apart from that, there hasn't been much aggression between the fish in the main part of the tank. My hendra group are looking very ragged, and I'm not 100% sure that they were successfully treated. I guess time will tell. 

Apart from that, I've got no complaints about how my other fish are doing. I've had rooibos tea in everyone's tanks so the water is nice and dark. 

I still haven't sold any of my wilds yet. I think I'll wait until next week as I'm going to a dog show on Sunday and people usually want to pick their fish up on the weekend. Plus I need to get some more fish bags as I have almost run out (I usually just recycle bags that I've previously received fish/plants in). 

My spotted blue eyes group is doing well, although they are extremely finicky eaters. They won't really take anything but live mosquito larvae and frozen bloodworms, so I've ordered some 'Aquaculture Crumble' from the business where I got them from. Apparently this is what they were raised on, so I thought it might be worth a try. I also ordered two bunches of Vallisneria nana for their tank, as well as a spawning mop as they didn't seem to like laying their eggs in mine. 

Their fry are doing well. They are still on Sera Micron (which they seem to have really taken to), and freshly hatched BBS. The biggest are started to look like miniature blue eyes now, and I ordered a bunch of Hydrilla verticillata to fill up their grow-out tank as they are still rather skittish. 

This is the best photo I could manage as all they do is lurk at the back of the tank when they see me approach. 










I also took some photos of my wilds. 

First up is my F1 Betta coccina group. 



















Then this is some of my Betta livida group. I did have a buyer interested in these but I cannot get into contact with her through FB. Unfortunately, the F1 female in the top right corner was blinded by one of the other fish in the tank, which is why her eye looks weird. The same thing happened to the young male on the left side of the photo. 










Next up is one of my favourite pairs; my Betta brownorum. 

This was the male sneaking up on the female. 










Then this is a blurry photo of the male but I thought I'd post it anyway as I very rarely catch him with his fins like this. 










Tomorrow I'm going to try and get out to a fish store that's near my house. They've got an awesome range, and I really only had a quick browse through when I was broke and in search of honey blue eyes. I might also see if they stock live blackworms, as I am in desperate need of some and I can't be bothered going into the city for $10 of blackworms.


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## Nismo83

nice updates as usual.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. I'm now debating whether to continue with my plans to keep/breed smaller Australian/PNG natives, or get back into keeping/breeding killifish once I've sold off the majority of my wilds. 

I wish I had the space and funds to do both!


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## Nismo83

Please don't give wilds up. U shd keep both


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## LittleBettaFish

Lol I'm not giving the wilds up completely. I will still be keeping my F0 pair of Betta coccina, my F1 Betta coccina pair, an F1 pair of Betta sp. api api along with the fry from my current pair, my Betta brownorum breeding pair, my Betta persephone group, my Betta uberis group, and possibly my Betta hendra group (still deciding whether to keep or sell them). So I will have plenty of wilds left, just won't be focussing as much on breeding them.


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## Nismo83

ok.. if not for the location, I wouldn't mind the uberis and the Persephone. hahaha I am greedy...


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## LittleBettaFish

I haven't got too much news from the fish room. I went to a not so LFS the other day and picked up some live blackworms, as well as some live plants. The plants are for my two plakat males, as the plants in their tanks were dying from neglect and a lack of light. 

Apart from that, all I really have to share, are these photos I took of my spotted blue eyes group. 

Female









I think this is a female. But whatever it is, it's the boss of the tank. It spends its whole day guarding this one corner of the tank from everyone else. 










Then this is my largest male. I'm slightly concerned about this male as he's rather gaunt and he doesn't seem to have much of an appetite. His feces look normal, and he's the dominant male in the tank so spends a lot of time chasing other fish around, but he just doesn't look like his thriving. I'm hoping the Aquaculture crumble I have on order, will bulk him back up. Otherwise, I might try a treatment for internal parasites. 










Finally, this is another one of my females.










I'm still really enjoying this group. While they do startle more easily than my bettas, they aren't overly shy, and I love watching them go about their daily business. I've always found the blue eyes have a bit more individual personality than some of the more commonly kept species of schooling/shoaling fish. This group in particular is quite curious, and they always have to go and check out any changes I make to their tank. 

I'm just waiting on the plants, food, and spawning mop I ordered. Then I can set-up a tank for a small breeding group of Honey blue eyes (if I can ever find them for sale here in Melbourne at less than $50 a pair). Apart from the plants, I've got everything else on hand here at home, so at least I'll really only be paying for the fish and the plants.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I put up an advertisement on FB for the wilds I wanted to sell. I don't like selling fish because I get overly attached to them, but I _have_ to clear some space if I want to branch out into rainbowfish and blue eyes, and I _need_ the funds from the sale of my wilds to purchase some eggs and breeding pairs/groups. 

I've got all my fingers and toes crossed, hoping I can get them all sold before Christmas. 

I'm also contemplating a rejig of my fish room. I'm considering dismantling my main rack, and replacing it with a slightly shorter rack (1.2m long instead of 1.5m long), of the same brand as my existing smaller rack. Then I would get rid of the white sideboard I have beside my fish room door, and replace it with another smaller rack. This would then give me three racks, with the two smaller racks being used for my wilds, and the main rack being used for my Australian natives. 

I'm just going to have to work out how much all of this is going to cost as I don't want to be spending hundreds of dollars simply on shelving. However, an extra rack would give me more usable space, and having all my racks match would make my fish room look neater. 

Apart from that, I've been fiddling with the settings on the Canon, trying to work out if it has any (positive) effect on my fish photography. 

These were a few shots of my spotted blue eyes that I took today. They are tricky fish to photograph. I never seem to capture their true colour with my camera, and they move so fast, especially when I just get the perfect shot lined up. 




























My spotted blue eyes fry also had their first ever mosquito larvae. I discovered a container of water with a whole lot of freshly hatched mosquito larvae in it, and my biggest spotted blue eyes fry hunted it down and ate it without any issues. 

I also discovered that one of my Betta persephone males has a built a nest between one of the breeding boxes and the side of the tank. I don't know how he expects to wrap a female in that space, but he was looking very determined last time I saw him.


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## Nismo83

good to see the Persephone building the nest. mine still not building any.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha mine weren't supposed to be building any nests or even thinking of spawning. 

Do you have more than one pair in the tank? I find with my coccina complex species, you get much better success rates with spawning if you have one pair per tank.

Got some interest in my Betta sp. api api group. Now I just need to pick the nicest sibling pair from the F1 group that I want to keep as my future breeding pair.


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## Nismo83

api api. It is so hard to get them and they are pricey. I am not sure of their sexing, it seems like they are male lookalike. any idea on how to differentiate?


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## LittleBettaFish

The males tend to be a much richer red, and the white edging to the fins is usually thicker. Some males will also have a spade-shaped caudal, but this doesn't seem to occur on all males. The ventral fins of the males are also thicker, and their anal fin is more angled (pointed). 

It can be difficult to sex them when they are young and not showing full development of fins or colour. But all of the breeding pairs I've purchased have been very easy to tell apart.


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## Nismo83

How about Persephone?


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## LittleBettaFish

Personally, all of my persephone males show green/blue irridescence on their sides, and my females don't so it makes sexing easy. However, I've talked to people whose males have had no irridescence, and so I imagine this would make sexing more difficult. 

My males also have brighter coloured fins, and the fins are larger overall. The ventral fins are longer and thicker, and my females tend to look plumper than the males.


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## Nismo83

Ok. I need to spend some time monitoring I guess


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## LittleBettaFish

Yep. Sometimes if the fish are young or not fully coloured up it can be difficult to determine their sex. But if they are large enough to be breeding, and comfortable in their tank, you should be able to sex adult fish fairly easily.


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## Nismo83

thank. I have a feeling they are all males. hahaha


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## LittleBettaFish

If you have some clear photos of each fish, I may be able to help you sex them. 

The plants I ordered for my spotted blue eyes arrived just before. Unfortunately, I really didn't want to move the rocks in the main tank around too much because it took me ages to get them looking in a vaguely natural arrangement. So this made planting the vallisneria slightly difficult. 

Rather than trying to jam a whole heap of vallisneria in between the main rocks, I've just decided I will wait until it fills in naturally. The substrate is only fairly shallow, and so I've found that if I try and plant into it, the roots tend to work themselves loose over time. 

So this is what the tank looks like at the moment. The water is cloudy because I did a water change and removed some of the leaf litter, which stirred up a lot of detritus. It's not perfect, but I still want to add some gum tree branches, and then I think with time as the plants fill in, it will look like a slice of an Australian creek/billabong. 










This is partly why I want to move away from keeping/breeding wilds. Living in Australia, it's much easier to replicate the sort of environment that our native rainbowfish and blue eyes would live in, than it is to replicate the habitat of fish from overseas.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> This is partly why I want to move away from keeping/breeding wilds. Living in Australia, it's much easier to replicate the sort of environment that our native rainbowfish and blue eyes would live in, than it is to replicate the habitat of fish from overseas.


actually the real biotope of wild bettas are pretty simple.. peat moss swamp or small water stream .. that is how they are..


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah but I would need a lot of leaf litter to provide enough hiding places for my wilds so they wouldn't fight, as there's really no aquatic vegetation in these places. 

And having that much leaf litter makes doing maintenance or catching fish too hard.

Well the person who was interested in my sp. api api group decided not to take them because there were too many. 

This is one reason I'm getting out of wilds. Australia wide, the market for wild bettas is very small, and because I don't ship, the market gets even smaller. My fish seem to produce way more males than females, so if people want pairs I end up with a whole lot of males left, which I then can't get rid of as they aren't like splendens where people want single males as pets.

Sigh. 

I also don't want to have to make the price so cheap that I am giving my fish away, as I do need the money. 

I really don't know what the future for some of the species of wild betta in Australia will be. Unless there are serious breeders out there that aren't active online, they don't seem to have the following of cichlids and rainbows and with new laws being passed next year that may stop the import of wild bettas into Australia, I think some species will be lost for good.


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## Nismo83

If only it is easier for u to ship out. Her her but then I am tight as well as I can't make up my mind to move temporary or not


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha I don't like shipping fish. I did it once interstate and it was too much of a nerve-wracking experience for me to do it again. You _technically_ aren't supposed to send fish in the post here and I was worried the bags would leak as I am terrible at bagging fish. 

Well since this journal is titled 'Wild Betta Journal' and my last few entries have been about my spotted blue eyes instead, I figured I'd better upload some photos of my wilds. 

Surprisingly my fish were in a cooperative mood today, and so I got some photos that I wasn't too ashamed to share. 

First up is my flirting pair of Betta brownorum. 










My female's spot. 










Male flaring at the female, and one of the juveniles deciding to photobomb the shot. 










Female on the look-out for the male. 










Then there's one of my Betta persephone males, except someone's been biting his fins so he's really not looking at his best. 










Next was just a fun shot where I tried to get as many of my F1 Betta sp. api api in the photo as possible. 










Finally, this is one of my favourite fish. My F1 Betta coccina male. I just think he is absolutely stunning. Especially the spade-shaped caudal. 



















Unfortunately, the glass was dirty in these shots.



















His siblings are the ones I've been wanting to sell. All I want to keep is his sister as they are a proven breeding pair and seem quite bonded. 

Along with my wilds, I still have my two plakat males, Atlas and Maverick. The plants in their tanks had browned off from not enough light. So the other day I visited a not so local fish store, and replanted the tanks with crypts, anubias, and java moss. 

This is the result. Not perfect, but I did it on a tight budget. The blob of java moss in Maverick's tank was thrown in there last night. I'm still not sure whether I should tie it down to the wood of not. 



















This is just a photo of Maverick. It took me forever to get one of him with his ventrals down. 










While the majority of my fish are doing well, it looks like my Betta hendra are still infected with velvet so I'm going to have to repeat the treatment. I'm also going to have to tear their tank down again, which is always fun. 

Apart from that, I have to get myself to a fish store to pick up some substrate. I'm not sure whether to do river sand, or a mix of coarse/fine gravel to make it look like the bottom of a river/creek. The tank is going to be planted with hydrilla and vallisneria nana, so I want a substrate they are going to be able to root into. 

I hate buying substrate. It seems like such a boring thing to be spending money on, when I could be spending that money on fish. But I hate the look of bare bottom tanks so I suppose I have no choice unless I go find a river and steal some sand or gravel.


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## Nismo83

beside treating the velvet, you will need to give all the stuffs inside the tank good wash and sunbath. 

u can try some planting soil that are suitable for aquarium. Over here is quite reasonable so I am sticking with ADA. 

your updates are always exciting


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah I know. This is why I had to destroy most of my planted wild betta tanks when almost all were infected. I had so much watersprite and java moss and I lost/threw out most of it. 

I like ADA aqua soil and I use it for my wilds. But it doesn't have the look I want for my Australian native tanks. I think I might go with brown coloured gravel. Sand is nice, but it does tend to look dirty when I use leaf litter.


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## Nismo83

there are 3 types of ADA soils, Amazonia, Malaya and African. Maybe you can try African. I am using Malaya, my altum are enjoying inside.. channoides soon but in another tank.


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## Aquatail

Great pictures, as always! I thought I'd drop in to let you know that I'm reading and enjoying the updates.

I believe you've occasionally mentioned that you have goldfish, forgive me if I'm wrong, but I've been wondering why you never post pictures or anything of them?

Anyway, good luck with your fish and I hope you can get rid of the velvet.


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## blueridge

I am loving your spotted blue eyes tank, LBF! It is coming along great. Also I love the lay out of Maverick and his buddy's tank too. The giant pieces of driftwood look great.


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## LittleBettaFish

I have used all three brands of aquasoil. It's the shape and the colour of the aquasoil that is why I'm not using it. It's not the sort of substrate that would be found at the bottom of an Australian creek/river/billabong.

Aquatail, I have three shubunkin. 

I don't share more photos or stories about them, is that they basically exist only to eat and don't really have any personality beyond that, so I find them rather boring.

I only keep them out of obligation, rather than any real attachment to them. 

Thanks Blueridge. The vallisneria has yellowed in places since that photo was taken, but hopefully once it starts to establish itself, it will look better. Now I just need to scour the local park for some dead branches. 

I'm looking forward to moving more towards the native sides of things. I just really like putting together Australian biotope style tanks.


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## Nismo83

I see. Will it be illegal for one to dig them out?


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## LittleBettaFish

Dig what out? Do you mean the dead branches? I was simply going to collect one or two dead and fallen branches from the ground. It probably is technically illegal, but many hobbyists seem to do it. 

Well today I picked up a 2kg bag of fine 'golden' gravel and a pair of honey blue eyes from an aquarium in the city. I only went in for the substrate, but then I saw a tank full of honey blue eyes, so I decided to get a pair (it was $35 for a pair and over $100 for multiple fish). 

While I'm fairly certain I've got a male and female, the male is not what I really wanted. These fish have only a very short reproductive lifespan (two or three years), so if you are keen to breed them, you ideally want young fish. 

However, the male I got is very large. He's actually larger than any other honey blue eyes I've ever had before. So I'm a bit concerned about his age. He also has been rather subdued. I mean most new fish take some time to acclimatise to a new environment but the way he's swimming is sort of abnormal looking and now I'm hoping I don't wake up to a dead fish. 

This is what he looks like. He is also very washed out in this photo.










Then this is what their tank looks like. I literally threw it together as soon as I got home. There's some melaleuca leaves floating at the surface, and I have some melaleuca branches soaking in my goldfish tank, as I find in this tank, the wood doesn't develop that slimy fungus on it. 










I do think I should have been patient and purchased a mop of eggs instead as I saw them advertised on a FB group I am a member of. But I got greedy and I was carrying too much cash in my pocket. So hopefully my pair will give me some eggs and 'pay back' their purchase price. 

While I'm on the topic of blue eyes, this is a photo of my spotted blue eyes nursery. I still don't know how many fry are in this thing. I replaced the exotic plants with some native hydrilla, and there's just peat moss and leaf litter on the bottom to encourage micro fauna to grow that my fry can hunt down in between feedings. 

They are thriving at the moment. If they live, these will be the first blue eyes fry I've raised to maturity. I'm still amazed by how quickly they take to powdered foods. They aren't like betta fry at all.










Finally, this was just a funny photo I took of my coccina male. I frightened him with the end of the thermometer and he had a brief moment of bravery before he darted off to hide.


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## Nismo83

Dig the soil?


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## LittleBettaFish

Lol it's probably also illegal to dig out substrate from creeks/rivers. Not that I'd want to be digging it out of any of the creeks or rivers near my house. They look pretty polluted and I'm fairly certain they are full of carp. 

Well my honey blue eyes male has survived the night. He still swims very oddly compared to his female, but miracle of miracles, he was actually investigating the spawning mop when I last checked in on them, and looked to be showing some actual interest in the female. 

I'm wondering if the odd swimming is because he is so fat. Both him and his female are going on 'starvation' rations of mosquito larvae, BBS, and NLS flake.


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## LittleBettaFish

Some time yesterday, my honey blue eyes male died. I found him upside down on the bottom of the tank and the female frantically racing around. Probably because now she is the only fish in the tank. 

That male was a reasonably expensive fish, and supposed to be my foundation breeding stock, so suffice to say I am fairly annoyed. I'm also not sure what to do with the female. I might have to rehome her, as I don't think it's fair for her to be alone, and there's no way I'm going to put her in with my spotted blue eyes.

I _knew_ I should have waited and purchased a mop of eggs. 

I also need to buy more BBS eggs because I left mine in a hot cupboard and ever since, I've had a dismal hatch rate. The other day I don't even think anything even hatched after 48 hours. 

It's days like this I feel this hobby is just one endless money pit. 

To make myself feel better, I took some photos of my wilds. Apart from the velvet infected hendra, the rest of my wilds seem to be doing well. Still no real interest in the fish I have for sale though, which is disappointing. If my track record is anything to go by, the longer they are with me, the more likely something will go wrong. 

First up is my Betta brownorum pair. If no one has noticed, I'm sort of obsessed with this pair. 




























Just a couple of my Betta uberis

Mum showing one of her sons how it is done


















Same with my Betta sp. api api 

Fry with mum


















One of my Betta livida males. Their tank is full of algae because the tank gets way too much light through my clerestory window. It used to have a curtain that I closed in the warmer months but then one of the cats pulled it off the wall. 










Then finally, my F1 Betta coccina group. I will be sad if/when the majority of this group go, as they are super friendly and I've really enjoyed watching them grow. I think the dominant male has a nest of eggs at the back of the tank and the female is behaving very aggressively. I really hate this tank for taking photos though. The front glass is all scratched up, and it's full of algae for the same reasons as my Betta livida tank.


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## Nismo83

I like uberis dorsal.


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## Sadist

I love his dorsal, too! Your fish are gorgeous, and I love your tanks, too. I'm sorry your new fish male didn't make it.


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## Aquatail

I'm so sorry about your honey blue eyes male. Does wherever you got him from guarantee them for awhile after purchase? Like if you bring them home and they pass in a certain time period you can get your money back or get another? I believe some stores here in America do that for like a few days to a week, but I don't know about Australia.

Awesome pictures! The one of your betta uberis female that makes her scales look really green is my favorite.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah I did toss up whether to take the fish back or not, but it's a half an hour or so drive into the city (my mum has to drive me because I don't drive, and trying to find parking can be difficult. Plus if there was something wrong with my fish when I got it, I'm not sure I want another from the same tank. 

So I think I'm just going to wait, and get a mop of eggs from an actual breeder instead. This way I will know exactly how old the fish are because I'll have raised them. 

My female seems to be doing better. She's a bit less frantic with her swimming and she ate a small amount of frozen bloodworm last night. I'm considering trying to rehome her with someone who has more of this species just so she's not alone. 

I agree that the dorsal fins on the Betta uberis, are probably my favourite feature of this species. 

Aquatail, did you mean the second photo down when you were talking about my uberis female? The fish in the background of the first photo, and the fish in the second photo are one of the young males. The female does show some green irridescence but not as much as the males. They seem to almost glow under certain lighting.


----------



## Aquatail

I hadn't thought of having to get another from the same tank. Unfortunately, even if they offered just to refund you, I doubt they'd be able to do it without you actually going to the store. Well, I hope you get a nice, healthy mop of eggs sometime.

Would a small mirror help the female at all? If she thought it was another fish maybe she wouldn't feel so alone. That's just an idea, though, I'm not sure if it would work at all.

Oops, I was talking about the second photo. He's a gorgeous fish. Them almost glowing sounds so beautiful.


----------



## trilobite

Aw sorry to hear about your male! :-(

Your wilds are stunners! if I had the tank space Id snap some up in a heart beat!
Have you tried aussie aquariums auctions? theres been a few people asking for wilds on there recently but hardly anyone ever posts any


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## LittleBettaFish

I thought about using a mirror, but then I thought it might make my honey blue eyes female even more frantic because she can see 'another' fish but can't get to it. So far she seems to have settled down somewhat. She occasionally paces back and forth along the glass, but otherwise seems to spend most of her time moving around the tank. 

Funnily enough she's actually more curious and less skittish than the spotted blue eyes I have, and they've been with me longer and are in an appropriately sized school. 

I've been a bit slack with advertising my wilds. I've only put them up on the AusAqua FB group. For me, the difficult part is ensuring that my rarer species such as my sp. api api go to an individual who actually intends on working with them long-term, rather than someone who's either going to kill the fish through inexperience, or is going to quickly lose interest and sell them on. 

I believe we've got those new import laws coming into Australia in March 2016. I really don't know what effect this will have on the keeping of wild bettas in this country, but this is why I really want my fish to land in the hands of serious breeders. 

I also don't ship. I'm a worrier, and the one time I sent fish to someone, I think I almost gave myself an ulcer from stress. 

After Christmas, I'm going to advertise my fish on a couple more sites, add some photos to my ads, and hopefully I can get them moved on. 

Other than that, I really have not been doing a whole lot. It's been really hot down here in Melbourne over the past few days. I think it was 32 degrees Celsius by about 8am this morning. I have water bowls hanging on the fence, and in the front and back yards for the possums and birds because our dogs have killed a couple of heat stressed possums in previous years, and I wanted to avoid that. 

We are supposed to get a cool change at around midday and I seriously cannot wait. Once it starts hitting 40 degrees Celsius with those hot northerly winds it's like walking into an oven. We've had something like 300 fires break out in our state, but fortunately, none are near me. 

So all I did today, was water the garden and take some photos of my fish. 

Persephone male 




























My biggest Betta persephone juvenile










An F1 Betta uberis male showing his 'glowing' green sides.


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## LittleBettaFish

Since my group of spotted blue eyes were petrified of the spawning mop I purchased for them, I decided to make them another one after a visit to a craft supply shop today. 

The yarn was thicker and fuzzier than yarn I've used previously (I wanted it to have the feel of fine plant roots) and I managed to get two mops out of the one ball. 

This is what it looks like in the tank. It's not fully waterlogged, but even so, I've already had a few fish investigating it. Hopefully I will find some eggs in it in the near future. 










Then this was just a photo of one of my females. 










Unfortunately, I'm not really happy with how the tank is looking. There's what looks to be blue-green algae growing on the sand and rocks, and because the vallisneria had to go in between the rocks it's not really thriving

I think I may overhaul their tank after Christmas. I'm hoping the largest of the fry will be large enough to join the adults in a few more weeks without the risk of being eaten.


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## Sadist

I had a laugh at your fish being petrified of the store mop. Good luck with the new one!


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## LittleBettaFish

It was very odd. I wondered if it was because of the large pool noodle used to help the mop float, or the fact the mop was made of finer yarn and was not especially thick. 

They just spent all their time cowering at the back of the tank, and as soon as I took the mop out, their behaviour returned to normal. 

I don't think they are the brightest species of fish, so who knows what goes on in their heads. 

They are also very finicky eaters. They like live mosquito larvae, frozen bloodworms, freshly hatched BBS, and that's about it. They aren't fond of any of the dried foods I've tried, so I'm going to trial some Seachem Nutridiet Shrimp Flakes and see if that gets a better reception from them.


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## Sadist

Good luck!


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## LittleBettaFish

I probably shouldn't have, but I added my honey blue eyes female in with my spotted blue eyes. It's been just under two weeks and she's been perfectly healthy in that time so I figured I'd risk it as I felt she was just getting more and more stressed the longer she was by herself. 

At least the spotted blue eyes are fairly easy to replace and I have their fry on a completely separate bucket and siphon so I won't lose both groups if I've introduced some deadly pathogen into the tank. 










Here she is here, looking much less anxious now that she is in the company of other fish. Eventually once I get my hands on some more honey blue eyes again, I will remove her from this tank and she will go and enjoy the company of her own species. 

There was some leftover hydrilla verticillata that had been floating around in her tank, and since I am going to break that tank down, I decided to add it to my spotted blue eyes tank as further spawning material. 

This is what their tank looks like at the moment. I'm going to tint the water with some rooibos, but for now, it will stay like that until I have sold my wilds and I have the money to expand my collection of Australian native fish. 










Apart from that, I received the IALs and BBS eggs I purchased yesterday in the mail this morning. For any Australians reading this, I can't recommend the 'Tech Den' highly enough. I purchase my fish related dry goods predominately through them, (except for my heaters as they sadly don't stock the brand I use) and I've never had a single issue. Their prices are also super competitive and they have a flat rate for shipping which is great. 

This time I'm storing my BBS eggs in the fridge and I will see if this has an effect on the hatch rate. The brand of eggs I got seem to take longer to hatch (around 36-48 hours) so I put them on almost as soon as they arrived and hopefully they will be ready to harvest tomorrow afternoon/evening.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just a short Christmas Eve journal entry.

Exciting news is that I found an egg in my spotted blue eyes spawning mop! Granted it's only one egg, but one egg is better than nothing. Especially considering their reaction to the previous mop I had in the tank. 

I always find it ironic that when you either aren't prepared, or deliberately trying to spawn your fish, they will constantly spawn, but as soon as you set about to purposefully spawn them, you end up with nothing. 

To wrap up my post, I took some photos of my 'shiniest' Betta uberis male. He's one I've bred myself, and I'm quite proud of how he has turned out. It was difficult to get him to stay still because his brothers and parents kept disturbing him as they thought they were getting a feed. I also should have cleaned my glass. 





































Then this is his father. 










And a younger brother. 










I have this group up for sale, but I'm really torn about selling them. I mean my pair almost died of velvet and I managed to nurse them back to full health and both they and their offspring have such personable natures, and are constantly at the front of the tank begging for food. 

I honestly think I might keep them. Bloody fish.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I wanted to 'slightly' tint the water of my spotted blue eyes tank with some rooibos. But I accidentally left the tea bag in the tank longer than I was supposed to, and this was the result. 










Luckily my blue eyes don't mind. However, they just ate some frozen brine shrimp and the little buggers refused to pose for any photos. 

This female thought she could get away, but caught her in that moment right before she clamped her fins up. 










Then these are just some photos I took of my wild bettas. I had more, but while they look great on the tiny screen of my camera, when I upload them onto my laptop I realise that all the fish are out of focus. 

F1 Betta coccina male. His brother is guarding a nest of eggs/fry so he is lording it over everyone right now. 



















F1 Betta sp. api api male. I wish this group would find a buyer already! They are eating all my fish food. 










Then just my female Betta brownorum. At least one fish is always cooperative for photos! 










Meanwhile I've been busy drawing up plans for a 1.8m rack that will be dedicated solely to keeping and breeding Rhadinocentrus ornatus. I just need to either win the lottery, befriend an elderly person and become the sole beneficiary of their will, or get a job, to afford to put it all together. However, hopefully at least one of those is an achievable goal for next year.


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## LittleBettaFish

Right after I posted this yesterday, I took some more photos of my wilds. 

This is my nicest F1 Beta uberis male. 



















This is one of his bigger brothers. 










Then this is one of my F1 Betta brownorum. 










Of course my brownorum male had to find the one smudge I'd missed on the glass while I was cleaning it. 










This one was better. 










Up next is some photos of my plakat male Atlas. At the moment Atlas is looking like one of the ugliest Betta splendens I have ever seen. He has two moods: angry and hungry. 




























I gave the boys an IAL each for Christmas, and this is what appeared in Atlas's tank shortly after.


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## Nismo83

Nice uberis.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. My uberis are one of the easiest tanks of fish to take photos of, as they are always at the front and always putting on a show.


----------



## Nismo83

Seeing your thread always make me want to order new fishes.


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## Sadist

I've "slightly" tinted my tanks like that many times  I have some loose leaf rooibos and was wondering if I could sprinkle a few pieces in and leave it.

I love your fish! If I had room, I would buy them. My biggest tank is a 10 gallon, though, with no plans or room for anything bigger.


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## LittleBettaFish

Lol Nismo, the wilds are very addictive. How are your persephone going? Any signs of spawning? 

Sadist, only one of my tanks is bigger than a 10 gallon, and it's only 12 gallons (I'm not counting my goldfish tank). I don't like larger tanks as I have to do water changes manually, so it's part of the reason why I only choose to keep smaller species of fish.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> Lol Nismo, the wilds are very addictive. How are your persephone going? Any signs of spawning?
> 
> Sadist, only one of my tanks is bigger than a 10 gallon, and it's only 12 gallons (I'm not counting my goldfish tank). I don't like larger tanks as I have to do water changes manually, so it's part of the reason why I only choose to keep smaller species of fish.


Yeah. Addictive. Currently I am in Thailand with 5 Macrostoma traveling with me in the north east region. Persephone aren't showing signs yet. Probably the pH is not low enough I guess.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah, the persephone can be tricky. But it seems with the persephone that if you can get that first spawn from them, they will continue to spawn.


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## Nismo83

I hope they will soon. Will be moving to rental apartment soon. So will probably shift the fishes to the new place as well.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well speaking of Betta persephone, today I discovered my 3.5 year old Betta persephone female, dead on the bottom of the tank. 

I fed everyone last night and I'm fairly certain she was out and about then, so I don't know what happened. None of the other fish seem to be showing signs of illness, so hopefully it wasn't anything contagious. 

With her death, there's only one surviving male from my original F1 group, and only one female Betta persephone left. 

I hope there are others in this country breeding this species, as unless one or more of my fry turn out to be female, that's it for me with this species. 

Apart from that, I've set-up a hospital tank for my Betta hendra group. Hopefully _this_ time I can get rid of the velvet for good. Then I am going to have to decide whether I want to keep or sell the group. 

Other than that, the rest of my fish are doing okay, even though my fish room is about 32 degrees Celsius. I've been in there half the day pottering around and it's like working in a sauna. 

Finally, here are just some photos of my very unphotogenic Betta coccina male (he is the father of my Betta coccina brood). I swear I do not have a single decent photo of this fish and I think I've owned him for at least a year now. 



















This photo is blurry but it's one of the rare photos I have of my pair together. This pair is probably the strongest bonded pair in my fish room.


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## LittleBettaFish

I spent the morning of the new year in my fish room. I changed the water on about 3/4s of my wild betta tanks, as well as my spotted blue eyes tanks. Somehow, even though I only remove 2L of water from each tank, I end up with about 50L of water on my floor. 

I have a clerestory window behind my fish rack. It used to have curtains, but then they broke and so I removed them. Unfortunately, the amount of sunlight coming in through that window has turned my Betta livida and F1 Betta coccina tanks into almost a soup of slimy green algae. I put a bed sheet up behind the tanks yesterday, but I think it's reached the point where I'm going to have to do a complete teardown on the coccina tank, and hopefully the buyer for my livida group is able to take them before a teardown becomes necessary for that tank as well. 

I don't mind a bit of algae and diatoms, but at the moment, it looks like the plants in both tanks are covered in mucus. 

Apart from that, I also have to teardown my old honey blue eyes tank as it's sitting empty with some half-dead vallisneria in it. I'm hoping I can revive the vallisneria and use it in a future set-up. 

On the topic of blue-eyes, I took some fun photos of a couple of my spotted blue eyes having a turf war. I'd just fed the group some mosquito larvae and freshly hatched BBS, and this part of the tank was prime real estate. I did have an awesome shot lined up of them circling each other with their fins up, but they ruined it by moving too quickly. 










Bit of body bumping/nipping










A failed attempt to move her rival on. 










Then this is one of my smaller males. I was chasing my two smaller males around the tank with my camera for ages, until finally I gave up an used a bribe. 










The last photo is just of their tank. I've given up breeding this group. I didn't find any eggs in the spawning mop so I took it out. I don't know if they are eating the eggs or simply not laying any, but I have their fry, and hopefully there is at least one breeding pair in that group. 

The fish right up the top that is a different colour, is my honey blue eyes female. You'd think she was a spotted blue eyes the way she interacts with the group. 










Now I just need to feed my Betta persephone juveniles/fry, and move my Betta hendra into their hospital tank and start their treatment. Hopefully I can avoid poisoning them.


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## LittleBettaFish

After what is likely hours of chasing my Betta coccina male around with the camera in the year or so I've owned him, I finally got some half-decent shots. 

His female is very plump, showing some prominent breeding bars, and is displaying a paler line down her topline. So I would not be surprised if they spawned in the near future.

There do appear to be a couple of small juveniles that I spot every now and then foraging at the bottom of this tank, but they vanish very easily into the moss and so all I can do is throw in some BBS and hope they are eating it. 



















I think this was the best photo of the lot. 










The female










She was hiding from him here










I was trying to get a side-on shot of him flaring at the pen. Unfortunately, I was unsuccessful. 










Putting his female back in her place











Other than that, yesterday was a bit of a debacle when I went to move my hendra group into the hospital tank. I had this large piece of wood in their tank and two fish had managed to wedge themselves into it. One fell out and flopped into my leg shortly after I removed it from the tank, but the other one didn't fall out until I put the wood down on the pavers out the front, to dry in the sun. 

They had their first dose of cupramine yesterday afternoon, and when I checked on them this morning they were feeling well enough to have a bit of a tussle. 

So I've got my fingers crossed I can permanently cure them of velvet, and there aren't any further flare-ups.


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## LittleBettaFish

I took this photo of puppy Clio just before, and I thought it was too cute not to share. 










She's about nine months now, and still as much of a terror as she was when we brought her home. However, after watching a whole slew of clicker training videos on Youtube (although I say 'yes' instead of using a clicker as I am too uncoordinated) I've been doing daily training sessions with her to try and shape her into an upstanding canine citizen. 

We haven't made any great leaps and bounds, but in the end, all I want is a well-mannered dog that can recall reliably off leash, heel at my side when asked, and maybe even perform a couple of tricks. I don't mind how long it takes us to get there, as I've just been having a lot of fun working with her. 

She still has has an issue with the muscles in one of her ears. However, it's greatly improved from when she went around looking like her head was stuck on crooked, and hopefully in a couple more months, it will be good enough that it's not going to get her majorly penalised in the show ring. 

It's hard to believe how fast they grow up. Although I am definitely not missing toilet training in the middle of winter. Never again would I get a puppy at that time of year! 

Other than that, I got a couple photos of my biggest juvenile Betta persephone. That anal fin is looking like it's getting pointier so I'm wondering if perhaps this isn't a male.


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## LittleBettaFish

_FINALLY_, I am getting a decent hatch rate with my BBS cysts again. I've been keeping the cysts in their sealed packet in the fridge, and I've been sterilising the jar I hatch them in, in between hatchings. 

Not only am I getting more cysts hatching than when I used this brand previously, but they are also hatching out a lot faster. 

It's nice to see my fry with full stomachs, and my spotted blue eyes adults have also been enjoying their freshly hatched BBS. The BBS go down into the leaf litter, and I find it encourages very natural foraging behaviour. 

One thing I've noticed on this forum, is that Betta splendens breeders often have a hard time discerning when a female is ready to spawn.

With my wild bettas it's much less difficult. I know as soon as this line appears down the back of my females (provide they are in breeding condition and it's not some sort of stress colouration), they are ready, or almost ready to spawn. 

This is my Betta coccina female from this morning. 



















Then she realised I'd put food into the tank, and she decided to leave the male waiting, and grab a bite to eat. 










I also took some photos of my brownorum group because they are on the same shelf. 

This is one of the smaller juveniles, but starting to show some nice colouration. 










One of the biggest juveniles, but its colour is much duller. 










My male surveying his territory. 










Then this was my female chasing the male off. 










Otherwise, I added the second dose of Seachem Cupramine to the hospital tank. So now I'll be hovering anxiously by all day, hoping that they don't have any adverse reactions even though I've treated them a couple times before without any harm befalling them.


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## BullyBettas

Awesome fish budd..


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. The wilds have always been my favourite over the man-made Betta splendens varieties. 

Got a nest full of eggs from my coccina pair, but I don't think any fry will last long with their cannibalistic older siblings around.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> Thanks. The wilds have always been my favourite over the man-made Betta splendens varieties.
> 
> Got a nest full of eggs from my coccina pair, but I don't think any fry will last long with their cannibalistic older siblings around.


true. wilds are addictive.. in the past I did kept channoides and mahachai before. but I wasn't knowledgeable enough 12 years ago. 

why don't you remove the cannibalistic siblings?


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## LittleBettaFish

Because I don't have the space to set-up extra tanks, and my main goal is to produce fish for myself, not to sell. So I only need a small number of young fish per species. 

Plus I would have to keep tearing my tanks apart trying to catch every single fry or juvenile in the tank. 

Anyway, today I had the camera charged up, and I got some more photos of my spotted blue eyes group. Unfortunately, I still haven't managed to capture a decent photo of my males sparring. They just move too fast for my camera and by the time I have them in focus they've stopped flaring. 










I don't know what was being eaten here. 










This photo was my favourite from today. 





































I'm also overhauling their tank sometime this week, or the next. 

I purchased two different sized gravel substrates, and I'm going to mix them together to give a more natural look. Underneath this, will be a layer of laterite, and a couple of 'Dino Dung' balls, which are root tabs made of clay and fertiliser. 










Planted into this gravel, will be bed of vallisneria nana, to emulate how it would grow in the wild. Then I will just scatter some eucalyptus and paperbark leaves over the bottom, and maybe put in a few smaller sticks and branches. 

I purchased this finer grained 'gravel' (it's really more of a coarse sand) to use in a tank for either honey blue eyes, or delicate blue eyes. I really haven't decided yet. All I know is that it will include a hefty amount of melaleuca wood, and some bunches of a native species of milfoil. 










This week is the week I have to get off my butt and contact the (prospective) buyer of my Betta livida group to see if they are able to take them off my hands soon. Then I will take some photos of my wilds I'm trying to sell, maybe drop some of the prices on them, and bump up their ad on FB. 

Lastly, this is a photo of one of my spotted blue eyes fry. I'm so happy with how well these guys are going considering how dismal past attempts have been to raise blue eyes fry. I'm glad I picked up some Sera Micron, as I think this is what made the difference.


----------



## Nismo83

I really like your tank... will you be able to design one for my mac? hahaha.. they will be shifting house sometime next week.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha my 'design' method half the time is just to literally throw rocks and wood and leaves into the tank to make them look more naturally placed.


----------



## Nismo83

Better than mine. Lol


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## LittleBettaFish

I got my melaleuca branches/roots down from the top of my wardrobe, and I started working on a scape for my next native tank. I think this was the most natural looking combination I came up with. 

The plan will be to have a bunch of Myriophyllum dicoccum/Howard River Milfoil in 
and around the branches on the right-hand side of the tank. 



















I'm still not sure whether to go with honey blue eyes or delicate blue eyes. I could probably squeeze some rhads in there, but I think they are better suited for a 60cm tank. The delicate blue eyes also get quite large so I am leaning towards a small group of honey blue eyes. 

I'm also going to place an order with Aquagreen for my plants and soil today. Then I can work on setting up a new tank for my spotted blue eyes group, and move them across into it. I'm hoping the darker substrate and increased cover will make them colour up more. 

Betta wise, my Betta hendra group look like they are doing really well in the hospital tank. I gave them all a feeding of blackworms this morning and their colour has intensified and their fins are no longer clamped. I'm always amazed by how fast the turnaround is on even heavily infected fish when they are put into a darkened tank dosed with Cupramine. 

My male Betta coccina is still guarding his nest of eggs. He's a very good father. He barely ever leaves the nest, and he always gets very depressed when the fry become free-swimming and it takes him several days to recover.


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## Nismo83

Do you ever worry of the waste that will be accumulated below the sand level?


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## LittleBettaFish

Not really. I usually end up with waste and detritus all over the bottom of my tanks because I don't use a gravel vacuum, but it's likely the plants absorb some of this waste as nutrients.


----------



## Nismo83

ok. maybe I am too paranoid about excessive waste accumulation. I always siphon the dirt off from the base for bare tank. my first Persephone tank is setup based of imitation of your tanks.. haha


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I don't really worry myself too much about keeping my wild betta tanks clean. As long as the water quality is good (ammonia 0ppm etc.), and my fish are healthy and/or spawning, I don't mess with the tanks very much at all. 

In other news, I'm sad to report that my largest spotted blue eyes male has passed. He's always _been_ healthy, but he's never _looked_ healthy. I don't know what has happened. There might have been something going on internally or perhaps he was just an older male as this species is not long-lived. 

To cheer myself up, I took some photos of the rest of the group. Although I suspect it's the same female in all the shots!

I'm getting better at photographing them now. I put a whole heap of microworms or mosquito larvae in the tank, and catch them while they are busy picking through the leaf litter. 



















This is one of my remaining males. I think I only have three males and seven females now, but at least I look to have a few males in my grow-out. 










I also think the one egg I picked off my mop the other week, hatched. Because I have this tiny fry in my grow-out that would have to be the slowest developing runt ever. 

It's small enough that I was worried it might be cannibalised by its larger siblings, but they just seem to ignore it. 

Now I've just got to feed the rest of my fish, put a fresh batch of cysts into my BBS hatchery, and place my Aquagreen order, although it likely now won't come until next week. 

Finally, I'm not sure if anyone reading this remembers when I posted about my eucalyptus seedlings I had growing after they sprouted in some of the pots around our house. I have nine separate seedlings in total, and the largest (fondly known as 'Gumby') has really had a growth spurt. This is what it looks like now. 

The tank next to the pot is 20cm tall to give an idea of scale. I've been pestering my mum to allow me to plant all of my seedlings in the garden. I'm not sure what species of eucalyptus they are, however I figure it's going to be decades before they are big enough to pose any sort of problem, and by then, we will have moved out. 

I just love gum trees. There are so many beautiful species, and they are just so quintessentially Australian. 



















I just have to stop the bloody possums eating the one out the front of our house to death! My gums are definitely having possum guard put around their trunks when they get large enough as otherwise they just decimate them.


----------



## Sadist

I can't wait for your new tank to be done! I love how the natural ones you have look.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Sadist.

Hopefully I can move my spotted blue eyes into their new tank by the middle of next week (I just need to order the plants and substrate additives), and then in another week or so, I can have my other tank up and running as well. 

Speaking of spotted blue eyes, I swear these fish are the finickiest in my fish room. They really only like live foods, and frozen bloodworms. I have tried them on NLS flake, Aquaculture Crumble that they were raised on at the breeder's/seller's place, and today I just picked up some Seachem NutriDiet 'Shrimp Flakes', to see how they would go. 

They responded to it more eagerly than I've seen them respond to any dry foods thus far, but they still did spit a fair amount of it out. However, I think if I persist, they will eat it less grudgingly. 

At least my honey blue eyes female is enthusiastic about whatever I put into the tank. 

Now here's a few photos of my wilds, mostly my various young uberis males. 

First up is my Betta brownorum female. She's got some tears in her fins as she's been flirting with the male. 



















Then my Betta uberis matriarch. She was disciplining one of her sons. 










Then here are said sons.




























Then this is one of the tiny Betta miniopinna juveniles/sub-adults that live with the Betta uberis group. I think they are smaller than they should be at this age, because they get run off from the majority of the food by the similar sized uberis. So I've been trying to target feed them BBS to at least give them a chance to catch-up. 










This is one of my Betta livida F1. I only have four young fish, and only one of them is female. Both she and the oldest male F1 are missing eyes. I'm not sure if it was the adults in the tank or their siblings that are responsible. 










Then finally here are a few shots from my sp. api api F1 group. I think there's at least two dozen in this tank. 




























My Betta hendra group are also in trouble. I had a look in the hospital tank today and the males have been tearing up each other's fins. It's going to be a while before they are back to being 'photo ready'.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Put my order in with Aquagreen. I'm getting three bunches of Vallisneria nana, one bunch of Howard River milfoil, 1kg of laterite, and 50 Dino Dung root tabs. 

My goal is to have my spotted blue eyes in their new tank by the end of next week. 

Other than that, I was puttering around my fish room earlier today and took a few photos. 

First up, is a photo of Atlas's and Maverick's tanks. The crypts lost only a couple of leaves, but seem to be rooting well into the substrate now, and the anubias in both tanks have gained new leaves. 










The boys were left uncarded for a couple hours this morning, and subsequently built bubblenests right where the other one could see. Sadly for Atlas, Maverick's was bigger. 










Then I was following the miniopinna juvenile from the post above around. I was surprised by how feisty it was, considering it's almost small enough to be eaten by some of the fish in there. 










The fish to the left got attacked and chased off. 










Unfortunately, the tables are quick to turn. 










Then this was just two of my Betta uberis. 



















Followed by a photo of my Betta brownorum male putting one of his offspring in its place. I definitely think the fish from this complex have a naturally 'fierce' look. 










Lastly, my Betta coccina male is done, or is almost done with his fry raising responsibilities. So now he is resuming his chasing responsibilities.


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## trilobite

Aw poor Atlas, his best efforts were futile..

Im sure youve heard this from me 100 times but your wilds are absolutely stunning! So long and snake like. I love that little feisty miniopinna! he seems to have way more confidence in himself than he should have haha
Whats that plant youve got floating in their tanks?


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## LittleBettaFish

I think Atlas spends more time racing around his tank flaring at everything than he does working on his bubblenest. 

For me, part of the appeal of this complex of wilds is their long, snake-like bodies. It's just very easy to make them obese if you overfeed them rich/fatty foods, and then they look like blimps with fins, so I feed them as sparingly as I can. 

The plant is Mayaca fluviatilis. I have it floating in most of my wild betta tanks and it's one of my favourite plants for providing dense surface cover.


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## Nismo83

I think I am going to catch the uberis itch soon


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## LittleBettaFish

They are a nice species. Very easy to breed too. I'm glad my current pair decided to stop spawning when they did or I would have been overrun with fry. Same as the past pairs I've had.

I've found they can be quite aggressive though.


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## Nismo83

I will certainly get them once I settle down at new place


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## LittleBettaFish

I just love the almost dragon like scaling on the males, and the way their dorsal fins look like a sail. 

Well I was going to move my spotted blue eyes group into their new tank next week. However, I found a fry swimming around in the tank today. It was fairly large, so it's obviously managed to avoid being eaten by the ten hungry adults for some time. 

I'm not sure if this is the only fry in the tank, or there are more fry, but I think I'm going to relocate this fry, and any others, into the grow-out rather than into the new tank. I think the conditions in the grow-out are going to match the main tank more closely than the conditions of the new tank would, and while my adults can handle the stress of a move, I'm not sure a fry this young would.


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## Sadist

How're they doing today?


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## LittleBettaFish

If you meant my spotted blue eyes fry, they are doing fine. I found another fry in the main tank, so I think I've got almost a dozen fry all up. Although it seems like the majority will be male based on behaviour and finnage. 

I'm not really happy with the spotted blue eye fry in the grow-out tank. I have seen my largest fry flicking against the heater cord several times. 

However, none of the other fry are showing any symptoms of disease. They look healthy, and are behaving as I would expect healthy fish to. I checked over them with a bright torch and couldn't see any 'dusting', which would indicate velvet, so I'm just taking a 'wait and see' approach before I jump in with medication. 

The two fry in the main tank are sparring constantly, and while they don't do as much damage to each other as betta fry would, they are still fairly aggressive. 

This ghastly looking tank is supposed to be my spotted blue eyes new home. I'm not happy with any of it. It was meant to look like a bed of vallisneria growing in a gravel bottomed river, but it just looks like a clump of vallisneria stuck into a pile of aquarium gravel. 










It doesn't help that I stirred up the clay in the laterite under the gravel when I was planting the vals and filling the tank up. This was the tank _after_ a water change. I think there will be a few more water changes happening before I even think about introducing any fish into it. 

I swear vallisneria is the most frustrating plant to plant. It keeps uprooting itself if I so much as look at it the wrong way. I wanted it all to be flowing the same way so as to look like the ends are streaming along the current of a river, but it refuses to do so, and if I try to make it, it uproots itself just to spite me. 

So I think I'm just going to have to wait until it anchors itself into the substrate before I attempt any sort of manual manipulation. 

I also need more leaf litter, and the leaf litter needs to age more so as to look more natural. I also want to scatter some eucalyptus twigs/small branches around on the bottom to form some 'snags' where my fish can poke around in and hide. 

I also way over ordered the vallisneria. I've got about a full bunch of it left in a bucket so I am going to have to figure out what to do with it. It would be a waste to throw it out or let it die. 

I did try to take some photos of my spotted blue eyes group, but they are hiding behind the rock in their tank and refusing to come out. I think they were not happy with the water change I did earlier today. 

So I got a few photos of my Betta uberis. 

This is my original female with a Betta miniopinna juvenile. 



















Then one of the F1 males. 



















I'm sort of going back through a fish room slump at the moment. Nothing is how I want it to look, but I don't have the finances to make it look the way I want it to. I want to get rid of the majority of my wild bettas but I also want them to go to buyers that know how to care for them properly. I want to get more Australian natives, but I can't until I sell off my wilds.

There's also been this awesome book on Australian rainbowfish released recently, which I really need to convince someone to buy for me because I can't afford it. 

I think 2016 is definitely going to have to be the year I get a job again. I just need to find a job that I can manage with my anxiety.


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## Fenghuang

Sorry about the fish slump. I go through cycles of that too, so I definitely understand. There are times when just nothing seems to be going right and the hobby makes you want to tear your hair out.

Personally, I love the way your tanks look, so part of it might just be every individual natural inclination to be overly critical of their own work. And the fact that you're taking so much time to sell your wilds shows that you care about them and where they end up. You are a responsible hobbyist, unlike the ones that just want to turn a quick buck or get rid of fish quickly so you can move onto something new and shiny.

Out of curiosity, what book is that? Sounds interesting...


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## LittleBettaFish

I am very overly critical and a real perfectionist in other areas of my life, and unfortunately this does spill into my hobbies. So it's really easy for me to get frustrated by my tanks because they don't look exactly how I imagined them to. 

It's only that I try not to cause my fish too much stress by making too many changes, that I don't tear my tanks apart more frequently. 

It's also why I find it difficult training our puppy. I have what are likely unrealistic expectations and I have to be careful I don't lose my temper with Clio because of that. 

The book is called 'Freshwater Fishes of Australia Volume 2'. It's basically photos and info on many of the species of Australian fish I'm interested in keeping/breeding.


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## Fenghuang

Ugh, yeah, I want to constantly get the urge to mess with my tanks. But it can be so much work and a hassle with the fish already in the tank and everything... Perhaps in the future, you could try using potted plants? This way "tearing them apart" wouldn't be completely messy for you or as stressful for your fish. 

This guy I watch on Youtube raises, I think, mainly wild livebearers and shrimp and all his tank scapes look really natural, but he rescape this tank and turns out his plants are just potted and cleverly disguised.

http://youtu.be/7ciySBcLnWc

Holy moly, $105! :shock:


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah the book is fairly expensive, but the photos are beautiful based on what I've seen from the preview, and from what I know of the author's other works. 

The plants I grow in my tanks are floating, not planted, and because the tanks are only small (between 7-10 gallons and usually only 3/4s full) I only use a thin layer of aqua soil so my fish aren't on bare glass and to provide my plants with some nutrients. 

I was thinking of using pots in my goldfish tank if they ever get their promised upgrade into a 100 gallon tank. They are so destructive with plants, I thought using pots buried beneath the substrate, and then and weighing the pots and plants down with large river pebbles might stop the goldfish from uprooting them.

But having once watched my goldfish working on uprooting a clump of vallisneria for a good quarter of an hour, I have my doubts.


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## Fenghuang

I googled it and the photographs look to be of very good quality. I enjoy photobooks too. But shame that one might be a little out of reach for me.

Oh, I forgot it is also hard to get some plants that are so common here in Australia, right? But it might be easier to have scape with some plants rooted in pots, since floating ones just don't ever seen to stay how you want them. But the floaters that just do whatever they want is more natural anyway...

For goldfish, you I have heard you have to kind of teach them as juveniles to not munch on the plants. Feed them enough greens so they leave your scape along. Mine totally never did learn (except two tiny ex-feeders that were honestly a bit dumb so...), so they were just stuck with plastic plants.


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## LittleBettaFish

I actually prefer the look of floating plants. I use java moss at the bottom of all my wild betta tanks, and then have a whole mass of floating plants at the surface with their roots growing down towards the substrate and providing extra cover. At the moment most of my wild betta tanks are looking okay, except for a couple of tanks that got overrun with algae because I no longer have a curtain on one of my windows and the tanks have been receiving too much light. 

What I really wish I could grow in my tanks, is java fern. Whenever I try to grow java fern, the leaves eventually develop these brown translucent spots, die back, and whatever this infection is, it then spreads to any other rhizome based plant in the tank. I can have java fern growing well for a year and then suddenly it dies off in a matter of days, along with any bolbitis or anubias I may have in the tank with it. No idea what it is, but I've learned not to buy java fern anymore. 

I have no issues with growing anubias, it's just so expensive to use in place of java fern and it takes longer to grow. 

I like the look of Amazon Frogbit, but I've only ever had luck with it in open top tanks. It seems to melt in my wild betta tanks, and I'm not sure if it's because of the condensation from the cling wrap. One plant I did have success with, and wish I still had, is Asian watergrass. I just can't find anyone that sells it. 

My goldfish don't seem to eat anything but their NLS goldfish pellets and frozen foods. I tried feeding them greens, I even made them a gel food specially designed for goldfish that was packed full of vegetables, and they wouldn't touch it. I can't even switch pellet brand because they only seem to eat the NLS pellets and it's just a waste of money.

Most of the time when they uproot plants they don't even eat them. 

Perhaps the goldfish know that deep down I don't particularly like them. I'm probably still going to be carting them around a decade from now.


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## Nismo83

Frogbits needs lotsa of light


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## blueridge

LittleBettaFish said:


> What I really wish I could grow in my tanks, is java fern. Whenever I try to grow java fern, the leaves eventually develop these brown translucent spots, die back, and whatever this infection is, it then spreads to any other rhizome based plant in the tank. I can have java fern growing well for a year and then suddenly it dies off in a matter of days, along with any bolbitis or anubias I may have in the tank with it. No idea what it is, but I've learned not to buy java fern anymore.


LBF if you ever find out what causes that, I would be curious to know too. My java fern does the same thing, and actually I had a huge plant that looked nice and was growing well, and then about a week ago it started to develop those brown spots.


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## LittleBettaFish

I believe my lighting would be considered fairly high lighting for the tank size I have (lights is not one of my strong areas when it comes to this hobby). Each light has two 24 watt T5 High Output Fluro tubes, and obviously being a floating plant, the Amazon Frogbit would have been receiving the lion's share of light. 

Blueridge, I tried asking on another forum and I've done lots of research and the only point I've found of any interest, was talk of a java fern 'virus'. However, there was scant information available and most of it was speculation. 

I've lost a tank full of java fern that had been happily growing for months, without any warning at all. There was no suspicious pinholes, no yellowing or browning of leaves prior. The plant simply melts away in as little as 24-48 hours after developing the first translucent spot. It then infects any anubias or bolbitis that is in the tank with it. 

However, the plant itself doesn't die. If you trim back the leaves right to the rhizome, it will eventually regrow.

It's a real shame as I like java fern. It's relatively cheap, easy to grow, comes in lots of different varieties, and the green leaves provide a nice contrast against the reds and blues of my wilds.

I'm not sure if there are any similarities between what happened to my java fern and what is happening to yours (yours could simply be some sort of nutrient deficiency), but this is just my experience.


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## blueridge

LittleBettaFish said:


> Blueridge, I tried asking on another forum and I've done lots of research and the only point I've found of any interest, was talk of a java fern 'virus'. However, there was scant information available and most of it was speculation.
> 
> I've lost a tank full of java fern that had been happily growing for months, without any warning at all. There was no suspicious pinholes, no yellowing or browning of leaves prior. The plant simply melts away in as little as 24-48 hours after developing the first translucent spot. It then infects any anubias or bolbitis that is in the tank with it.
> 
> However, the plant itself doesn't die. If you trim back the leaves right to the rhizome, it will eventually regrow.
> 
> It's a real shame as I like java fern. It's relatively cheap, easy to grow, comes in lots of different varieties, and the green leaves provide a nice contrast against the reds and blues of my wilds.
> 
> I'm not sure if there are any similarities between what happened to my java fern and what is happening to yours (yours could simply be some sort of nutrient deficiency), but this is just my experience.


My java fern did the same as yours did, and my one plant I had had for over a year. I don't know if mine might be a nutrient deficiency though, because I don't have the problem of it affecting my anubias that is in the same tank. But I also dose with seachem excel too once a week :-? It is kind of weird. I haven't tried cutting back the bad leaves. I normally have just thrown the plant out.


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## LittleBettaFish

Lost one of my spotted blue eyes females yesterday. I don't know what happened. No issue with water quality, and there were no lesions or other visible signs of disease or parasites on her. 

All the other fish in the tank are fine, including the two fry. So I'm baffled. 

I was concerned about my spotted blue eyes fry in the grow-out having velvet but they seem healthy still. I turned up the sponge filter in their tank because I was worried about there not being enough oxygen, and now they spend all their time with their heads pointing into the current because this is the corner I feed them in. 

My spotted blue eyes males were putting on a lovely display after I fed them today and I tried and tried to catch them with sparring/displaying with their fins fully erect on the macro lens. But then I gave up and just snapped a few semi-blurry shots of them using the standard lens. 



















This male is rather odd looking. He is paler than my other two males and has enormous eyes. Knowing my luck, he's probably the father of all my fry! 










Then I was concerned about the health of my Betta coccina pair. The male was not as coloured up as he normally is, and they were both being a bit reclusive. However, they were both eager for their blackworms today so I don't think anything is wrong with them. Sometimes the male does get a little depressed when his fry become free-swimming and it can take him a while to bounce back if they don't immediately spawn again after. 










I also found this in Maverick's tank. Atlas and him are locked in a battle of the minds. I think it's purely psychological warfare. 










I think this is one of the best photos I have of Maverick. Mr Stumpy Bodied Spoon Head in all his glory. 










Atlas is looking better. I think his ventrals are finally growing back. 










Apart from that, I completely tore down my F1 Betta coccina tank. The algae had just taken over, and so now they are in a 30cm cube. Unfortunately, I used up all the water from my water aging tub in their new tank, so water changes will have to be skipped this week. I had five or six rooibos tea bags in 13 litres of water in my tub, so you can imagine how dark the water in their new tank is. 

I've also put polystyrene sheets behind and in between the tanks on my top shelf, just to try and prevent as much light reaching them from my clerestory window.


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## trilobite

Oh man I love Maverick! Especially his big black eyes. I feel like its time for a bit of a domestic betta spawn ;-)

Sorry to hear about your little blue eyes girl. Those males are looking really nice though


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## LittleBettaFish

I _might_ have been tempted if I'd had the space and money. But Maverick has a short, out of proportion body, and a bad topline and both of those faults would nix him as a potential breeding candidate for me.

This was the male I would have really have liked to have had a spawn from. Really the only things that bothered me about him was his anal fin, and that he wasn't as thick through the body as I would like to have seen. He came from Jodi-Lea and it was a real shame he was an egg eater. 










One day I'm going to get an in focus, close-up photo of one of the spotted blue eyes males with his fins fully erect. They look simply spectacular when they are sparring and displaying. I'm bummed I haven't been able to sell any of my wilds because I really want to increase the number of natives I'm keeping. 

Their new tank is on hold at the moment. I think I need more gravel as the vallisneria keeps uprooting itself. So frustrating. I'm not looking forward to tearing that tank apart with all the laterite/clay under the gravel.


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## Nismo83

sorry to hear the lost of the blue eye


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## trilobite

He doesnt look horribly short but its probs just the photo. I had a red boy once who looked relatively normal on camera but in real life was such a mess...I wish I could look half normal in photos like he did lol..

Oh man though, that marble is lovely and that dorsal is my dream dorsal, that sucks about his egg eating, its always the ones we want to breed that tend to have other plans

I look forward to the day when you get your perfect blue eyes shot!
What camera do you use? Im getting sick of constantly mine acting up on me and contemplating a new one.

Good luck with your wild sales! I know how frustrating it can be to get rid of fish sometimes


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## LittleBettaFish

I am surprisingly fond of my spotted blue eyes group. When you watch them long enough you really notice their individual personalities and start to pick out your favourites. Hopefully that is the last one I lose. 

Trilobite, I agree that it's always the ones you want to spawn most, which won't. It's like how it always seems that the fish you treasure most keels over, while the fish that mean very little, seem to live forever. 

I use my mum's old Canon Eos. I know nothing about cameras and changing the different functions, so I just set it on the close-up setting and switch out the 'standard' lens for the macro lens if I want a real close-up photo. 

Moving on to other fish related topics, my spotted blue eyes fry were going crazy this morning. The largest was chasing everyone around with his fins flashing and putting on quite a show. 

I really tried to get a photo of some of my larger fry. Unfortunately, they just move too fast. So instead I managed to get a photo of the smallest fry in the tank. Surprisingly even though it could easily fit into the mouth of its siblings, they don't try to eat it. 










Then Maverick and Atlas were continuing their battle when I uncarded them this morning. 










My Betta coccina pair are definitely back to their old selves, and feeling rather frisky this morning. 




























My Betta uberis group were also feeling their oats (or perhaps I should say 'blackworms') this morning. 




























Then I managed a couple of photos of my Betta brownorum bubs before they got chased away by their father. I find this species one of the most difficult to sex as in some cases the females can look very similar to the males. A lack of a spot does not indicate that the fish is female as some females can have extremely large lateral spots. 



















Finally to wrap it all up, out of the dozens of photos I took of my spotted blue eyes group this morning, there was only one worth posting.


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## LittleBettaFish

I went and picked up 5kg of this 3mm brown gravel yesterday as I am going to tear down the 'new' spotted blue eyes tank, and redo it, with the vallisneria planted much deeper. 

Other than that, I've just been sort of moping around my fish room as it's in such disarray. I'm just about ready to pull the whole thing apart. Meanwhile, my Betta coccina group are sitting on the bottom shelf of my sideboard because the only free spots on my rack where next to tanks where the fish had been, or are, infected with velvet. That spot was originally taken by my water aging tub, so now I have nowhere to put that. 

Ugh. I hate mess and chaos. 

So I took a few photos to cheer myself up that it's not all doom and gloom.

First up, is my Betta coccina male.



















Then one of my smallest/youngest Betta uberis.



















Up next is my Betta brownorum male showing off his long, sinuous body. 










Finally, his female, looking very red in this photo. 










I'm also annoyed that my Betta hendra don't seem to be making a full recovery. I'm not seeing as much dusting on the body, but there are still spots on the pectoral fins. The group is doing fine and all of them are looking much better, but I don't want to take them out of that hospital tank until I know they are 100% cured. However, I am personally sick of staring at tanks with blankets draped over them.


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## Nismo83

Have you ever tried malachit green?


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## LittleBettaFish

I think I've tried nearly every medication designed for use against velvet that is available in Australia. Seachem Cupramine seems to be the safest to use on my wilds (as long as I don't overdose it), and apart from this current infection with the Betta hendra, I've had great success with it. 

I think I'm going to put the group through a second round of treatment, and hopefully this will be enough to kill off those last remaining parasites. 

I completely redid my spotted blue eyes tank. Because I had used the laterite soil under the gravel along with clay root tabs, which had started to break down into chunks of mud, it took me ages to rinse all the clay out of the gravel. I'm not happy with the look of the substrate. It's not really what I envisioned at all, but I'm hoping once I add more leaf litter, and once the vallisneria starts to spread, it might not bother me as much. 

I was so careful planting the vallinseria this time, and thankfully none of it has worked loose. There is some milfoil floating around on top of the vallisneria, but this will be removed once the fish go into the tank. 










Then I just took a few 'happy snaps' of some of my fish. 





































I really don't like the shape of this Betta persephone juvenile. The angle of the photo makes it look even stumpier than it actually is. 










Then this is just two of my smaller Betta uberis at the front, with a Betta miniopinna behind.


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## Nismo83

do you have a tank to spare? sometimes the tank is "over-crowded" with the ich that we can't see.. changing to another tank may help.


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## LittleBettaFish

They were moved from their original tank into a hospital tank. Their original tank was then drained, the substrate and wood left out in direct sun for a couple days when the temperature was around 40 degrees Celsius. The plants from their tank have been left soaking for the past few weeks in water treated with Seachem Cupramine to hopefully kill any parasites that were remaining. 

The hospital tank was set-up with fresh tap water and was wiped out with hot water and white vinegar before the fish went into it. 

I'm going to have to set-up another tank to let the water age for a few days so the pH can stabilise, and so I don't accidentally poison them as apparently you have to wait a day or so after using Seachem Prime before you can dose with Cupramine. Then I will move them across and breakdown the hospital tank they are in now. 

I've just been feeding my fish, so I took the opportunity to get several photos of my spotted blue eyes as this is the only time they stay still. 

This is my largest female. 










This is one of my males.










Then this is my bloody honey blue eyes female that ruins about 95% of the photos I try to take of this tank by swimming through them. Usually she travels at the speed of light, but I got lucky and managed to catch her while she was stopped.


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## LittleBettaFish

My future spotted blue eyes tank doesn't have a heater in it yet, and while it's summer, the temperature outside has really only been mid to high twenties during the day, and cooler overnight. I also haven't added any water conditioner as I was planning on doing a couple more water changes before I added the fish. 

Therefore, I was very surprised to discover not one, but two, spotted blue eyes fry swimming around in there. 

Because the milfoil had been in with my spotted blue eyes group, I went through it for ages looking for eggs, and I couldn't find a single one.

Obviously, I just didn't look hard enough. 

I'm not sure if there are more eggs/fry, but I now have around a dozen young spotted blue eyes spread between three tanks. 

Considering the lukewarm reception my spawning mops receive, I might just tie an elastic band around the ends of the milfoil and use it to collect eggs instead. 

Now I'm too afraid to do anything to the tank in case I kill the fry. I think I might add a heater and slowly bring the temperature up, as well as some Prime, and leave the water changes until the fry are a little older.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well now I have three tiny fry swimming around in the future spotted blue eyes tank. Not sure if there are any others, or this is it. 

The three fry are swimming around together, and I managed to get a photo of one of them up against the glass. 










This tank has also been overtaken by snails, and the waste they produce has completely covered the leaf litter making it look very unsightly. So any snail I see, gets squashed. 

Then because my wilds decided to be cooperative (they haven't been fed today so are easy to bribe), I took a few photos. 

My Betta coccina pair have been flirting. 




























My Betta brownorum pair were also feeling sassy.










Then just one of my Betta persephone males and the largest juvenile.



















I'm so far behind on water changes. So tomorrow I'm filling up my water aging tub and I will get them all done next weekend. The weather's just been so hot, stormy, and sticky, I really haven't felt like doing much of anything. 

I also need to get my behind in to gear, take some photos and redo the advertisements for my wild bettas. 

It was a good thing I got into the wild betta hobby when I did, especially when the Australian dollar was stronger. I looked at the prices for recently imported pairs, and it was over $100 for a pair of wild-caught Betta coccina. Australian natives are definitely looking better and better! 

I also have run out of live blackworms and am out of the Hikari frozen spirulina brine shrimp. Unfortunately, I absolutely detest the only store I know of, which stocks the latter. The service is appalling and I don't like how they treat their fish, especially the bettas.


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## LittleBettaFish

Don't really have much to post, except a few photos. 

Really the only news I have, is that the temperature took a nose dive overnight and now I can only see two spotted blue eyes fry out of the three I had. The water was pretty chilly, and I think this species can get into trouble once the temperature drops to 12 degrees celsius or below, so I put a heater in the tank this morning, and hopefully they will be a bit more comfortable. It's only set to 20 degrees as I didn't want to shock them with too rapid a change in temperature, and I will bring it up another few degrees tomorrow and the day after until it is at 26. 

Anyway onto the photos. 

First up is one of my spotted blue eyes tucking into some white worms. 










Then my largest female posing nicely. 










I was too lazy to put the light over the top tanks of my rack (Betta sp. api api and Betta livida), so there's only photos of my Betta uberis and Betta brownorum today. 

Someone was in trouble here. 










Then just a close-up. 










This photo turned out blurry, but it's my brownorum male deciding whether or not to chase after the female, whose tail you can see disappearing into the plants. 










Then my big Betta uberis male decided to make a rare appearance (usually he lurks around at the back of the tank).










Finally, this is one of his largest/oldest sons as a comparison. 










I'm going to the fish store tomorrow to pick up some live blackworms. I'm sort of wondering whether to get another pair of honey blue eyes (smaller and healthier this time) if they have them in stock, as my honey blue eyes female is pestering my spotted blue eyes. She's like a blimp now as she eats most of the food that goes into the tank.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I took a large number of photos today. Amazingly most ended up being usable. 

Firstly, we have my Betta brownorum male being his usual cranky self. 










Blurry here, but at least his fins aren't clamped and the juvenile was in focus. 










Up next, are my Betta livida group. This tank is on the top shelf of my rack and so is overgrown with algae. Most of the time they look like they are swimming through mucus soup. 

Here's my two adult males having an argument. 










Then these are some of the young fish in the tank (I think there's like five of them and two are missing eyes because someone has attacked them). 










Unfortunately, I think I only managed to get one female from the F1 group and the rest are males. Because I've been waiting so long for their prospective buyer to get into contact with me, and because I only ended up with a handful of young fish to select from, I am contemplating separating out the breeding pair and trying for another spawn or two. My only fear is that something happens to the female, meaning I am stuck with a group of males that I can't do anything with. 

So we shall see. Part of me would hate to see this species disappear from my fish room after I waited so long to get a hold of it. 

Here is one of my young males with the unrelated adult male in the tank. 










I think that is a young male on top, followed by the same adult male as above, and then my adult female on the bottom. 










Moving on, this is the 'next generation' of my Betta sp. api api. Since I was aiming for longer bodies with this spawn, I am interested to see what they look like when they mature. 










This is sort of a dramatic looking shot from the Betta sp. api api F1 group. 










Meanwhile, the java moss in some of my tanks is growing out of control. It's easy to see how I can lose fish in such a small volume of water. 



















My F1 Betta coccina group are slightly happier with their temporary tank. At least there's no algae! It really needs some more plants, but I'm lucky this group isn't especially aggressive. I also need to lighten the water up slightly as it makes photo taking very difficult. 




























Apart from that, I went to the fish store yesterday to get my blackworms, and I was a bit disappointed to see some bent spines and emaciated looking threadfins and blue eyes in their sale tanks. There were also no live blackworms in stock so now I have to go to another store today to pick some up. 

I noticed the store I'm likely going to go to, had Aphyosemion australe gold available on their website, so I'm going to have to resist the temptation to bring a pair home. I still do miss my killifish. I'm just fortunate, that there's no Aphyosemion striatum, or Chromaphyosemion poliaki available or I'd really be in trouble.


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## LittleBettaFish

STILL no blackworms for my fish. Apparently the store is getting them in tomorrow after lunchtime. At least they should be fresh. 

Over the past couple of days, I've been rethinking selling off various species of wilds completely. I've decided I'm going to retain a sibling pair (I've seen at least one F1 female) of Betta uberis and sell the rest. I also may try that spawn with my pair of Betta livida, and I'm hoping that perhaps there is a sibling pair among whatever Betta miniopinna I have left. 

Then I'm just going to sit and see what happens with these new importation laws coming into action in March. It would be great if it didn't make importing pairs of wilds so prohibitively expensive that it might as well be impossible, as I probably will want to revisit keeping and breeding wilds some time in the future. Especially species such as Betta persephone, Betta sp. wajok, Betta rutilans green, and Betta tussyae, where I just felt like I never achieved as much as I could have. 

Since I've been spending some time back in my fish room again, I'm remembering why I got into keeping and breeding these beautiful little fish in the first place. It's really just the ongoing battles with velvet, the extremely skewed sex ratio I get with my spawns, the expense and risk of importation, and the limited market here that puts a dampener on my enthusiasm. I really need to have two or three pairs of each species and that means more space and money than I am going to have in any sort of foreseeable future. 

I also took a few photos while I was pondering my future in the hobby. 

This is my largest F1 Betta uberis. He's almost as large as his father now, although his fins aren't as impressive. 



















Then this is 'Shiny', the male I am going to be keeping and crossing with a sibling female. He's simply so beautiful I couldn't let him leave my fish room. 










Then this is just my Betta brownorum female. I can't resist taking photos of her. 










Then this is one of my homebred Betta brownorum out of my now deceased brownorum female and one of her sons. His mother was extremely aggressive and killed her mate, and her sons inherited her nasty temperament. This male is brother to my cull male 'Zig-Zag', and shares a tank with Zig-Zag and his uncle. 

However, he viciously attacked his uncle, and spends his time intimidating Zig-Zag, so I think I'm going to have to separate them all. 










You can see him in this photo in the top left corner, bullying poor Zig-Zag. I don't know where his uncle is. He rarely comes out anymore, which is a shame, as he is the nicest of the three. 










Oops, last but not least, I forgot to include a photo of my 'technical assistant' Kanika.


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## Nismo83

glad to hear that you are not going to them up totally.. I ordered a few new one..


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## LittleBettaFish

I was never going to give them up 100%, but cost and availability is just the biggest issue here. Especially with these new laws in March, which could make it difficult for hobbyists to import individual wilds.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> I was never going to give them up 100%, but cost and availability is just the biggest issue here. Especially with these new laws in March, which could make it difficult for hobbyists to import individual wilds.


then perhaps you should keep them for the time being now and see how the law changes in March.


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## LittleBettaFish

I can sell all but one sibling pair of Betta coccina (as I will still be keeping the original pair and there are a few juveniles and fry in with them), all but the one sibling pair of Betta uberis, and all but one or two sibling pairs of Betta sp. api api, as well as the current breeding pair. 

This should allow me to still keep each species going in my fish room. 

I _may_ hold off on selling the Betta livida until I can get another spawn or two from them. Simply because I think there's only me and one other person in Australia keeping this species.

However, this means I'm going to have to set-up a temporary breeding tank, and I'm going to have to purchase some java moss as otherwise the male will tear the female to shreds. I have duckweed and heaps of mayaca fluviatilis spare, so this should hopefully let me set-up a tank without too much expense. 

Really the only thing that might be an issue is heating, as I'm not sure if I have a heater spare. 

I'm going to the fish store today to pick up my live blackworms so I will see what they have in the way of plants. If they are selling watersprite I may get a few bunches of that, as this is always useful to have on hand. 

This means my current species list will look something like this:

Betta sp. api api
Betta brownorum
Betta coccina
Betta hendra
Betta livida
Betta miniopinna
Betta persephone
Betta uberis 

Now I just have to cross my fingers that the new laws don't make importing wilds financially non-viable as if I am in the position to do so next year, I would like to import a couple of pairs of Betta sp. wajok and Betta persephone. 

To wrap up my long-winded musings, here's a photo of Maverick from yesterday.


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## Nismo83

I was told minopina is endangered and hard to get bow


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## LittleBettaFish

Miniopinna has been endangered for years. They were fairly easy to obtain a year or so ago. I think Hermanus had them, don't know if he was successful breeding them.

I found them the hardest species to breed out of this complex. I had issues with egg eating and they just did not spawn as frequently as my other species. 

I have at least two miniopinna in my uberis tank. It would be nice if they were a pair, although the parents of these juveniles lacked the bright red ventrals that my previous pairs from Joty and Hermanus had. So I probably would like to add 'Betta miniopinna with bright red ventrals' to my future purchase list.


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## Nismo83

I see. Hopefully will be able to get a pair soon


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## LittleBettaFish

Picked up my blackworms and some Ocean Nutrition frozen brine shrimp with spirulina and garlic. I also discovered two containers that must have filled with rain during recent storms and were brimming with mosquito larvae, so my fish had quite the feast today. 

I've decided breeding my pair of Betta livida and fixing up the main Betta livida tank, will be my next project. 

This is what the main tank looks like. That brown slime is algae and the whole back of the tank is absolutely covered in it. I'll probably be able to salvage the watersprite, but probably only a very small amount of java moss. 










There was no java moss at the store I went to today, so I am likely going to have to drop by the store I don't like to purchase two or three bags. 

The store did have some really cool wood pieces though. Hollowed out logs and pieces with lots of nooks and crannies, and all very reasonably priced. I had to resist the urge to run out the store with the whole lot. Although perhaps I may need to go back and get the $15 u-shaped log I saw for my Betta livida breeding project. 

My young Betta livida males were certainly feeling their blackworms this afternoon.

This is perhaps my nicest young male. It's just unfortunate he was blinded in one eye. This is his blind side.










Then this is one of his brothers. This male has a small green spot on the other side of his body. 










I'm not 100% certain on the gender of this fish, but I think it's male as its anal fin has a much sharper angle than the two females in the tank. Shame, as if it had been female I would have kept it for breeding. 










The last of my Betta livida photos for today is also one of the young males. It could be the same male as the one featured in the third photo. 

I also captured one of my Betta persephone juveniles on the move. This is a different fish to the one I've posted photos of recently. I still can't sex these four. Personally I find Betta persephone very difficult to sex, as young males can closely resemble females until their fins grow and their colour comes in.


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## LittleBettaFish

I've decided I'm going back to that fish store and picking up one or two hollowed out logs. One can go into my spotted blue eyes tank as some 'mental enrichment', and the other can go into my Betta livida breeding tank. 

Speaking of spotted blue eyes, my main tank received a massive overhaul yesterday. I removed all the vallisneria, and about half of the hydrilla. Unfortunately, the roots of the vallisneria had grown through one of the clay root tabs, and it made a huge mess when I pulled it up. 

Now there's just a spawning mop and a clump of hydrilla as the only cover in the tank, and only potential spawning sites. I figured that since the sole purpose of purchasing these fish was to breed from them, they had better get down to breeding before they become too old and infertile. 










I rushed getting the spawning mop into the tank yesterday so it's not fully waterlogged in parts. Lesson learned. Never rush. 

I found one egg on the mop this morning. I also managed to scoop up a newly hatched fry from the main tank when I was filling up a container with water for the egg. So now both egg and fry are in the container until the egg hatches, and the fry is big enough not to be a snack for its siblings. 

My males have been going racing around chasing females and sparring since this morning. Of course I didn't catch a single one of them in focus, and up close, with the camera. This was the best I could manage before I gave up.










Other than that, I've started work on my Betta livida breeding tank. I've got the tank, heater, and sponge filter. I just need plants, and then it can be filled up and the fish can go in. Hopefully, I can have the pair in the tank, before the end of next week. 

Wrapping up my post, are just some photos from my Betta uberis tank. 



















This is one of my Betta miniopinna


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## Nismo83

one word: Addictive


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## LittleBettaFish

That's the truth.

Anyway, I haven't really been doing much with my fish these past couple of days. 

However, what I did do, was move eight of my young spotted blue eyes into the main tank with the adults. The adults (especially my honey blue eyes female) did attempt to eat the smallest fry, but I put the hydrilla from the grow-out into the main tank and I have seen it out eating today so I think they've lost interest in it. 

I attempted to photograph some of the group today, but they were too quick. So here are a couple photos of my largest female I took a few days back.



















Then it's just a round-up of some of the usual suspects. 














































Maverick actually remained stationary long enough for me to get two photos today. While I love how vibrant his red is, I still cannot stand his topline. 



















Apart from that, I went to a dog show yesterday. Clio wasn't entered because she's still having issues with the muscles in her ear, which in hindsight, was probably a good thing as the judge was pinging bad ears. 

However, Clio went to socialise and get some more exposure to what it's like at a show. The German specialty shows here are VERY loud with people blowing whistles, honking horns, shouting out, ducking in and out of tents, and running around the outside of the ring. 

Clio was really well-behaved. She was able to focus on me without wanting to play with every dog we passed. She always plays very nicely with other dogs, especially young puppies, so she was thrilled to be able to play with her 'best friend', which is her breeder's latest puppy. This dog is _such_ a sweetheart. I've never seen her snarl or snap at another dog. If a dog has a go at her she simply walks away without any reaction at all. 

The other day she went to the vet's as we are trying acupuncture to see if it will make the muscles in her ear work properly. It was so odd. The day after the acupuncture the ear went much straighter, and the ear tip, which is still soft, was much more rigid. She's got another appointment soon, and then she will have weekly appointments up until the National, which is the largest conformation show for German Shepherds in Australia. However, we're only going to enter her if the ear is good enough that it's not going to be seen as a major fault. 

I still can't believe this rangy terror was the cheeky, dark-faced puppy I went and visited at the breeder's house.


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## LittleBettaFish

Since it was a nice day, we took the camera to the oval today and snapped some photos of Clio. 

She had an acupuncture visit yesterday, but unfortunately the improvement wasn't as drastic as it was after the first appointment. The ear doesn't bother me as much as it used to, but when it slips down the side of her head, it looks like she's had a stroke. 

We've also started seriously working with her, to get her fit and ready for the shows in March. I think by this time she will have moved up an age class and will be competing against dogs that are much older than she is. The judges really like to get the female dogs working hard and so it's unfair to put them in when they are not fit and the handler ends up almost carrying the dog around the ring. 

Here we are practicing our stands. Our leg placement (especially the front legs) isn't perfect, but at least we were standing still. 










Here is where Clio's personality really shines through. 










Here's me running her as she makes a beeline for my mum. 










I just liked her expression here. 










She's carrying a bit more weight than _I_ personally like to see. However, hopefully once she starts working more she will drop some of the weight and gain more muscle. If not, it's onto starvation rations.

She's also extremely out of coat. She's been blowing her top coat, and she's lost her undercoat, so she looks like a nudist at the moment. I have a feeling her coat is going to be pretty long once she grows it back, especially the gigantic ruff/mane she has.


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## LittleBettaFish

ARGH my stupid laptop went back when I had almost finished typing up my post, so now I have to start completely over. 

Well tonight, there was a battle going on between my three Betta brownorum males. I was surprised to see it was actually Zig-Zag taking on the surviving Disappointment, considering how peaceful he normally is. In fact I thought these two might be able to share a tank together if I separated out Psycho Red, who is the usual agitator, but now it looks like I'm going to have to have everyone separated. 

Here is Zig-Zag taking on Surviving Disappointment. I don't know why Zig-Zag's body has remained brown in colour. Perhaps because he is lowest on the totem pole. 



















Then Psycho Red stepped in to challenge Surviving Disappointment. 










Before finally Zig-Zag came back to challenge the victor. 










Looking at the photos I really cannot believe how greatly Zig-Zag's topline has improved. I would not have believed that such a deformed fry would have grown into a relatively normal looking fish. 

My main rack is looking very sad at the moment. I have so many projects lined up in my fish room that I hope to get through over the next few days. 










I want to move all the tanks from the top shelf onto the bottom shelf because I am sick of having to get out the step ladder to reach them, and I am sick of losing the battle with algae because of how much light they are receiving from the clerestory window. 

One of the tanks on the bottom shelf of the rack is my BBS hatchery, so it can be moved without any issue. The larger tank will be moved across to my sideboard to make room for the tanks from the top shelf, and the smaller tank will be remaining but turned so that the shorter side is facing outwards. 

I think I might move the whole shelf up a notch or two to bring it level with the bottom shelf of my smaller rack as sometimes fish can get nervy when they are so close to the ground. 

I also took some photos of my F1 Betta sp. api api while I was putzing around feeding everyone (the recent humid weather has been great for culturing mosquito larvae). 

First up is a nice, long-bodied female. 










Second, is a promising young male that I will likely end up keeping.










He has a much more spade-shaped caudal than the other males from this group. 










Finally, this appears to be a young male based on ventral fins and colour. 










I'm planning on setting my Betta livida breeding tank up tomorrow. I was very disappointed with the price of the java moss at the fish store I visited the other day ($7.00 for not even a golfball size serving). So tomorrow I'm going to see if the fish store I purchased my blackworms from, has any moss in stock. If not, I'll just purchase several pieces of wood, and use some plants from their current tank, and one of my other tanks to fill in the empty spaces. 

I also have to set-up two additional tanks. One new hospital tank for my Betta hendra group as for some reason their treatment hasn't even touched the velvet, and the other tank for my remaining Betta livida as their current tank is getting torn down because it's so overrun with algae. 

I just have to see whether or not I have enough heaters to do so.


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## Nismo83

Nice to see the updates. Currently on hospital bed lol


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## Sadist

I really love Aquatic Arts. I bought two servings of java moss, and it was much like a 1 inch thick carpet. I had too much for the 2.5 quarantine tank and had to add some directly to the 10 gallon. It cost a little more per serving as the super loose bits that I bought on Amazon (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01200O8BO?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o01_s00). The amazon bunch did come with a free colony of gammarus shrimp, which was a plus for me, but the amount of plant material was disappointing. Aquatic Arts even had a free heat pack in with my plant shipment because it was cold outside.


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## LittleBettaFish

Hope you are on the mend Nismo! 

Sadist, unfortunately I'm in Australia. I'm assuming Aquatic Arts is based overseas and even if they were willing to ship, it would be illegal for me to have live plants imported into the country.


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## Sadist

Oh, I'm so sorry I forgot that. They're U.S. based. I think the amazon company I ordered from overseas to you, too. Good luck!


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## LittleBettaFish

I think I should probably put my location back under my display photo as most of the members on here seem to come from the US/Canada and probably assume I am likewise. 

I don't know why I decide to start big projects in my fish room during such hot weather. My fish room is sitting at 32 degrees Celsius, and by the time I'd finished draining tanks, moving tanks, and lugging buckets back and forth, I felt like I was working in a sauna. 

I went to the fish store today and picked up three hollowed out logs. According to the employee there, this wood (I'm not 100% certain what it is) will release loads of tannins, which is exactly what I am looking for. 

This is what my main rack looks like now. 










I've torn down my Betta livida tank, and set-up two tanks on the bottom shelf. One is for the breeding pair of Betta livida and the other is for the rest of the group. 

The fish store I visited had no java moss in stock. However, I was able to salvage a surprising amount from my tank once I'd blasted all the algae and detritus off with the garden hose. So the only tank that needs java moss now, is my F1 Betta coccina tank, and I'm going to steal some from my F0 Betta coccina tank as I know it is disease free. 










The tank with all the moss is for the breeding pair. I've still got to add duckweed and mayaca fluviatilis to provide some surface cover, but otherwise they will be going in tomorrow. I just wanted the pH and temperature to stabilise so I didn't cause them any extra stress. Especially since the female decided to jump out of her temporary holding tank and scare the crap out of me. 

My next big 'project' will be moving my Betta persephone tank to my sideboard, moving my two Betta sp. api api tanks down onto the bottom shelf, and then dismantling the top shelf. That's going to be done very slowly and with utmost care because I don't want my Betta sp. api api groups getting stressed, especially the young fry. 

I also eventually (in another couple of weeks) want to set-up a tank for a pair of F1 Betta sp. api api. There's a couple of very nice females and males and it's about time they did something more than just stuff their faces. 

After getting everything done, I took a few quick snaps before collapsing in a sweaty heap.

Betta brownorum juvenile. 










F1 Betta uberis. 










I'm annoyed this photo turned out so blurry. But it's of one of my F1 Betta uberis males challenging his father (at front).










Before realising just how big and mean his father is, and beating a hasty retreat. Run away! Run away!










A young male just starting to colour up. 










Maverick being his usual affectionate self. It was water change day yesterday, and I added some IAL to their tanks, so both boys were feeling particularly feisty. 










They are now engrossed in a bubblenest building competition because I have them uncarded.


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## Sadist

I love the uberis coloring.


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## LittleBettaFish

I agree Sadist, the Betta uberis are spectacular. They are also the most photogenic fish in my fish room, likely because of the number of males, so there's always something going on. 

The latest point of contention has been over the IAL I put in the other day. 










Even the matriarch of the tank was putting her claim in. 










I think most people look into my tanks and see a group of fish that look exactly the same. However, because I spend so much time with my fish I am able to recognise individuals as a result of the small variations in appearance. 

These are just a few of my young males to illustrate what I mean. 










Same male as above. 














































Frustratingly, the water in my new Betta livida tanks turned extremely cloudy overnight. I've done 50% water changes on both tanks and hopefully by tomorrow morning the fish can go in. 

I'm hoping that once my breeding pair of Betta livida settle in, I will be able to get some cracker photos of them displaying and spawning without the other fish interfering. I've even made sure that the two likely nest sites are facing the front of the tank.


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## LittleBettaFish

I moved my Betta livida group into their new tanks today. This marks the beginning of my 'Betta livida Breeding Project'. The plan is to ultimately produce between 50-100 young fish. To maximise survival rates, I will be using a grow-out tank. I need to have a larger pool of females to draw on, and I'm hoping that even with my heavily male skewed spawns, there will be at least a handful of females amongst those 50-100 fish. 

My unrelated male will likely be used as an outcross for these F1 females, and I may even cross him with the F0 female, and then pair up these offspring with their half-siblings to avoid excessive inbreeding. 

Of course all of this depends on whether or not I can get my breeding pair routinely spawning. So I've definitely got my fingers crossed. 

Apart from that, I just took a few shots of some of my wilds. 

First up is my Betta brownorum female. 



















Next up is some of my young Betta sp. api api. These fish are exasperatingly difficult to get a good photo of. Just as you get the perfect photo lined up, some other fish comes along and ruins it. 

This is one of my youngest Betta sp. api api fry. 










One of my young males in with the F1 group. 










An older full sibling to the fry in the first photo. 










This photo is my favourite. This juvenile is also a full sibling to the first fry and the one pictured above. I was using my finger as a lure. 










My next project is definitely setting up a breeding tank for a pair of F1 Betta sp. api api. I have a tank, heater, sponge filter, and substrate. Once again, it's just the live plants that I need. 

I'm contemplating putting a small amount of java moss in a tub outside and letting it grow. This way if I need some, I'm not having to take it from my tank. I'm just not sure how fast it would grow. 

I think I've given up on keeping any further Australian natives other than my P. gertrudae. I don't have the space and money to keep both these and my wilds, and I want to see what effect the new import laws have on the importation of wild bettas in this country before I blithely sell off half my collection. 

It will be a tragedy if these new laws prevent the import of wild bettas into this country. 

The immediate result will be that I likely lose Betta persephone, Betta miniopinna, and Betta hendra from my fish room. I will also never have the chance to reacquire Betta rutilans, burdigala, tussyae, and sp. wajok.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I'm feeling rather foolish. 

I could never work out how to switch to manual focus when using the macro lens to take photos of my fish. I probably should have just read the instruction manual, but I didn't know where it was.

Turns out that all you have to do is pull the lens forward slightly and it goes into manual mode. This made taking photos of my spotted blue eyes so _*MUCH*_ easier. I still need to practice more with using this mode, but I bribed the group out with some white worms and took a few half-decent shots. 

I think my chances of getting an in focus photo of one or more of my males sparring/displaying are much better now I can just follow the fish around without the camera randomly zooming in and out. 

I think this male was taunting me. 










Two females. I think that's my big female on the right. 










I really, really like this photo. 










Didn't like this photo as much. 










Of course all my males come out and immediately start sparring as soon as I put the camera away. 

Meanwhile the three spotted blue eyes fry I had growing out in a separate tank are still alive and seemingly doing well if their size is any indication. One is definitely large enough to go into the main tank without threat of predation but the others are still a little small. I'm not sure if the fourth fry I put into the tank is still around or if there were any other fry that hatched out, but I may have to upgrade to a 15 gallon tank if the group keeps expanding as there are probably close to 20 fish in the 10 gallon.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my breeding pair of Betta livida have shown zero interest in each other. However, my young, one-eyed male and his one-eyed sister were flirting up a storm this morning. He was beautifully coloured and strutting his stuff, and she was barred up and doing a seductive wriggle. 

My young male then got himself so worked up, he decided to take on the adult male in the tank. Who is about triple the size of him. I think my adult male was just so confused about why this shrimp of a fish was attacking him, he thought retreating was the safest option! 

I've also been doing some more practising with the manual focus on the macro lens. I think I'm getting better. I came SO close a few times to catching my spotted blue eye males with their fins fully erect. 

My first shot was probably my worst. 










A close-up of one of my females. 










Another close-up of a female. 










This would have been a good photo if the female hadn't been in it. 










Finally caught one of my males up close. 










One of the males watching over his harem. 










This photo would have been good if at least one of the males had been in focus!!! 










I find it very calming to watch this tank. There's always something going on, and I don't have to worry that it's going to end in WW3.


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## Sadist

Wow, they're gorgeous! I may have to give them a try some day.


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## LittleBettaFish

They're a great little fish. Their only downside is that they are fairly short-lived. I think they only live a couple of years. 

There are a number of different varieties available, with slight variations in appearance between them. 

I find they just seem to have a bit more individual personality than other shoaling species of fish.


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## Aqua Aurora

I'd read recently that spotted blue eyes only last about 18 months when they breed prolifically. Not sure how long they live if they're aren't actively breeding all the time.
I love mine, moved them to my husband's 12g long cherry shrimp tank recently (the are as big as the adult female shrimp!) they don't bother the shrimp but they do investigate what they're eating. Lovely fish, cute faces, they get pretty bold and are smart (know ques for feeding time-probably the fastest fish to learn those ques yet). If you get them GET A LID (or least a dense mass of floaters-they will love that), they can jump. I've only had one jumped (spooked a male when lights were off and i put my hand in the tank.. he was a pain to catch on the desk to put back but he survived just fine).


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## LittleBettaFish

I believe keeping them at higher temperatures also lead to a shortened lifespan. 

I have enough young fish/fry to keep my group going once the original members die. 

One thing I am most frustrated about, is that I don't believe we have the Aru Island strains here in Australia. However, we seem to have some lovely Australian strains, it's just a matter of finding the space to house them all separately... and the money to pay for them!!


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## Aqua Aurora

LittleBettaFish said:


> I believe keeping them at higher temperatures also lead to a shortened lifespan.
> 
> I have enough young fish/fry to keep my group going once the original members die.
> 
> One thing I am most frustrated about, is that I don't believe we have the Aru Island strains here in Australia. However, we seem to have some lovely Australian strains, it's just a matter of finding the space to house them all separately... and the money to pay for them!!


What temps are you keeping yours at? Mine are 76F (24.4C)
Yes it usually boils down to room and funds limiting our addictions (additions).. I notice the ones you have are a bit paler than mine (body and eyes) but have larger sports and the fins more translucent (mine have opaque white fins). Note sure which exact strain/subgroup mine are.


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## LittleBettaFish

Mine are kept at around 24-26 degrees Celsius. 

I find it very difficult to capture the true colour of these fish on my camera. I think the flash washes them out. Looking at photos of other fish of the same strain/locality, it seems that the colour really depends on lighting and the mood of the fish. 

The males make for such an impressive show when they are sparring/courting the females though. In the afternoon, the sun filters through my window and lights up some of their tank and they go crazy. 

Charged up the batteries in my camera just before, so going to try and take some photos of my wilds later today.


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## LittleBettaFish

I'm finding my Betta livida pair increasingly exasperating. Today after a meal of blackworms they showed brief interest in each other and there was lots of flaring, wriggling, and vertical barring. Now they've gone back to completely ignoring each other. 

It seems all of my fish were feeling recalcitrant today as no one was staying still for photos. My spotted blue eyes wouldn't even come out when they saw the camera. I couldn't even tempt them with frozen bloodworms. These were the best photos I could manage before I gave up completely. 





































In other news, if you've ever wondered what a severe velvet infection looks like, this is it. 



















For such a bad infection I'm surprised that the fish are still eating well, showing good colour, and behaving fairly normally although the discomfort from the parasite is causing them to clamp their fins. 

I don't know why the Cupramine isn't working on this group. My Betta persephone haven't had any relapses after they finished up their first treatment, and this is my Betta hendra group's second treatment and they are looking worse than when they went into the hospital tank. 

I've set up a new hospital tank today, and I will move the group over tomorrow and start another round of treatment. If the Seachem Cupramine doesn't work the third time, I'll try another medication. It's just I've had such good results with it in the past, and I know it won't hurt my fish, even at a lower pH. 

I also couldn't remember if I shared this photo here or not, but this is my largest Betta persephone juvenile. I'm still not certain on sex. I thought male, someone else on FB thought female. It just seems like its ventrals are fairly long, it's not as rounded in the body as my young females usually are, and it's very aggressive. 










I'm hoping it's female, but knowing my luck, both it and its siblings are all male. I just need one quality female and one quality male to keep my line going!


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## Nismo83

Try adding some oxycure salt and see if it helps. Maybe u can put a bright lamp or flash gun on the top of the tank


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## LittleBettaFish

I've never heard of Oxycure. I don't even know if it's available here. What is it? 

I'm just hesitant to change medications because I can't afford to replace these fish, and I don't want to accidentally kill them. I know with Cupramine that unless I overdose it is very safe. 

My Betta livida pair are still refusing to spawn. The male built a bubblenest the other day and the female occasionally bars up, and that is the extent of their flirtation. I had to do a water change on their tank today because the wood had developed that clear slime and it was making the water cloudy. So I'm hoping the water change and mosquito larvae will encourage further romantic feelings. 

While I was doing water changes on my spotted blue eyes tank, I removed the spawning mop to have a look through it. I thought maybe I might find a couple eggs considering how many fish are in the tank, and how long it's been since I last checked it. 

Turns out there were 20 eggs all up, some of which are eyeballed and look like they could hatch any day now. I've put the eggs in a container in my grow-out, and I just need to add an airstone, and some methylene blue, to prevent the eggs from fungussing. I've got my fingers crossed that most, if not all of the eggs, hatch. 

The grow-out has at least five fry in it at the moment, and any fry that hatch from these eggs will be joining them once I feel they are ready. 

Unfortunately, because I removed the spawning mop and fiddled around with the tank, my spotted blue eyes were more skittish than usual. So it was very difficult trying to get any decent photos. Which was a shame as when they weren't hiding, my males were looking spectacular. 

I got so close with this photo. 










Then this was just one of the fry out and about. I was surprised to see it eating alongside the adults as it's not much larger than some of the mosquito larvae.


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## Sadist

That little fry is adorable! The male is awesome, too. Hopefully, you can get some more pictures in a day or two, after they settle down.


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## LittleBettaFish

My male spotted blue eyes are wimps. They are very quick to startle and always send the females out first before they will venture out themselves. 

Looks like none of the eggs I collected yesterday have gone bad. A couple of them them look so close to hatching, I would not be surprised if they did so in another day or two. 

STILL no signs of breeding from my pair of Betta livida though. I might switch the male out if they don't spawn by the end of next week. If I still don't get any spawning happening, I'm going to put the group up for sale, and two of my other breeding pairs can go into their tanks. 

I can't get my wild bettas to stop spawning when I'm not purposefully trying to breed them, but as soon as I say I want to breed x pair of fish by x date, I don't get a single bubble blown. 

I've got to dose my Betta hendra tank today and get that covered up. Then it's two weeks of waiting and hoping that this time the medication works. I've got an unopened bottle of Cupramine so I'm going to use this instead, in case there was something wrong with the other bottle. 

I also took some photos of my F1 Betta sp. api api as I'm going to be writing an entry on my blog about them. I discovered a very promising male in the tank that I only got a quick look at before one of the other males chased him away. It's going to be difficult picking which one I want to use as future breeding stock. 

I also have discovered a single, deformed male in this tank. His body is abnormally short, giving him a sort of 'hunchbacked' appearance. This is the sort of dilemma I hate facing as a breeder. His deformity doesn't seem to be impacting his way of life. However, I can't keep every deformed fish I breed, as I'm already squeezed for space and I can't just put a whole group of culls together and expect them to get along peacefully. Especially if they are male. I also would never sell or re-home a deformed fish, as once it leaves my fish room I have no control over whether it is bred or not. 

For now he gets to live, but when the group gets sold his fate is going to have to be decided. 

That is the downside to breeding. Having to be the one to wield the axe.





































'Stumpy'










Then this is just a photo of my original Betta coccina male. I think he was/is guarding a nest in the film canister and I think he only came out to intimidate the female and see if it was dinner time. 










The juveniles in this tank are growing up, and I see them out a lot more than I used too. It looks like I have at least a handful. I'm hoping he produces at least one more son that is as nice as he is.


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## blueridge

Your wilds are looking nice as ever LBF! Love looking at your guys


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Blueridge. 

Did I read correctly that your pair of rubra had spawned? If I wasn't just imagining things, good luck. I hate the waiting you have to do with mouthbrooders, especially being on tenterhooks not knowing if they will swallow or not.


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## Nismo83

My Rutilans, wajok and brownurum will be arriving next week. 

Yeah. I do agreed with you on the mouthbrooder eating the eggs. It happened twice to alpha since moving to my new place. I am thinking whether to get another chiller or should I get another SS pipe with ehiem 1260 to power it up


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## blueridge

LittleBettaFish said:


> Thanks Blueridge.
> 
> Did I read correctly that your pair of rubra had spawned? If I wasn't just imagining things, good luck. I hate the waiting you have to do with mouthbrooders, especially being on tenterhooks not knowing if they will swallow or not.


Yeah they did! I have barely seen the male colored up and the female like not at all, so when they decided to do it is news to me :lol:


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## LittleBettaFish

Good luck with your new fish Nismo. Hopefully in the future I will be able to add sp. wajok and rutilans back to my fish room. Just got to wait and see what happens with the new laws in March. 

I think macrostoma are the worst species for swallowing their eggs. However, I do wonder if all the stripping of eggs makes for a male that loses the instinct/ability to hold eggs to full term. 

Hopefully even if this is their first spawn, your male holds to term Blueridge. It's such a wait with the mouthbrooders as well. Not like the bubblenesters where the fry are free-swimming in a matter of days. 

Meanwhile I think I got a bit heavy-handed with the rooibos in my spotted blue eyes tank. It's still this dark even after two partial water changes. 










Then even though my spotted blue eyes were out and about at the front of the tank I had issues with getting them in focus and almost every shot I took came out blurry. 

I mean this was the best photo taken after almost half an hour spent sitting in front of their tank. Just...sad. 










Then this was one of the juveniles/sub-adults sharing a tank with the adults. I'd say it's about half an inch from head to tail to give an idea of size. 










The eggs I collected the other day still haven't hatched *taps fingers impatiently*, but none of them look like they have fungussed either, and I think I am seeing a few more eye up. 

I also discovered mosquito larvae in the wading pool we'd put out for the dogs. So now I have a second tub of larvae to harvest from. We've had a fairly mild and dry summer, but it's been very humid so it's been great for mosquito breeding. 

In non fish related news, my gum tree seedlings are doing well. I actually found about nine more very small seedlings growing in the pots we have our herbs in, so I've dug them out and put them in a pot and I will see how they go. 

My mum's agreed to let me plant my biggest seedling in the backyard. I want to convince her to let me plant one or two more of the seedlings around it, as if they are the species I think they are, they will look better growing in a group. Plus it provides more habitat for the birds. 










Unfortunately, the sort of tilted seedling almost met its demise at the teeth of Clio. She yanked it out of the pot not that long ago and it was touch-and-go for a while there as I wasn't sure if it would make it.


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## Nismo83

Yes. He hold to term in his previous 4 spawns. The 5th was a mistake of mine. 6th and 7th could due to fights between the males as I added a third to them. I am going to change my setup soon. To add one more tank in the line


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## blueridge

LittleBettaFish said:


> Hopefully even if this is their first spawn, your male holds to term Blueridge. It's such a wait with the mouthbrooders as well. Not like the bubblenesters where the fry are free-swimming in a matter of days.


Thanks LBF! He is still holding! *knocks on wood* I actually prefer mouth brooders to bubblenesters because I seem to have more luck with them. I also don't mind the wait because that just means that I can make sure that my microworm and vinegar eel colony will be up and running since sometimes I let it go :lol:

Love your blue eyes by the way! They are very pretty fish


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## LittleBettaFish

You'll need a whole fish room dedicated just to your macs Nismo. 

I'm too impatient for mouthbrooders. I'm finding it difficult enough waiting for my blue eyes eggs to hatch. 

The blue eyes _are_ nice. Someone posted up photos of this lovely locality/strain on the rainbowfish FB group I am part of, and now I have added it to my fish wishlist. 

STILL not making any headway with my Betta livida pair, which is bitterly disappointing. They flirt and chase each other around, and the female is plump and barred up, it's just nothing has been happening. 

I think my Betta brownorum pair might have spawned as the male has been very aggressive towards the female and his juvenile offspring, and keeps vanishing, presumably into the film canister to guard his eggs/fry. 

Today I've got to move my Betta persephone tank over to my sideboard, so that on Wednesday when I'm doing water changes, I can move my two Betta sp. api api tanks down to the bottom shelf. 

I think I also need to replace all the fluro tubes in my lights. They are a few years old and I'm wondering if they are better at growing algae than plants nowadays. It's just the cost involved. I mean I'd rather spend money on fish, than I would on lights. 

Since there was a lot of action going on in my Betta uberis tank today (I think some of the smaller/younger males are gaining confidence), so I couldn't resist taking some photos. 

This is one of my tiny Betta miniopinna with my original Betta uberis male behind it.










My original male is enormous nowadays. 










Telling one of his sons off. 










After the bottom male interrupted a fight between the two males at the top of the photo, they decided to turn their attention to him.










One of the smaller males. 










I call this photo 'Small, Medium, and Large', although the male in the middle does not look happy. 










Small male. 










Another tussle going on here. 










Then to wrap things up, this is just one of my F1 Betta coccina.


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## Nismo83

My future apartment will have an AC room for the Macrostoma. I just purchased a SS piping and will be rearranging the current setup to run and chill an extra tank so I can separate the comm tank up. I will also need extra space for the coccina complex group. It is additive b


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## LittleBettaFish

I don't have to worry about chillers. My biggest worry is how many heaters I can safely run in my fish room before I accidentally start a fire haha. 

I also have some good news to share! My spotted blue eyes eggs have started to hatch! I found a newly hatched fry swimming around in the hatching container, sadly along with one dead fry. There's a whole lot of eyed up eggs, so hopefully my lone fry has some companionship soon. I only have had one egg thus far fungus, so I'm hoping that the rest are fertilised and healthy. 

Before I go and begin the arduous (and likely messy) task that is moving my Betta persephone tank, I have a couple photos to share. My camera battery died before I could take anymore, but this is my Betta livida female and two of my young Betta livida. There was a bit more promising behaviour between my pair earlier today, so the male has one more chance with the female before he is swapped out.


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## LittleBettaFish

Did a water change on my spotted blue eyes tank, took out all the hydrilla, and put the spawning mop back in, followed by a good feed. 

Results are as shown...

This is one of my young males wedged in between some adults. I don't think he's quite an inch in length yet.










Same male. I'm very happy with how this photo turned out.










One of the adult males with that bloody honey blue eyes female in the foreground. 










So close, and yet so far.










Spewing he was not straight on. But I think this is one of the closest I got thus far.










One of my smaller adult females.










The young male from the first photos, with what I think is one of his young siblings.










I just wanted to share these before I put the camera away for the day and stopped pestering my fish. 

I never did get around to moving my persephone tank.


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## Sadist

Wow, I love the photos! I really love the spots on the male fins and how pretty he is as he extends them.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yes, they look like completely different fish when they have their fins erect. The females also seem to use their fins to communicate their dominance over lower ranking fish. When they're all huddled in a group eating there's a lot of fin flashing and chasing. 

Unfortunately, their fins do get a bit tatty over time as they spar quite a bit. 

I could dedicate a rack solely to the different varieties of spotted blue eye. I read somewhere that there were around 15 strains within Australia, all with slight variations in appearance. I'm just not sure if all are being kept in captivity, and how easily obtained they are. There's this beautiful strain with spectacular finnage and a golden glow to the belly/body. Would love to have the opportunity to one day own/breed a few. 

I think when I have a disposable income again, I'm going to join ANGFA (The Australia New Guinea Fishes Association). Hopefully this will put me in position to be able to source the fish I am after. I mean it's not like this is a fleeting fancy. I plan to dedicate the rest of my fish keeping years to the conservation of Australian native species. 

In other news, another spotted blue eye fry has hatched out. I'm going to add some water from the grow-out into the hatching container, because sometimes this can encourage further hatching. 

I think I'm going to run three tanks for my spotted blue eyes. Two breeding tanks, and one grow-out. This way I will have a breeding group made up completely of young fish I've bred.


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## LittleBettaFish

It was 39 degrees Celsius here today with hot, gusting northerlies. You break into a sweat as soon as you open the door to my fish room, so of _course_ this is where I chose to spend the majority of my day. 

It's water changes for my wilds tomorrow, so I took advantage of the sunny weather, and disinfected all the equipment I'm going to need to use. Atlas and Maverick had their water changed, and then while I was on a roll, I drained and moved my Betta persephone tank. 

I also picked two eggs off the mop in my spotted blue eye tank, which have gone straight into the hatching container although I have a feeling I accidentally crushed one. There were two fry in the hatching container that I could see. Although there certainly could be more hiding in all the hydrilla. 

Still no signs of any eggs/fry/spawning activity from my Betta livida pair. However, love was definitely in the air for my Betta brownorum pair this evening. There was lots of wriggling, flaring, and chasing going on. Some of which I captured on camera, most of which I sadly did not. 

But at least I managed to capture my Betta brownorum male with his fins open for once! 

The female was just out of view to the left here. 




























I like how the spot on his other side is slightly different. 










The female being followed by one of her confused looking offspring. 










ARGH!! Forgot to clean the glass!! 










Then this was just one of my Betta uberis males being cheeky in the tank over. 










Finally, I added the 1st dose of Cupramine to the hospital tank. I've got my fingers crossed that this time the medication works and I can start taking some photos of my Betta hendra again without them looking like they are on death's door.


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## Nismo83

lovely brownurum


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## LittleBettaFish

Brownorum are definitely one of my favourite species. I just wish I could work out whether the development of the spot is the results of genetics, or some sort of environmental factor. This pair both have spots, and yet none of their offspring have any.

While I was doing water changes today, I finally got around to moving my two Betta sp. api api tanks to the bottom shelf of my main rack. 

This is what the rack looks like now. This is the entirety of my wild betta collection, excluding Betta persephone, and Betta hendra. On the new 'top' shelf, are my F1 Betta coccina, my Betta uberis/miniopinna, my Betta brownorum, and my F0 Betta coccina. Then on the bottom shelf I have my two Betta livida tanks, my two Betta sp. api api tanks, and my Betta brownorum 'bachelor' tank. 










Now I've just got to organise my smaller rack. The hospital tank has to be moved, and then I want to set-up a second grow-out for my spotted blue eyes. There's just enough room for a fourth tank on this rack, so this spot will be kept open for future Australian natives. 

Speaking of my spotted blue eye group, I've got at least seven fry now, and a few more eggs look very close to hatching. I've been collecting between 1-3 eggs from the spawning mop I have in the main tank, and just adding them to the hatching container. 

I'm thinking I'm going to remove the native milfoil from the grow-out (it's just floating around in there), loosely tie the ends together with an elastic band, attach a piece of pool noodle, and let this float upside down in the main tank to replace the yarn breeding mop. I want to see what the reaction from my fish is, and whether they prefer a more natural surface to lay their eggs on. Plus milfoil is great for helping with water quality. 

My Betta livida pair haven't been breeding, but the wood has turned the water in their tank black so it's very difficult to see what's going on in there, even with the light on. I did see some promising behaviour today while I was doing water changes, with my female showing the lighter coloured stripe down her back, which usually indicates that a spawn is imminent. So I guess I will wait and see what happens. 

Just to wrap up my post, I took a photo of one of my F1 Betta sp. api api. They seem to prefer being on the bottom shelf, and at least it means I don't have to get out the step-ladder when I want to take photos. 










I did almost drop their tank on the floor when I was moving it. I thought draining 3/4s of the water would be enough to make lifting it easier, but apparently I was wrong. Those 10 gallons are deceptively heavy.


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## Nismo83

Apiapi, one of the higher price strain in coccina complex.


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## LittleBettaFish

Lol I paid a premium for my original pair as that was when they were first being sold in Australia. $200 plus shipping for a pair of fish that couldn't have been much bigger than an inch. 

I've got some bad news in that my (my mum's really) camera is not working. I was taking photos the other day and it started showing an error message. This means there won't be any photos until the camera is fixed. Because a text only journal is fairly dry reading, I likely won't post again until I can take photos again. 

However, I do have some good news to share. 

My Betta livida pair FINALLY spawned. My male has a nest in the corner of the tank, and I can see at least a handful of eggs in it. I don't believe either fish ate their eggs in the past, but obviously since I _want_ to breed them, they'll decide to do so now. 

I don't know what took them so long; perhaps they needed time to adjust to being on the bottom shelf. I did think a spawn was forthcoming yesterday evening, because the female was coloured up the most I've ever seen her, and she was behaving very aggressively to the male in the tank over. 

Other than that, the rest of my fish are doing fine. 

I've counted at least ten spotted blue eye fry that have hatched out, and they are getting daily feedings of Sera Micron. I still don't trust the older fry in the grow-out not to eat them, because there is still quite a size discrepancy. 

This photo was the last photo I managed to take before the camera stopped working. It's one of my 'homebred' spotted blue eye juveniles/sub-adults, and it looks female based on colour and finnage.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> Lol I paid a premium for my original pair as that was when they were first being sold in Australia. $200 plus shipping for a pair of fish that couldn't have been much bigger than an inch.


yeah.. they are pricey given their size. an adult macrostoma pair is about 200-250sgd over here.. api2 will cost 120-150sgd over at Singapore


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## LittleBettaFish

It's too bad no one wanted my group of Betta sp. api api. I could have been rich!! 

I'm sad to report that I think I lost my beautiful male Betta hendra (he's the fish in my display photo and he pops up a bit on AB and Google images) yesterday. I was forced to euthanase both him, and another of the group, after I found them dying at the bottom of the hospital tank. It looks like another fish might have died since then, and there was another one looking like it wasn't going to make it. The three surviving Betta hendra are in better shape, but I'm not sure if they will live through the duration of the treatment. 

Whatever 'strain' of velvet this is, it's nasty. It's definitely not something I want to spread through my entire fish room. It's like the Seachem Cupramine doesn't even touch it at the recommended dosage. 

What's even more depressing is that those tough new import laws come into effect this month. So I might not be able to get my hands on a replacement pair of wild-caught Betta hendra.

My good news is that my Betta livida eggs hatched, and my male is doing a good job looking after his brood. I actually had to put something between his tank and the tank containing the rest of the Betta livida because he was stressing himself out trying to defend his nest against the other male. 

There's only a small number of fry, but this pair never seemed to have large spawns. Now I just have to hope these aren't the only fry they produce! 

My spotted blue eyes fry are also doing well. They've been moved into a temporary 4 gallon grow-out, and once they're sexually mature, I will be moving a small number into a 10 gallon breeding tank. 

I think I might have to start selling some of them soon. Otherwise half my fish room is going to be devoted to one species of fish. 

Unfortunately, the camera is still broken, so no photos.


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## Nismo83

Sorry to hear of the losses. Hoping to lay my hands on a few pairs of Hendra next month as I am traveling away for 10days this month so decided to delay the shipment.


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## blueridge

Sorry to hear about your Betta Hendra, LBF. Velvet is the worse


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## LittleBettaFish

I lost the rest of my Betta hendra this morning. It feels like I failed my fish, and I think I'm going to change my display photo on here because I don't want to be looking at a fish whose death I was responsible for. 

I hope whatever virulent strain of velvet they were infected with, it dies with them. I'm going to disinfect _everything_ today, and then leave it out in the sun to completely dry out, as it's going to be 36 degrees Celsius, and I figure this ought to kill anything remaining. 

It's just frustrating how I could successfully treat certain fish (my Betta uberis pair that have never had a relapse and have gone on to produce fry without infecting them also) and then there are groups of fish that seem to make a 100% recovery following treatment, only for the velvet to reappear without any of the usual 'triggers' such as a temperature fluctuation, poor water quality, or a heightened stress level. 

I've only ever had this issue with my wilds. I don't know what the cause is, but some days it feels like trying to push a boulder up a hill. It's very one step forward, two steps back. 

Now I just have to hope that the new import laws aren't going to mean a cessation in the import of wild bettas and I can get a new pair of Betta hendra in the future.


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## Nismo83

It shd be able to get a pair maybe just more expensive. Sorry to hear about the total loss.


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## blueridge

Sorry to hear about your loss LBF


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## LittleBettaFish

My worry is that it may be impossibly expensive to bring in small numbers. I wouldn't touch any wilds that came in through a wholesaler as I knew someone who worked at one of those places and disease was a frequent problem. In fact, the Betta coccina he got for me from one of the wholesalers was riddled with ich. 

It's not even the loss of this species from my fish room that upsets me. It's the fact that watching and interacting with this group of fish really brightened my day. I do have the tendency to get too attached to my fish, especially my original breeding pairs, and it's just hard to lose them.


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## Aqua Aurora

Sorry for your losses :c No chance of finding another breeder of that species in Australia you can get healthy offspring from?


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> My worry is that it may be impossibly expensive to bring in small numbers. I wouldn't touch any wilds that came in through a wholesaler as I knew someone who worked at one of those places and disease was a frequent problem. In fact, the Betta coccina he got for me from one of the wholesalers was riddled with ich.
> 
> It's not even the loss of this species from my fish room that upsets me. It's the fact that watching and interacting with this group of fish really brightened my day. I do have the tendency to get too attached to my fish, especially my original breeding pairs, and it's just hard to lose them.


let me know again once the law is clear. I can help you in this. not an issue. I just need to know who is the transhipper. You need not pay me a cent except for the shipping cost and whatever.


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## Olivia27

I'm sorry for your loss LBF  x


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## Aquatail

I'm so sorry about your betta hendra. If it means anything, I think you did everything you could for them and it isn't your fault.


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## Sadist

Aquatail said:


> I'm so sorry about your betta hendra. If it means anything, I think you did everything you could for them and it isn't your fault.


+1 Hang in there! A sunlight disinfection should hopefully get rid of any remaining problems.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks guys. I know I wasn't as proactive at the start as I should have been, which is why I spent the last couple of days kicking myself over it. The only reason the fish got sick in the first place was because I shared equipment between tanks, even though nowadays I should know better. 

Well the situation looks grim for the import of wild bettas. The transhipper here in Australia has suspended her importing services for the time being, and has stated that 'imports as we know it have ceased'. 

It will be a real tragedy if we are no longer able to routinely import wild bettas into this country, or at least at a price that isn't astronomical. I mean I don't even mind if it costs an extra couple of hundred dollars to import in a pair of wilds, but if it's going to cost an extra couple of thousand, well that is just out of the realm of realistic spending for me. 

I'm so frustrated that I just didn't have the funds to import multiple pairs of wilds into Australia before the new laws came into effect. 

Bloody Australia. Sometimes your quarantine laws just do not make sense. Like how goldfish are still allowed to be imported even though they seem to be the fish most likely to end up in our waterways causing damage. 

At least I have good news in that there are more Betta livida fry than I first thought. The male has been really good with them, and I expect that they will be free-swimming in another day or two.


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## Nismo83

Good news on the livida. Should I visit Australia I will see what I can do


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## LittleBettaFish

Lol unless you plan on smuggling fish into the country, there's nothing that can be done. At least not for the foreseeable future. 

Had a sort of bittersweet day yesterday. We had Clio our German Shepherd puppy entered into a smallish show to see how heavily her wonky ear would be penalised as when she was younger some judges didn't mind it, but others did. Now she's older we would expect it to be more heavily penalised, and so we wanted to see if it was worth putting her into the National or not. 

There were 11 puppies in the class, and she got pulled out fifth after her individual (which is about where I think she should have placed if her ear was normal), but then quickly dropped back down to eighth because the more she went around, the more the ear went out. Unfortunately, the judge made the comment that when her ear went out to the side, it threw off her balance and made her drop onto the forehand. 

Meanwhile everyone keeps thinking it's a yeast infection or that she has something in her ear no matter how many times we tell them it's something to do with the muscles/nerves that hold the ear up and control its movement. 

I may hate conformation showing, but I'm competitive and in it to win it. Sadly, no matter how well conformed Clio is, and how brilliantly she moves, the ear will never place her on a level playing field with the other dogs and I don't want her getting placed below dogs she would have beaten were her ear perfect. 

So mum has decided to retire her from showing, unless there's a drastic improvement with the ear and it firms up. Of course all the other breeders think we should run her on, and get another puppy, but she's not going anywhere. 

Apart from that, the camera is still broken, so no photos. We've had a few unexpected pet bills come up (our old dog has started cartrophen injections and our cat has to go in and get his teeth cleaned/possibly extracted), so it's about last on the list of priorities. 

But all of my wilds, excluding my Betta persephone are doing well. My Betta livida pair spawned again, and the fry from the first batch are coming along nicely. From the looks of them, they should be large enough to take BBS soon. 

My Betta persephone group came down with velvet again. I'm wondering if it was because their tank was receiving a lot of afternoon sunlight and causing the temperature to fluctuate. I had to euthanase two adult males, and my one remaining female, so now I have the four juveniles and two adult males left. They are receiving treatment at the moment, and we will see what happens after two weeks. 

Meanwhile, my spotted blue eye group is thriving. I found I actually had double the amount of fry than I thought previously when I broke their grow-out down. I moved them over into the 'main' tank with the adults and they have settled in well alongside the other young fish in there. 

The most recent batch of fry are being temporarily housed in a 4 gallon tank. However, when they are older and less fragile, I plan on moving them to a 10 gallon tank so that I have two separate breeding groups. 

I've just got to feed everyone, do a water change on my two spotted blue eye tanks, and then order some more BBS cysts and Seachem Prime, and all my fish related chores are done for the day.


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## Nismo83

wonder what will be the penalty?


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## LittleBettaFish

A fine most likely, and destruction of the fish coming into the country. I believe the authorities will also dose tanks containing any livestock they think has come into the country illegally, with some sort of poison, killing everything in them. I think some hobbyists in WA had this happen with cherry shrimp as they are technically not a legal import. 

Who knows what will happen in a year or two anyway. It may be that small numbers of wilds are legally imported, albeit at a much higher price. Although it's likely going to be the more popular species that are easier to recoup costs on. 

I can't tell if my Betta livida pair have spawned a third time, or if the male has just moved the nest. The wood I put into their tank has developed a thick layer of fungus/biofilm over it, and this has caused an explosion in the growth of microorganisms that I think might be feeding off it. This is providing an almost constant source of food for my Betta livida fry. I haven't even had to feed them once, but they always have plump bellies. I would say this is what has been fuelling their fairly rapid growth. 

My Betta persephone group seem to be handling the Cupramine treatment well enough, and are all still showing a healthy appetite. I'm going to check them over with the torch later today and see if the infection is retreating or advancing. 

I've also got to set-up two new tanks. One will be for a pair of F1 Betta sp. api api, and the second for a sibling pair of F1 Betta coccina. This will mean I have both species spread over three tanks, insurance, in case anything goes wrong. 

The difficulty is going to be choosing which pair of Betta sp. api api I want to breed with. I want a long-bodied pair, with the male showing a nice spade-shaped caudal, sharply pointed anal fin, and rich red colouring. I've got a few contenders, but separating one out is going to be tricky in a tank of 20 odd fish. 

I'm determined to keep this species going in Australia, considering I was likely the first person ever to own and breed them in this country! 

If I have the space, I also want to separate my young Betta brownorum into their own tank, so my pair can start breeding again without the risk of interference/predation. Betta brownorum is one of my favourite species, and with just one pair and five unsexed young fish, I really need to build my numbers up as quickly as possible. 

It's unfortunate that I've got a _very_ tight budget to work with. I definitely need to purchase BBS eggs and water conditioner as I'm nearly out of both, but I think I'm also going to have to purchase some more plants as I don't think I can harvest enough from the tanks I have running now. I have enough mayaca fluviatilis, just not enough java moss. I suppose worst comes to worst, I can just pick up some dried sphagnum moss and use that to provide hiding places for my fish. 

At this point it looks like I'm going to need to start using the top shelf of my rack again. But this time I'm going to box the top shelf in with foam board or something similar, so that the tanks aren't receiving direct afternoon sunlight.


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## jaliberti

LittleBettaFish said:


> ... I've also got to set-up two new tanks. One will be for a pair of F1 Betta sp. api api, and the second for a sibling pair of F1 Betta coccina. This will mean I have both species spread over three tanks, insurance, in case anything goes wrong. The difficulty is going to be choosing which pair of Betta sp. api api I want to breed with. I want a long-bodied pair, with the male showing a nice spade-shaped caudal, sharply pointed anal fin, and rich red colouring. I've got a few contenders, but separating one out is going to be tricky in a tank of 20 odd fish. ...


Have you produced F2 from any of the coccina complex via selective breeding? Years ago I attempted to produce F2 via selective breeding with _Betta burdigala_ in similar fashion to what you are now doing, i.e. chose a long-bodied male with sharply pointed anal fin and rich red coloring + a gravid female from a tank of my F1 fish. They were given their own tank but never bred. Meanwhile, back in the grow-out tank breeding occurred with a pair I hadn't chosen, in spite of the fact that they were sharing the tank with ~20 of their siblings. 

I've experienced similar scenarios with other bubble-nesting species. I am of the opinion that selective breeding is not as effective as breeding which occurs naturally, that human selection of a pair to be bred is inferior to permitting the brood to decide for itself which pair is the alpha pair. 

You've produced F1. I know 1st hand the required investment of time, money, effort, energy, frustration, etc, that has been required to produce those F1. Therefore, you have earned the right to choose a pair from your tank that you want to produce F2 from, you deserve it. I am not taking that away from you.

However, I believe allowing the brood to undergo natural selection is more in line with keeping wild betta "wild." The wild caught pairs we have in our tanks were not selected by humans. They were selected by invisible traits which allowed them to overcome drought, flood, famine, heat waves, cold snaps, and predators. Peace.


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## LittleBettaFish

I can't hope to exactly replicate the selective pressures of nature in my tanks. However, in 99% of cases I try to ensure that only the strongest survive. Most of my young fish are fed sporadically, and weaker/deformed fry tend to be out-competed by their healthier siblings. Between this and cannibalism by older siblings, I tend to end up with from between 5-15 young fish from a single breeding pair. Considering my pairs will often spawn weekly for months at a time, with each spawn likely producing over 20 fry, I feel that my level of 'interference' is extremely low. 

To be honest I've never really had an issue breeding pairs I've put together. In fact, if I keep my fish in a group setting, the rate of reproduction is usually very low to non-existent. My Betta sp. api api group have been together for months now and there's been zero attempts at breeding. However, I know they are sexually mature, and I know if I separate a pair out, the chances are high that they will breed. I _need_ to separate out fish if I want to keep a species going in my fish room. The pressure is even greater now that imports of wild bettas have effectively stopped. 

Considering my fish are never going to know life outside of a tank, I don't think it matters if I choose to go with the male that is slightly redder in colouring or has a nicer body shape. These are all characteristics that occur naturally within this species, and it's not as if I am deliberately breeding for colour or form mutations. Besides, my original breeding stock did not have the opportunity to pick their mates. They were paired up by the seller and sent on to me. So already there has been interference by humans. 

I do understand where you are coming from, and my beliefs do follow a similar vein. It's just in this case I do want to retain a certain 'look' to my fish, and since the pair I'm going to select have already been through the rigorous process outlined above, and not only survived, but thrived, I figure that they have proven themselves worthy of passing their genes on.


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## jaliberti

That experience with the group setting is contrary to mine. I know we're not dealing with the same exact species, but all of the coccina complex have similar requirements. What tank differences are there between the pair you separated out vs the group setting? 

My grow-out tank was 122cm long x 33cm wide with a water depth of 9cm. The depth is significant because my nesting sites are not the black film canisters, as I've come to believe that no species of fish are inherently submerged bubble-nesters (that's another thread). Instead, I use the black plastic boxes which come with the SanFranciscoBay BBS hatcheries, without their top/clear canisters (copy/paste for photo: http://i.ebayimg.com/00/s/NjAwWDcwMA==/z/X4AAAOxy4fVTA6Z8/$_1.JPG ) Laying on its side in 9cm of water leaves a surface area inside where nests are built. 

My pair tank was 30cm long x 17cm wide, same depth. Two boxes in that tank, in opposite corners and with open ends facing away from each other (facing the tank sides), one for the male/nest + one for the female to hide before/after breeding. (This set-up has worked like a charm for _Betta splendens_ plakats, _Trichopsis_, _Pseudosphromenus_, _Macropodus_, the list goes on and on. No set-up is more efficient IME for breeding bubble-nesters.) Despite the smaller size tank, the pair actually had more water per fish than did their siblings in the grow-out tank.

Anyway, the initial depth of the grow-out tank had been much higher but when I separated a pair out I decreased the depth to 9cm and added one box, just one. One box, IME, allows for easy removal of the alpha male (and sometimes alpha pair) from the ~20 other specimens. (I did not allow more than 1 spawn per tank.) The box is simply lifted from the tank at an angle so as to retain the water - and the male comes along. I wanted to identify the alpha male regardless of his color, finnage, etc, in case the male that I had selected wouldn't nest. I hadn't expected a pair and certainly hadn't expected a mating pair, but that's what happened.

You mention cannibalism by older siblings and weekly spawnings for months at a time. In that case the very first spawn has the advantage over subsequent spawns. In effect, any spawns occurring after ~1month merely serve as a food source for previous spawns. 

Yes red colouring and nice body shape are naturally occurring characteristics. It can become a slippery slope however, which can eventually lead to genetic erosion that we see within the betta splendens complex. 

You're correct, original breeding stock did not have the opportunity to pick their mates as they were paired up by the seller (unless the pair was caught under a nest while breeding). So I should've instead written "Fish which survive in the wild are not selected by humans. They're selected by invisible traits..."


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## LittleBettaFish

I have seen a male Betta persephone hatch out his fry in a submerged piece of PVC piping, and I have had a male Betta uberis attach his eggs to an oak leaf at the bottom of the tank and use that in a fashion similar to a bubblenest. They also will seek out plants and IAL to build their nests under, so I would say that they are submerged bubblenesters in so much that they like to raise their spawns in/under objects in the tank. 

I only have room for smaller tanks, and the high cost of electricity means I can only have a very limited number of tanks. My groups are usually in 10 gallon tanks heavily planted 3/4 full, and my breeding pairs are usually in 7 gallon tanks about 2/3 full. I will occasionally have fish in a group setting spawn (my Betta hendra and F1 Betta coccina for example), but the survival rate of the fry can be very hit and miss as I assume the sub-adults and adults sharing a tank with the breeding pair hunt them down. 

Unfortunately there's going to be genetic erosion going on with wild bettas in Australia no matter what I do. Imports of fresh stock into this country have effectively stopped with new laws that passed in March. Wild bettas have always been a niche market in this country, and the coccina complex has never been _that_ popular, likely due to their requirement for low pH/acidic water. 

This means an enormous amount of inbreeding is going to have to occur, to keep certain species viable in this country (such as Betta livida). 

It's also not like this pair selected for their appearance (but who are also healthy specimens) are going to be my only breeding stock. I have at least 25 fish in my F1 group, produced by three separate wild-caught pairs. Then I have a further dozen or so F1 fry/juveniles that have been produced by my adult breeding pair. This adult breeding pair were originally paired up with different partners when they produced the original F1 group. I highly doubt one tank of 'purposefully' bred Betta sp. api api is going to bring about the decline of the species. 

Besides, any fry this pair produce will still have to overcome a great deal of challenges to reach adulthood. They aren't Betta splendens fry getting fed twice a day, with jarring once the older fry start causing trouble. If they can't compete with their siblings, they die, and this 'natural' process of culling will show me very clearly if the pair produce abnormally weak fry.


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## jaliberti

LittleBettaFish said:


> ... the coccina complex has never been _that_ popular, likely due to their requirement for low pH/acidic water. ...


Their requirement for low pH/acidic water may be one reason for the lack of popularity, however Discus are an enormously popular fish (at least in North America) which often times are kept at pH levels of 5.0 for breeding. So there's more to it than just pH

What is the pH level of the water in your most productive breeding tanks? How are you acquiring/maintaining those levels and how are you testing?

I recently came across an interesting article ( http://aquaristmagazine.com/lowering-aquarium-ph-effective-methods ) which compares the pH lowering capabilities of 5 different natural substances. Part of the results read, "Alder Cones: pH 5.8 These turned the water the darkest colour of all items tested and began leaching out tannins very quickly however the water did not see the largest drop in pH to match its colour."

I learned the hard way that water color and pH levels are not in direct correlation. Some of my lighter colored tanks have lower pH levels than some of my darker tanks. And all my tanks' pH levels rise if left untouched for just a few days. Seems the lower the pH acquired the more difficult it is to maintain.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think wild bettas just don't have the following to begin with. Discus are cichlids, and cichlid keepers seem to make up the bulk of 'serious' hobbyists. Wild bettas share similarities with fish like Parosphromenus. They are very much a niche market, and rarely found in fish store tanks. 

I don't know the pH in any of my tanks. It's too low for my test kit to accurately measure, and the cheap pH meter I purchased ended up in the bin. 

Melbourne tap water is very soft. Out of the tap, the pH sits at around 6.8, and the KH is extremely low (takes only one drop to change the colour of the solution using the API test kit). This makes it ideal for my wild bettas, but the pH does have a tendency to plummet very quickly in the 24-48 hours following a water change.

Because of this, I perform small water changes using water that has been aged for a week or so in a tub with rooibos and peat moss, and heated to the appropriate temperature. 

I figure if I have successfully spawned every single species from this complex over the years, and they are usually very healthy and brilliantly coloured, the water conditions must be to their liking. 

Anyway, I wanted to update my journal to say that I went to my local Bunnings (a hardware store chain), and picked up a bag of dried sphagnum moss. This is going to be used in the tanks I am setting up for my F1 Betta coccina pair, my F1 Betta sp. api api pair, my F1 Betta brownorum group, my F1 Betta livida pair, and however many Betta miniopinna there are still in my Betta uberis tank (there seems to be at least two and I'm hoping that they are a pair and not the same sex). 

I do prefer to use java moss, but it's going to cost a fortune to buy as much as I'll need so the plan is to buy a couple of small portions of java moss, and let this fill in slowly over time while the sphagnum moss provides temporary cover. 

Setting up the tanks and moving my pairs into them, will be my project for the next couple of weeks. I've cleared my water aging tub and BBS hatchery off the top shelf of my rack, and now I just have to move the tanks up there. Before I do that though, I have to box in the top shelf with foam board so that I won't end up with tanks full of slime and algae again. 

Apart from that, there's not really much fish news to share. I did get excited when I saw there would be wild bettas available on the FB auction group I am a member of. I was secretly hoping that there might be a pair of Betta hendra up for grabs, but at this point, it looks like they are all splendens complex fish. I suppose from a seller's point of view, the splendens complex species tend to move much more quickly. 

Not having a camera is seriously doing my head in. I've missed all these great photo opportunities, and the only updates I've been able to post on my blog are written. 

I think it's the shutter, but it looks to cost several hundred dollars to get it repaired, and we just don't have the money at the moment. Then one of my aquarium lights decided to go on the blink, so it's out of action for the time being.


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## Nismo83

According to write up, coccina group needs less than 4 pH for breeding.


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## jaliberti

Which write up? IBC? SeriouslyFish? or ???


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## Nismo83

Seriously fish.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think some species from this complex are slightly more flexible than others, as I have read/heard about people successfully breeding these fish at a higher pH (like above 6.0). 

Betta persephone seems to be one that requires a very low pH to successfully reproduce.


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## Nismo83

probably.. I could get any to spawn still. haha


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## LittleBettaFish

So none of your coccina complex have spawned yet? That's a shame. I wonder what the issue is? 

Today I tried seeing if my Betta livida fry were large enough to take BBS. Based on their orange stomachs, I would say that it was a success. I did a quick head count and there seemed to be at least 10 fry that I could see. However, the water is essentially black. I can't see more than a inch or so in, even with a bright torch. So it's likely there are more in there. 

I'm thinking if I can get around 20-30 fry surviving through to maturity from this pair, it will be a good start. Just hope it's not something like 29 males, and 1 female. 

Other than that, I moved my P. gertrudae fry into a HOB breeder box (it's hanging off the main tank), because I need their grow-out tank to house my Betta miniopinna. The breeder box is only small, but it's only until they are big enough that hey aren't going to be eaten by the adults and other young fish in the main tank. 

I'm going to set-up my Betta miniopinna tank tomorrow, and then move them into it on either Wednesday or Thursday. Their colouring is very washed out being in with the more aggressive uberis, so it will be interesting to see if they colour up more once they are on their own. At least it would make sexing them both easier.

Then I'm just going to gradually set-up the rest of the breeding tanks on my top shelf, and move fish into them. 

That'll mean I'll have fourteen tanks dedicated to my wild bettas, one tank to my P. gertrudae, two tanks to my fancy bettas, and one tank to my goldfish.

Unless one of my fancy bettas dies or I sell off my P. gertrudae, this is about as many tanks as I can run before I need to go out and buy new tanks. Plus the cost of electricity here is enormous, and we are approaching the cooler months now, when my heaters start to come on, and stay on. 

I also have some good news to share on the progress of my Betta persephone group. I think it's been just over seven days since I started treatment, and although sadly, I lost two of the smallest juveniles, the rest of the fish (two adult males and two unsexed juveniles) appear to be making a recovery. 

I had a look over them with the torch yesterday and couldn't see any signs of parasites on their bodies or pectoral fins, and they were behaving much more normally, and even chased down the mosquito larvae I put in their tank. 

So I guess I'll see where they are at in another week, and then I'll start thinking about moving them out of the hospital tank. 

I might see how they tolerate a low dose of aquarium salt, and use this as a long-term preventative against velvet, as I'm likely not going to be breeding this species even if the juveniles turn out to be female. Past experience tells me that if velvet is going to make a reappearance, it's when there are fry in the tank.


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## jaliberti

LittleBettaFish said:


> ... fourteen tanks dedicated to my wild bettas, one tank to my P. gertrudae, two tanks to my fancy bettas, and one tank to my goldfish.
> ...
> I also have some good news to share on the progress of my Betta persephone group. I think it's been just over seven days since I started treatment, and although sadly, I lost two of the smallest juveniles, the rest of the fish (two adult males and two unsexed juveniles) appear to be making a recovery.
> ...
> I might see how they tolerate a low dose of aquarium salt, and use this as a long-term preventative against velvet, as I'm likely not going to be breeding this species even if the juveniles turn out to be female. Past experience tells me that if velvet is going to make a reappearance, it's when there are fry in the tank.


So 18 tanks total, and with several species. I've been there and found myself overwhelmed. Lesson learned. This time around it's one species only.

What was your 1 week treatment for the persephone? 

Have you tried aquarium salt before? Salt will bring water closer to neutral, so in the case of acidic water it will cause an increase in pH. It's a mineral quite foreign to blackwater swamps.

I copied this from another forum: “… soft water fish, they're naturally inhabiting places with very little bacteria in the water column. In case you aren't aware, as pH drops, bacteria find it more difficult to survive. Below pH 6 for example, filter bacteria essentially stop working. It's also why you do things like pickling to preserve food. … come from habitats were the water pH can be below 5 and the water has virtually no mineral content at all. The water is extremely ‘clean’ and consequently the fish living here have a relatively weak immune system. When transferred to harder water conditions and a higher pH, they are exposed to lots more bacteria, and effectively become overwhelmed. … ” "... This species has some very specific requirements that absolutely must be met; think discus, only even more so. … Fish acquired will most likely be wild caught, and they inhabit peat swamps and blackwater streams in very densely forested areas of Sumatra and Borneo. ... These fish are highly prone to skin infections, velvet and other parasites, and protozoan, and poor water conditions are nearly always the cause. ... "

The quote was not written specifically for species of the coccina complex, but could just as well be applied.

IME almost anything added to water of pH<5 will cause an increase in pH: plants, substrate, clay pots, fish (yes fish - crazy I know), even driftwood.

Driftwood has been touted as an acidifier and may very well be for water of pH>7, but in pH<5 it causes an increase.

Even the plastic containers used for nesting bring about an increase. Only Catappa leaves and peat moss have allowed me to acidify water of pH<5 even further, though I haven't tried the other substances used in the experiment I posted about.


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## LittleBettaFish

18 tanks definitely don't put me at a point where I'd be feeling overwhelmed. I've had close to thirty before, and _that_ overwhelmed me, simply because I hadn't done any sort of planning (such as purchasing multiple racks) before acquiring fish and tanks. 

I only do small water changes once every two weeks, so it's not like the maintenance of my wild betta tanks is particularly demanding. It takes me longer to disinfect the equipment I use during water changes, than it does to perform the actual water changes themselves. 

I am aware of the effects of aquarium salt on water chemistry. The Betta persephone are suffering from velvet, and receiving a two week treatment with Seachem Cupramine. I am aware of the effects of aquarium salt, which is why I'm going to see if the fish can tolerate a low dose. Obviously, if they react adversely, I will remove the salt from their water with water changes. 

I guess I am sort of wondering what point you are trying to make with your posts? I don't know if this is intended or not, but some of what you have written comes across (at least to me) as having a slight passive-aggressive tone to it. 

I have a blog called Redwine Bettas. It goes back about three years and chronicles my successes and failures with keeping and breeding coccina complex species. 

Yes, I've made a great deal of mistakes in the past, and some I regret terribly, but I've learned from those mistakes and adjusted my fishkeeping practices to try and stop them from happening again.


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## jaliberti

LittleBettaFish said:


> ...
> I guess I am sort of wondering what point you are trying to make with your posts? I don't know if this is intended or not, but some of what you have written comes across (at least to me) as having a slight passive-aggressive tone to it.
> ...


There's no point trying to be made with my posts other than the sharing of info. No passive-aggressive tone intended, but it's your journal and since you're feeling this way I'll unsubscribe now. Best of luck with your fish and keep up the good work. Over & out.


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## Nismo83

Nah. No luck yet. I just finish setting up a new rack for them. Hopefully they will be good until the day I am back and let see if any good chance of spawning will take place. My alpha is holding on day 4 now. Looks like there is a chance in this new comm tank. Previous attempt were all disturbed by the 3rd male I had added.


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## LittleBettaFish

Lol I need more racks. I've only got two, and one can only hold about four 10 gallon tanks. 

I assume the 'alpha male' you are talking about is one of your macs? You must have a herd of them by now? 

Well my Betta livida male spawned again this morning. Woke up to find a nest full of eggs and a protective father hovering underneath. Because the water is dark, all I see is a pair of gleaming green eyes. You can definitely see why they were named for them. 

I've also moved my two Betta miniopinna into their new tank. Sadly, it looks like these _were_ the only two survivors. I probably should have separated them sooner, but not much can be done now. I'll just have to wait until they are large enough, and showing enough colour, to correctly sex. What I will be annoyed with, is if no one is breeding the Betta miniopinna I've sold previously. I think one group is now deceased due to no fault of the owner, but there are at least two other groups of fish out there. 

It's just frustrating that wild bettas in this country don't seem to garner the same dedication that other restricted or rare species of fish do. I mean FB is a great asset to connect breeders and hobbyists, and yet the FB group for wild bettas in Australia, is pretty much a ghost town. 

That's why I won't be selling any of my fish in the foreseeable future. I'm not going to put all the work in, and then my fish just vanish off the radar. 

Another gripe I have is that the weather is cooling down, and this means I'm going to be getting less and less mosquito larvae appearing in my tubs. I think I'm going to try and find a starter culture of daphnia this year. There was one up for auction recently, but it went for like $25 and I have to do further reading on their care, before I part with that much cash. It will be like my moina culture all over again. 

Apart from those two points of contention, everything else seems to be going smoothly. I'm still moping about the fact I can't import any wild bettas, especially I've _finally_ got a system going that works. But I suppose that's life. 

One cool thing that did happen yesterday that is completely unrelated to my fish, is that we spotted the pair of wedge-tailed eagles that live in the park near our house, on the hunt, while we were out walking the dog. I still think it's amazing that we are only 18km from the CBD, and we can see birds like that. Just goes to show the importance of retaining large tracts of natural bush, considering that fifteen minutes drive from our house, they are putting in these huge (for a suburb) developments everywhere.


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## Nismo83

Yeah. Is my Mac. Well first four spawn only have two survivor in total. The fifth is good. Counted about 28 of them though some are deformed. Saw another male flaring this morning. Hopefully while I'm away more are holding.


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## LittleBettaFish

Didn't you artificially hatch some as well? How are they doing? Or were they from among your first four spawns? 

I don't have the patience for mouthbrooders haha. 

My Betta livida fry are absolutely thriving. I have so many swimming around in the tank now, and their bellies are always full of microworms, BBS, and infusoria. My female is looking as good as when I first got her, and my male has regained his green sides in the dark water. I'm just waiting on my aqua soil and IALs before I move my sibling pair into their new tank. My parcel got stuck in the mail because of Good Friday. So probably won't be here until Tuesday. 

I feel like this group has given me a goal to work towards again with my wilds, and really just reignited my passion for wild bettas in general. 

My F1 Betta coccina that are sharing a tank with their parents are big enough now that I think they are starting to be perceived as potential rivals for food and other resources, rather than just easily discouraged pests. They are still too small and not coloured up enough to sex, but hopefully this will become easier over the next couple of months. 

My two Betta miniopinna are still settling into their new tank. I was hoping that they were a male/female pair, but I'm starting to think they are both male. The largest is quite aggressive and spends most of its time chasing the smaller one around. If they are both male, I may have to divide their tank as two males can spell disaster. 

Other than that, I think my Betta persephone group is nearly finished their treatment. The remaining four fish are all still alive and after careful scrutiny with a torch, seem to be clear of parasites. However, I'm going to give it another few days, before I take them out of the hospital tank. Then they are going into a sort of 'halfway' tank, which will just have substrate, wood, and some IAL. This way it won't be a hassle to move them back into the hospital tank. 

I think my biggest juvenile _is_ turning out to be male, based on its aggression levels, its fins and body shape. However, the smallest juvenile looks like it could go either way. 

I swear this species has always been cursed for me. I've never had any trouble breeding them, it's just keeping them alive long-term that's been the issue. 

In other news, Jodi-Lea, the main supplier of wilds here in Australia, has some more fish up for auction, and has indicated that this is her last shipment of wilds. So I've been obsessively refreshing the page to make sure I don't miss out if Betta hendra miraculously pop up. 

It's probably only a very small chance that they will (most of the wilds in previous auctions have been splendens complex), but I am _so_ desperate. 

I also hope any other wilds sold are finding themselves in the hands of serious breeders and not just casual hobbyists who don't really plan on maintaining them long-term. 

However, if by some miracle, I do get a pair Betta hendra, I'm going to have to sell off my spotted blue eyes group. They are taking up a tank, heater, filter, and valuable rack space. Much as I like them, I like my wilds better, and this strain of spotted blue eyes is one of the most commonly kept in Australia, so it's not like they are difficult to replace. 

My plan is to have each species (or at least species that I am breeding with) divided into two or more tanks. This way I won't have a repeat of my Betta hendra or my original Betta sp. api api group again. 

That's about it for me. I know my journal is probably really boring without photos, so I apologise. It's so frustrating not to be able to share photos of my fish and my fish room progress.


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## Nismo83

Good to hear on your livida. I did hold the 5th batch in the thumber before putting them into tank. They are growing well and my colleague is helping me to look after then on weekdays since I am out station now. Hopefully everything will be good when I return home next saturday


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## LittleBettaFish

My camera is still broken :sob: 

Good news is that I have _so_ many Betta livida fry. I counted at least twenty the other day, but that was just those up against the glass. I am starting to think there may be double that amount in the rest of the tank.

My pair also spawned again. Right before water change day. I was very careful not to disturb the male's nest as it was full of eggs, and I had to be careful not to suck up the numerous .5mm fry that wouldn't get away from the end of my siphon. 

My Betta brownorum pair have started spawning again, so I want to move the juveniles and sub-adults out of that tank ASAP. This time I'm going to keep the water extremely dark, and see if this has any effect on how many fry develop the lateral green spot/blotch. 

I also have to share some further good news in that it looks like I've successfully treated my Betta persephone group. All four fish are alive and doing very well (if their feistiness is any indication). They'll be moving out of the hospital tank in another couple of days, and then I will see how they go. The real risk will be if one of the juveniles is female and I decide to make another attempt to breed them. As if the velvet is going to come back, it will come back if there are fry in the tank. 

Unfortunately, I think my two Betta miniopinna are male. If so, that will be it for me and this species. I suppose this is the sad reality of the new import laws. Just wish I'd held onto my previous pairs, but I couldn't predict the future and what was going to happen. 

My spotted blue eyes are also doing well. Since I added more hydrilla to their tank, I almost never see them. Which seems an almost impossible feat, when there are probably over 30 fish (including the fry and juveniles) in a 10 gallon tank. I'm still not sure whether to keep or sell this group. For now they are staying, because the young fish are much too small. 

Other than that, not much has been happening. Which is probably a blessing, as usually when something is happening in my fish room, it's something bad.


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## Nismo83

glad to hear so many breeding news.


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## LittleBettaFish

Set-up two tanks today. One for an F1 pair of Betta coccina (my two males have decided to wage war on each other so a move is necessary), and one for my F1 group of Betta brownorum so they stop cannibalising their newly free-swimming siblings. 

The Betta brownorum group will be further split if there is a female among them. I still have a male from my original, and now deceased, wild-caught pair. I would like to see if I can use him to boost my brownorum numbers, so that I am not just relying on the one pair. 

I'm just waiting on my sphagnum moss to become waterlogged, and the water to clear and parameters/temperature to stabilise, and then I will be moving both groups across. 

Meanwhile my two Betta miniopinna have decided they hate each other. Funnily enough, it's actually the smallest with all the attitude. It is just mercilessly chasing its larger sibling around. They are two fish, both less than an inch, in a 4 gallon tank with lots of cover, and they still just hunt each other out. Typical bratty bettas. 

At present, all of my current crop of young fish look to be growing out well. I reckon Betta livida numbers are pushing 40-50 based on a quick headcount I did yesterday, and some of my Betta sp. api api youngsters are almost big enough to move in with their half-siblings. I also have around a half a dozen Betta coccina juveniles still sharing a tank alongside their parents, which I have been seeing a lot more of lately. They are getting to a size where their presence is less tolerated by the breeding pair, so I sense a move is in store for them at some point in the near future. 

My Betta persephone group is also doing well. So far it looks like the velvet hasn't come back, but I always know how quickly this can change, so they are checked daily and once my hands have been in their tank, I don't do anything further with the rest of my fish that day. 

Still can't sex the two youngsters though. Sometimes I think the largest might be female, but I always find Betta persephone difficult to sex until they start showing adult colouration. 

Some good news I had is that a hobbyist friend local to me, and who I sold a pair of Betta hendra to some time ago, still has them. So I've put my name down for a pair if she manages to get fry from them. 

I've also decided my spotted blue eyes have to go. Once I fill up the five tanks on the top shelf of my rack, I'll be out of usable tank space. With the large number of Betta livida fry I have, I'm going to need somewhere for them to go once they outgrow their current tank. Plus, I would like to separate out a sibling pair of Betta uberis in the next few months. 

That's about it from me. Just another boring text only update while the camera is still out of action!


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## Nismo83

You are still clear on what you are doing. I'm lost. Haha. Guess I have to cut down or cut away the small fishes.


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## LittleBettaFish

Lol it's very easy to get carried away with the wilds. I learned to keep it to a few favourite species, or even a single complex, so that way it's easier to maintain your enthusiasm long-term. 

Even then I have had an on-off relationship with my wilds over the years. 

My biggest problems now are a lack of money, and a lack of space. I'm also almost out of power outlets to plug my heaters into.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> Lol it's very easy to get carried away with the wilds. I learned to keep it to a few favourite species, or even a single complex, so that way it's easier to maintain your enthusiasm long-term.
> 
> Even then I have had an on-off relationship with my wilds over the years.
> 
> My biggest problems now are a lack of money, and a lack of space. I'm also almost out of power outlets to plug my heaters into.


yes it is very easy to get carried away. My macrostoma community tank has stabled down. Alpha released his 6th spawn.. and Beta male is holding his long-awaited spawn. Day 4 now. 

I probably going to count down on the coccina group


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## LittleBettaFish

How many adult macs do you have in total now? 

I should have chosen macs over the coccina complex species. At least then I might have made some money when it came time to sell them haha. 

Not much been happening here. My F0 Betta brownorum and F0 Betta coccina males both have nests, and I finished setting up the tanks for my F1 Betta brownorum and Betta coccina earlier today. I think my Betta persephone male also built a small nest in a film canister. I think he's being a tad optimistic, unless that largest juvenile turns out to be female.


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## Nismo83

4 males 5 females in adult stage. And a pair in Juv stage. There will be an incoming pair from Brunei this Wednesday. My new tank is not ready yet.


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## LittleBettaFish

Going to need a few grow-out tanks with all those pairs! 

I just received some awesome news. A while back, I had contacted the main seller/importer of show and wild bettas asking if she had any coccina complex species in stock. I was desperately hoping she'd have a pair of Betta hendra available, but it seemed like this was not the case.

Until I checked my email this morning and discovered that yes, she actually did have a pair of Betta hendra in stock! 

So I've shot a reply back telling her I was definitely interested, and now I'm just waiting to hear back so I can send the funds through. 

What's handy is that I haven't moved my Betta coccina or Betta brownorum to their new tanks, so I have a tank already set-up and ready to go. 

I really couldn't afford to get any further fish, but I just felt like if I let this opportunity slip through my fingers I would seriously regret it.


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## Nismo83

Yes. I am still waiting for my first pair of Hendra as well.


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## LittleBettaFish

I thought you ordered the Betta hendra ages ago? 

I introduced my pair of Betta coccina into their new tank. I had a number of young females to choose from, but I went with the female that the male had successfully spawned with previously. 

They aren't used to being by themselves so I think they are a bit overwhelmed. 

It didn't help we had an eight hour power outage here. I covered my tanks with blankets and fortunately, it wasn't too cold during the day. The last thing I need is the temperature fluctuating too greatly with all the young fish I have in my tanks. 

My Betta miniopinna pair were a bit put out that there were fish next to them again. They coloured right up and were pacing up and down the glass. I don't think they realise that they are small enough my Betta coccina pair could probably eat them. 

I've got to pay for my Betta hendra pair first thing tomorrow morning ($180 ouch), and then I've got to work out where I'm going to put my F1 Betta brownorum as their tank will be taken over. 

I've got too many fish, not enough tanks, not enough money, and not enough room!


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## Nismo83

I ordered some time ago but there were too small. Burdigala will be coming as well. That's real expensive over there.


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## LittleBettaFish

Ah okay. Also did you mean wilds are expensive in Australia? I don't know what's going to happen with prices once supply dries up. Especially if people are only jumping on the bandwagon as a knee-jerk reaction to the change in import laws. It's definitely going to be interesting to see if those people buying up wilds now, are still going to be working with them in another year or two. 

Well my Betta hendra pair were shipped out yesterday and are due to arrive some time today. I'll be waiting on tenterhooks until then, because if one or both fish are DOA, I very strongly doubt they can be replaced. 

This time I'm not going to put all my eggs in the one basket. Once they've got a few spawns under their belts, I'm going to move them into another tank so I will have a back-up group of Betta hendra if something goes wrong. 

Other than that, my poor Betta coccina pair are still getting over the shock of being in a new tank without their siblings. Since they've been removed from the tank, their brother has coloured up and started showing green irridescence down his sides. There's been some flirtatious behavior between him and his four remaining sisters, so I'm not sure if he's going to pair up with one of them and spawn. 

That's about the most recent news from my fish room. Not much has been happening, and everyone (including my Betta persephone), appear to be healthy and well.


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## LittleBettaFish

My Betta hendra pair arrived earlier today. 

The male didn't handle the shipping process as well as the female, but they are both moving around the tank and slowly gaining more confidence and colour. They are smaller than I was expecting. I'd say maybe an inch from head to tail. 

They've got heaps of cover in there, the water is nice and dark, and I've put some mosquito larvae in, so now it's just a matter of waiting and letting them settle in. 

Wish I had my camera to share some photos though.


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## Nismo83

nice.. yeah I meant it is expensive over in Australia. well I lost 5 pcs Persephone comm yesterday. and I have additional 2 pairs of mac..


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## LittleBettaFish

Does that mean you lost five Betta persephone? Do you know what happened? That's definitely a sad loss. 

My Betta hendra pair seem to be settling in nicely. I don't like my male as much as my original male (he's got these piggy looking eyes), but he's still got room to grow and we will see what happens. 

At first the male was being bullied by the female, but the tables seem to have turned and he's been chasing her around this morning. I'm (hopefully) picking up some live blackworms today as I want to start conditioning this pair for breeding and blackworms seem to be the best food to do so. 

Apart from that, not much else has been happening. 

My spotted blue eyes group has been _tentatively_ sold to a hobbyist friend (for those who read my journal and remember 'Jar Fish' apparently he is still alive and doing well with her), which will free up tank space and a heater for my wild bettas. 

Doing some quick calculations, I've probably got the rack space for 18 tanks. I've only got seven species of wilds at present, so this will allow me to distribute each species through multiple tanks. 

Now it's more a matter of having enough plants and substrate to fill them all.


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## Nismo83

I suspect is the new flower clay pot that I put in the tank which cause the problem for their death.


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## LittleBettaFish

Hmm I wonder if it had been sprayed with something. I've used clay pots plenty of times and never had any issues with toxicity. 

Meanwhile something exciting is happening in my fish room. Woke up to find my pair of F1 Betta coccina in the film canister with the female showing that pale 'breeding bar' along her topline. Based on that, and her body language, it looks like the pair are spawning, or at least close to spawning. 

These two have spawned several times in the past. It's just their siblings ate whatever fry were produced. I'm hoping now that they are alone, I'll get my first _living_ group of F2 Betta coccina. 

I swear live blackworms are one of the best conditioning tools. I always get spawns very shortly after feeding them. The female was already showing vertical barring yesterday, so I did a short mirror session with her after feeding, and that coupled with the blackworms seemed to be enough to induce spawning. 

Still no spawning activity from my Betta hendra pair. But I wasn't expecting much there. I will say that both fish are so much friendlier now. As soon as the male sees me, he comes over. The female is not as bold, but this is because once the male spots her, he chases her away. 

Other than that, my Betta livida fry are growing out nicely. They're only 1cm in size, and I've already seen them squaring each other off. I don't know if the parents have had any recent spawns, but there are enough fry in the tank that it's not a concern. 

I've also got the F1 pair that I still need to separate out, so I will be hopeful for more Betta livida fry there.


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## Nismo83

Most probably it was new and I didn't soak it before use. It's ok. I have decided to cut the coccina collection. I will be concentrating more on Macrostoma


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## LittleBettaFish

That's a shame. I wish you could send me your coccina collection! You have some lovely fish. 

After feeding everyone this morning, I'm starting to wonder if my two Betta miniopinna aren't actually a male/female pair. The smallest one definitely looks female, but the way 'she' has been interacting with the largest one of late seems more flirtatious than aggressive. Lots of body wriggling and vertical barring present. 

I am crossing everything that this is the case. Would love if these two weren't the only Betta miniopinna in my fish room.

And my F1 Betta coccina pair are definitely spawning! Fortunately, they are not virgins so things are progressing more quickly.

Also, my mum said I can use her phone to take some photos of my fish, so I will see how that works out, and maybe I will have some photos to share later today.


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## Nismo83

I still have some coccina family. Tussyae, Persephone and Rutilans. You want them? I can send them to you for free but shipping on you. Haha


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## LittleBettaFish

Lol, and all the fines that will come with importing them now those new laws are in effect. 

Well the attempt to take photos with my mum's phone ended a bit disastrously. By the time the camera had focussed on my fish, they had already zoomed off. Then I tried to take a couple of videos of my brownorum flirting and when I uploaded it onto my laptop it came out sideways. 

I did however, get a photo of what my main rack is looking like nowadays. Those two empty tanks on the top shelf are getting filled tomorrow. 










At the moment it's just my spotted blue eyes and Betta persephone on the smaller rack. But once the spotted blue eyes are gone, there will be two tanks for wild bettas in their place. 

I just need more plants. My java moss just never grows fast enough to fill up new tanks, and I'm wary of purchasing plants from fish stores because I don't want to introduce any disease into my fish room. 

My Betta hendra and F1 B. coccina tanks look pretty pitiful compared to the other tanks in my fish room, simply from a lack of greenery.


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## Nismo83

Oh. You aren't continuing with the spotted blue eyes? Will you still get fine if they are imported properly?


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah, I have to move the blue eyes on, as I need the space for my wilds. Especially now I have so many young fish growing out. 

Unfortunately, I'm fairly certain the new import laws require the death of a certain number of fish to test for this particular disease. It sounds like in the distant future there may perhaps be some way to get wilds into the country legally and without massive loss of life. However, for now, private import of small numbers of wilds has ceased. 

That's why I'm kicking myself I didn't have the money to import multiple pairs of fish before the new laws came into effect.


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## Nismo83

that's pretty hard to get new pairs in now from what you have mentioned. I am going to get re-organised again on my coccina groups. guess I will keep just a little of them instead of what I started off with.


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## blueridge

Your main rack is looking good LBF! Full of fish :lol:


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## LittleBettaFish

It's been quite a while since my rack has been this full of _healthy_ wilds. It's almost like when I first starting keeping wilds, before all my issues with velvet. 

With that said, I'm a little concerned about my Betta splendens male, Atlas. He should be three years old in October, and he's taken a nose dive condition wise. His breeder is a hobbyist friend of mine, and apparently none of the males from that spawn lived very long. He's the only one left, along with a few sisters. 

He still has a good appetite, and is extremely cantankerous. He has just started having difficulty swimming, and when he's not flaring at my other male Maverick, he's on the bottom of the tank not moving much. 

Other than that, the eggs from my F1 Betta coccina pair have hatched! The male has been busy looking after them, and I can't wait until they become free-swimming. 

My Betta hendra pair have not yet spawned. I'm going to give them a good feed, add some more floating plants to the tank, and drop the water level by a couple of inches to see if this makes a difference. 

And that's about it from the fish room. Without a camera and any major dramas, I don't really have much to share. 

In dog news, I have been teaching Clio to weave between my legs, heel between my legs, and spin in a circle. She's also recently mastered 'high-five', which wasn't difficult as she already knew 'shake' and can target things with her paw on command. She's been really good with her 'wait' (which is just a stay) command, and she will readily do it at a sit, stand, and drop. Although there's been some regression on the 'drop', so we've been working on the basics of what dropping is. 

One thing I have to do, is get her back to doing her perch work. She's so uncoordinated, and I want to use it to teach her a nice heel.

I just wish every video I watched on Youtube, didn't involve a Border Collie or some other flexible and enthusiastic breed. Clio's so slow and awkward by comparison.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my camera just suddenly started working after I thought I would give it one more try. So I took a whole heap of photos just in case it suddenly decided to stop working. 

First up is my new Betta hendra male. He's still growing into himself, and wasn't sure of the camera, so this was the best I could manage. 










Then this was just a photo showing how overgrown my Betta sp. api api breeding tank is. I'm going to harvest some of the mayaca fluviatilis and use it in my newest tanks, as I know the fish in here are healthy. 










Then this is one of my fry from my 'Betta livida Breeding Project'. The water is so black in this tank it is impossible to do any better. 










Moving on, these are some photos of my Betta brownorum pair flirting. 























































I swear the male was either guarding a nest, or trying to lure the female back as he refused to come any closer to the front of the tank. 










This female and her siblings will always be special to me, as Betta coccina was the first species I ever owned, and these were my first group of homebred Betta coccina. Now a new generation begins with her future nephews and nieces. 










This is my 'shiny' F1 Betta uberis male. He is causing trouble in the main group, and will be moving to a tank with a sister (if I can find one) as soon as I have the space.










Last but not least, is a terrible photo of my largest Betta miniopinna. Still cannot sex either this or its sibling. 










I'm not sure if my camera is going to work next time I try to use it, but at least here are some photos to break up the tedium of text only posts.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well the camera was _still_ working when I switched it on this morning, so I decided to once again take as many photos of my fish as I could. 

First up, is my Betta brownorum group. My pair were putting on a ripper of a show for me. I just couldn't catch it on the camera as they kept darting in and out of the plants. 




























They still share a tank with their five offspring. I'm hoping once I've moved them into their own tank, and the adults aren't a constant looming threat, they will start colouring up more. 





































This is the one I am thinking could be female, but I'm not 100% sure. 



















This is where my Betta hendra tank is sitting at the moment. If things go to plant, the java moss _should_ grow over the sphagnum moss, and the mayaca fluviatilis will spread out and form a dense mat at the surface. 










I managed to get a decent shot of my male while he was flaring at the mirror. 










A not so great shot of the female. She was hiding because the male is a jerk. 










Speaking of jerks, it's Shiny, 'King of the Jerks' doing what he does best. 










Then last but not least, two of my larger Betta sp. api api juveniles.


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## LittleBettaFish

Took just a few more snaps before I fed my fish, so thought I'd tack them on here. 

My Betta brownorum male coming to tell off one of his sub-adult offspring. 










Said offspring. 










Then just my Betta hendra male preferring to make war and not love. He really needs to grow bodily into those fins.


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## Nismo83

Always like your coccina groups. I just can't keep them as like yours.


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## LittleBettaFish

Is that just because of a lack of space? My biggest issue is now finding space to move my young fish to, so the breeding pairs will continue spawning. 

I was late harvesting my BBS, so my young fish got fed tonight. While they were eating, I took the opportunity to get some photos, especially of my F1 Betta sp. api api who tend to hide whenever they see my camera. 

Once again my Betta brownorum were putting on a show, so I couldn't resist. I actually got some nice photos of my male this time without him clamping his fins or looking like a red sausage. 





































They thought I was going to feed them. The wilds are just as greedy as normal bettas!



















This is a 7 gallon tank, which is 30cm/12 inches across. So you can see how small they are in comparison. I ran out of rooibos, so the water isn't as dark as it usually is. 










One of my younger Betta sp. api api. 










Same fish. 










One of the older F1 Betta sp. api api. This is a female. 










I think this was also a female. Sometimes the smaller females can be difficult to distinguish from young males. As they get older and the males' colour and fins change, it is easier. 










Close-up of same fish. 










Then lastly, one of my F1 Betta coccina from the second group of fish, which are still sharing a tank with the breeding pair. I counted about seven of them tonight. They are going to need to go into their own tank eventually. 










Meanwhile my Betta hendra pair _still_ haven't made any efforts to spawn. The female was so barred up yesterday that she looked like a zebra, and she's been showing some very promising behaviour. It's just the male is more interested in attacking her, than he is in wooing her. But I know most of the courtship between my coccina pairs starts off pretty violent and then slowly eases down. 

My first batch of F2 Betta coccina fry are almost free-swimming. Not sure how many there are, but even a small number of fry, is better than no fry at all. Hopefully this is the first of many future spawnings. 

My Betta livida fry are still thriving. They just polished off a meal of BBS and the water is so dark that all I can see of them are their orange stomachs. 

Finally, my spotted blue eyes group is all alive and well. The juveniles and sub-adults are slowly maturing (my irregular schedule of water changes is probably a contributing factor), but even at their current size, I seem to have many more males than females. 

Now I'm just hoping that haven't deposited any fertilised eggs on the clump of hydrilla I left in their tank. I always feel bad about destroying eggs, especially ones that are eyed up and close to hatching. 

And that's about all I have to report from my fish room for tonight. I'll likely take some more photos tomorrow. Just get as much use out of the camera before it dies completely.


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## Nismo83

More of not able to maintain their live. Lol


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## LittleBettaFish

Well after losing so many of my young fish, as well as a number of my breeding stock to velvet and misadventure over the years, I'm not going to say that I'm particularly good at keeping them alive either! 

My current method is just to have a single breeding pair to a heavily planted tank. The only other fish with them are their fry or siblings. No unrelated adults as I find this is when the most aggression occurs. I don't separate my breeding pairs because some of my pairs appear to be quite bonded (especially my coccina) and they show signs of stress if kept apart. 

Then it's just live/frozen foods, minimal disturbance to the tank and fish, minimal water changes with aged water only, and only removing the young fish from the tank once they are large enough, rather than continually uprooting the breeding pair. 

So far it seems to be working. In fact I'm having such a run of good luck I am suspicious that something bad is on the horizon!


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## LittleBettaFish

Yesterday while feeding my fish, I moved around the film canister that was in my Betta livida tank. It had been wedged under some plants, and I put it back up near the surface. This new position must have been more to my male's liking, because there's a frothy nest in there, and my pair are very busy spawning. 

I did try to lure the female out to get some photos of her in breeding dress as her green eyes were literally glowing. However, the combination of the dark water and the flash washed her colours right out. 

So I took a few photos of their fry instead. The biggest of the fry pictured is probably just under 1cm total length, just to give an idea of size. 










These next two were having a fight over the IAL. At this size, no damage is done. It's more intimidation and threats. 



















Next I took some photos of my Betta hendra male. He's not a difficult subject to capture. It's more getting him to turn onto his side as all he wants to do is stare at me. 





































This fish is my smallest Betta miniopinna. Its bigger sibling was lurking somewhere nearby making threats of violence. 










Meanwhile, there was some strife in the Betta coccina henhouse. I think my male is too afraid to go anywhere near the females in case they force him into spawning. 



















My male has really coloured up since his brother went into another tank. In real life the sheen on his side is green not gold. 










Speaking of Betta coccina, my F2 Betta coccina fry went free-swimming today. My male is a bit stressed. He's lost all his colour and is pacing back and forth against the glass, which is exactly what his father does. The behaviour should settle down in another day or two, especially as the female looks ready for another spawn.


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## ThatFishThough

LBF! Is this you photo? It looks... a lot like your Brownum.

Edit: http://www.aquabid.com/cgi-bin/auction/auction.cgi?fwbettas&1462508343
Edit 2: *facepalm* I found your Blog. :3 I now see why your pictures are all over the internet. The picture below was taken from google and used on AB.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah that seller uses photos of mine. The hendra, api api and miniopinna adverts used to (probably still do) include photos of mine. 

Although the seller was using my Betta persephone as a visual illustration of the _Betta miniopinna_ he/she was selling. 

I can't be bothered doing anything about it. I just think it's lazy when sellers don't use photos of the wilds they are selling, as there _can_ be wide variation between individuals from the same species. 

Haha most people I meet through FB know me through my blog. It doesn't get a lot of comments, but it seems like it gets many more lurkers.


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## LittleBettaFish

Got some exciting news....

My Betta hendra pair are spawning!! 

Because it was their first spawn, I didn't want to cause them too much stress. So there's no photos to share. 

Now I'll just have to see how the male handles his parental duties, and whether either fish is going to be inclined to eat the eggs. It's not only the male I have to look out for. In the past, I've had males that lacked any sort of protective instinct, and the female would get into the canister with the eggs and eat them. 

Other than that, I took this awesomely timed (or at least I think so) photo of my F1 Betta coccina. It very clearly shows the differences between each sex. 










I still find it strange that my Betta coccina pair seem to have produced more females than males with this first group of offspring. I raised seven fish to sexual maturity, and unless I have a sneaker male, it seems like five of those seven are female. 

Be interesting to compare the first group, with this second crop of juveniles from the same pair. 

Here's another female. She was really barred up before I took this shot as she'd been arguing with one of her sisters. 










Spent the day at dog club yesterday, so not much else to report.


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## Nismo83

congrats... that's a good news... now I wish I can expand my mac tanks


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## LittleBettaFish

Well there's a few more eggs in the nest now. 

I really hope this pair turn out to be excellent parents, as it would go against everything I believe in to artificially hatch the eggs. However, if I want to keep this species going in my fish room, I would have to. 

You sound like me, always wanting to expand my fish room. I really need a third rack, but even if I had the money, I don't think I have the space to fit one in.


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## Fenghuang

Congratulations on your hendra spawn, LBF! 

About the more females in a spawn, have you noticed that same occurance in any other of your groups?


----------



## LittleBettaFish

The only other group that could potentially have more females than males, is my Betta brownorum. However, I find this species _really_ difficult to sex, especially when they aren't fully coloured up. So at this point I'm not sure what the ratio of males to females is from the five Betta brownorum I have.

Otherwise I almost always get around two or three males, to every one female.


----------



## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> Well there's a few more eggs in the nest now.
> 
> I really hope this pair turn out to be excellent parents, as it would go against everything I believe in to artificially hatch the eggs. However, if I want to keep this species going in my fish room, I would have to.
> 
> You sound like me, always wanting to expand my fish room. I really need a third rack, but even if I had the money, I don't think I have the space to fit one in.


I wish I could turn back the time.. I would have done the setup differently.. now I really regretted.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

My biggest regret is that I didn't buy a second 1.5m rack when I had the money, and I didn't get all my tanks custom made, to make the best use of space. If I had tanks that were only 20cm wide, but 45-60cm long, it would have meant I could have fit an extra half dozen tanks on each rack. 

Well it looks like my worries about my pair of Betta hendra eating their eggs were unfounded. The male is doing a great job. It looks like he did some work on his bubblenest overnight, and he's moved the eggs to the front of the canister. 

There are more eggs than I thought, so looking forward to seeing them hatch. 

Being that it was such a nice day, we took the camera with us when we were running the dogs. 

Unfortunately, most of my attempts at standing her, were not especially flattering. The photo below, was the best of the bunch. 










Unfortunately, her ear still isn't right, which will keep her out of the show ring. However, I don't think she's turned into a bad looking girl. 

She really surprised me at dog club this week. She hadn't been in three weeks, as she was in season, so I thought she'd get there and completely lose her mind. However, she spent most of her time waiting quietly at my side, which for Clio 'I have no off switch', is a massive achievement. 

I even got a nice heel out of her with eye contact and an automatic sit at the end. 

I think her day was made when the intact male at club (she is literally obsessed with him), turned up. She's like his official stalker. 

I'll probably have some more fish photos up tomorrow, or even tonight, depending on whether I can be bothered.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Turns out I did take some photos of my fish. The afternoon sun had lit up all my tanks, and as I'd just fed my Betta coccina groups, they were looking too good to resist snapping a few shots. 

First up, is my original wild-caught pair, showing the youngins how it's done. 










Then this is the same fish from the photo at the top of the page. I was teasing him with the mirror to get him to flare, but I kept missing my shot. 



















One of his sisters. 










Then this is his full brother and sister. These are the two I separated out into their own tank, and they are the parents of my F2 fry. I had the mirror up against the side of the tank, and they were both defending their turf. 










I was worried the above pair weren't happy in their tank based on their behaviour and washed out colouring. So yesterday I added another clump of mayaca fluviatilis to their tank, along with some IAL and rooibos, and today the male has been showing off and chasing around, a very flirtatious female.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

My Betta hendra eggs are _so_ close to hatching. I think they will hatch either tonight or early tomorrow morning. 

My male Betta livida is also still guarding his nest last I checked. He gets grumpy when I flash the torch into the canister, so I can't tell if there are any fry in there. 

I've also seen a few free-swimming Betta coccina fry. The pair's been flirting heavily and the male has been in and out of the canister all day, so I'm thinking a second spawn isn't going to be far off. 

The male from this pair is simply stunning. He definitely surpasses his father, even when his father was in his prime, and he's definitely much more photogenic.

These photos aren't even him fully coloured up. 



















Then my Betta brownorum were putting on their usual show. 




























Finally, I spent ages trying to get a decent photo of at least one of my F1 Betta sp. api api, and this was the best I could do. There's just too many males and they're always ruining my shots because they chase each other around. 










I've come to the conclusion that I have to buy more plants (meaning watersprite, mayaca fluviatilis and java moss) if I want my wilds going into the newer tanks to be 100% happy. I've stretched my current stock of plants as far as I can, but my fish are used to heavily planted tanks, and when I put them into anything less, they start to fret. 

I swear I've spent just as much money on plants as I have fish over the years, and it's not even like the fish I purchase are all that cheap!


----------



## Nismo83

looking good..


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I agree, but then again I'm probably just biased. 

Today I woke up to find my Betta hendra eggs had hatched. The male is still doing a great job, so I think my fears of egg eating and cannibalism are unfounded. 

I also discovered that my F1 Betta coccina pair are in the film canister spawning! At some point I want to separate out, and pair up, their brother and one of their sisters. I just need to find the tank space first! 

With all these fry and young fish, my BBS hatchery has definitely been getting a work-out.


----------



## Nismo83

I was never good at hatching BBS. always a problem for separation and also it make the surrounding sticky.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I hate hatching BBS. I have to keep reminding myself to set my hatchery up so my fry have something to eat. I wish microworms were more nutritious as they are so easy to culture and harvest. 

I've got my usual daily photos from the fish room to share. I tried to mix it up, and include more than just my Betta brownorum pair, but I wasn't particularly successful. 

First up is one of my F1 Betta sp. api api males. 










Then this is why I can't take nice photos of this group. 










At least my Betta brownorum make photo taking easy. 




























My female thought she was hiding. She soon discovered that she was mistaken. 










Moving on, we have the beautiful and fierce Mr Shiny. 










Challenging your father probably isn't the wisest course of action, especially when he's about double your size. 










Except I think this is Shiny back again, this time fighting with his brother. I swear this fish does not learn.


----------



## Nismo83

microworm is definitely easier to maintain and culture.. but I couldn't feed them anymore. call me superstitious or something. after using them, my hand got bitten by a dog, and my baby girl sort of have her elbow out of position (minor dislocation). I had since disposed all the worms. I am feeding on non life at home for the time being.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I have such bad luck, I probably wouldn't notice if my microworms were causing me worse luck than usual. 

Do you just go straight to BBS then? I suppose your fry being mouthbrooders, are bigger than the fry from bubblenesting species. 

Got some photos of the beautiful Mr Shiny to share. He was causing havoc as usual. Some fish just never learn. At least with his attitude, he can make for some great photos. 





































Then this is his 'big' brother. You can see his green scaling/irridescence is not as thick. 










One of the smaller males managed to sneak into the photo here. 










Two of the smaller fish. I wonder where they learned this behaviour from? 










Last up, is the friendliest of my Betta sp. api api juveniles. With one of its siblings trying to avoid detection. 










Other than that, my Betta coccina eggs and Betta hendra fry are doing well. Just got to get my BBS hatchery set-up as I have been slacking off.


----------



## SplashyBetta

Gorgeous fish! I especially love your betta brownorum. I think they're my favourite wild.


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## Nismo83

I'm using ocean nutrient instant bbs now. Cost 14sgd a small bottle. Ready to feed. And the Mac fries like that. I am not getting much luck with the hatching of fairy shrimps after back from my holiday. No idea why as well. At times I would purchase daphnia if I pass by those aquarium shops.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks SplashyBetta. I love my Betta brownorum pair. Watching their tank never fails to brighten my day. 

I took a couple of photos of my brownorum male today as well. Just didn't share them in my previous post. 



















Ah, I am familiar with the Ocean Nutrition product. I used it before but my fry had no interest in it. Thought it might be the lazier option. 

I really want to set-up a daphnia culture. Just it's harder (and more expensive) to find starter cultures. Plus I managed to kill my moina culture, so I might need some practice.


----------



## Nismo83

maybe I can send you some fairy shrimps, they work just like BBS but without the aeration and salt. The mouth brooder fries are easier to eat such food.. I find them less picky...


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Some sad news to share from the fish room today. I had to euthanase my plakat male Atlas. Talking to his breeder, it seems like there were issues with longevity with the entire spawn, but particularly the males. I believe he was one of the last surviving fish from that spawn. 

Even so, I've never been able to keep a fancy betta alive for more than a couple of years, which is why I won't be getting another. 

Some good news, is that my Betta hendra fry are probably a day or so away from becoming horizontal. The male was out earlier today showing off to the female, and of course my camera chose that moment to run out of batteries. The female is plump and very interested in the male, so perhaps they will spawn once this crop of fry are free-swimming. 

My Betta coccina male has been in his film canister all day, and has extended his nest. I can't see how many eggs are in there, but I have seen a couple of fry from their first spawn swimming around. 

It also looks like there _is_ a female sibling for Mr Shiny to be paired with. There are also two or three smaller fish that haven't fully coloured up, and haven't fully developed their fins. Whether or not these are females remains to be seen, but it would be nice to have at least one more female as a back-up. I want to try and have a tank set-up for them, in another week or two. 

Now I'm just waiting to see what sex my two Betta miniopinna turn out to be. At the moment they are waging war, not making love, so I'm thinking they are likely not a breeding pair. 

Finally, to end the post, I have a handful of photos to share. 

First up, is my Betta hendra male coming over to see what I was doing. This is the one photo I managed to take before the battery died. 










Then just a couple of my Betta sp. api api females. Could be the same fish in all three photos, but I don't really know. 




























Then just a group shot while everyone was out eating BBS. I've definitely got more males than females in this group, but at least I have enough females that I can put together multiple pairs. 










I'll have a longer post with more photos tomorrow, but it's night-time here, and there's a pile of dirty dishes in the sink with my name all over them.


----------



## Nismo83

Guess you are one of the few to be successful in apiapi


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I've never had any difficulty with breeding Betta sp. api api. In fact I found them a very easy species to work with. 

The two species I've had most difficulty with, are Betta livida (they don't seem to spawn as frequently as my other pairs), and Betta miniopinna (only one pair was prolific, the rest either ate their eggs or spawned infrequently). 

It's a shame I won't be able to get another opportunity to work with Betta miniopinna again, or at least not for a long time, as sometimes it's fun to have a challenge.


----------



## Nismo83

I have not yet successfully bred any coccina group. Success so far are channoides, Ocellata and Macrostoma. But I do realize that cold water play a part. I am thinking to get another two pairs of wild caught Ocellata in.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Lol considering coccina complex are all I keep, I would probably take up another hobby if I couldn't get any of my pairs to spawn.

Have you thought about trying a species like Betta foerschi or Betta strohi? That's my favourite complex of mouthbrooders. Like coccina complex fish, only larger.


----------



## Witchipoo

I just wanted to pop in and say that this journal is fascinating. I'm really starting to have an interest in wilds, there are so many!
And that hendra male js stunning, the form he has, body and fins. Beautiful.
Back to lurking.
:-:-D


----------



## Nismo83

Goers hi looks nice. I am thinking on that but most probably not until I loved to my own place.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks Witchipoo. That has always been my mission with this journal. To bring awareness about the many different species that make up this genus. 

I have always thought that Betta hendra, are one of the most striking species of freshwater fish. The males look even more amazing in the flesh. 

My Betta hendra fry have abandoned the nest. The male fretted a bit this morning (his colour faded and he was pacing up and down along the side glass), but he's been flirting with the female all afternoon. 

I took some photos, but they didn't come out the best. I was a bit slow with the focussing. 














































It's difficult to get flattering photos of the female as the male was chasing her around. 










Then I just took some photos of my Betta coccina group. I'm not sure if the fish in the first photo is actually a young male. I think I can see ovaries, but it is much more masculine looking and aggressive than its sisters. Although it could just be the dominant female in the tank. 



















I think this is the same fish here.










Apart from that, I spent yesterday at a dog show with Clio. Clio wasn't entered, but we took her along for some socialisation. Probably not the best decision, as it was absolutely freezing. The wind was blowing a gale, and there were a couple of sudden downpours that left everyone huddled under the few covered areas with their dogs. 

Clio was very well-behaved. She had to sit and wait for quite some time, and she did so without fidgeting or trying to lunge at the dogs that were walking past. One of her biggest issues, is barking and lunging at dogs that aren't German Shepherds. Yesterday she didn't react at all, not even when a man walked his Beagle right into her. 

We did have a couple of moments where she got overexcited (mostly when she was playing with a friend's intact male), but otherwise I was proud of Clio. 

Now I just wish her ear would fix up, so we could enter her in some shows and kick some butt.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I couldn't resist getting a few more snaps of my Betta coccina group. It looks like there could potentially be a couple males in with the latest bunch of juveniles, so if I've correctly sexed my females, this could give me the potential to have four further breeding pairs. 

I'm just a sucker for that rich, red colouring, fierce expression, and spade shaped caudal. Plus the breeding pairs seem to form fairly tight bonds. 

There was a bit of a confrontation here. 










My male trying to find where I put the mirror. 



















This isn't the best photo, but I like it. You can see the females are ready to be bred. 










I think the fleeing female had got in the way while the male was attacking his mirror.


----------



## Nismo83

Am still waiting for my first pair of Hendra to arrive. But my friend did gave me two pcs. However not sure of the sex.


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## LittleBettaFish

At least Betta hendra are one of the easier species to sex. It's really only difficult when they are very young, as the males can resemble females.


----------



## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> At least Betta hendra are one of the easier species to sex. It's really only difficult when they are very young, as the males can resemble females.


the smaller size one is chasing the bigger size one so I assume that will be male and female (the bigger sized).


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Could be, or could just be an aggressive female. My Betta uberis male spent at least the first week here hiding because the female was so aggressive towards him.

Also, speaking of Betta hendra, my pair have already spawned again. I must have missed it while I was out, as I noticed a tail disappearing into the film canister, and when I looked in, there was a nest full of eggs. 

I'm going to get the camera out in a little while, and see what fish are feeling in a cooperative mood.


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## LittleBettaFish

Had to replace the cling wrap on 12 tanks today. Talk about a painstaking process. 

While I was doing that, I cleaned the inside glass of my Betta livida tank, and was able to get some photographs of my Betta livida fry. 





































Then I just took a few of my Betta coccina group as the rest of my fish were pretty sluggish after an earlier feed. 





































Other than that, my Betta coccina fry must have left the nest as the male is frantically swimming around. He had some mosquito larvae so I'm hoping that settles him. 

My Betta hendra male is also still guarding his eggs, and I've spotted a few fry swimming around near the surface. 

I've got to start a new culture of microworms. Mine is starting to slow down, and with all these young fish, I'm going to need them!


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## NickAu

OMG those eyes, He looks so mean. As I type this my wife who saw what I was looking at is saying " No way, No, Forget it " I am sure I have no idea what she is talking about.

I do like the idea of being to keep more than 1 betta in the tank.









Oh now I get what she means.


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## LittleBettaFish

That's part of why I love fish from this complex. They are so fierce looking, and their temperament often matches their looks! 

Unfortunately, wilds are probably only going to get harder to find in Australia since their import has been effectively banned.


----------



## NickAu

And if and when the time comes for me to get some wilds, I know someone in Victoria that breeds them and will most likely sell me a few for a fair price.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Well my spotted blue eye group were paid for and picked up, yesterday afternoon. The buyer is a hobbyist friend who lives nearby, so even though I was sort of sad to see them go, I know they have gone to a good home. 

I then spent the rest of the afternoon breaking their tank down and reorganising my fish room. 

My fish all got fed today, so I didn't take many photos. My lovely Betta brownorum male also had his ventral fins bitten half off, so there won't be any photos of him until they grow back. 

First up is my Betta hendra male. His latest crop of fry are just starting to leave the nest so it was hard to get photos of him as he kept darting back and forth.



















Their first crop of fry are doing really well. I've started them on microworms and hopefully they should be ready to start taking BBS soon. 

Next up is one of my F1 Betta sp. api api females.




























To give an idea of size, I would say this fish isn't more than an inch long total length. 

Meanwhile this is one of the smaller juveniles still sharing a tank with my wild-caught pair. I had to lure it out with the nib of a pen because it was hiding from its larger siblings. 










Other than that, with my spotted blue eye group gone, I now have two extra tanks to dedicate to my wild bettas. One tank will hold an F1 Betta uberis pair, and I'm tossing up what to put into the other. I _was_ thinking of trying the F1 male from my original brownorum pair, with what I think is the female F1, from my current pair. At least I will be able to tell very quickly if my guess at sex was correct.

Finally, I'm just going to end my post with a little whinge. I wish there was some way that I could convince my mum to let me rehome my plakat male, Maverick. If I'm perfectly honest, I really have close to zero interest in 'normal' bettas nowadays. There's always something going on with my wilds, and they make for such captivating subjects on camera that Maverick feels rather boring by comparison. 

More importantly, I feel like Maverick just isn't thriving here with me. 

The only trouble is he's technically my mum's fish. She paid for him, and I've paid for everything else. Even though she rarely shows him any interest I know as soon as I broach the subject of rehoming him, I am going to meet opposition. 

It's just so annoying to have a fish sitting there taking up space and resources that I don't even have any attachment to. I'd rather use the space to set-up a grow-out for some of my Betta livida fry.


----------



## Fenghuang

Congrats on happy growing fry woohoo! Now if only my pair would breed. The male just doesn't understand. :dunno: 

The Betta hendra male is stunning. I love those spots and that pretty green... Is he actually blue in RL? A lot of Google images show males that are blue (well, the ones that aren't obviously taken by you.)


----------



## LittleBettaFish

They can look blue or green depending on the lighting in photos, but I think they really have more of a greenish cast than blue in real life.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I'm sure there must be other breeders out there that have fish they should have culled, but never did. 

I have two of them. Zig-Zag a Betta brownorum male that outgrew a nasty spinal deformity, and 'Stumpy', a short-bodied Betta sp. api api that I can't help but keep around because he is otherwise healthy and has a spitfire personality. I figured if he's not suffering, he's not going to be used for breeding, and he's not going to be sold, there was no point in culling him. 

Unfortunately, because he's so friendly, he manages to ruin many of the photos I take of my api api group. So today I took some photos exclusively of Stumpy.





































Now my wild bettas rarely get names. However, along with Stumpy, there is this particularly feisty little female (that's her flaring in the photos above), who has staked out a small area at the front of the tank as her territory. Everyone, including some of the big males have learned to stay out of her way as she doesn't hesitate to give them a nip. 

Watching her today, the word that instantly sprang to mind when I looked at her, was 'Sassy'. So this is now her new name. 




























Meanwhile, I think my Betta coccina female is going to burst if she doesn't spawn. She's so eggy, but I'm concerned that if I put a canister in the tank, the male is either going to be swamped by multiple females ready to spawn, or there's going to be a fight as the breeding pair try to defend the nest and eggs.

One of my top priorities for the rest of this week, is to move my F1 Betta brownorum into their own tank. Their parents have been really getting stuck into them lately, so I don't want them getting hurt, or stressed enough that they get sick. Plus I'm hoping that in a tank of their own they will colour up and become easier to sex. 










Lastly, I've noticed the water in my tanks isn't staying as dark as it used to. I don't want to go back to using peat moss as it makes a mess, so I'm wondering if mopani driftwood might do the trick. I hate the look of mopani, but it's relatively cheap, and it seems to release a lot of tannins. I'm thinking if I bury (under the plants) a small piece at the back of some of my tanks, it will keep the water darker between water changes. 

I sort of want a level of colour halfway between pitch black and urine yellow. At the moment most of my tanks are leaning more towards 'urine yellow', so this is what I want to remedy.


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## ThatFishThough

My tanks do get pretty dark after awhile, I have 2 hunks of mopani in my 20.


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## Nismo83

Maybe you can put the peat moss in a bag?


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## LittleBettaFish

I used to cut up a pair of stockings and put the peat moss into stockings. So I could probably do that again.

On a completely unrelated topic I am having the worst luck at hatching BBS recently. 

I think it's the brand of eggs I'm using, and this is the last time I waste money on them. Not even 10% of my eggs have hatched, after more than 24 hours. 

I hate having to rely on BBS.


----------



## NickAu

You ever tried this stuff?
http://www.oceannutrition.eu/products.aspx?Product=instant-baby-brine-shrimp


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## LittleBettaFish

I have tried it in the past, but my wild betta fry really only go for live foods. 

Plus it was fairly expensive, and I'm fairly certain you had to throw it out after a certain period of time once it had been opened. When I used it I think I ended up throwing 3/4s of the jar away.

I've had good luck with eggs I've purchased from Fishchick Aquatics, so I think I'm just going to get them from there. Plus I might see if she has java moss and peat moss in stock so I can get my two empty tanks planted up and ready for fish. 

At least I managed to hatch enough tonight to feed my Betta livida fry. My Betta coccina juveniles had mosquito larvae, and my Betta coccina fry and Betta hendra fry are still small enough that microworms will do. It was really only my Betta sp. api api juveniles and the F1 group that missed out. 

That's the only downside to feeding live/frozen foods. It probably takes me just as long to feed my fish as it does to do water changes, and I have to thaw out or harvest about five different foods per feeding. 

But at least my fish are happy.


----------



## Nismo83

im using it.. and I finished it in 3.5 weeks. it cost 14sgd over here in Singapore.. and the mac fries really grow up well.. in 3 weeks time.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I think I'm still going to stick with live foods for my coccina complex wilds. I think they tend to be more finicky than the mouthbrooders as I remember it was very easy to transition my young strohi and unimaculata onto dried foods. 

Speaking of food, I am curious to see if this frozen food would work for bettas. I can't see why not considering most pellets aimed at bettas consist of krill and various fish meals, which aren't exactly the most natural food source for these fish. 

http://www.hikariusa.com/diets/coral-gumbo/

My wilds have always refused to take frozen daphnia, and I want to introduce more variety than frozen bloodworms and spirulina enriched brine shrimp. Just wondering if anyone can see any ingredients in there that would have the potential to cause harm to my fish? 

Otherwise, I took a few photos of my F1 Betta brownorum last night. I still think at least one of them is female. But I have such difficulty with this species as there can sometimes be very little difference between the sexes and often you can only tell the females apart when they are ready to spawn and are full of eggs.


----------



## Crossroads

Nothing I see. Just prey items and vitamins
http://m.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod_display.cfm?pcatid=8159
I feed this one to all my fish and 
http://m.petsmart.com/h5/hub?id=/fi...lid-food-zid36-21362/cat-36-catid-300039?null
To my community tank.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

After posting this I realised the food seems to be aimed more at corals. So I'm wondering if this would mean once thawed, it might be too small for my wilds. However, it does say 'smaller marine fish' on the packet so who knows. 

The Ocean Nutrition Formula One looks promising. Just not sure how many stores actually stock the Ocean Nutrition brand, and whether they stock more than the bog standard bloodworms and brine shrimp. 

I may suck it up and try the daphnia again. Perhaps I can get some of the younger fish eating it. 

I just feel its healthier feeding those sorts of foods, versus a fattier worm based diet.


----------



## Crossroads

I have zero issues out of the formula one. My fish attack it like mad. Ky just flat out refuses to eat anything else. Period. I get some crazy bright colors out of my fish too.If you can get some, give it a shot. I literally just drop two cubes into the community and once ones been torn up, I spread it for the pencilfish who won't dive in and attack.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I know one store that stocks Ocean Nutrition, so next time I'm there I'll see what their range is like. 

Thanks for the tip.


----------



## Crossroads

No problem! Hope your wilds like it!

Also I think the daphnia is a fish thing, I can only get my cories and pencilfish to eat it.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Tonight I took some photos of my Betta sp. api api males. 

This group is out of three separate wild-caught pairs. I'm still surprised at the amount of variation between the males in terms of body length/thickness, colour, and fin size/shape. 

This male is very dark red, almost a maroon, compared to the others.










This male and the one behind him, are lighter coloured than the above male, and also thicker with shorter bodies. This is probably my least favourite 'type'. 










I'm not sure if this is the same male in all three photos. 




























This male has better proportions. I don't know which pair threw all the short-bodied fish but they won't be used for breeding as I worry I will end up with deformities. I feel a longer body is a more natural 'form' for wilds. 










A smaller male with a spade shaped caudal and really pointed anal fin. 










For some reason, they seem more amenable to having their photos taken at night. I'm hoping once I separate out a pair I'll be able to get some nice photos of this species without other fish interfering.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

My Betta hendra pair were putting on a show tonight. Unfortunately, the camera hates their tank and it is very hard to get in focus shots. 

However, I did manage one of my Betta hendra female. 










And then the two of them together. 











Next up, is my Betta brownorum male. You can see that one of his ventral fins is still damaged. The female is also missing half of one of hers. 










I also managed to get a photo of the only surviving Betta brownorum male from my original pair. If there _are_ female offspring from the above male, this is who I will be pairing them up with. 










Next is one of my least favourite fish. He is the son of my original Betta brownorum female, and is as vicious as she was. He's Zig-Zag's full brother, as well as the half-brother, and I suppose nephew, of the male above. I would never use him for breeding because he's simply too aggressive and I worry he would harm the female, as his mother killed her breeding partner. Plus I worry about the risk of him producing deformed offspring, being that Zig-Zag has the spinal deformity, and they had a sibling that I was forced to cull as it never developed proper fins. 










To wrap things up, here's a a photo of my largest Betta sp. api api juvenile. It's starting to colour up now, although it will still hide from the adult pair. Not 100% certain on gender. I was leaning towards female, but so often with these fish, young males can very closely resemble females until their fins develop and their colour comes in fully. 










Other than that, I've been very carefully cultivating my gum tree seedlings, and I have around 20 now. I lost two or three of the smaller ones when I transplanted them into separate pots, but the rest of them seem to be doing well. The largest is probably close to 30cm tall now.

This is all part of my plan to make the garden much more bird friendly (and not just for the aggressive and territorial species that come when you artificially feed, or only use nectar-rich natives). 

I think mum has realised she's lost the battle against me planting the gum trees in the yard, and surprisingly, she's starting to come around to the idea of planting more natives in the garden. 

Following the same sort of principles used when setting up a sorority tank, I'm going to plant out dense areas of cover in parts of the back and front garden, to provide shelter for the family of small birds that regularly visit. This is to keep them safe from the resident 'gang' of noisy miners, which are a very aggressive and territorial native species that is advantaged by suburban development. 

One day, I would love to move out to the country and be one of those greenie types, but for now, the best I can do, is bring a little slice of the Australian bush to my home, and hopefully provide some valuable food and habitat for some of our beautiful and unique flora.


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## Nismo83

Nice update as usual


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks :mrgreen:

I took a few photos this morning. 

I thought this one was funny, even if it's not perfectly in focus. 










Then here's Shiny showing off. 










This is followed by my Betta brownorum female. 



















Along with one of her offspring. 










Next we've got the Betta sp. api api juvenile from the previous post lost in a sea of mayaca fluviatilis. 










Wrapping up the fish photos, I have one of my F1 Betta sp. api api males. This one has these weird forward thrusting, and bent, ventrals. 










Lastly, I wanted to share a couple photos of the gum trees I mentioned in my post last night. 

The largest seedling is missing from this photo, but you can see they are growing well. 










Those very small seedlings to the right of the photo, show how much they have grown since I plucked them out of the pots they had sprouted in. 










Other than that, while weeding around the shrubs in the front garden, I found a couple of pieces of mopani I'd thrown out. So I might clean these off, put them into one of my tanks, and see if they are still have any tannins left in them. 

I've also got to email Fishchick Aquatics today and see if they have BBS and java moss in stock.

I swear even though a lot of these businesses have a flat shipping rate, the cost of shipping definitely adds up. I just wish I could get every brand/product I use, from the one place. Instead what usually happens is that Business A will stock the water conditioner I use, but not the heater brand I use, while Business B will stock the heater brand, but not IALs. 

Sometimes I feel like this hobby is the equivalent of me emptying my wallet out and setting my money on fire.


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## ThatFishThough

Haha! Yep. Or maybe just throwing the entire wallet in the fire.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my day started with my Betta hendra pair spawning. I tried to get photos but most of the action took place in the film canister or was blocked by plants. Before they have their next spawn, I'm definitely moving the film canister into a better position for photos. For such a cracker pair, I hardly have any photos of them.

It also looks like my Betta livida pair snuck in another spawn. Unfortunately, even at such a small size, their fry are incredibly aggressive and there is some quite serious damage being done to fins. It looks like I'm going to have no other option but to try and catch as many fry as I can, and then move them into a separate tank. I'm just worried being that they are so young, the stress of a move will trigger velvet. 

My camera unfortunately went flat today, and I was sick yesterday and some of today, so I don't have many photos to share. Just a few from my F1 Betta coccina tank. These females are so ripe for breeding, it's a shame I simply don't have the space to do so. 




























Then one of my homebred Betta brownorum. 









Before finishing up with a photo of Shiny flaring. 










Otherwise, I purchased 20 grams of BS eggs, and 3 'clumps' of java moss. I'm hoping my order was sent out today, as I paid for express postage and this means it should arrive tomorrow. Both my empty tanks are in need of java moss before they can have fish added, and any java moss that is left over, will go into my Betta hendra tank as that is still rather sparse. 

I still need airline tubing and IALs, and then any remaining fish 'pocket money' will go towards plants. With wild bettas, I don't think there is such a thing as 'too many' plants, and I definitely get better colouration and behavior from the wilds in the more heavily planted tanks.


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## LittleBettaFish

My java moss and BS eggs arrived today. I've got my BBS hatchery bubbling away so I will see what the hatch rate is 24 hours from now. 

One packet of java moss went into my Betta hendra tank, while the other two packets were split evenly between my two empty tanks. Thankfully, my Betta hendra male doesn't have any concerns about me sticking my hands into the tank while he has a nest full of eggs. Not even when his film canister ended up vertical. 

This is what the tank looks like now. I'm going to _slowly_ raise the water level another couple of inches, and over time, the java moss will completely overgrow the sphagnum moss. Basically, sphagnum moss is a stand-in for when I don't have enough java moss. 










Then because I needed to replace the cling wrap on a few of the tanks, I actually wiped the algae off the front glass, and even gave the glass a clean with some white vinegar. 

This meant I was able to get a couple of reasonably decent photos of my Betta uberis male, Shiny. His colour can look vastly different depending on his mood and lighting. 



















I also took a photo of my Betta brownorum female, simply because she's one of my favourite fish. 










Followed by my Betta coccina 'matriarch', also a firm favourite. 










Her male is less obliging. He's not photogenic at the best of times, even less so when he's got a nest full of eggs/fry to tend to. 










This was him putting on the brakes when he saw the camera. 










Apart from that, I was feeding my Betta sp. api api group earlier today, and I discovered the perfect breeding female. She must hide herself away at the back of the tank as I've never noticed her before, but she is the spitting image of my original Betta sp. api api female, just with slightly longer ventrals. Now the challenge will be finding that exact female again in a tank of about thirty similar looking fish. At least the male is easy enough to identify based on his fins. 

I'm also on the hunt for 3-4 moderately sized, and moderately priced, anubias barteri or coffeefolia. I'm a member of a FB auction group, and this seller always has anubias up for grabs. It's just I've never dealt with this seller before, and I'm always leery that the photo being used in the auction isn't 100% representative of what I'm going to actually get. 

I need anubias to provide the main bulk of cover in my new tanks, at least until the mayaca fluviatilis and the java moss have established themselves. I also can't spend more than $50, which I think is going to be my biggest hurdle.


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## Nismo83

nice update.. anyway with the new forum layout.. it seems harder to use..


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## Betta T

The first betta is extremely gorgeous!  And the other ones are nice too.


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## LittleBettaFish

I haven't found the new forum _too_ difficult to get used to. It seems like most of the buttons do the same thing on the new forum, as they did on the old. 

Also, thanks for the kind comments Betta T. 

Well my two empty tanks are almost ready for inhabitants. I just have to put heaters in, and pick up some Prime from the aquarium tomorrow, and my Betta brownorum and Betta sp. api api will be ready to go in. 

Catching everyone without having to completely tear apart their tanks to do so, will be the real challenge! The only downside to having my tanks so heavily planted. 

The latest news from my fish room, is that my Betta hendra eggs have hatched. As usual, the male is doing an excellent job looking after the fry. 

My F1 and F2 Betta coccina fry and juveniles are doing well, as are my F1 Betta sp. api api, and F1 Betta livida. In fact, I noticed one of my bigger Betta livida fry was starting to show some nice colour in the fins and body. 

I also got the camera out and took some photos of my Betta sp. api api group. I finally managed to get a decent photo of one of my males without one of the others getting in the way. 

First up though, is a female I was following around the tank. I actually really like her, so she could find herself in the breeding tank. 





































Then lastly, is the male.


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## Nismo83

the layout on the first page.. I am slow to changes.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I went to an aquarium that had recently opened yesterday, and I was rather disappointed. Their FB page made it seem like they had many more fish and dry goods than they actually did. 

About the only fish of interest to me, were the killifish. However, it didn't look like they had been sold as actual pairs, unless the female A. gabunense were all hiding. 

Other than that, I picked up a bottle of Prime from the PetBarn closest to my house, so now I can _finally_ do water changes. I also got heaters into my two empty tanks, so by tomorrow morning, they will be fish ready. 

This means tomorrow, I will have to select a pair of Betta sp. api api from a group of close to thirty fish. I definitely know which male I want, but the challenge will be to catch him as he is always at the back of the tank. As for his breeding partner, I'm leaning towards using the female in the above photos. She's one of the most dominant fish in the tank, she's healthy, she's got no physical deformities, and so I'm hoping she produces healthy fry for me. 

So unless I find a female I like better when I am netting them tomorrow, she will hopefully be the mother of a new generation of Betta sp. api api. 

This photo I took tonight of her, sort of cemented my decision. 










Then this is a slightly out of focus one of her flaring at another female. 










Finally just a photo of Shiny to wrap things up. 










Unfortunately, it looks like my plans to put Shiny together with a sibling female will have to go on hold. Once my current two empty tanks are filled, I will have only two tanks left. One is already reserved for an F1 pair of Betta brownorum, but now I'm not sure if I should use the other as a grow-out for Betta livida fry, instead of my original plan, which was to use it for the Betta uberis pair. 

Decisions, decisions. 

I'm also likely going to have to move my F1 Betta coccina juveniles and sub-adults out of their current tank at some point. They are very quickly outgrowing that tank.


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## SimplyXt

Your betta hendras are gorgeous. I'm keen to watch the fry develop.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. I'm keen to see how they turn out as well. I see the odd fry every now and then, but they likely won't be out enough to take photos until they have grown some. 

In the end, it turns out that I went with neither the male or female Betta sp. api api that I intended to. This is because some of the males had nipped caudals, and as the main identifying feature of the male I had chosen was his very pointed caudal, I couldn't tell him apart from the others. To make matters worse, the females lost their colour completely as soon as the net went into the tank, and as some are very close in appearance, I couldn't locate the above female. 

So instead I chose one of the smallest males in the tank, who hasn't fully developed his finnage, but who shows a good length of body. I paired him up with one of the smallest females, who also had a good length of body. I wanted the length of body as some of my F1 fish have unusually short bodies, and I didn't want them passing this trait on, as I feel it would be a hindrance rather than a benefit to a wild fish. 

While small, there's been some definite flirtation going on between the two. Now they are by themselves, they are showing much stronger colouring, and so I've got my fingers crossed that in another few weeks, or even a couple of months, I am able to get a successful F1xF1 spawn. 

Other than that, my F1 Betta coccina pair spawned again and the male has fry hanging from the nest. My latest batch of Betta hendra fry went free-swimming so the male has lost all his colour and looks miserable. However, my Betta livida fry are still thriving, and my F1 Betta coccina juveniles are growing in leaps and bounds. As they now associate me with food, and know that when I tap on the glass it means food, they come shooting to the front of the tank to get fed. 

Because of this, I was able to get a photo of one of the larger juveniles. At this point based on colouring it does seem that the majority are male, which means I can pair them up with their four older female siblings. 










I also took a few photos of Shiny being Shiny. 




























Meanwhile we had some drama today, with Clio putting her front legs through a window while trying to get to our cat. There was glass everywhere, but thankfully she didn't do any major damage and only had to get stitches in a couple of small, but deep, gashes. 

It's always a bit of a nightmare taking Clio to the vet as she still barks at other dogs, and even though _I_ know she's not going to attack them, it frightens the other dogs and their owners. Plus she's got an unbelievably loud and shrill bark so it's rather deafening in enclosed spaces. 

When we first got to the vet, there were two smaller dogs by the door. So my mum went in, informed their owners that Clio was going to probably bark but that it was only noise and no malice, and then we brought her in. The owners were okay with her meeting their dogs, which she did very politely. There was a bit of barking, but she was happy to sit and wait _relatively_ quietly in the reception area, which for Clio is a big ask. 

Then when she goes into the consultation room, she immediately sits next to the vet with this expectant look on her face, waiting for a treat! We've never seen this vet before, but she was great (they deal with so many German Shepherds at this clinic which makes a huge difference in how they behave around them), and Clio started doing her 'come back here' bark when she momentarily left the room. 

She went under a general anaesthetic, which always makes me nervous, but she came through fine and has had her wounds flushed and stitched. 

The cat meanwhile, who was the cause of all this drama, came away completely unscathed and even proceeded to sneak into the house in what was likely a bid to stir up more trouble. So he was banished to the laundry (where he sleeps at night) for the rest of the day.


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## LittleBettaFish

I took some photos of random wilds from my fish room today. I think I'm going to have to do water changes before I take any further photos, as the algae growing on the front glass of most of the tanks is starting to ruin a lot of my shots. 

First up is my Betta brownorum male. Since I removed all but one of the F1 fish, they've been a little more shy than usual. However, I did catch them flirting this morning, so I'm hoping that they start spawning again. This time, I'm going to aim for more than just four offspring surviving to maturity. 










Then I have my F1 Betta coccina male. The camera flash always makes the sheen on his side look gold, rather than the green it is in real life. 










Up next we have his father, who as usual, made photo taking difficult. At least his fins aren't clamped in this one. 










I also got a couple of Shiny because he is the only fish that seems to sit still long enough. 



















Shiny is followed by a photo of the F1 Betta sp. api api male I have in the breeding tank. He's only about an inch total length, but he's recently developed some serious attitude. I tried to get some better photos, but he kept darting off into the java moss chasing the female. 










I also got a sort of 'action' shot of three of my Betta sp. api api males. It's not in focus, but I think it captures the fierceness of these little red fish very well. 










Last but not least, I also got a photo of one of the females from the group. She was right under the bright light in this photo so her colour washed right out. 










Other than that, not much to report from the fish room.


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## LittleBettaFish

I took a whole lot of photos today. 

First up is a photo illustrating what I suppose could be called submission. These two males were squaring off and flaring, when the one on the left suddenly decided he didn't want to fight. He was backing away in this photo. The other male gave a half-hearted chase, but nothing physical came of it.










Then we have the patriarch of the group, my original wild-caught male. Going back through my emails, he has been with me for two years now. During this time, I almost lost both him and his female to velvet, but now they are probably the oldest wilds in my fish room. As you can see, he is still going strong and he is the dominant male in the tank. Not even the son that is almost the same size as him will challenge him. Unfortunately, his beautiful long ventrals have taken some damage. 










This is his largest male offspring, and probably the son that closest resembles him. This male is also growing out his ventral fins as he spends most of his time defending his 'territory' from Shiny and the rest of his brothers. 










This male is one of the smallest in the tank. His growth was probably stunted by the fact that I do such infrequent water changes. However, he's perfectly healthy, and does hold his own against some of his larger brothers. 










Meanwhile, Shiny now has a chunk missing from his caudal. Likely a result of his winning personality. Like I told my mum, some wilds are just aggressive jerks. But they make for the best photos because they are usually stirring up trouble. 




























Then we have a couple photos of my F1 Betta coccina juveniles. 



















Followed by a photo of one of their adult full brothers. 










My Betta brownorum pair are still being shy, but I managed a photo of my female. She's still one of my favourite fish, even if she's not the most colourful, or has the most extravagant finnage. 










I'm going to finish up with the best photo I have taken thus far, of the F1 Betta sp. api api female who forms one half of my breeding pair. As you can see, she is small. However, she was showing breeding bars tonight, and is being chased around by a very interested male, so fingers crossed it results in something. 










There's not been much to report from my fish room. I'm going to try and set-up a tank to move my F1 Betta brownorum male and what I think is an F1 Betta brownorum female into. At least I'll know for sure whether I've correctly sexed the female or not based on how they react!


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## SimplyXt

I'm holding thumbs your F1's breed!

Shiny loves the camera. I chuckled at how you described him - as an aggressive jerk LOL.

How do you clean the algae off your glass? I have in a couple of my tanks and it drives me crazy.


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## LittleBettaFish

Shiny definitely has attitude. Anyone comes into the area of the tank he deems as his 'territory' and they very promptly get chased out. Of course the rules don't apply to him when he's busy encroaching on his brother's (the male he's pictured with) territory. 

All I do is wipe the front glass with some paper towel whenever the algae starts making photos difficult. Otherwise, I probably have more species of algae in my wild betta tanks, than I do plants. I've got to give my uberis tank a clean as the algae is starting to take over the java moss again.


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## LittleBettaFish

My Betta hendra pair spawned today. Theirs is a difficult tank to photograph, but I did manage to get a few photos this time. 

Female in breeding dress (she was out looking for eggs)










Male showing off/trying to lure the female back into the canister. 










Female checking it's alright to come back in. 










Then I took a couple photos of my male yesterday, although I'm disappointed with how photo of him flaring turned out. 



















My Betta sp. api api pair were also out and about this morning, and the female stayed still long enough for me to get this photo. 










Up next is a photo of my wild-caught Betta coccina male, and his son. 




























Before finishing up with a photo of a tussle in my Betta uberis tank.


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## LittleBettaFish

My Betta hendra male is busy guarding his latest batch of eggs. However, he did take time off his parental duties to come and have some frozen bloodworms tonight. I like that none of my wild betta males are really bothered by my presence when they are guarding eggs/fry. It just makes life a lot easier considering that some of my pairs can spawn at least once a week, for many weeks on end. 

Speaking of spawning, I think my F1 Betta coccina are close to spawning again. They have been flirting, and the female is showing some serious vertical barring. The male meanwhile, has become much more aggressive, and had a flare session with the mirror last night. 










As you can see, the female has some damage to her caudal. But she's a healthy fish, and on a diet of live/frozen foods, this kind of damage heals quite quickly. 










I still find it hard to believe that these are fish I watched grow from an egg. After all my difficulties with velvet, and the amount of fry and juveniles I lost of was forced to cull, it's nice to prove that I can rear a fish to adulthood. 

I think their brother is going to die a virgin though if I do not get him and a female sibling into a separate tank. Betta coccina has to be up there as one of my favourite wild betta species. They exude attitude, and I love their fins. I think at the rate they are reproducing, my fish room is going to be solely dedicated to Betta coccina. 










Other than that, I'm happy with how my Betta livida fry are developing (the pair looks like they might be close to spawning again), and what I've seen of my Betta hendra fry (I seriously do not know where they all are hiding), they seem to also be doing well. 

I'm likely going to start moving my F1 Betta sp. api api juveniles and sub-adults in with the rest of the F1 group soon. Once that's done, I'm going to sell my F0 pair, and put an F1 pair into their old tank. This will mean I'll have two tanks containing F1 breeding pairs (and hopefully their fry), and then the third tank will contain the rest of the F1 fish until they are required for breeding. 

My Betta brownorum juveniles/sub-adults have definitely developed some attitude now they are unattended minors. I still can't tell if I have a female in this group or not. I'll be setting up a tank for my F1 male this week anyway, and then I will see how the most likely female candidate reacts to him. 

I'm also not sure if my two youngest Betta persephone are male or female. One is close to sexual maturity, and its fins and colour _suggest_ female, but it could just be a immature male. I've made that mistake many times before with this species. I'm actually hoping it is female, as I may try my hand at breeding this species again. I figure if the velvet comes back, I treat it and don't make any further attempts at breeding, but it would be beyond amazing to have more than a handful of Betta persephone again. Especially as it seems like I'm one of the only people in Australia currently keeping this species. 

At the moment I have the older male out with the two young fish, and his son, in a clear breeding box. However, the older male appears to have very limited vision as I think he suffered damage while the group was in the hospital tank. So I'm thinking I'll put him into the breeder box, and let his son out, and see how he reacts to the 'female'. 

I don't know why eyes seem to be such a common target for attack among my wild bettas. Feeding my two half-blind Betta livida sub-adults is always a challenge because they will fruitlessly swim around in circles trying to get the food if I don't put it directly in front of them. 

Otherwise that's about all the exciting news from my fish room today. I'm hopefully going to the aquarium on Monday to pick-up some frozen foods, and I also want to see if they have any more of the wood that I am using in my Betta livida tank. I need to seriously darken up my Betta hendra, F1 Betta coccina, and Betta brownorum tanks, and as this wood turned my Betta livida tank black, I'm thinking it will do the job.


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## LittleBettaFish

I went to the fish store earlier today, and picked up a couple of pieces of wood. The largest piece was sawed in half, so I had enough for the three tanks. I saw this cool hollowed out log when I first visited the store a while back, and it was still there today. The only reason I don't buy it, is that I have nowhere to put it. Although thinking about it, I could probably get it to fit into one of my empty 10 gallons.... 

I also like the wide range of frozen foods this store stocks. I got a packet of Ocean Nutrition spirulina enriched brine shrimp, and then I also got a packet of the black mosquito larvae to try. It went down a treat with my fish, so it's a product I'm likely going to use over winter when live mosquito larvae become much more scarce. 

Fish wise, they didn't have much that sparked my interest, but I just go there for food and dry goods. 

As to what's been happening in _my_ fish room, my Betta hendra male's eggs have hatched, and I managed to take a photo of the fry. Unfortunately, the window behind this shelf on the rack creates a lot of glare, so I may move this tank onto the bottom shelf instead. 










In much more exciting news, my F1 pair of Betta sp. api api spawned!! There's only a very small amount of eggs, but considering both male and female are about an inch total length, I am pleased enough that they were able to successfully spawn. Here's hoping that this pair prove to be good parents, and that this is only the first of many spawns. 

I also took a few photos of some of my Betta uberis males. 

First up, is my original wild-caught male. 










And this is what the same male looked like back in 2014. 










Then we have one of his smaller sons. 










Followed by everyone's favourite, Shiny.


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## LittleBettaFish

My Betta sp. api api eggs hatched. It looks like there's really only a handful of fry, but the male has been doing a great job as a first-time father. He has expanded his nest (he is the smallest breeding male in my fish room and yet he builds the biggest nest), moved his eggs/fry to the back of the canister where they will be safer, and he has been actively patrolling the area around the nest and keeping the female at bay. 

Meanwhile, my Betta hendra fry are pretty close to free-swimming as you can see from this photo. 










And my F1 Betta coccina pair are in their film canister spawning as I type. 

This is the female last night. 










Then this is the female in breeding dress (bad photo) this morning. The lighter coloured strip running along her back is a tell-tale sign that she is ready to spawn.










I also took some photos of my Betta uberis group. As you can see, there is a wide variation in size between the males. 














































Last but not least, I have a photo of what I think was the Betta sp. api api female I was originally going to breed from.


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## LittleBettaFish

My Betta sp. api api male is still doing a great job as a first-time father. I had a look into the canister with the torch tonight, and it really looks like there are maybe six fry in total. But like I said, both fish are only about an inch in size so it's amazing that the female was able to produce any eggs at all. 

My Betta hendra fry are almost fully horizontal now, and will likely leave the nest tonight or tomorrow morning. Which means my male is going to be extremely stressed over the next few days. 

My Betta brownorum pair are _still_ not spawning. I'm hoping a water change tomorrow, and a feed of live mosquito larvae, will do the trick. I worry that I'm going to lose this species from my fish room if I can't get my pair to produce any further offspring. 

I fed everyone in the evening rather than the day, so I don't have many photos to share. I did however, get a few photos of my dominant F1 Betta coccina female being her usual jerk self. 




























Then I took a photo of one of my F1 Betta sp. api api males enjoying a meal of frozen brine shrimp. 










Followed by a photo of two other males in the tank. I think a few words had been spoken prior to this photo being taken. 










I _finally_ got around to chucking a heater in my water aging tub, and disinfecting all my water change equipment, so I am going to do water changes on half my tanks tomorrow. Then I'm going to repeat the process, and in another week's time, do the other half of my tanks. 

Hopefully after I've given the tanks a good scrubbing, I will have some better quality photos to share.


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## LittleBettaFish

Last night I _finally_ got around to doing water changes. I've been really slack on that front, but I forgot how much my fish appreciate a (small) water change. The front glass of my tanks are also now free from algae, which makes taking photos so much easier. There's also the usual turf wars that go on after I added some fresh IALs. 

Then this morning, everyone had a feed of the frozen mosquito larvae I brought the other day.










I also took some photos of my Betta coccina females (a couple were taken yesterday). I love how feisty they are. When I can get them in focus, they make for some great photos. 
































































I don't really have much news to share, apart from the fact my Betta hendra fry are now free-swimming, and my Betta sp. api api fry must either be free-swimming or very close to it.


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## LittleBettaFish

Lately I feel a bit like I've been talking to myself with this journal.

However, two exciting things happened this morning. 

Firstly, my F1 pair of Betta sp. api api spawned again, even though their fry only _just_ went free-swimming. Looks like the female only produced about six eggs again, but at least I know they are feeling comfortable in their tank. 

Secondly, I discovered my Betta hendra pair spawning again. They never spawn this soon after the fry have left the nest, but at least it means the male isn't moping around like he usually does. 

The most recent batch of eggs from my F1 Betta coccina pair have also hatched, and the male is going to be busy over the next couple of days as there are a LOT. 

One fish I am concerned about, is my wild-caught Betta brownorum male. He just hasn't been himself. His colour is vibrant, his appetite is normal, but he seems to be lacking in vitality. Right now the female is following him around, very keen on spawning, but the male just doesn't seem interested. He flares at her, and gives a bit of a half-hearted chase, but he's not his usual feisty self. I'm very fond of him, so I'm hoping it's nothing. Right now he's in the film canister, so if he builds a nest and spawns I'll be a little less concerned. 

Otherwise, I actually managed some half-decent photos of my Betta hendra while they were spawning today. As usual with this tank, a combination of the flash, and glare coming from the window has washed the colour out of the fish. 

First up is the male coming out of the canister to see where the female has gone (she was looking for eggs). You can see some eggs already in the nest.










Female in full breeding dress looking for eggs.










Wrapping.










Female stunned, and male waiting for her to snap out of it. 










Female still stunned, but you can see an egg on the bottom of the canister. The next photo I too was blurry so it was deleted, but it showed both fish coming to scoop the egg up. 










Ready to go again. 










I also took a few photos of random fish. 

F1 Betta coccina juvenile. I'm thinking male based on colour/fins. 










F1 Betta coccina female telling a sibling off. 










My Betta uberis patriarch, keeping his sons in line. He is at least two years old (as long as I've owned him) now.


----------



## NickAu

LBF, Ocean Nutrition also sells a product called Tropical quintet 

*Tropical Quintet - Ocean Nutrition 
*


----------



## LittleBettaFish

My wild bettas are finicky little things. They won't touch daphnia and mysis shrimp (I even tried daphnia twice in the past), so that leaves me with only the bloodworms and brine shrimp that they would find palatable. I like to use the spirulina and garlic enriched brine shrimp from Ocean Nutrition (I haven't tried their bloodworms yet as I usually use Hikari). 

What I need is a frozen food where each ingredient is blended up and combined into a single cube. Although then they probably would take one bite and spit it out. 

I feel like a parent finding a creative way to hide their kids' vegetables.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well my fish room is now ***** and span. I replaced the cling wrap on the top shelf tanks, and gave the fronts of all the tanks a wipe with some white vinegar. 

I started setting up the tank for my F1 Betta brownorum (hopefully) pair yesterday afternoon, which means the main rack in my fish room is now completely full. Some of the tanks being only recently set-up, need time to mature, and for the plants to grow in. But I don't think it's looking too bad. It's My next project, is getting my smaller rack up to scratch. At the moment it's only holding my Betta livida and Betta persephone tanks, and both of those are looking pretty shabby. 

In my previous post, I wrote that I was concerned about my Betta brownorum male. Shortly after I wrote that post, the pair started randomly wrapping at the back of the tank. There was no nest, and no eggs were produced, so I don't know what that was all about. He came out to see me today, and was enthusiastically hunting down mosquito larvae, so I'm hoping his strange behaviour was simply related to me removing the four juveniles/sub-adults. 

I also swapped my Betta persephone males around. That one-eyed male may have difficulty finding his food, but he had no trouble in evading the net. Then there was a fight between father and son, after the father escaped the breeder box because I hadn't slid one of the sides down fully. It's no wonder the father is missing an eye in the first place! 

I've only got a few photos to share as the camera battery died, and then most of my fish were pretty sluggish after their evening feed.


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## LittleBettaFish

My wild-caught Betta coccina male randomly decided to spawn yesterday. Undoubtedly, most/all the resulting fry will be eaten by their much older siblings, but it's always reassuring to know your fish are feeling comfortable enough, and healthy enough, to spawn. 

My Betta sp. api api male and Betta hendra male are still busily looking after their eggs, and my Betta brownorum are playing a drawn out game of 'will they/won't they'. 

I've got a few photos to share from the fish room today. As you can see, everyone seemed to be in a flaring good mood. 





































This is my Betta brownorum male a few seconds before he chased the female away. I don't think he _looks_ sick. It's just I'm used to him being more friendly and feisty than what he has been lately.


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## LittleBettaFish

Not much been happening on the fish front since I last posted. My Betta hendra did another back-to-back spawn with me discovering them wrapping in the film canister this morning. 

My second batch of F2 Betta sp. api api fry have gone free-swimming, so will have to see how soon the pair spawn again. 

My F1 Betta coccina, F2 Betta coccina, and F1 Betta livida fry/juveniles are growing nicely. Starting to see some colour filling in on the fins of some of the biggest now. A couple of my F1 Betta coccina are almost large enough for me to correctly sex. At this point looks like it could well be a nice blend of males and females. If so, this pair will once again be the odd ones out in my fish room, having produced a great deal more female offspring than any of my other breeding pairs. 

I've also added my F1 Betta brownorum male to the new breeding tank. It's not 100% ready, but he was being mercilessly bullied by his nephew/half-brother, and he seems to be relishing the peace and quiet. 

I'm still not sure if any of my (unrelated) F1 Betta brownorum are female, but we'll see what happens once I add 'her' to the tank. Best outcome would be they produce many, many offspring together. 

My original Betta brownorum male is also completely back to normal. He's been flaring and flirting with the female and built a nest. I just can't tell if any spawning has occurred. 

Finally, I have a few photos to share that I took tonight of various fish.

First up is my Betta brownorum female. 




























F1 Betta coccina female










One of my smallest F1 Betta uberis males sparring.










It's out of focus, but I'm fairly certain this is the one F1 Betta uberis female I have. There's another smaller sibling that _could_ be female, but at this point I can't tell. 










Then two males prepping for battle. 










Before finishing with a couple photos of my Betta persephone. The one on the left I'm really, really hoping is female. The colour on the male is crap because they don't really like their current tank, and I just threw a T5 fluro over the top of it. 



















I also got to play with a litter of puppies yesterday. Nike's litter sister whelped four puppies. When we first saw them, they still had their eyes shut. This time however, they were up and about, and did not appreciate our efforts to get them standing nicely for photos. I think they are about 3-4 weeks old at this point, and we will be seeing them again in another couple of weeks. 

I still think German Shepherds make for the cutest puppies. They look like little bear cubs at this age, and in another few weeks, those sharp teeth will be put to good use.


----------



## Nismo83

Looks like it is busy spawning time for your wilds


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Just not the one pair I really _NEED_ to spawn, which is my Betta brownorum. It's so frustrating. This pair used to be so prolific, and now they are by themselves again, and I have their tank perfectly set up, they won't spawn. 

If they don't spawn, I've got to hope that their largest offspring (who I thought might be female) will spawn with the unrelated F1 male. Otherwise I will eventually lose this species from my fish room if I can't import and I can't replace them locally.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Still no action from my Betta brownorum pair. The male spends most of his time in the film canister, and apart from coming out to eat and occasionally flare at the female, doesn't do much else. 

So far my F1 Betta brownorum pair haven't caused each other any harm, but they aren't really interacting much either. I've been fattening them up on live mosquito larvae, but I'm still not sure if the 'female' is actually a female. The male lost a lot of condition being in with his nephews/half-brothers, so I'm wondering if it's going to take him a little while before he is ready to spawn. 

Otherwise, my F1 pair of Betta coccina spawned again, my most recent batch of Betta hendra fry hatched, and I think my pair of Betta livida may have snuck in a spawn as there are bubbles coming out of the film canister.I also discovered that one of the smaller F1 Betta uberis is indeed female, so now I've got at least two females to work with. I'm not sure if there is another female floating around in there, or it's just these two, as some of the smaller fish rarely come out from hiding except to eat.

Not really much else happening around here. I've mostly been busy with Clio as she just wants to go and go and go. We got a leather bite rag delivered today and that's now her 'special' training toy. I find dogs tend to be a bit more animated and responsive when the reward is a toy, instead of just food all the time. It's just hard as Clio has very little interest in her toys outside of the house and so I've been trying to build this interest up. 

I've been trying to teach her to cover her eyes with her paw using sticky tap, and she is _so_ close to getting it. I've also almost got her left/right spins on a verbal command only, and I've *finally* got her moving anti-clockwise when her front paws are up on her 'perch' (which in reality is just a pot saucer). Now she just needs to learn to swing into my leg in both directions. I also want to get my dad to build me a long platform, so I can teach her to stand in front, behind, in the heel position, and to the right of me. 

She is the first dog I've ever trained myself, and sadly, she probably knows the most commands out of any of the dogs we've owned. I've definitely made mistakes, but at least I'll know what to do differently with whatever puppy we have next. 

First thing will be no going off the long-line until a recall is reliable. Mum is so lax about ensuring dogs are trained to recall off leash, and it drives me crazy. I only just got her to purchase a long-line recently, and Clio is going to be doing some intensive recall training. 

Finally, I have some photos to share of my fish. 

First up is a photo of one of my Betta livida fry taken with the macro lens. 










Next up is one of my smaller F1 Betta coccina. This one looks to be a young male. 










I think this is the same fish. 










Their father.










Shiny. 










My favourite F1 Betta sp. api api female










One of Shiny's smaller brothers. 










The same fish.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Starting with the bad news first, I lost my plakat male, Maverick. He had gradually been declining in health, which seems to be the eventual fate of all my fancy bettas, and the reason why I will not be buying any others. 

In further bad news, there's been no spawning, or no attempts at spawning from either Betta brownorum pair. Which is incredibly disappointing and disheartening. The female of my wild-caught pair seems interested and is plumping up, but the male has not been interacting with her much at all. 

I've tried all my tricks at inducing a spawn, but it just isn't happening. 

However, something did happen today that got me a little excited. While I was feeding my Betta persephone, the fish I suspect is female appeared to be trying to flirt with the male. She barred up vertically, and was flicking her body at him. This male unfortunately, just isn't as dominant or aggressive as his father (even with only one eye), who has multiple spawns under his belt. So my new plan is to separate the father and the possible female out into a tank of their own, and see what happens. I'm hoping that if this is a female, I can get a spawn out of them once they are away from the other fish. 

I've also been hearing the siren song of killifish again. I can see myself owning at *least* one pair before the year is out. Likely Aphyosemion gabunense or Aphyosemion striatum, if I can wrangle it. 

Apart from that, my wilds are all hale and hearty, and let's hope they continue to be so in the future, particularly my Betta persephone if I can get them to spawn. 

Wrapping up my post, I took a few photos earlier today to share.

First is two of my Betta livida fry. The dark water in this tank makes decent photos almost impossible.










My Betta brownorum female.










My Betta hendra male defending his fry, which are almost completely independent. 










My two biggest F1 Betta brownorum sparring. They fight a lot more since I removed their larger sibling. Their remaining sibling is about a third of their size and has wisely learned to stay out of their way. 










My F1 Betta coccina male flaring. He was in a strop today. 



















The most dominant of the females. You can see who got the most frozen brine shrimp.


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## LittleBettaFish

I decided to start my post off with some good news. 

My pair of Betta brownorum FINALLY spawned. The male has a small nest of eggs tucked away at the back of the film canister, and they should be hatching out tomorrow. Now I just hope that this isn't the only spawn I'm going to get out of them. 

My Betta hendra are also on their second or third consecutive spawn. The male's been moving his eggs into the film canister and back out again all day, and the poor female isn't allowed near the front half of the tank. 

Then yesterday, I set-up my Betta persephone breeding tank. As the one-eyed male is a proven breeder, I've put him in with the 'female'. She's been vertically barred up since they went into the tank, and has been following the male around. At this point I'm not sure if the bars are a young male demonstrating his submissiveness, or a female indicating her breeding readiness. I've been conditioning them with live mosquito larvae (the precious few I can find), and now I just have to wait and see whether I've correctly sexed the female, and whether or not they are interested enough in each other to spawn. 

Bad news is that I think my F1 Betta brownorum may be a male. The pair are still very 'meh' with each other, and the 'female' doesn't really seem to be plumping up with eggs, even though I've been steadily fattening them up. At least they aren't attacking each other, and the male's fins are almost completely healed. He's quite a striking fish. He's got the largest green spots of any of my Betta brownorum males, and his body turns quite red when he is fully coloured up. 

It will be a shame if they aren't a pair, as this male is unrelated to the female, and it would have meant less inbreeding. 

I also think my two Betta miniopinna are female. The largest is definitely female as I can spot her ovaries, but it's difficult to tell with the smallest fish as it spends most of its time avoiding its sister. 

For some reason, my wilds have not wanted their photos taken. I did manage to get a few that weren't too bad, but most ended up getting deleted as soon as they were taken. 

First up is one of my F1 Betta coccina females. 










Followed by an F1 Betta uberis female. I'm going to pair this female or her sister with Shiny, as soon as I have a tank free. 



















Then these are my Betta hendra eggs. 










An F1 B. sp. api api female. 










One of my younger F1 B. sp. api api with a belly full of frozen brine shrimp. 










Shiny.










Today also brought with it the realisation that for the first time since I started keeping bettas, I'm keeping *only* wild bettas. Somehow it makes things seem a bit more serious now.


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## LittleBettaFish

I haven't posted in my journal for a while now because there really hasn't been anything much to talk about. 

My wild bettas are still the only fish in my fish room at present, and they are all doing well. Disappointingly, my F1 pair of Betta brownorum have failed to spawn, and I'm really starting to suspect that the 'female' is male. My pair of Betta persephone are also a flop. At this point I don't know if I've incorrectly sexed the female, she's still too immature to successfully spawn, or this pair just isn't compatible. 

My young fish are busy eating, fighting, and growing. Right now I have F2 Betta sp. api api, F1 Betta sp. api api, F1 Betta hendra, F2 Betta coccina, F1 Betta coccina, F1 Betta brownorum, and F1 Betta livida growing out. Hopefully in the near future I can add F2 Betta uberis to my list. 

I've also been given permission to turn the smallest bedroom in the house into a permanent fish room. My current set-up was only supposed to be temporary, and then the fish would be moved downstairs. But after much hint dropping and pleading, they are allowed to stay upstairs and only have to be moved into the room over. 

There's enough space in there for a 1800mm rack and a 900mm rack, which will give me more than enough space for my current tanks, and room for a few more. I'm also going to properly plan out my fish room this time. That was my mistake with my current set-up. It was allowed to grow and spread organically, and it's just a nightmare with all the power cords and airline tubing everywhere. 

I do have to share the space with the cats, but I don't think they'll mind. Especially not in winter when my fish room is usually the warmest room in the house. 

Other than that, there's not really much else going on. I did try getting some photos but the only fish that would cooperate were my Betta uberis, and even they don't look their best.


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## LittleBettaFish

I've just finished up swapping my Betta persephone males around. The one-eyed male just hasn't been thriving in the larger tank, since I raised the water level a couple days ago. His son is healthy and fully mature, so we'll see what he makes of the 'female'. 

I also discovered that my pair of Betta hendra spawned today. I don't even think the male had a bubblenest built when they started. 

Otherwise, my Betta brownorum female was out and about earlier this afternoon (along with some of the fry). I am wondering if these two will spawn again soon, as she was hanging around the film canister while the male was in it. It's difficult to get photos of these two, as they tend to clamp their fins and contort their bodies into unflattering positions, but I managed to get a couple of photos of the female. 



















My F0 pair of Betta coccina spawned recently, so everyone in the tank has been sort of tiptoeing around trying to avoid the male's notice. The juveniles are large enough now to draw their parents' ire, so they are careful not to get too close. However, the female did pose nicely for one photo. 










Followed by one of my F1 Betta sp. api api males. 










I also took photos of several of my tanks. This is exactly how my wild bettas like it. I still think they show their best colouration, and are more consistent breeders in heavily planted tanks.


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## Kisiel

Your fish are stunning. And that's some huge IAL!


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## LittleBettaFish

I think it's a bit of an optical illusion, especially as my wilds aren't all that large themselves. Those are sold as 'small' IALs, and the largest is probably around 15cm. The 'large' IALs from the same company are almost too big for my tanks.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think if I could only keep one species of wild betta, it would have to be Betta coccina. I just love the colours, attitude, and fins on these fish. The dominant female in my F1 group, is only about half the size of her brother, but you can see she doesn't back down easily. 










You can see one of her sisters trying to get out of the way in the top right corner. 





































Meanwhile, the sibling pair from this group have given me plenty of fry to work with. They are a fairly aggressive pair, and unfortunately, they have the propensity to go for each other's eyes when doing battle. A couple of days ago, I had real concerns that the female was going to be permanently blinded, but thankfully she's healed up fine. 

Of course my camera managed to miss all the best shots of this pair, and the two I got aren't great. But the male of this pair epitomises everything I love about wild bettas. Personally, I don't think man can best nature when it comes to creating beautiful things. 



















Then I tried to get some photos of my Betta hendra male. However, he's guarding a nest of eggs and so he was getting increasingly agitated by my efforts. I did manage one in focus photo, which captured his colour nicely. 










In other news, my largest Betta livida juveniles took their first frozen brine shrimp today. It's fascinating how they learn what to eat by watching their parents and each other. I'm also starting to see green spots developing on the sides of the males, so really excited to see how this group grow out, especially considering their endangered status in the wild. Hopefully I get some balanced sex ratios for once! 

I don't think it's going to be long now before I move some of the largest juveniles into a separate grow-out. I just need to buy some more plants and IALs. 

Finally, still no signs of spawning activity from my Betta persephone pair. I've been flaring them with a mirror as sometimes this seems to strengthen the bond between the pair and encourage courtship/spawning. However, the only one who does any flaring is the female while the male just skulks off to hide. They were looking so beautiful today with their bright blue fins all but glowing in the dark water, it made me miss my previous group. If they don't spawn, my only hope will be that wild bettas somehow find their way back into Australia again and I can import a pair.


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## LittleBettaFish

Recently I paired Shiny (F1 Betta uberis male) with a sibling female and moved them into their own tank. Yesterday, I caught them spawning, with the end result being a nest full of eggs. I will say that they were pretty efficient for a virgin pair, and so far Shiny has been doing an exceptional job with the eggs. 

I did manage to get a couple photos of the female in breeding dress. However, Shiny refused to come out of the film canister, so there were no photos of him. 



















This morning I also discovered my F1 pair of Betta sp. api api wrapping. They must have heard that I was going to be putting them up for sale next week. The fry from their first few spawns are doing very well. There's not many, but as they say, quality over quantity. 

My F1 Betta coccina male also has a nest full of fry, and my Betta hendra male just bid adieu to his most recent batch. 

Meanwhile, I think my youngest F1 Betta sp. api api are mostly/all female. As I'm selling their parents, I now have the next to impossible task of catching every single F1 fish and moving them in with the main group without tearing the tank apart. Unfortunately, this is the downside to keeping wild bettas in heavily planted tanks. 










Because I was already down there with my camera, I got a few shots of some of my F1 Betta sp. api api males.




























Because I was being sentimental, I was trying to get some nice photos of my original Betta uberis pair. Typical me, all the best photos were out of focus, and my female wouldn't even come out at all. These two are probably the oldest wilds in my fish room (not a difficult achievement at this point in time), and if the eggs from Shiny hatch, they will finally become grandparents. 



















Otherwise, all my young fish appear to be growing out well. My Betta brownorum pair appear to have made no further attempts to spawn, and I'm just hoping that at least one of their current fry develops the characteristic lateral green spot. I've also decided to put my Betta persephone back into the same tank as it doesn't look like they are ever going to spawn, and it's one less heater I have to be running over the winter. 

Finally, I've decided that I'm going to get back into Australian natives when my fish room is set-up. I was going to start keeping/breeding killifish again, but I think I need fish that I don't get as emotionally attached to. Killifish are like wilds in that they have their own unique personalities and you start becoming fond of individuals.


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## LittleBettaFish

Got some extremely bad news to share. It looks like several of my larger Betta hendra juveniles have developed white spots on their bodies. No other tanks in my fish room are infected, including those housing young fish, so I don't know what the cause is. At this point I don't know if it's ich or velvet, so I haven't rushed into treating it. If I turn up the temperature and it's velvet, all I'm going to do is make the infection spread more quickly and grow in severity. But on the other hand I don't want to start dosing medications if it's only ich. 

If I get another outbreak of velvet, I'll be seriously considering my future with wild bettas. It's just too emotionally and financially draining to go through it all again.

Otherwise, the rest of my fish are doing well. My F2 Betta uberis should be free-swimming in another 12-24 hours, my F1 Betta brownorum are growing out nicely, I am being overrun with F2 Betta coccina, and my F1 Betta livida juveniles are now eagerly taking frozen mosquito larvae and brine shrimp (although some of the smallest definitely bite off more than they can chew). 

My sub-adult F1 Betta coccina are making nuisances of themselves. One of the largest, a female, has decided that she wants to rise above her mother in the pecking order so the adults are busy keeping their recalcitrant offspring in line. There's also some torn fins on their adult sisters as I think they've been stirring up their brother again. 

I took a few photos of my fish, but then my camera went flat. 

First is my wild-caught Betta brownorum female. I can't tell if this pair are spawning in the film canister at the back of the tank as there were what looked like bubbles coming out the top. 



















This Betta uberis male has been very busy trying to claim Shiny's half of the tank. Unfortunately, he is one of the smaller males in the group. 



















You can see here how he compares in size to his father. I think even his mother is larger than he is. 



















Apart from that, I haven't really got a whole lot of news to share from my fish room. I do however, have some dog stories to share. 

The other day we visited Nike's breeder's house, as one of her dogs had recently had a litter. There were eleven puppies in total and as they were only a few days old all they did was make noises and wriggle around in the whelping box. But the breeder gave us a couple of girls to hold (which always makes me panic because I feel like I'm going to drop them) and I gave plenty of cuddles to Nike's sister and her mother. 

The breeder also has three older puppies from Nike's sister she is running on, and Clio follows them around like a mother hen when we're down at club. At one point she was lying on the ground with all three puppies clambering all over her, and she just had this expression of pure happiness. 

And that's about the only redeeming feature of Clio's at the moment. I've come to the conclusion that Clio is hyperactive rather than high-drive, and it's bloody exhausting to live with. Everyone but Clio is capable of settling in the house. In fact right as I type this, she is in the crate sitting next to me screaming to be let out, and she can't have been in there for more than an hour or two. 

She simply has no off-switch. It's like this constant cycle where I wear her out (either physically or mentally or both) and then as soon as she wakes up she has to be doing something, and if it's not something productive, it's something destructive. The trouble is that it's very difficult to channel her energy productively. In spite of all my best efforts, she has almost no interest in toys so she won't chase a ball, tug, or run after the flirt pole. By nature, she isn't one of those bouncy enthusiastic types, and I'm finding it increasingly difficult to get her motivated simply by using high-value food rewards. Furthermore, her reactivity means we are limited as to where we can take her and at what times, and several idiot dog owners have made it impossible to walk her around the streets like I do with the others. 

I mean I love her, but she is such a handful. She couldn't be a more polar opposite of her dam (she has a very quiet nature) temperament wise. 

To top it off, Nike is having a phantom pregnancy, so has been carrying two toys around and crying any time she's left alone. When it comes time to desex the two older girls, Nike is definitely going first!


----------



## kitkat67

What a beautiful German shepherd! We might be getting my dad a dog soon...meaning we are getting me a dog


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## Nismo83

velvet should be gold spot..


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## LittleBettaFish

Nike is beautiful, but I don't know where she was when they were handing out brains. 

Nismo, when my wilds have been infected with velvet, I found the dust was more grey than gold, with larger spots on the membranes between the pectoral rays. It also seems to move quickly through a tank, and at this point only a small number of young fish are affected. 

I just had a look in with the torch while everyone was eating and I couldn't see any spots. However, this torch isn't as bright as the other, which I seem to have inconveniently misplaced. I will say that my Betta hendra juveniles are growing well. I am surprised at how many there are simply because I almost never saw them when they were smaller. 

Can't wait until they are large enough to be sexable, although I find with hendra that a young male can disguise himself as a female for quite some time. 

At this point I'm going to hold off on any treatments until more fish are affected, or those fish that are affected start showing worsening symptoms.


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## Nismo83

my batch of mac fries caught some white spots and I used copper safe.. maybe you want to try. that was about 2 weeks ago.. just one dose and till now everything is good


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## LittleBettaFish

I've had issues with velvet not responding to copper medication, perhaps resistance resulting from the fact I had to use it so frequently in the past. The copper medication I use requires a two week exposure period, and as I ended up with severely deformed Betta brownorum fry from copper exposure before they hatched, I only want to use it as a last option. My pair are almost continuously spawning so there are eggs appearing twice a week or so, as well as very young fry, so at this point I don't want to use medication if I don't have to. 

As I can't even find any juveniles with spots on them, I'm just going to wait and see what happens. 

In better news, my F1 Betta uberis pair have done a back-to-back spawn. The fry from their first ever spawn went free-swimming yesterday (although a few stragglers were in the film canister this morning) and right now the pair are in the middle of their second spawn. I've got my fingers crossed they throw mostly females as then I can sell some of the F1 males as the testosterone level in that tank could stand to be taken down a notch. What I am most interested in, is whether or not the males will inherit Shiny's thicker looking scaling. He is still the only F1 male in the group to display that trait. 

Unfortunately, my camera is flat, so I'll recharge it today and get some photos later this afternoon/evening.


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## Nismo83

I see... too much medication does give bad effect... I seldom use them on my betta... only did a salt bath and the copper once..


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## LittleBettaFish

I don't like using copper but when I was fighting velvet in almost every tank I had no choice. I always try to avoid treating tanks with medication if I can avoid it, ever since I read that certain medications may affect fertility/make fish sterile. 

Anyway, not much has been happening in the fish room. I can see free-swimming F2 Betta uberis fry up near the surface, the few F1 Betta brownorum fry I can spot in the tank have full stomachs, and my Betta hendra fry look to have left the nest. I'm seeing green blocthes appearing on the sides of more of my F1 Betta livida. I just have to hope the fish without blotches are female, and not simply colourless males (as can happen with this species). 

I've got mosquito larvae in containers all over my fish room. Because of the cold weather, the growth rate on the larvae has been excruciatingly slow, making them useless for all but fry/juveniles. Therefore, I've been scooping the small larvae from my outside tubs, leaving it in my fish room where the temperature during the day is probably low to mid twenties, in a bid to speed up their life-cycle. So far this has been working well. I just have to ensure I either cover the containers, or I harvest the larger larvae first to avoid creating a plague of mosquitoes in the house (been there, done that). 

This weekend I want to try and visit Nike's breeder, so I can catch as many mosquito larvae as possible from the drum of water in her backyard. The frozen mosquito larvae is proving a poor substitute to the real thing (although it's still enough to get my fish spawning). 

For the first time in ages, I also have watersprite starting to break the surface in one of my tanks. Almost all of my watersprite died off when I was treating tanks for velvet, and when I added the mayaca fluviatilis, the remaining plants continued to struggle. Since I know my Betta livida tank is 100% free of any diseases or parasites, I might cultivate the watersprite in there, and break small pieces off to distribute to my other tanks. The roots that grow down from floating watersprite provide the ideal haven for very young fry, plus I like the look of the emergent growth. 

I did also take some photos today. I did take more but as usual, when I uploaded them onto the laptop I realised most were out of focus (it's very difficult to tell on the camera unless they are _really_ out of focus). But I do think I got a cracker shot of one of my Betta uberis males flaring. 

First up is an F1 Betta sp. api api male.










Followed by one of the younger F1 Betta sp. api api from my wild-caught pair. 










Then just a few photos of my Betta uberis males. 

This smaller male had caught the attention of his much larger brother. 



















The male who has taken over Shiny's territory. Surprisingly he has managed to hold it against the several larger males in the tank. 










One of the smaller males in the midst of an argument. In this tank, all problems are solved with violence. 










Then this is the photo I thought was the best. This is what I say to anyone who dares say wild bettas aren't as colourful or interesting as fancy bettas.


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## Nismo83

Gorgeous uberis. Will be having 6 pairs each of brownorum, wajok and Rutilans coming in next week. And also 11 pairs albirmingata. Lol


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## LittleBettaFish

Lol there is definitely no way I could keep that many pairs of an individual species. We would get the first electricity bill and my mum would have me out on the streets, fish in tow. Especially now we're in the colder months where the aquarium heaters really get a work-out. 

Not much has been happening in the fish room. I was going to pick up the mosquito larvae from Nike's breeder on Sunday, but then mum wanted to go home early from club and so I will be picking them up next week instead. 

My most recent batch of F2 Betta uberis have hatched and are under the watchful eye of their father. My Betta hendra pair were also in the middle of a spawn when I looked in this morning, although with the bigger juveniles in the tank I'm not sure how many of these younger fry will survive. 

I did water changes on the tanks on the top shelf of my rack yesterday morning before going to club, and I also carried out a _long_ overdue water change on the goldfish tank. The water temperature is sitting around 10 degrees celsius at the moment, so they are not particularly active. I've barely been feeding them as they just haven't had much of an appetite. As I can very easily crash the cycle in this tank due to the difference in pH/hardness between my tap water and the tank water, I've had to stagger water changes. I changed out about 30 litres yesterday, and if the pH is still sitting above 7.0, I will change out another 30-40 litres later on today. Because lugging buckets of water around in the wet and cold is what I love about this hobby! 

I've also decided to condense all my F1 Betta brownorum into the one tank. However, I will be keeping the most aggressive male into a large breeder box as I don't want him attacking the other fish. The only fish he can tolerate is his brother Zig-Zag and I think theirs is a very uneasy truce. 

I'm also condensing my Betta persephone back into the same tank. It's certainly looking like my biggest F1 is male, which leaves only its runt sibling as a potential female. However, until it's large enough to correctly sex I'm going to keep them in the same tank to cut down on electricity costs and space. 

Apart from that, I took a few photos today and the other day, so I thought I'd share. 

First up is my original Betta uberis male. I've had him just a touch over two years now, but he definitely still has it. Just wish I'd cleaned the glass. 










Then one of his sons in full flare. 










Followed by one of my F1 Betta sp. api api. This particular fish is a female. 










I'm not sure if this is the same fish, or one of her sisters. These two are from the group where the majority are/seem female. 










Next up is a photo of my Betta hendra female in breeding dress (she was actually looking for eggs when this photo was taken).



















Followed by the male (he thought I was going to feed him while he waited for the female to return, as you can see he's _such_ a shy fish).


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## Nismo83

I am housing temporary for a friends... there is some delay.. the albi will come in at later stage.. I aren't good with nester I guess.. except for my orange HMPK.. non of the nesters breed at my home.


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## LittleBettaFish

That's odd. Maybe something in your water they don't like? I think I only have as much success as I do because of my tap water. Part of me never wants to move from my house as the water is perfect for the wilds.


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## Nismo83

probably is the live feed... call me superstitious or something, the last time I tried with microworm I got myself bitten by a dog and my daughter also got injured.. after I dumped them all it become ok ..


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## LittleBettaFish

That could be it, I think live foods are certainly key to breeding success with the smaller wilds. 

First I have some sad news to share from the fish room. Yesterday, I had to euthanase Zig-Zag's brother. The backstory is that I use these clear plastic breeder boxes to separate my wilds into. However, there are holes drilled into the bottom of the breeder box that my fish can and have, become stuck in. Because of this, I put craft mesh or substrate over the bottom of the box and until now, this has solved the problem. 

Unfortunately, while I put a layer of substrate over the bottom of the breeder box, a corner was left bare and I discovered the male trapped in one of the holes. When my rutilans male was similarly trapped, I was able to manipulate him loose. However, this didn't work and I had to smash the breeder box to break my brownorum male free. Sadly, too much damage must have been done and I made the decision to euthanase him. 

I've since binned the remaining breeder box, although too late for it to matter to Zig-Zag's brother. 

In happier news, the rest of my fish are still doing well. I've been keeping my eyes on my Betta hendra group, but their behavior and appearance are normal as far as I can tell. My pair are still spawning, colour is good, fins aren't clamped, no signs of irritation, and appetites are healthy. The young fish are active and growing well, and starting to see some colour coming through on the larger juveniles, which are now starting to take frozen brine shrimp and mosquito larvae. 

The other day, I also took a really close-up photo of my latest Betta brownorum spawn. The male had moved them out of the film canister, so I got a quick shot in before he moved them back. 










Then today I just took some impromptu shots of my Betta coccina, and of course they had to congregate around the smudge on the glass. It's also very hard to take photos of the youngsters as they are forever chasing each other around. Just when you've got the perfect shot lined up, some bonehead comes along and ruins it. 

First up is my dominant F1 female. 










One of her sisters. 










Then these are their younger full siblings, still sharing a tank with their parents although I'm likely going to move them soon as they are causing trouble. 

A young male 










Two young males. 










Matriarch of the tank










Another young male (likely one of the males from the above photos)










A terrible photo of the largest female sub-adult. She rules the roost over her smaller brothers, but backs down when her parents are around. 










I think at this point the sexes are fairly balanced, with there being perhaps one more male than female. Once these males are mature, I will then have the means to create an additional three F1 pairs if need be.


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## Nismo83

sad to hear that... I should be able to DIY laser cutting acrylic pretty soon. Let me know if you want to DIY any partition tanks. =)


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## Fenghuang

I'm sorry to hear about the young male... I lost a fish earlier last month to a similar trapped situation. I got him just earlier that day! It's unbelievable how these fish wiggle themselves into spaces too small for them to fit and devastating.

But congratulations on those babies. It's a really good picture!


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## LittleBettaFish

That moment, when your 'cull' outlives all its breeding quality siblings, and actually matures into a breeding worthy example of its species. 

A couple days ago, I lost the last of my F1 Betta brownorum males from my original pair (he was an uncle/brother to the male mentioned above). I noticed he'd been having some difficulty eating one day, and then the next he was dead in typical betta fashion. This means Zig-Zag is the last fish left related to my original pair. Since the two adult males have died he's coloured right up, and has been lording it over the younger and smaller F1 fish. Fortunately, he's not as aggressive as his deceased brother, and there's enough fish in the tank that no one is being singled out or bullied. 

He also didn't want to get his photo taken, even though he was looking gloriously red in the afternoon sun. 










Meanwhile, I've sort of been rather 'meh' about the whole fish thing, which is why I haven't posted in a while. I just can't muster up much enthusiasm at the moment. There is a part of me that wishes I wasn't so attached to my fish so I could just sell everything off. I don't know why I feel this way. I think a large part of the problem is that the wild betta community is so small, and most hobbyists/breeders live overseas so I don't really have anyone to talk about wild bettas with. Even on this site, there are so few members that keep wilds, and most don't even seem to post. 

In a sense, I guess I'm feeling fairly isolated. 

Because of this rut I've been stuck in, I don't have many photos to share. But here are a few I took recently. 

First up is one of my F1 Betta coccina having a sneaky go at his father's caudal. 










F1 male and female having a stand-off. 










Same female as above under different lighting. 










Next, is of one of my F1 Betta brownorum fry. They are growing surprisingly fast, but so far it looks like none of this group have the lateral spot either! Without it, they look more like Betta rutilans than Betta brownorum. 










Finally, this is one of my Betta livida juveniles. You can see the green spot developing on its side.


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## LittleBettaFish

My Betta hendra pair were flirting yesterday. It's a shame the male isn't a more cooperative subject as his colouring is spectacular. No photos of the female because he was chasing her. One day I swear I'm going to get an in focus photo of this male in full flare. 




























This group are in absolute isolation as I'm still not sure whether or not they have velvet. I haven't noticed any change in behaviour, especially in the young fish, which seem to be the first and most severely affected. However, I'm not taking any risks and once my hands have been in that tank, they don't go in any others. 

Meanwhile, my Betta livida juveniles are thriving. Most of them are now taking frozen foods without any problems. Although some of the smallest seem determined to take on more than they can chew (or swallow). At this point I'm thinking I'm going to end up with many more males than females, which is certainly frustrating. They are definitely going to need to go into a separate grow-out in the next couple of weeks. The breeding tank only holds 5-6 gallons of water and they are very quickly outgrowing it. 










I also took a couple more photos of Zig-Zag as he's looking so nice. I just wish he would let me get a photo of his other side as his lateral spot is much larger. 



















To wrap up the photos (and this post), here's my dominant F1 Betta coccina female and her brother. That's one of her sisters disappearing in the background. I don't blame her, as these two can get nasty!


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## LittleBettaFish

Spent some of yesterday at dog club, and then several hours taking photos of a litter of five week old German Shepherd puppies. Clio should come into season soon, and along with losing her coat, I think she's also missing a brain. She disgraced herself by barking at a miniature dachshund (how terrifying) and then for the rest of the time we were at club, wouldn't relax or focus. If she was more into toys I could have got the long line out of the car and let her chase a ball and burn off some energy, but she has such little interest in toys what ends up happening is I throw the ball and then have to retrieve it while Clio is wallowing about in some foul-smelling puddle (it's very boggy where we train). 

Meanwhile the puppies are the ones we visited a few days after they were born. There's eleven of them, and they are _so_ adorable. We were trying to get photos of them stood up, but there was a lot of photobombing and biting going on. I've always liked the pink collar girl, and I mean how could you not? She was still small enough to fit under my jumper :mrgreen: Clio is utterly obsessed with the sire of this litter. I have to keep her away from him when he's at club, as all she wants to do is rile him up and wrestle with him. 










In fish news, it's been _slowly _warming up here and the number of mosquito larvae in my tubs seems to be steadily increasing. All my wilds are doing well. My Betta brownorum fry are growing scarily fast, although I still can't see any spots developing. My Betta livida and Betta hendra juveniles are like hungry swarms of locusts and I have to go the fish store this week to pick up some more food. I am wondering whether I should trial Repashy gel foods, specifically the 'Grub Pie' in the tanks with lots of young fish as they are churning through the BBS and hatching and harvesting it is such a pain. 

It's just a matter of whether or not they will accept it, as my wilds as such fusspots. 

I think Shiny is pining for his brothers. His colour has faded and there haven't been any further spawns. However, my F1 Betta sp. api api and F1 Betta coccina pairs seemed to take ages to fully settle in once they were removed from the main group, so hopefully with time, he'll be back to his former glory. 

I took a handful of photos of my fish, but I will get some more tomorrow. 

First up is my F0 Betta brownorum male. 



















Then a female F1 Betta coccina










Followed by one of her brothers










Before wrapping it up with a photo of their father, still looking in excellent condition. 










Finally, in fish related news that doesn't involve my wilds, I think I'm going to try and find a different food for my goldfish. At the moment I'm using the NLS Goldfish formula, but it seems to create a brown dust/gunk that clogs up the filters. Surprisingly for goldfish, my three are very particular about their food. They won't eat Hikari or Omega One, and I'm thinking of trying Sera or New Era. I just wish Sera's website was easier to navigate so I could work out what was in their goldfish specific foods. 

As I have duckweed growing in a tank outside I would like to supplement their diet with this, but I'm not sure whether they actually it it, or they simply mouth it and then the filter sucks up whatever is left. 

All I can say is that I forgot how much waste goldfish produce. Because the tank temperature was hovering around 10 degrees celsius, they were hardly eating. Now it's warmed up, they are back to daily feedings, and it seems like as soon as I do a water change there is waste on the bottom of the tank. I feel almost like they are mocking me.


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## Nismo83

your Hendra are really a beauty... hopefully I will be able to own a pair when I moved to my new place.


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## astrummortis

These fish are gorgeous. I don't know anything about wild bettas, but I love their shapes and colors here!


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## LittleBettaFish

I actually prefer my previous Betta hendra male (the one in my display picture). This current male is beautifully coloured and has more impressive fins, but he is shorter and his body shape is weird. 

Thanks Astrummortis. It's so hard to truly capture the colour of these fish. They look most spectacular when the afternoon sun hits their tanks.


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## LittleBettaFish

Having your brine shrimp cysts decide to go from a hatch rate of around 90% to a hatch rate of about 50% within a couple of days when you have a fish room full of young fish to feed, is not fun. 

Fortunately, my Betta livida fry and juveniles took very quickly to NLS flake, which I decided to try after I didn't hatch enough BBS to feed everyone. I was actually surprised by how enthusiastically they ate it up. Usually my wilds can be reluctant to try anything new, but all it took was one fish to grab a mouthful and the others (including the adults) quickly joined in. 

At this point, I'm thinking I might start trying all my young fish on flake food. This way I can alternate between flake and BBS until they are large enough to start taking frozen foods. At the moment I'm using an expired container of NLS, but I do want to see whether there is a better option out there. 

This group is so difficult to take photos of, as they are always on the move, and the camera doesn't like the light I have over this tank (it's a 10,000K tube). 










This is my favourite juvenile, as its (most likely a male) lateral blotch is so large. 




























Then I took some photos of my Betta coccina group as they are always clamoring for attention. 

One of the young males trying to avoid the notice of his father. 










I'm fairly certain this is the same male. 










My original male.










My original female.










Finally, to wrap up the photos I took a few of my F1 Betta sp. api api group. 

First is one of the smaller females. 










Then this is my favourite male. His colour is so dark and rich. 



















Another small female. 










Otherwise, things are going 'swimmingly' in my fish room. At this point I have so many fish, I'm going to have to seriously consider moving some onto new homes. It's just I keep making excuses as to why I can't sell a certain fish because I'm just too fond of them. Curse wild bettas and their endearing personalities! They are such individuals, and when I've had them for a year or more (especially fish I've bred), I can't bring myself to sell them, as I often don't know what happens to them once they leave my hands. 

Like when I sold several pairs of Betta persephone that I'd bred and raised for over a year, and all but one pair were dead within a short time of leaving my fish room. 

Ugh, this is why I want to get into keeping/breeding Australian natives. When all the fish behave in an almost identical fashion, it's easy not to get attached.


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## astrummortis

Your favorite male's colors are so lovely, and his eyes stand out so brightly! I love it 

I've never bred, but my wife and I both agree that we'd have problems selling them afterward for all of those reasons. I'd love a wild betta, but we're very much out of room. :/


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## LittleBettaFish

My camera never seems to capture the true brilliance of their eyes. They are much more vivid in real life.

Today was water change day. As always, there was some squabbling as everyone reasserted their place in the pecking order. There were also some territorial disputes triggered by the addition of IAL to a couple of the tanks. 

My Betta uberis group and Betta brownorum pair were the worst offenders, and I took a few quick photos while they were showing off. 










This male was threatening a smaller male (not the one behind). I find the fins clamped like this tend to be a pretty serious threat when coupled with a very slow, deliberate approach. 










The male he was threatening was just out of view, but as soon as this male got nearer he backed off. 










At least two years old and still the dominant male in the tank. 










Meanwhile my Betta brownorum pair were excited because I moved one of the film canisters around. As this played out, it was my little female that was the aggressor. Unfortunately, my male very rarely puts on much of a display beyond flaring and chasing. 





































Apart from that, there's not much else to share.

I've started doing twice weekly 40 litre water changes on my goldfish tank, and they seem a lot livelier. My plan was to feed them duckweed I'd harvested from an outside tank, but I can't tell if they ate the duckweed or it simply got sucked into one of their filters. I think I might buy a couple of bunches of elodea and let them destroy those. I just know that years from now, when all our current pets are dead, I'm still going to be carting those three goldfish around. 

I was also frustrated and saddened to read about a species of native fish that is being threatened with extinction in part because of the continued restocking of trout in Australian waterways. It just dumbfounds me that it is illegal for me to dump a goldfish into the local waterway, but thousands of trout, which seem to have a documented effect on our native fish, are released simply so people can fish for them. I mean surely there must be native alternatives, although I do recall reading a species of rainbowfish that went extinct in one location because people translocated native, but not indigenous, predatory fish.

I always believe a species that is native to our country should always take precedence over one that was introduced. Although some urban habitats are so degraded the only species that can thrive in them are ferals. I mean it's disgusting the state of some of the creeks and rivers around where I live. They are doing rehabilitation work in places, but progress seems excruciatingly slow. 

Anyway, that's enough of me on my soapbox. It's just this is really the only place I have to rant. I think if I start one more conversation about the environment with my mum she may drown me in one of my fish tanks.


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## MysticSky22301

I absolutely love all of your fish  I wish I wasn't limited on space. Those beautiful blue green Hendra would be a prize ^^


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## LittleBettaFish

Betta hendra are beautiful. When both fish colour up during courtship/spawning they are simply stunning. 

Unfortunately my male is a continued source of frustration because he never wants to pose for photos. 

At least it looks like he might have a couple of sons that may prove more photogenic when they are older.


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## MysticSky22301

^^ I would love to see that


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I put the light over my Betta hendra tank and got a few photos while they were flirting this morning. Between the male's refusal to stay stationary for more than a few seconds at a time, and the fact this tank is very densely packed with plants, taking photos of the pair is such a frustrating process. 

The male wouldn't even fall for my 'pretending like I'm going to feed you' trick. I think they are on to me. Sort of like how our older hens knew when the roosters were just pretending that they'd found something interesting just so they would get within mating range. 

First up is the female. 










The pair together. 










A slightly better photo of the male. 










Then an out of focus photo of one of their juveniles. It's starting to look like I have a _lot_ of males in this F1 group. Skewed sex ratios strike again! 










Then my F1 Betta coccina male was bossing his sisters around (not that they pay him much mind). 










Before ending with a photo of one of my Betta livida juveniles. There's been a lot of fin chomping going on amongst the youngsters, so I think I'm going to have to get into gear and set-up an empty two footer as a grow-out. 










Otherwise, it's bucketing down here. I think we are expected to get between 8-15mm of rain. We had a beautiful run of warm weather with the start of spring, and now it's back to freezing cold temperatures and ceaseless rain. Got to love Melbourne weather.


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## MysticSky22301

Wow! Beautiful ^^ I'm half debating turning part of my house into a fish room/ critter room, not that my SO would mind when we get our own home. He's as in to "exotic" creatures as I am he's planning on reptiles lol.

We might end up with Hendra at some point maybe I'll link him to this post XD


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## astrummortis

What great specimens. Thanks for sharing!


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## MysticSky22301

They come in blue o.o


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## rubertthefish

These bettas are so beautiful! I thought my betta was pretty, but these are so cool on a whole different level.


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## LittleBettaFish

Betta hendra can look blue or green depending on the lighting, and the camera settings used also seem to have an effect on their appearance. In natural sunlight every single Betta hendra I've owned, has always been more green than blue. 

Wilds are renowned for dramatic and sudden changes in colour. It's just a shame they tend not to do well in a store setting, so tend to look quite drab and colourless to the 'uninitiated'. 

Rubertthefish, I think these fish are beautiful because it's a natural beauty. They are 100% natural with nothing artificial.


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## MysticSky22301

Do people cross these guys with splendens? I swear I saw a cross breed on eBay being passed off as a normal splenden the body was long and thin


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## LittleBettaFish

I don't believe it's possible for coccina complex species to hybridise with Betta splendens. However, you _can_ hybridise Betta splendens with several closely related species that fall within the splendens complex (Betta imbellis for example). In fact, the true wild form of Betta splendens is endangered partly due to hybridisation with released ornamental forms of betta. 

While I'm posting in my journal, earlier today I took some more photos of my Betta livida juveniles. I don't know if it's the lighting or my camera, but it's next to impossible to take nice photos of this group. These were the best out of the good couple of dozen that I took.


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## LittleBettaFish

I took some photos today while I was in the fish room. 

First up are more photos of my Betta livida juveniles because I needed at least one good photo to use on my blog. 




























While the rest of the group is doing well and developing normally, the juvenile to the top of the photo below, has something wrong with its ventral fins. At first I thought they were missing completely, but on closer inspection it seems they are just abnormally small. Knowing my luck, this is probably the only female in the entire group. Its fate is a bit uncertain at this point. I know I should cull it, but at the same time I feel bad for killing a fish when the deformity has no bearing on its quality of life. Especially when the bloody thing is one of the friendliest in the group, and comes rushing over every time it sees me. 










Moving on, I took what would have been a nice photo of one of my F1 Betta sp. api api males if his head had been in focus. This is one of my favourite males, and I just wish my three pairs had produced more offspring like him. 










Next up is a photo of a rather lackluster Shiny. I don't know why he is unhappy with this tank. I think this pair have spawned twice and now the only time they interact is when Shiny is chasing the female off from food. It's a shame as I thought he would have thrived being away from the group, but he seemed happier when he was beating up, and being beaten up, by his brothers. At least there are fry in the tank, so it hasn't been a total loss. 










Finally, I took a couple photos of my Betta hendra male being his usual dominating self. 



















Apart from that, I have to do a 40 litre water change on my goldfish tank (can't wait), and then I have to feed my wilds. I'm wondering if maybe I can use airline tubing and a suction cup to make a 'corral' to keep the duckweed from getting pulled into the filters in my goldfish tank. My only concern is that when the goldfish disturb the duckweed and it sinks, it gets sucked into the filter anyway. I just want to know whether or not the goldfish are actually eating the duckweed, before I start adding it regularly to the tank.


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## LittleBettaFish

Just finished up with water changes. Everyone also got a feed as they'd missed out yesterday, and my brine shrimp won't be ready for harvesting until tomorrow afternoon. 

At this point I'm considering trying to wean all my young fish, and fish that aren't being used for breeding, onto pellets. I did have some of my young fish taking flake food, but it seemed to cause issues with bloating, and I don't want to risk permanently damaging their swim bladders. 

It's simply getting too costly to feed them all on frozen foods (I must have at least 50 fish), and the mosquitoes aren't reproducing fast enough to feed more than a couple of tanks once or twice a week. 

It's just a matter of whether or not enough fish will take pellets to make it worth purchasing them. I've found the younger fish are more open to trying new foods, and this can encourage the adults in the tank to feed as well. 

Otherwise, not much else has been happening with either me, or my fish. It's finally stopped raining, although the forecast for tomorrow has an expected rainfall of 6-20mm! Just as everything was finally starting to dry out. They did say it was going to be a wet Spring, but this is ridiculous. 

I did take a few photos of my fish while I was pottering about. Surprisingly, they were more cooperative today. Probably because they were starving. 

First up is my F1 Betta coccina male. This is the male sharing a tank with his four sisters. He actually spawned recently with the dominant female in the tank, but despite their best efforts, I think the other females got into the nest and ate the eggs. 










Next up are a couple of photos of my Betta livida juveniles. 



















An F1 B. sp. api api female. She's quite a nice fish. 










Then one of my F1 Betta sp. api api males (I think I will be using this male for future breeding projects). 










This is my largest F1 Betta uberis male. 



















I think that is one of the females on the bottom right of this photo










The above male's father. 



















We also took Clio to the park today to try and get a nice photo to send to her breeder, which turned out to be an impossible task. The camera wouldn't focus, and then mum didn't realise I'd switched it to manual focus and the one time Clio was standing nicely, all the photos turned out blurry. Then her bad ear was having a _really_ bad day, so most of the remaining shots were useless. She's also blown all her coat so is not looking her best. 










Then at dog club I put my foot in my mouth and likely came across as a total jerk to someone who came over to offer advice about Clio's barking (she was barking because my mum was running around helping double-handle some puppies in show class). Afterwards, I was too embarrassed to explain myself, because I only know a couple of people down there well enough to feel comfortable talking openly with them. 

Clio has very low food drive (even if she misses a meal before training) and non-existent toy/play drive, she doesn't care a bit about praise and will actually pull away if you try to pat her during training. For a correction to mean anything to her, and to stop a behaviour, it often has to be much stronger than what I am comfortable giving. Otherwise, she just ignores it. Add to this, her reactivity and weak nerves, and I've found her a difficult dog to work with. 

Therefore, it just makes me want to scream when I see dogs at club that I _know_ live in kennels and don't receive any obedience training, looking better trained than the dog that I have poured literal blood, sweat, and tears into. When she's switched on, Clio does a decent heel with an automatic sit, she can sit, stand, and drop using only verbal cues, do a short drop stay, stand stay, and sit stay, speak on command, weave through my legs, heel between my legs, nose target, paw target, spin in both directions, and has awesome hind-end awareness because of all the perchwork we've done. 

Yet there's always this feeling of reluctance whenever we train. The tail never wags, and there's always a hesitancy to my responses. Even when I won't reward a slow sit or slow drop. I use really high-value treats for training (such as froze green tripe), and I've tried countless times to get her revved up using a toy so that I can then channel that energy into our training, but nothing changes. Our training sessions are only about 5-15 minutes long, and any time we're working on something new or difficult, I always break it up with some games or tricks. 

All I want is a dog like our older girl. Nothing phases her. She is aloof without being aggressive or frightened (it's nice having a dog that will go and sit quietly on her bed when visitors are over), she has great prey/play and food drive, she is biddable and willing to please, and even though she enjoys getting out and about, she also settles well in the house.

I would not have thought it would have been so difficult to find another dog with a temperament like that.


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## Nismo83

recently I purchased a bag of bbs eggs from a guy in Malaysia and there is no need to use air bubbling as well.. pretty good hatch rate. less than 24 hours I can have the bbs hatched and also easy for me to harvest.. that guy nick is Betta NFS in facebook.


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## LittleBettaFish

Air isn't a big concern for me because I run all my tanks and my BBS hatchery off a single large air pump. What I need, are brine shrimp cysts that have a very high (90% +) hatch rate in water that is only 10-15 degrees celsius, and that will still hatch within 24 hours at that temperature. Because of the colder temperatures here in Melbourne, the major hassle in hatching brine shrimp is having to use a heater.

Today I tried some of my fish on crushed up NLS pellets. My Betta brownorum female gobbled them down, and everyone else in the tank at least had a go, my Betta livida pair and juveniles have been taking flake food for a while so no trouble there. However, they were less of a success in my Betta hendra and F1 Betta sp. api api tanks, and this is after two to three days of fasting. 

My difficulty is that I need a very small pellet size as my young fish often bite off more than they can swallow (or even chew), and crushing the NLS pellets up made a huge mess and so isn't very practical. So the hunt is now on. I just wish Repashy gel foods were cheaper as I've always wanted to see what my wilds think of it. 

In other fish news, my goldfish are doing great now I'm doing 50 litre water changes twice a week. The only issue I have with their tank (besides the size) is the filter media. I am running three internal power filters, but the media consists of all these off-cuts of filter sponge, and it's annoying trying to rinse the gunk off multiple squares and strips. So I think I'm going to have to lash out and buy some new filter sponge, and then slowly replace the old media so as not to disturb the cycle. You really get an appreciation for how much ammonia goldfish can produce when the cycle in their tank crashes. Especially when you are doing water changes with a bucket and siphon. 

Otherwise, I've got off my butt and been working with Clio on her reactivity again. I've started taking her for walks at 5:30am in the morning because there's only a few dogs around at this time, and depending on how she reacts to them, we will start going later and later. So far she's seen two dogs and she didn't bark at either, so that was good. However, she's still a long, long way off from where I'd feel comfortable taking her for a walk during 'peak hour' as I call it. 

Her latest 'achievement' is mastering the drop using only a verbal command. She used to do it off a verbal only command when she was younger, but then I didn't do as much work with the drop when I was teaching other commands, and she started dropping only if I had food in my hand and cued the drop with my hand. So I started heavily rewarding her while she was in the drop, which very quickly meant she was throwing herself into a drop as soon as I asked for it. The only downside is that then she starting dropping all the time, so now I only heavily reward the drop randomly, so she's not sure if she's going to get no treats, a single treat, or multiple treats. I also started heavily rewarding sit and stand, and she's almost completely stopped dropping when it's not being asked for. 

Sometimes I feel like it's one step forwards, and two steps back. 

Because I haven't spent much time in the fish room the past couple of days, I only have a few photos to share 

First up is one of my Betta brownorum juveniles successfully chasing his much bigger father off the leaf. 




























Then this is one of my F1 Betta sp. api api females flaring at the mirror. I wish I'd paired her up with a different male, but I'll have to see what their offspring turn out like.


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## MysticSky22301

Training is a pain :/ honestly i have problems with my 2 boys being scared of harnesses, but liking to run off. They are loud but would never bite, not even another dog. My most well behaved is my little poodle she doesn't even need a leash. we've taken her on busy middle of town walks and miles long hikes in the middle of nowhere she's so well behaved <3 

I still love your fish ^^


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks, I quite like my fish too.

Looks like I am going to have to replace the tubes in my two fish room lights. They must be several years old now, and should have been replaced a while back, but it's only become necessary now that two tubes have completely burnt out. I think I'm going to replace the 10,000K tubes with 6,500K tubes as I prefer how the latter looks. 

I'm just not sure if I can get T5 High Output tubes at the local hardware store, or if I'm going to have to order them online.

Otherwise, not much has been happening in the fish room. Everyone continues to do well, and my Betta uberis male Shiny, is finally settling into his new tank. He's coloured up, and has started spawning with the female again. 

I took a handful of photos just before, and was _so_ close to capturing the perfect full flare shot of my Betta hendra male. For some reason Photobucket wouldn't upload my photos, so I had to create a new account and thankfully that worked. 

This is my massively overcrowded Betta livida tank. The larger fish are the breeding pair. I really need to get the juveniles out of this tank and into the 2ft grow-out. I've just been putting it off as it's such a hassle moving so many fish. 










Then we have one of the occupants up close. 










Followed by two photos of my Betta hendra male. 



















Walking Clio at 5:30am most mornings is killing me (especially when it's only single digits), but it's been worth it. We've seen people, cyclists, garbage trucks emptying rubbish bins, someone throwing newspapers out of their car window, and apart from a slight reaction to a dog that was going nuts at us behind a fence and that she couldn't see, she's hasn't barked at any dogs we've seen thus far.


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## LittleBettaFish

I took a few photos while I was feeding everyone tonight. 

Starting off with a couple of my Betta uberis males. 




























Next is one of my Betta livida juveniles. He was eyeing off the frozen mosquito larvae, before making a quick exit with a piece. 



















Then this is my F1 Betta sp. api api tank. You can actually see the male lurking in the film canister (I think he has a nest in there). 










Finally, I got a couple of photos of my Betta hendra pair sharing a meal (at one point there was some tug-of-war over a frozen bloodworm). 



















Not much has been happening on the fish front. I thought my wild-caught Betta coccina male was sick or dead as he had been missing for a few days, but turns out he was guarding a nest of eggs. I also had been missing one of my F1 Betta miniopinna. There's only two fish in the tank (a definite female and a smaller fish that I haven't been able to sex), and the female can be quite aggressive. I thought she might have killed the smaller fish, but tonight it turned up to have a good feeding of frozen bloodworms. 

Speaking of bloodworms, conditions in my outside tubs must be to their liking, as I swear I've got more bloodworms than mosquito larvae at the moment. Unfortunately, both tubs are completely overrun with pest snails and what appear to be small leeches or planaria, so I want to set-up a third tub, and eventually empty the other two after pulling as many mosquito larvae and bloodworms as possible from them. 

I just wish the weather would warm up, and it would stop raining. I hate cold, gloomy weather.


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## MysticSky22301

How do you raise blood worms and mosquito larvae in the house? I've tried the blood worms all die and the mosquitos drive me insane later


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## LittleBettaFish

I don't raise them in the house. I have a couple of large tubs out in the backyard and I get the mosquito larvae and bloodworms from those.


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## LittleBettaFish

Had a bit of a fiasco this morning, when we took Clio and Ares to the reserve for a run. I had _just_ let Clio loose in one of the fenced soccer fields, when I see this bully breed dog coming down the hill towards us. I called out to mum who was at the gate with Ares, as I did not like how this dog was approaching (it looked almost like it was stalking us). Meanwhile Clio goes absolutely ballistic. She's lunging and barking at this dog who by now has reached the fence. I had managed to grab her collar, but when she's that over threshold, there's nothing that will stop her barking. 

It was very fortunate that the bully dog wasn't aggressive, as it took the owner forever to reach us, and of course he has a French Bulldog with him that immediately darts under the fence and runs over to where me and Clio are standing. As Clio isn't actually aggressive with other dogs, and *loves* playing with Frenchies (there's a couple down at club), she immediately starts trying to play with it. 

Except the French Bulldog isn't interested in playing with her. Instead it grabs one of the balls, and runs off to the other side of the soccer field, where it remained until my mum managed to catch it. 

I just hope this won't make Clio's reactivity worse. I've been working so hard with her the past couple of weeks, and it's so disheartening when you feel like all your hard work really hasn't achieved much. I was just celebrating the fact that she only barked twice at a dog we passed in very close quarters on a recent walk, and then we go back to being completely out of control again. 

Anyway, here's a photo of the monster out in the backyard this afternoon, 'helping' with the removal of a fallen branch. 










In other news, not much been happening in the fish room. I'd been busy the past few days and had fallen behind in the fish room, so everyone got a much needed feed yesterday. Otherwise, I've been trying and failing to take photos of some of my fish to use in my blog. I really need some photos of a Betta sp. api api male, but all the photos I've taken thus far are either out of focus, or the fish is pulling some demented looking pose.

The weather has been absolutely dismal here, which is having a real effect on the number of mosquito larvae in my tubs. Today was clear, but it sounds like there's more rain and showers forecast for next week. This is why I don't try and raise tropical fish outside in Melbourne. The weather is all over the place. Even in summer, the temperature can suddenly plummet overnight.

However, I did take some photos of my wilds, although the photo of my Betta hendra male is the only one I actually like.


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## MysticSky22301

I have small dogs, when we lived closer to Illinois the rental properties were constantly changing residents. A couple moved in behind us and has this grey brown Akita mix that came up to my waist x.x he wasn't exactly friendly and got loose one day while I had my dogs out to go to the bathroom.. my dogs bark but never bite even another dog. They were barking at him and he started growling instinctively I grabbed this huge dog by the collar and twist lifting his front paws off the ground so he can't grab one of my tiny pups. I didn't hurt him but I was the only person aside from his owners he never charged at! About this time his owners pulled around corner with a 6 month pregnant me hauling a dog that weighs as much as I do towards their car -_- the next day he charges my dad who calls the landlord then the cops. Needless to say the owner got a dose of reality because by law we could have shot the dog to protect ourselves and the cop said if it kept being aggressive he would come take care of it himself. The dog ended up in a concrete floor kennel with a full cover on a chain.

Having a strange dog run at you is totally terrifying!


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## LittleBettaFish

I was more surprised that the owner didn't seem at all concerned that his dogs were running towards two German Shepherds, one of which is hugely oversized, and one that was hackled up and barking. If that was me, I would have broken the world record for sprinting getting over there. 

It was like the time a whippet came up behind our other reactive dog Nike while my dad was biking her (it was barking and lunging at her), and my dad in his wisdom decided to let Nike go so that she could 'defend herself'. Nike's 62cms tall at the shoulder, and a good 70 pounds, so you can imagine how enormous she was in comparison to a whippet. 

She was chasing this dog for what felt like forever. Fortunately, Nike is not particularly fast, but she was dragging a lead through thick scrub, so all I could see was her breaking her neck if it got snagged, or the whippet breaking a leg. 

Meanwhile the owner is sauntering along the path making no attempt to even call their dog or even looking like they were concerned by the fact that their dog was being chased by a loose German Shepherd! It wasn't until Nike stopped to look at a woman walking past that we both managed to catch our dogs and I think by that time Nike had forgotten why she was chasing the dog in the first place and went over to it with her tail wagging looking like she'd made a new friend. 

It's definitely terrifying having a loose dog approach you, especially if they look like they aren't that friendly. 

I'm meek as a mouse in real life, and used to not say anything. However, after some close encounters I now yell at owners who have their dogs loose where they shouldn't. I mean I should be able to walk my dog down the street without being accosted by multiple loose dogs.


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## MysticSky22301

I completely agree, we would have had a fence if our landlord would have allowed it.. ugh! It would have saved SO MUCH headache. My two boys are actually scared of a leash they cower and refuse to walk so a long fenced in run just works better, I've debated putting collar's on them and just letting them suffer until they get used to it. But then they mope for days and won't play and barely move and I feel horrible 

Any ideas on how to fix that?


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## LittleBettaFish

Are they scared of the lead or the collar? If it's the lead they have problems with, I'd probably let them drag the leads around for short (and supervised) daily sessions. Giving them something like a bone or puzzle toy during these sessions will make having the lead on, a positive experience, and has the added benefit of stopping them focusing on the lead. 

Otherwise, I imagine you'd have to slowly desensitize them to the collar and then the lead by breaking everything down into smaller steps. Such as first showing the dog the lead or collar and then simply rewarding any interest the dog shows in both. Then you'd just keep building on these sessions, until the dog is 100% comfortable with having the collar on and the lead attached. 

With that said, I will add the disclaimer that I'm only new to training dogs myself, and perhaps there is a better way of approaching this issue. 

I haven't posted in my journal recently, because there really hasn't been much to talk about. On the fish side of things, I've had continued issues with aggression from my F2 Betta coccina, and my F1 Betta brownorum. I have found several dead Betta coccina juveniles, and watching them interact with each other, they are definitely much more aggressive than any of the Betta coccina I've raised previously. I'm wondering if this is also because it seems like there are more males in this group than there were in my previous two groups. 

Meanwhile, in my Betta brownorum tank, there's one bugger of a juvenile that attacks not only his siblings, but also his parents. He's less than an inch in size, but he somehow has everyone cowed. His nickname is 'Terror', and he's going to find himself in isolation soon if he doesn't stop causing trouble. 



















One positive is that at least he has the trademark lateral blotch! I thought for certain that I was going to get another group of solid red fish, but it looks like there are at least one or two others in the group that also have spots forming. I just wish I knew what I had to do to increase the percentage of fish displaying this trait. 

I also took some photos of my Betta uberis tank. 

First up is my biggest F1 male. 










His father, who looks to have sustained some injuries from battle. 










That's him again chasing one of his sons off. 










The big F1 male again. 










Then this is one of three females that my wild-caught pair produced. The females are absolutely dwarfed by the males because they aren't as aggressive when it comes to food. But the 'stunting' doesn't seem to be permanent, as once I removed their sister from the group, she quickly grew to full adult size. 



















Finally, these are my remaining Betta persephone. Unfortunately, none of these Betta persephone display the beautiful green irridescence down their flanks that my original group did. I have three definite males, and the one fish I can't yet sex is the one with the vertical barring. I am hoping it is female, but it's likely male. The young male in the back of the photo used to vertically bar up and behave similarly to a female with the older males, but over time it became clear that he was indeed male. 

It's just a shame, as it seems like I finally fully cured these fish of velvet, but at the expense of my last females. There are still wilds coming into Australia in spite of the tougher import laws, but I'm not sure if Betta persephone will be a species that makes a return to this country. 










Apart from that, my outside tubs are finally producing a steady supply of mosquito larvae. I had the tubs in a different spot in the yard, and the water became quite foul smelling. The bloodworms must like those sorts of conditions, as for a while, this was all I was pulling out of the tub. Now the tubs are back to where they were originally, and we've had some very heavy rainfall, the bloodworms have gone into decline, and the mosquito larvae are thriving once more. 

I also have decided that I want to try my hand at Melanotaenia pygmaea, or as it's more commonly known, the Pygmy Rainbowfish. Apparently it should do well in my softer water (although I will used crushed coral to prevent the pH from dropping too low), and I just really like the colours I've seen in videos and photos. 

At the moment I don't have the funds, and the supplier I normally purchase from, is out of stock. However, by the end of the year I hope to have a group of these beauties swimming around one of my tanks.


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## LittleBettaFish

Not much been happening on the fish front. I did receive my brine shrimp eggs this morning, and got my hatchery bubbling away ASAP. Along with the eggs, I also received a packet of IAL, as well as Fluval branded pellets for my goldfish. The only negative to this food, is that the pellets are just too small, and I can see myself going through the 150g container quite quickly. 

I spent some time in the fish room this afternoon, feeding fish, adding IAL to some of the tanks, picking out algae, and replacing cling wrap. Today I decided that I need a better system for water changes. I want to start doing 25% water changes on all my tanks once a week, and for that, I am going to need a much bigger tub to age my water in. I'm thinking something that's 100L + . This will be a drastic change to my usual lax schedule of water changes, but I've had some issues with shorter seeming bodies on my young fish and I'm wondering if the lack of water changes are to blame. I'm also wondering if it will help keep the algae under control. 

Either that or I'm going to send everyone into shock and start a velvet epidemic going again. 

I took a few photos today, but not many as everyone was too full to move. 

First up is my original Betta uberis male. 










Followed by one of his daughters. I have noticed these two females are becoming more assertive, and have even been chasing the males off during feeding time. 










I wish this photo was in focus, but I think it nicely captured the attitude of my Betta hendra male. You can see all the young fish in the background. 










This is the tank that's causing me grief at the moment. It's my F1/F2 Betta coccina tank. The breeding female has been left almost completely blind (I suspect the male), and the juveniles just ceaselessly squabble amongst themselves. In spite of all the hiding places, they all seem to want to congregate at the front of the tank. It got to the point where I thought they were sick with something, as everyone was going around with clamped fins and stress stripes. Below is one of the larger juveniles. This is a young male, and a particularly bad tempered one at that! 



















Other than that, not much else to share. I've got to get some better photos of my fish, but I need to get the replacement tubes for my lights first.


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## Nismo83

I like the Hendra... shame that I still can't get a pair.. and I had reduced most of my wilds now since the macrostoma are breeding again


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## wildborneo

what brand of BBS do you use? do u use bleach to soak the eggs for 10 min. I understand that will give a better hatching rate


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## MysticSky22301

I can try that, they both seem to dislike the harnesses, my shi tsu mix simply won't move he freezes like he shuts down . The poodle mix is fine once we are walking around but getting the harness on him is difficult 

I still love your fish <3


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## LittleBettaFish

While Betta hendra are one of my favourite species, this pair and their offspring, are likely going to be sold. There is something I don't like about the male's topline and he seems to have passed it onto his offspring. It's sort of straight, instead of gently rounded. 

I'm going to have to start reducing numbers of wilds soon. I must have at least 100 young fish growing out in my fish room at the moment, and I don't have the space for anything more than a couple extra tanks. 

Great news that your mas are breeding. It seems like people either meet with great success or complete failure when working with this species. I'm just glad my coccina complex wilds aren't such finicky breeders. 

WildBorneo, I am currently using 'Ocean Nutrition Micro Artemia Cysts'. I don't soak the cysts in bleach, and this brand seems to have a very high hatch rate regardless. 

As I said in the previous post, I've never dealt with dogs that hate being collared/harnessed. Our challenge is more in getting our dogs to remain calm when they see their collars come out. I do think trying to create some sort of positive association with the harness is going to be key. 

Speaking of dogs, for the first time ever, Clio had a dog go by on the street this morning, and the only reaction was some hackling. The dog itself had hackled up and the owner had to keep pulling it back towards him, so I was happy that Clio still managed to remain (fairly) calm. I had put her behind a parked car and just let the owner know she might bark (at this point run out of treats so I didn't have anything on hand to distract her with), but she did really well and just watched as they went by. 

We also met a five month old black Labrador earlier on in the week. We were on opposite sides of the road and I warned the owner she might bark because she gets frightened, and while Clio did a couple of barks and had hackled up, she started to calm down (the lady had remained standing there with her dog), and when the dog and its owner turned to leave, she gave the little whiny bark that means she wants to play. 

Considering that this was a dog who would go over threshold and bark hysterically at a dog over 100 metres away, I think this is a vast improvement. 

I've been taking her at 6am instead of 5:30am as there are more people and dogs around, and I wanted to see how she would handle it. Her change in confidence and attitude has been astonishing since I first started taking her three or four weeks ago. She's started to investigate objects that give her a startle without any prompting, and she just seems much more relaxed. 

I wish I'd persevered with this a lot earlier, but I just couldn't deal with another reactive dog after Nike.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> While Betta hendra are one of my favourite species, this pair and their offspring, are likely going to be sold. There is something I don't like about the male's topline and he seems to have passed it onto his offspring. It's sort of straight, instead of gently rounded.
> 
> I'm going to have to start reducing numbers of wilds soon. I must have at least 100 young fish growing out in my fish room at the moment, and I don't have the space for anything more than a couple extra tanks.
> 
> Great news that your mas are breeding. It seems like people either meet with great success or complete failure when working with this species. I'm just glad my coccina complex wilds aren't such finicky breeders.
> 
> WildBorneo, I am currently using 'Ocean Nutrition Micro Artemia Cysts'. I don't soak the cysts in bleach, and this brand seems to have a very high hatch rate regardless.



my other wilds are a failure.. probably I didn't give them enough care like the mac. 


I am currently using a bbs supplied from PRC and doesn't require air pump to hatch.. they are good and hatch within a day depending on temperature.. you can fb the seller named betta nfs to see the video. I got from him and I will probably be getting direct from the supplier in china.


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## wildborneo

Currently I have 9 sp of coccina complex group in my fish room. certain sp just do not spawn although the tank set up are very similar. I use sera super peat substrates, IAL, Java moss, Fishes fed almost solely on live food of BBS and gridal worms, I have a hendra pairs that has spawn 4 weeks in a row but no luck so far with Livida, api api, Uberis and my home town wild caught brownorum. I have caught the Brownorum myself, and is my favorite of this complex, but I have little success in breed them. I know sexting them is difficult, so i have them keep in pairs and community tank. I have seen 2 fries in the community tank thats all! I have also try to lower the water, do water change etc. I guess its still finding the right pairs


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## LittleBettaFish

I've been a bit slack with my wilds. I've got to invest in a larger tub to age my water so that I can start doing weekly 25% water changes as I have so many young fish growing out and I want them to stay healthy. 

Knowing Australia, it's probably illegal to import brine shrimp cysts into the country unless you have some kind of permit. I don't even know if it's legal to import pellet and flake foods into Australia without some kind of permission or permit. 

It does amuse me that goldfish are still allowed to be imported despite the fact that many end up in our waterways.

WildBorneo, I'm wondering if it is the diet of your fish that is part of the problem. BBS is not much of a meal for adult fish, and I personally found a grindal heavy diet caused my previous wilds to become obese. I would suggest foods such as live mosquito larvae, live blackworms, live or frozen bloodworms, live or frozen (enriched with spirulina and/or garlic) brine shrimp, live daphnia etc. for your breeding pairs. This is what I feed my wilds, and apart from a couple of pairs that ate their eggs and were quickly sold on, I have had no issues breeding any of the species from this complex. 

Not much has been happening in the fish room. I took a good two dozen photos tonight and all but a handful turned out horribly. I really need to buy some replacement tubes for my fish room lights, and the camera seems to be having more difficulty in focusing properly of late. I try not to fiddle with it too much, after it randomly decided to stop taking photos altogether not that long ago. 

First up is my Betta brownorum male. He's finally come out of hiding, coloured up, and put his unruly offspring in their place. Although he does have a dent on his head where I think someone's had a go at him. 










Followed by aforementioned 'unruly offspring'. 










This one is 'Terror', my future breeding male provided he has a sister to pair up with. 










Then this is one of my F1 Betta uberis males. He was looking absolutely splendid in full flare, but of course I failed to capture a single in focus shot of him. 



















Before wrapping things up with a photo of my Betta hendra male.


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## wildborneo

will give your food suggestion a try, friends have been saying my fishes are fat . For the tropics, there is always a major spawning period at the end of the year as the weather is cooler due to the monsoon rain so we must take this opportunity to have as many fries as possible to grow out in the next year.


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## wildborneo

how often do you feed your fish?


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## LittleBettaFish

If you go back to the start of my journal, you will see what fat fish look like.

I fed my earlier wilds a very fatty diet, and it showed. However, even if you feed sparingly, I find captive kept fish are always going to carry more condition than wild-caught individuals. I will say that a 'worm' heavy diet (namely blackworms, white worms and grindal worms) will put more weight on a fish, than a diet consisting predominately of mosquito larvae, daphnia, brine shrimp, and similar foods. Apart from bloodworms (both live and frozen), my wilds nowadays receive live blackworms and white worms as a very occasional treat.

As to how often I feed my fish. It varies. Some weeks they may get fed almost daily, and other weeks they may go one or two days between feedings.

News from the fish room is that there really is no news. We did have a power out two nights ago because of strong winds. I covered all my tanks up with thick blankets as the overnight temperature was expected to dip to 10 degrees Celsius, but fortunately, it came back on within a couple of hours.

As Photobucket has been down for several days, I hadn't bothered to take any new photos. However, I do have a few of my Betta livida group to share.














































Otherwise, we spent last weekend at a dog show with Clio. As there were multiple shows running that weekend, there would have had to have been at least a couple of dozen breeds present. Clio behaved herself perfectly. She reacted once the entire weekend, and it was a single bark versus the hackled up lunging and hysterical barking that she used to do. I could not have been prouder, especially considering there were a number of German Shepherds present trying to attack every single dog that went by. I feel that sort of behaviour does such a disservice to the breed, and it just reflects badly on the club.

Meanwhile everyone keeps telling my mum to get Clio back in the show ring. However, if Clio beats dogs with her faulty ear, we get comments made behind our backs, and if she gets penalised for her ear, she's likely going to end up behind dogs that she would have placed above had the ear not been an issue. Personally, I don't care that she isn't showing because I detest conformation showing. 

Training wise, Clio has become a totally different dog. She's finally started to do a head-up 'prancing' style heel, and she seems to be having a blast when we train now. Her new favourite game is me sending her out and around a cone, and then having to come running back to me for a reward. She also really enjoys chasing her ball at the park now, which is a vast improvement considering at one point she wouldn't even chase the ball, let alone bring it back for more. 

At the moment we are working on recalls (a constant, uphill battle), heeling backwards, and turns/pivots while heeling (she gets very focused on going straight while heeling). 

After a particularly great training session yesterday, I came to the realisation that although Clio may not have been the dog I would have chosen breed or temperament wise, she's certainly become my 'heart dog', and I couldn't imagine life without my cheeky girl.

We've got club in another couple of hours, so we'll have to see how Clio behaves herself there. Knowing Clio, she's probably lulling me into a false sense of security!


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## wildborneo

my Uberis and brownorum have spawned and the fries are free swimming today. Livida male is guarding a nest! how soon will the fries start taking micro worms? and for how long before i need to change their diet to BBS?


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## LittleBettaFish

Congratulations on your successful spawns. They should be able to take microworms fairly shortly after becoming free-swimming. I always switch to BBS as soon as the fry are large enough to take it as it is more nutritious food than microworms. However, I will continue to feed microworms if there are still fry too young or too small to take BBS (as I leave my adult fish in the tank I end up with spawns of different ages).


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## LittleBettaFish

Well it's been a while since I've posted anything, mostly because it seems like the forum isn't as active as it used to be. 

Anyway, I now have a new permanent fish room in what used to be the smallest spare bedroom. Because of the size of the room, I had to downsize from a 1.5 to a 1.2m long rack. However, I could probably squeeze in a third rack if it became absolutely necessary to do so. It took about four hours to move 14 tanks just a few metres. I certainly wasn't breaking any tanks down completely, as it's simply too stressful for my wilds, so I had to partially drain, move, and refill tanks individually. 

However, apart from nearly killing my wild-caught Betta coccina female with the siphon (I'm definitely putting some sort of netting over the siphons in the future), the move went ahead without too many hiccups. 

One thing I hated about my old fish room, was having power cords and airline tubing trailing everywhere, so this time I tried to make everything as neat as possible (eventually I would like to use PVC piping and run the tubing from that). I also put labels on the power boards, so I know what heater belongs to what tank as there's nothing more fun than playing the 'guess what tank's heater you've unplugged' game. 

The only thing that's missing now, are the lights. Based on the fact I'm only growing low light plants, I think at this point I'm just going to use shop lights rather than spend money on aquarium specific lighting.

It's only a small scale set-up, but I'm pretty chuffed with how it looks. At the moment there are a couple of Ikea chairs in there, but eventually we will probably get some sort of bench seat, so that I can watch my fish in style. 



















Otherwise, my fish seem to be doing well following the move. I've only got concerns about my Betta hendra as they were a little clamped up and skittish before I reconnected the air pump. However, I checked on them earlier this morning, and they'd definitely made an improvement in terms of colour and behaviour. 

It also turns out that my two Betta miniopinna are a breeding pair. Even though the male is only about an inch total length it hasn't stopped them from successfully spawning several times. Disappointingly though, the male is an egg eater like his father. Normally, this pair would be gone from my fish room as I only want breeders that show strong paternal/maternal instincts. However, I have grown fond of these two, and I will likely try and artificially hatch their eggs simply because I don't want to lose this species from my fish room, and I won't be buying any further wilds. However, if any of their future offspring show the same egg eating tendencies I will likely let this particular line die out, as I personally don't want to be producing fish from this complex that can't rear their own young without human intervention. 

There's also some promising young Betta sp. api api males in my F2 group, and my F1 Betta brownorum juveniles are maturing nicely. I have what appears to be a large number of F2 Betta uberis fry growing out, and there are also some fry in my F1 Betta coccina tank where I have the single male with the four females. 

With so many young fish now close to sexual maturity, I am likely going to be moving a large number of older fish on before the end of the year. 

I'm going to be in my fish room later today, so hopefully I will have some further photos of my fish and tanks to share then.


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## wildborneo

Nice set up! whenever i tell myself " that's it, no more tank" there will be some project that come along  the natural light will save u heaps on electricity


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks, and it doesn't help when you have empty tanks laying around just asking to be filled with fish! If I put in another rack I could probably fit another two or three tanks in. But being that I do water changes manually, I don't want to have too many tanks to look after. Plus these racks aren't super strong, so I don't want to overload them. 

I think natural sunlight also brings out the best colour in the fish. It just seems that whenever the sunlight hits their tanks, and the fish are putting on a show, they disappear as soon as the camera comes out. 

I just cannot find an appropriate container to store my water in. After reading of reports of hobbyists losing fish from leeching chemicals, I'm wary about using anything but a food safe plastic tub. Unfortunately, I haven't found anything over 50 litres. I would use one of my spare tanks but I need something light enough that I can carry it outside to disinfect it in between water changes. Although now I'm wondering if maybe I find an acrylic fish tank and use that. Can anyone tell me how heavy acrylic tanks are compared to glass? 

I also took this photo of my Betta hendra male just now, having a flare at the female. 










I've also been trying to take at least one in focus shot of my Betta miniopinna male to post on my blog. Unfortunately, neither fish would comply with my demands, but here are a couple of photos to show just how small they are.


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## MysticSky22301

I use 6 kitty litter bucket's that hold 5gallons each ^^ they are perfect safe I've used them for years. Tidy cats brand to be exact, just use really hot/ boiling water to wash away the litter dust and disinfect them if you have a disease outbreak. I fill mine every time I empty them and I usually have enough to do half the tanks


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I solved the problem by picking up two tubs that are the same brand as I was using, just in a larger size. The store was closing down, so I got them for close to half price. Unfortunately, they weren't sold with lids this time, so one of the tubs is sans lid for now. 

Things have been going 'swimmingly' in the fish room. Most of my breeding pairs are regularly spawning, my young fish are growing well, and I'm starting to get the algae back under control with more frequent maintenance. About the only downside to my new fish room is that I desperately need to install that third rack to give me space for further grow-out tanks. I am also still waiting on lighting, but as this room receives ample natural sunlight, the plants are thriving regardless. 

Today I put some fish up for sale. My F1 Betta coccina group, a sibling pair of Betta uberis, my pair of Betta livida, and three pairs of F1 Betta sp. api api. I am still debating whether or not to put my Betta hendra pair up for sale. If there is a particularly nice sibling pair in the F1 group I might, but then I think I will miss watching the male put on a show. Here's hoping I can sell the lot, preferably before the end of the year. 

At this point in time, I still cannot tell if one or both of my Betta miniopinna are eating the fry. I don't think it's the male as he's surprisingly been very diligent in caring for the most recent spawns. I would guess it's the female if it's anyone, or else the fry _are _reaching the free-swimming stage and I just haven't been able to locate them. As it's only a 4 gallon tank, if there are fry in there, it won't be long before they are large enough to easily see. 

Other than that, my F0 Betta uberis male has been deposed by one of his sons. Unfortunately, this has unsettled everything, and nobody is looking very happy. There really are too many males for that size tank, and it was only that my dominant male kept everything in check that I got away with it So I'm going to move the group into a 40 litre tank, and possibly separate the bullying male out. 

I took some photos today, but there were only a few worth posting. 

This is the Betta uberis male causing all the trouble. He's a beautiful fish (and I wish this photo had been in focus) but he's terribly aggressive. 










I think this is a different male (judging by the fin damage) with one of the females up front. 










My Betta coccina matriarch. Her sons and daughters are almost fully grown now, but she still makes them toe the line. 










One of the males from the F1 group. I love his fins. 










Could be the same male in this photo, with what I think is one of his sisters. 










One of my F1 Betta brownorum. 










F1 Betta sp. api api female. She's almost a dead ringer for my original Betta sp. api api female. It's strange that this pairing threw several females with these shorter ventrals, as pair had long ventral fins themselves.


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## LittleBettaFish

Been a while since I last posted updates, but everyone's doing well. 

In another week or two, I will be setting up another rack, which will allow me to move my Betta livida group into a larger tank, as well as separate out my F1 Betta brownorum, and F1 Betta hendra. Unfortunately, I haven't sold a single fish that I've put up for sale. I thought I had a sale, but the buyer seems to have dropped off the face of the earth. Disappointing, but I did only advertise them on an almost defunct FB group, so after the New Year, I will be advertising them elsewhere. Perhaps my prices are too steep, but these are rare fish that are expensive to import and difficult to find, so I don't think it's fair to expect me to give them away. It's not like they produce hundreds of fry each spawning, and not like it only takes them three months to reach sexual maturity. 

I went to the fish store yesterday and picked up a 3L bag of ADA Malaya, and two hollowed out logs to go in the new tanks I will be setting up. I was looking to buy a packet of IALs, but I can't seem to find these in many fish stores around here. I've also been dying to try Repashy Grub Pie for ages now, but whenever I go to buy it online, it's always out of stock. 

My fish seem to be appreciating the more regular water changes. It's time-consuming having to disinfect all that equipment so frequently, but for me, it's better to be safe than sorry. I'm still battling algae in a lot of the tanks, but that's always been, and always will be, an issue for me based on how my tanks are set-up. The plan is to eventually thin out the mayaca fluviatilis in each tank, and slowly replace it with watersprite. The mayaca fluviatilis seems to be an algae magnet, and the thick mat it forms over the surface makes water changes difficult. 

Otherwise, I don't have much more news to share. Still no fry sighted in the Betta miniopinna tank, although one of my Betta persephone males did briefly spark some excitement when he started blowing bubblenests. However, every nest I've seen has been empty, and I think it's just the result of some sort of dominance play between the younger males and the older males. It would have been nice if that smaller fish had been female, but sadly, I think it's male as well. 

I did take a few photos to finish up my post with. I dug the tripod out of the wardrobe, but I have to ask mum how it actually works as it doesn't come with instructions and has a lot of parts that look like they break easily. However, hopefully, this will allow me to take better photos of my fish as I don't have to worry about holding the camera. 

First up is my Betta hendra male. He narrowly avoided being put up for sale because I love his personality. 




























This is a terrible photo of one of his offspring (not exactly sure on gender as with this species young males can closely resemble females). A few of his offspring are close to sexual maturity, and I have at least one sibling pair in the group. 










This is one of my F2 Betta coccina males. This group has a very skewed sex ratio, with the pair producing almost all males. 










Finally, this is the older brother of the male above. Out of the youngsters, this is the dominant male in the tank (I think his father mostly just humors him, as there is quite the size difference between them). The fish in the bottom left, is his partially blind mother. I don't know how much she can see, but she somehow manages to know when the male is flirting with her, and she also appears wherever there is food, although I do have to target feed her as she can't seem to see the food itself.


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## wildborneo

How many months before u would call Coccina F1 sexually matured?


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## MysticSky22301

I'd LOVE a pair, I'm just in the US :/ 

I was going to suggest rainbow mealworms site for rhapsody products but I'm not sure they can ship outside of the American continents, I could ask ^^ I love this company

I'm looking into my first real tank rack ^^ I'm excited

I'm still completely in love with the Hendra and would be ecstatic to get ahold of some after my move


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## LittleBettaFish

I can't give an exact figure as my young fish seem to develop more slowly than fish from other breeders (probably because they get fed less often). However, I find that even at a small size, the difference in fin size/shape as well as colouring between male and females (particularly if your males have the green lateral blotch like mine) makes sexing this species fairly easy.

Oops just realised there was a post in between. 

Unfortunately, Australia's quarantine regulations are really strict. I imagine that trying to ship Repashy in from overseas would be either impossible, or impossibly expensive. I think we only have one main importer for this product in Australia and they supply stores, and it seems to sell out very quickly. 

Racks make everything so much easier. It was a nightmare before I purchased my first rack. There were tanks everywhere and doing water changes took forever. I just wish my fish room was larger so I could fit a fourth rack in. I do think I'm going to have to ask my electrician brother a favour and get him to install another power point, as even with power boards, I am running out of places to plug things into.


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## MysticSky22301

^^ I talked to the founder of inglorious Bettas and she sent me a link for a shelving unit that holds 1000 lbs per shelf! I want it XD She's got five 10g tanks on one shelf o.o


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## LittleBettaFish

Sounds like my first rack. That was similar to the shelving they use in warehouses, and I think it could hold something like 750kg per shelf. I could actually climb up onto it without fear of it breaking. 

The racks I'm using now aren't as strong, but they look better, and as don't have any tanks over 15 gallons on them, there's no issues with bowing. 

I also took a few quick photos before the battery in my camera died. I've discovered that this Ikea under cupboard lighting strip works really well as lighting for my fish photos. I also think the tripod is missing the piece you mount the camera on. It would help if it had instructions but these are also missing. At least mum can't blame me for that as I've never used it before! 

First up is an F1 Betta coccina female. I'm not sure if there are still fry in this tank, but I've been feeding BBS regularly just in case. 



















I think this is her sister. It's difficult to tell as the two dominant females in the tank look very similar. Oddly they have taken on a much more masculine appearance than the two lower ranking females. 










Then we have my Betta brownorum male. Trying to get him to unclamp his fins for photos is a challenge. I was hoping for more action shots of him and his female, but the young fish kept interfering. I also don't know who was responsible for his missing ventral. 



















Next is one of my Betta sp. api api females staring down her sister. 










Meanwhile it's bucketing down here. I'm talking flash flooding rain. We're sprung several leaks, and I'm really hoping my mosquito larvae tub hasn't overflowed. We live near an ambulance station and I swear I've heard at least three of them go by. 

I feel like I live in the tropics at the moment. We've had several days of really hot, humid weather, and then this enormous storm.


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## MysticSky22301

I have a design for large mosquito larvae bins ^^ two 50g drums cut length wise on racks so I can freeze the extra

Love the new pictures


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## LittleBettaFish

If they are going into your fish room, I hope they have lids on them! I always forget to put lids on my mosquito larvae containers when I bring them inside and next thing mum wants to know why there is a plague of mosquitoes buzzing around. Must be that broken fly wire screen....

Got drenched going outside, but my mosquito larvae tub had almost overflowed and I can't afford to lose them.


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## MysticSky22301

These would stay outside lol and yeah no mosquito plague please! I have awesome plans and I'm finally on track to accomplish them

By the way, have you asked about pre-ordering the rhapsody? Or contacting the company it's self? By reading the ingredients it might not be too hard to make your own version if nothing else works. I made Betta bites the same way you would snello and most of love it, so do my corys and guppies. I'm thinking about ordering dried fly larvae, mosquito larvae and silk worms and really spoiling my fish


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## LittleBettaFish

If I'm honest, I'm too lazy to try and make it from scratch. Especially as I don't think mum would appreciate insects being crushed up in her blender. Also, I once went to the effort of making gel food for my goldfish and they wouldn't touch it. 

On the topic of goldfish, one of my longer finned shubunkin has something wrong with its caudal fin. The end of caudal has some tearing, there's some streaks of blood, and what look like small blisters forming. After throwing my old ammonia test kit in the bin this morning, I'm ordering new ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate test kits tonight. This is so I can rule out water quality as a potential cause, especially with my soft tap water, which can be a nightmare with a cycled tank. 

I suppose the only other cause is injury, either from the two other shubunkin, or something in the tank. However, the three have been together for four or five years now, and I haven't noticed any issues. The tank is also bare bottom and completely empty save for the internal filters. The caudal of this fish does rub against the glass when it's on the bottom of the tank, but I'm not sure if this is enough to cause such extensive irritation. 

I just hope it's something that can be easily remedied, as I would hate to lose this fish after so many years (must be at least five or six now). 

I spent the morning in the fish room just watching my fish go about their business. My most surprising discovery today, was a bubblenest in my F1 Betta sp. api api tank. As there are so many males in this tank I don't know which male was responsible, and there are no eggs in it, but I thought it odd that after all this time someone would decide to start nesting. The thick mat of Mayaca fluviatilis provides the perfect material to build a nest in. 










Then I dropped by my Betta brownorum tank. 

This photo shows the size difference between the male and one of his larger offspring. Disappointingly only a small percentage of this group are developing the green lateral spot. I'm still baffled as to whether this trait is controlled by genetics or environment. 










I did think perhaps this juvenile was female, but for the life of me, I cannot correctly sex this species.










Then we had a photobomber 










This is my F1 Betta coccina male. He and his four sisters are up for sale and I did think they'd sold, but the buyer stopped contact with me. 










He and the dominant female have a complicated relationship. 










He used to have a really green sheen to his sides, but either it's faded as he's aged, or it doesn't show up in photos because of the flash. 










Almost forgot this photo of two sisters having a stoush


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## MysticSky22301

Do a water change on the goldfish, are his fin edge's white-ish? I delt with similar symptoms in my last house, the chloramine was so high fresh treated water had OFF THE CHARTS ammonia. My goldfish suffered the most because the cycle had crashed during the move. Red steaks, looking like the start of fin rot at the edges, tears. It's what I'm going to call "ammonia burn" for lack of a better term. But they were also lethargic and almost gasping for air. In the end it forced me to move again within 6 months, saving some of my favorite friends, including Goldy who I've had now for 7 years, through 3 moves.

I still wish you could ship to the US  

You started my interest in wild bettas and I keep thinking it would be fitting to get my first ones from you^^


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## LittleBettaFish

The only thing that makes me doubt water quality is the issue, is that I change out 40-50 litres twice weekly, and the pH was sitting above 7.0 when I tested it today (I only have issues when the pH crashes but it hasn't done that in a long time as it's kept buffered with crushed coral). Also, all three fish are behaving perfectly normally. I can tell straight away from their behaviour when the water quality is off. 

Melbourne tap water is some of the highest quality in the world, and I don't think it has very high levels of chlorine (I don't believe chloramine is even used in some catchments). I also use Prime whenever I do water changes, so it should detoxify any resulting ammonia. 

I did a 30 litre change earlier today and will be doing another tomorrow, and will be testing the water as soon as my test kits arrive. 

They would be some pretty expensive wilds if it even was possible for me to export fish!


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## MysticSky22301

Sometimes the long finned goldfish just injur themselves it can happen turning around too close to the glass  it doesn't take long to heal


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## LittleBettaFish

It looked a little less angry and red yesterday, but I may add some aquarium salt to the water just to help aid in healing. 

Well the end of 2016 was quite a day here. I swear we drove about 100kms in a bid to find the uprights for my new rack. My other two racks are 600mm deep, but this rack needed to be only 400mm deep to fit in the space I had left. After visiting three stores, we found two uprights, and based on the fact this product had been pulled from their website, I think they were the last two left in the entire state! 

By the time we got home it was about 4pm. But I was determined to get this rack assembled and the shelves painted even if it killed me.Usually these racks are fairly straightforward to put together, but of course everything went wrong yesterday. I would hammer one beam into place, only to find next beam wouldn't slot into place properly, so I would have to go back and remove the beam I'd already hammered in. I think it was about 8:30pm by the time I had the rack fully assembled with the shelves all painted and dropped into place. 

This is the end result. The reason the bottom shelf is so high from the ground is that I needed to fit a kitty litter tray and rubbish bin under it. I installed the hook to hold my siphon hoses, and I have a shelf that I will be attaching to the main rack today to hold the jugs and watering cans I use during water changes. 

Eventually, I want to swap out the uprights on the shorter rack, with 1800mm high uprights, so I can run an extra shelf of tanks. I also have to get around to purchasing lights at some point, but as I've spent way too much on my fish this past month, this likely won't be in the foreseeable future. 

I was surprised by how 'finished' the third rack made the room feel. Basically all available wall space in this room is taken up by racks and fish tanks, and I love spending time in there. 










I also took some photos of my original Betta coccina male. His last batch of fry have just gone free-swimming, and the female is plump with eggs, so he was in a pretty feisty mood. It wasn't helped that the female mistook him for one of the younger males, and chased him off. 





































The youngsters were being particularly unruly today, and one of them even decided to challenge her mum even though there's quite a size difference. 










Mum is not happy here. I think one of her sons was trying on his moves. 










Then this is her in normal colours. 










Before finally, a photo of my F1 Betta uberis male. He'd had been chasing his brothers and sisters around prior to this photo being taken. I did plan on moving this group into a larger tank to give the males some breathing space, but the tank I intended to put them into has a chip in the bottom corner join and I'm not sure I feel safe using it. So I may have to find some way of replacing the tank, as they can't continue to stay in their current tank. 










Otherwise, the rest of my fish are doing well. Some of my F2 Betta uberis fry are almost fully coloured up, at only about 1cm in size. I already can see one male, so I'm just hoping that this pair have produced a larger number of females as this is such an aggressive little species. Still zero fry to be seen in the Betta miniopinna tank. Based on the fact that their parents ate their eggs/fry and someone in this tank seems to be eating the eggs/fry, I think I won't go any further with this line. 

My F2 Betta sp. api api are growing out _very_ nicely. There's quite a number of young males, and all of them seem to have inherited the longer body of their mother, which was what I was hoping to achieve by using her. The plan is to cross one of these F2 males onto one of the long-bodied F1 females, to try and avoid the stunted look of some of my F1 Betta sp. api api males. It's almost like the caudal peduncle is too short, and doesn't taper, but remains thick, so it makes the affected fish look like they are missing about half a centimetre of body. I do have one particularly spectacular F1 male, which I may use as a future breeder, but it depends on how good the F2 males turn out.


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## MysticSky22301

My biggest goldfish actually had a chunk of his dorsal fin and a strip of scales taken off by a rouge leach -_- his dorsal is a little short and the scar is white but otherwise he's looks totally normal now so don't worry too much. 

They look amazing  have you thought about dividing the uberis into 2 tanks instead?if you can't replace the larger tank it might work?


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## LittleBettaFish

My worry with splitting the group into two tank, is that there will be fewer males in each tank and that this might cause an increase in aggression. I've had this happen when keeping small groups of mature males together. I would also need to then buy two new tanks because even split, the group have outgrown the 30cm cube (the larger males are about 2 inches total length), and I don't have any empty 30cm tanks on hand. 

The aquarium store I frequent, has some very reasonably priced rimless tanks. I think I'll just pick up a spare 10 gallon and put in lots of wood, plants, sphagnum moss and IALs, and see how everyone gets along with the extra space and cover. 

My biggest dilemma now, is what to put in the tank/s that will go on the top shelf of my new rack. I'm thinking Australian blue eyes, although then I'm torn on what species. I love gertrudae, but mellis hold a special place in my heart. However, there are also luminatus and ivantsoffi available here nowadays, neither of which I have kept before. I would eventually like to turn my attention from the conservation of wild bettas, to aiding in the conservation of Australian native species. However, to do that I will need to upgrade a number of my tanks, and that means money, something which is in short supply nowadays.


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## MysticSky22301

One of my favorite American native species is the red/orange spotted sunfish. I really want to work on getting these and the dollar sunfish into aquarium culture they are absolutely beautiful

The first one is the red spot the second is the blue version of the Dollar


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## LittleBettaFish

The colour reminds me somewhat of domestically bred discus. I like the Pygmy sunfish, they seem a neat little fish. 

Do many people keep US natives over there? Rainbowfish and blue eyes are quite popular here, but we have a number of species that would likely do well in aquaria, but are protected. Even though most of these species are being driven to extinction by factors such as habitat loss and bushfires, as well as the introduction of gambusia and trout, and could probably do with having captive bred populations existing outside of public aquariums and places like that.


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## MysticSky22301

I don't really know how many people keep them , it's quite a few though if you look up the videos. Most keep green sunfish and bullhead catfish ( I have one of those too) 

The dollars get HUGE maybe 4 in a 50 gallon tank I need to research the aggression a little better on them.

The red spots are a more manageable size but don't really school, though they can live in groups. And they are my favorite ^^


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## LittleBettaFish

Do they breed easily in captivity? That seems to be a major hurdle to popularity in the hobby. Although if they are US natives, I imagine getting wild-caught stock is not difficult. 

Today was water change day. I did water changes on all of my wild betta tanks, and I am about to go down and do a water change on my goldfish tank. The water aging tubs definitely make changing the water on that many takes a lot easier. Because it's already heated to tank temperature, all I need to do is scoop the water out into a small, plastic watering can (these are great for topping up smaller tanks) and empty it into the tank. Putting the cling wrap over the top of the tanks is what takes the most time. I've definitely invented some new curse words in my struggles with that infernal cling wrap. 

I also attached a shelf to my main rack. This holds my water conditioner, as well as the jugs and watering cans used for water changes. It's been hammered very firmly into place, as I didn't want it falling off and taking out the tanks below. 










Then this is my new rack with my Betta livida grow-out filled, and the water aging tubs in place. I'm using one more tub than planned, so my BBS hatchery will go on the top shelf. A more powerful air pump was needed to run this number of sponge filters, so I ordered a new Resun six outlet air pump, which hopefully will arrive in a couple of days. I _was_ going to use the hook on the side of the rack for my siphon hoses, but that didn't work as planned, so it's become a towel hook instead. 










Then to wrap up my post, here's one of my F2 Betta sp. api api males being a jerk to one of his siblings. He even chased his mum off, and she's about twice his size.


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## MysticSky22301

I did find video of dollars spawning in an aquarium, I am petty sure the spots have too because the research I did they lay eggs on plants and don't care for them, where as much species do parent in some form. I asked an old fish pro here why sunfish weren't kept in aquariums, he said they were, more as a fad that died out because apparently the genetically closed population became way too susceptible to diseases. In my experience these fish are partially immune to many aquarium sicknesses. I never had ick or anything except maybe external parasites and finrot . External parasites being the worms pond raised goldfish get. 

Both species are from the southern part of the united States, there red spots can be found anywhere from the southern end of Missouri To the panhandles of Florida and Texas. I know the dollars are common in Florida ^^ and I can contact the DNR to get them legally shipped into Iowa


Instead of cling wrap i use press and seal! So. Much. easier.


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## LittleBettaFish

Never even heard of Press and Seal. I wonder if they sell it here. What's the difference between that and cling wrap? 

Been busy in the fish room. This morning I FINALLY moved my Betta livida across into their new tank. Because visibility was so poor once I'd stirred all the mulm up on the bottom of the tank, I had to wait until it settled, catch one fish, then wait until everything had settled again before catching another. Considering there were about forty of them, it obviously took quite a while. Unfortunately, most of the java moss in their previous tank, was brown and dying, so I salvaged what I could, and the sphagnum moss will provide cover until it grows in over the next few months. The water is not as dark as I'd like for this species, so I will be making some IAL extract tomorrow and adding it to the tank. 

Here's one of the males enjoying the extra space. 



















I think it was this male that caused a great deal of confusion recently on a wild betta FB group because of that large lateral blotch. Some people were convinced he must have been a Betta coccina. Best way to tell them apart, Betta livida have green ventral tips, whereas Betta coccina have black ventral tips. 

There was also a brief moment of panic when I found my Betta hendra male clamped, lethargic, and gasping at the surface the other day. Fortunately, it turned out to be a minor infection near his head that had caused some swelling. Within a couple of days it's almost completely healed, and you can see he's back to his feisty self. 










I also managed to get a photo of one of his sons. It looks like there's at least one pair from the F1 group for me to continue this line with, so I'm chuffed with that. Because they share a tank with their father and he's quite aggressive, it's rare for the younger males to colour up more than this. This is why I will be moving them out into their own tank in the next week or so. 










Then just a couple of photos from my F1 Betta coccina tank. That's the same female in both shots, and the photos were taken only a minute or so apart. Just goes to show how colouration plays an essential in communication between these fish. 



















Finally, my largest F1 Betta brownorum male (and one of the only ones that has developed that eye-catching lateral blotch) is maturing nicely. When he colours up fully, he is almost as red as his father. Annoyingly, because he rarely sits still for photos (being either chased by his father or chasing one of his siblings) and as the quality of photos from this tank is never great because of the lighting, these two photos are the best I could do. I have everything crossed that there is at least one female in this group, hopefully two. Then I can pair one up with this male, and the other up with my unrelated male Zig-Zag. 



















I'm also not sure if I mentioned it in previous posts, but I ordered a new air pump to run all the filters on my two smaller racks. They didn't have the four outlet model in stock (which is what I'm using at the moment), so I had to go with the 6 outlet pump. My air pump arrived today (along with a 50 pack of IALs), but it wasn't until I started connecting the sponge filters to the air pump that I realised I forgot to order airline tubing and check-valves. Luckily, I had enough offcuts of airline tubing to connect all the filters, but it looks like I will need to swing by the fish store sometime in the near future as my last air pump rusted when water back siphoned into it. 

Finally, I'm not sure if anyone currently reading my blog remembers that what must be a couple years back now, we found and raised a baby bird that had fallen out of its nest following a bad storm. I think we had him about a year before we had to pass him onto a local wildlife carer for release. We did get told that he'd formed a bond with what I think was a previously released female, but apart from that, we didn't hear anything else and we never knew if he'd been released successfully or not, or even if he was still alive. 

Then a while back, a bird was drinking from our bird bath that I could have sworn was 'Mr Cheeps'. On impulse, I made the cheeping noise that meant he was about to be fed, and even though it had been such a long time, the bird responded by opening its mouth and flapping its wings. As it also responded to my whistles with a whistle of its own, I was convinced it was him. 

Basically, it looks like Mr Cheeps has claimed our house as part of his territory, and he and his mate are frequent visitors to our garden. The other day, we even had a duet down the side of the house before he flew off. Yesterday, I even heard him doing this creepy low-pitched whistling that he used to do when the door to his room was closed and he was alone. So I really am convinced that I'm not just being overly hopeful, and that it is indeed him. 

Anyway, that about wraps things up. Got to do a water change on the goldfish tank later tonight, and then it's disinfecting the water aging tubs and getting them filled up tomorrow.


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## MysticSky22301

XD Mr cheeps likely DID claim your yard he grew up there! Personally I'd sit outside with some mealworms and see if he came to eat ^^ 

Press and seal has tiny bubbles that give it more cling, it's almost like a reusable sealant. Plus it's only sticky on one side.

I finally got my hellea Aztecs culture going and for some reason they LOVE Microworms, my purple metallic guppies are breeding and my snails are finally growing up^^ I'm going be ordering plants soon too and my next project? Blue or purple Moscow guppies to cross to the purple's


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## LittleBettaFish

Oddly, Mr Cheeps spent hardly any time outside. He was mostly inside in a large cage because we were worried that kurrawongs or other butcherbirds (two species known for attacking and killing smaller birds) would harm him, and I would roll him out during fine weather so he could sit out on the back deck. 

I'm wondering if he just came to have a drink, and then realised who I was when I talked to him. Being that the wildlife carer lives only a couple streets away, and there are no resident butcherbirds, it makes sense that he would stake out this area as his territory. 

I did contemplate throwing him some kangaroo meat but I decided against it, as I don't want him and his mate expecting to be fed and constantly loitering around the garden. We get this family of small birds that occasionally visit during the colder months and a butcherbird could very easily kill them and their young, or at least scare them away. They are pretty savage little birds. It's quite something to watch them catch their prey, and either impale it on a branch, or stuff it in their 'larder'. Mr Cheeps used to get stuck into the little hand vacuum I cleaned the bottom of his cage with, and even the dogs and cats weren't safe when he was in a strop. 

I will have to check out the Press and Seal when I'm in the supermarket next. 

It's funny you mention guppies, as recently I contemplated a switch to endlers after seeing some particularly nice fish online. Unfortunately, I'm only interested in what I suppose are called 'pure' wild endlers, and of course it seems like you can't get them here. The only thing I don't like about endlers and guppies is how large the females are. I always think they look downright ugly in comparison to the males.


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## LittleBettaFish

Good morning here from Melbourne. Not got much planned for the fish room today as it's going to be 36 degrees Celsius, and it can get uncomfortably hot working in there. Late yesterday, I pulled an empty 20 litre tank out of the shed, which I want to get cleaned out and filled up today, so I can move some of my larger Betta hendra juveniles and sub-adults over. Eventually the whole group will go into a 40 litre tank and this 20 litre tank will likely be used to spawn Betta brownorum or Betta sp. api api. 

Sometime today I will be picking up a new 40 litre tank for my Betta uberis group. Even though it's likely the other tank has been holding water with that chip in the bottom glass in the past, I think it's safer to replace it, than risk a future failure. Hopefully this will help ease some of the territorial aggression between the males, or at least give the lower ranking males more places to retreat to. 

I took a few more photos last night, while I was hanging out in the fish room. 

First up is my Betta miniopinna female. I think they spawned again, so no photos of the male. This pair still haven't grown much, so they are like my mini miniopinna. 



















Followed by a couple of photos of what I think is the same Betta livida male. Unfortunately, I managed to miss the perfect photo of my adult male in full flare while I was focussing on the younger fish. 



















Then my dominant F1 Betta coccina female and her brother. The mark on her head is an injury and not external parasites. I still occasionally see fry in this tank. I'm not sure how many there actually are, but I throw BBS in for them to eat, so I guess we'll see what comes of it. 





























Finally, this is one of my fish room 'assistants'. She is also the suspect in several airline tubing chewings. As you can see, Kannika cannot resist an empty tank.


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## MysticSky22301

Beautiful kitty  I have a cat obsessed with airline hose x.x I have to keep a spray bottle handy


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## LittleBettaFish

Kannika waits until the cover of darkness to chew on the airline tubing. All evidence against her is purely circumstantial. 

Yesterday I felt like I was on one of those hidden camera television shows trying to buy a new tank. The service has never been fantastic at this particular store (surprising considering how many staff they employ). But yesterday really took the cake. To top it off, I didn't even look at the bettas because of the condition most were in, and it was just an all round unpleasant trip. The only positive was being able to see in person, a species of rainbowfish I am interested in keeping in the future. 

But at least my Betta uberis group have their larger tank, and as soon as it cools off outside, I will be cleaning it out and filling it up. It is also, a very nice tank. Rimless, with low iron glass, you just can't beat that. 

I was planning on taking lots of photos to post here and on my blog. Unfortunately, my camera had other ideas, and photos will have to wait until the battery finishes charging. However, I did manage a small number of photos, which I'll share as I know how boring these posts are when they aren't accompanied by photos! 

First up today, is a very flirtatious Betta hendra female. 





































Next is my Betta miniopinna male taking time off from parental duties. So far I've been unable to get a really great photo of this fish, which is annoying as he is beautiful. His darker ventral fins are a bit of an oddity, as most Betta miniopinna seem to have bright red ventral fins. The parents of this male, as well as another pair imported at the same time, also had darker ventrals. 










Meanwhile, it looks like all that flirting between the dominant female and her brother in the F1 Betta coccina tank has resulted in a spawn. I tried to get a photo of the male under the nest but it was causing him too much stress. 










Lastly, we have 'Trouble', finally giving me a photo good enough to use on my blog post about Betta brownorum. Not a terrifically great photo, but better than any others I've taken of him.


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## wildborneo

I always enjoy the photo of your tanks and the set ups. Can u please take photos of your step by step tank set up for this new tank.


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## LittleBettaFish

I will take some photos when I set-up the Betta uberis tank today. But below I've written out what I do when setting up a new tank. 

1. Fill up the tank with cold tap water. I use Seachem Prime to condition my water. 

2. Sprinkle a thin layer of ADA Malaya or Africana over the entire bottom of the tank. 

3. Add a few pieces of wood to the tank.

4. If I have enough java moss, this is all I will use as cover for the lower half of the tank. Otherwise, I will use a combination of sphagnum moss (soaked until it is fully waterlogged) and java moss, and eventually the sphagnum moss is covered up by the java moss as it grows in. 

5. Add however many IALs are needed. Sometimes I will soak these first so they sink straight away, other times I will leave them to float. 

6. Add any surface or floating plants to the tank. 

7. Put in a heater and filter. 

8. Let tank sit for 2-3 days without fish (my tap water is soft and can make the pH crash so I try not to put fish into tanks set-up the same day unless I've used aged water) and add some rooibos tea if the water isn't dark enough. 

9. Add fish to the tank. 

Sometimes I may have to do a couple of water changes before adding fish if the water becomes cloudy or the wood develops that clear slime on it. But otherwise, this is about all I do.


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## MysticSky22301

I need to find a bunch of drift wood but the only place I can get it is the river, how can I make it safe for my fish?


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## LittleBettaFish

As long as it's not a type of wood that's going to leach potential toxins into your tank, I imagine boiling it would kill anything harmful.


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## wildborneo

thanks. photos plse.

I always have problem adding the aqua soil to the tank as they float every where! and they take time to sink


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## MysticSky22301

Thanks, most of it is oak or maple, pine doesn't float like the others. It could also be dogwood or ash


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## LittleBettaFish

What brand of aqua soil do you use Wildborneo? I find sometimes my ADA aqua soil will float, but if you poke the floating grains with your finger, they will immediately sink to the bottom of the tank. 

Well I didn't take any photos of me setting up the Betta uberis tank. I had to move plants and fish across at the same time, and there was too much going on to take photos.

But I still have to set up a tank from scratch for my F1 Betta brownorum group (early next week), so I will take photos then. 

Today I moved my Betta uberis group across into their new tank. Fortunately, I was able to use almost all the plants from their previous tank in their new set-up, as once I rinsed the detritus and algae off with the hose, they were surprisingly healthy and green. 

One of the females did end up on the floor after managing to jump out of the net (she's fine), but apart from that, the move has gone smoothly. It does seem that moving the group has completely thrown the existing hierarchy into disarray, and I witnessed several of the smaller males squaring off with the previously dominant male. Being that he is the largest and most aggressive male in the tank I expect him to retain his position of power. However, at least now there is more space for the other males to claim individual territories of their own. 

Otherwise, not much else has been happening. My Betta hendra pair spawned, but the eggs were gone by the following day. Likely eaten by one of the younger fish in the tank. 

Meanwhile, I tried to take some photos of my fish tonight and I swear I missed every single 'good' shot. If I could get the camera to focus tonight it would have been a miracle. 

With that said, I did manage to get a few 'okay' shots. 

First we have my original wild-caught Betta coccina female. Some of her grandchildren are nearly at a size to be having fry of their own. 










Followed by her long-time mate. He was looking absolutely spectacular tonight so shame that I couldn't capture it on camera. 



















Finally one of my F1 Betta sp. api api females. She's from the female only group. I like this female in particular, as she's got such a beautiful long body with that rich, red colouring. Because of this, she reminds me very much of my original Betta sp api api female. I'm just hoping I've got a nice F2 male to cross her with, as she hasn't got any full brothers. The F2 males are going through a very awkward looking phase at the moment, which I'm hoping at least some of them grow out of. 










And that's about it for tonight. I will be spending more time in the fish room tomorrow, so I will (hopefully) have more news and photos to post then.


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## wildborneo

I use ADA aqua soil too. some of the soil takes weeks to sink to the bottom. Now i tie the soil using a fine net cloth or a perforated container as non of my plants have their roots in the soil


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## LittleBettaFish

That's very strange. Never had that issue and I've been using ADA aqua soil in all my tanks for ages now. Any grains of aqua soil that are floating in my tanks sink as soon as I touch them with my finger. 

I'm not certain if I've said this already, but because I'm not planting anything into the substrate, I actually add the aqua soil to the tank after it's been filled. I just scoop handfuls out of the bag and very gently sprinkle it over the bottom of the tank. Seems to make the water less cloudy this way and it saves me making a huge mess when I accidentally disturb it.


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## LittleBettaFish

Some sad news from the fish room today. 

After their numbers were decimated by old age, disease, and misadventure, I was left with only four Betta persephone. Yesterday, I discovered that their numbers had shrunk again, with the literal loss of the smallest fish in the group. I have found no body in the tank, and so far, no body outside the tank either. At this point, I doubt I will ever know what happened to it.

I then made the tough decision to euthanase the older adult male of the group. He was missing an eye, after it was damaged while he was in the hospital tank being treated for velvet, and even though I kept him in a breeder box and took special care when feeding him, he had started to decline.

Now all I'm left with, is two unrelated adult males. Considering the terrible luck I've had with Betta persephone, once these two are gone, I doubt I will ever keep them again, even though they truly are one of the most beautiful of the wild betta species. 

Fortunately, the rest of my wilds are doing great. My Betta hendra male has made a complete recovery from his injury, and my Betta uberis group seem to be getting along better in the larger tank. 

I also have some photos to share. It always feel like I take one-hundred crappy photos to get ten decent shots, although surprisingly, my fish were somewhat more cooperative today. I think I just need to clean the inside glass in some of the tanks. 

To begin with, is my F1 Betta brownorum male. 



















I also managed to get this photo of the female before she vanished. 










Next is my largest F1 Betta uberis male (apart from Shiny). He still remains the 'alpha male' of the group. 










Followed by a particularly feisty Betta sp. api api male. 




























This is Shiny's mate, with a glimpse of Shiny in the background. 










Finally, just wanted to share a photo of my Betta hendra tank to show how overgrown it is. This tank must have been set-up for a year now, and the fish love it. You can kind of get an idea of the size of my wilds when you consider that this is a 30x30x30cm tank and that is the adult male up front.


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## MysticSky22301

Oh no! I'm sorry your Persephone failed 😫 the little api api are so pretty <3 

I've been browsing killis and wilds I think I'll have to break down and sign up on aqua bid when I want to buy 

I have a pair in the spawning tank right now ^^ mort is so stubborn, she was trying to get him to wrap and he ran her off x.x


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## LittleBettaFish

That Betta sp. api api male is one of the better ones from that group. I just wasn't happy with a large number of the males from my original F1 group. I think there's something wrong with the caudal peduncle, whether it is too short or oddly shaped, it just makes them look out of proportion. You can sort of see what I'm talking about with the male on the bottom of the second photo. 

It's a shame as I have a lot of breeding quality females, just not as many breeding quality males to pair them with. 

You're lucky living in America that you have access to so many more killifish species than we have here in Australia. If more of the species I wanted were available here, I'd be very tempted to switch to breeding killifish, as they are such colourful characters. I particularly like the Aphyosemion and Chromaphyosemion species. The colours have to be seen to be believed on some of them. 

Plus I find the whole process of picking eggs and waiting for them to hatch quite therapeutic.


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## wildborneo

My moss do not do well when the water gets too dark or too acidic, they seem to melt away. yours looks healthy how do you keep them that way?


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## LittleBettaFish

In some tanks the moss does better than in others. I find if I don't use my siphon to clean off the gunk and algae regularly, it tends to start dying off. 

This room does also receive a lot of natural sunlight, and while the water in my tanks is dark, it's more umilked tea versus black coffee.


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## LittleBettaFish

Here's some photos from the fish room today. 

First up, my Betta brownorum group. 

This is the male.










His largest son. 



















The female. 










Followed by my Betta miniopinna female. 










Then we have Zig-Zag (he is unrelated to the above Betta brownorum). I just wish all my Betta brownorum had colouring like his! 




























Finally, this is my new Betta persephone set-up. You can see one of the males at the front of the tank. I will be raising the water level when I do water changes next. It will look better once the moss starts to spread and the anubias grows back some more leaves. It's a shame I didn't have a pair of Betta persephone, as this would have made a perfect breeding tank.


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## MysticSky22301

Beautiful ^^


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## wildborneo

nice tank. how do you ensure all the fishes get enough food when the tank is so overgrown? I have a group of persephone fries that grew up with the parents, their growth were slow and the are stunted in size for not getting enough food.Now I remove the fries or the parents when the fries are about 1cm. and keep them in a grow out tank. my aim now is to spawn enough F1 to set up species biotope tanks for all of them. I have stated a 3ft coccina F1 biotope tank, thats when I can really enjoy the fish, as F1 they are not scare of human and they will swim around. I will post some pictures once i work out how to do it here.


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## LittleBettaFish

Are your wild-caught fish shy? I only ask because you say your F1 Betta coccina are friendlier, and it seems many people have issues with shyness and these fish. I'm just curious as to why this has never been an issue for me. It usually takes my wild-caught fish less than a week to start coming up to the front of the tank when I walk by and you wouldn't be able to tell which of my fish were originally wild-caught and which were bred here. 

My tanks are only small, and I try to ensure everyone gets at least some food. Even so, I still do end up with fish that are smaller than their siblings because they don't receive as much food. I have found that when I separate these runts out, most will catch up to their larger siblings in size. So it seems in some cases the stunting is not permanent. 

Unfortunately, I can't set-up multiple grow-out tanks as I don't have the space, and I definitely don't have the money to pay the enormous electricity bill that would result.


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## wildborneo

yes, certain of my wilds are very shy, like Brownorum which I hardly see.







I am attempting to post the photo below hopefully they will appear
this is my rutilans biotope tank, a mix of F1 and wilds 
















The coccina biotope tank


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## wildborneo

hmmmm nothing appear. I am taking the URL image link from the Photobucket and insert. is that right?


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## wildborneo

[/URL]


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## ThatFishThough

I think it is best to download the pictures to your computer. Then go to "Go Advanced" then the Paperclip Icon.


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## LittleBettaFish

Today was water change day. Tanks 1-8 got a 4L water change, and I'm doing tanks 9-13 tomorrow. Then I have to do a water change on my Betta persephone separately using just tap water. This is because they were previously infected with the same strain of velvet that took out my Betta hendra group, and I can't risk that ever getting into any of my other tanks. 

Because water changes seem to stir everyone up, I managed a few photos tonight once the water had cleared. 

First is my F1 Betta coccina pair. I just put this film canister in, and already the male and dominant female have been checking it out. She is the only female he spawns with, and even though the other females seem willing to spawn, he chases them off. His mother and father have a similar 'bond'. 



















This lighter coloured stripe is the best indicator for me that a spawn is imminent. 










Next is my F1 Betta sp. api api female (not a particularly flattering photo). 










Followed by her oddly shaped mate. He was a nicer looking fish when he was younger, but then he grew into a rather unfortunate adult. 










And this is one of their larger male offspring. 










Finally, this is another photo of my Betta uberis female showing off her spawning colours. 










I picked up some sphagnum moss from the hardware store, so I will be setting up my F1 Betta brownorum tank next week. Hopefully once they have been removed from the tank, the original pair will start spawning again. You can never have too many Betta brownorum! 

My outside tubs have been providing me with a steady supply of mosquito larvae, enough that most tanks gets at least 1-2 feeds a week (I don't really bother with tanks that don't house young fish or actively spawning pairs). My neglected vallisneria nana that I've got in an outside tank has also made a comeback with the warmer weather. The plan is to bring this inside, kill any snails or snail eggs that might be on it, and get it growing so I can use it in future tanks. 

That's about it from here in Melbourne. Maybe someday I will have more exciting news to share.


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## MysticSky22301

The api api male seems to be very thick bodied compared to the female could that be why he looks odd?

13 tanks? I thought I was bad! XD I'm looking forward to expanding when I get my new racks though. I've got six 5 gallon buckets I have to refill almost every other day o.o how do you keep water in hand to do 9-10 tanks at a time! I've thought about a 50 gallon barrel to be honest 😳


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## LittleBettaFish

For some reason this male always looks thicker in photos than in person (he's also one of my smaller males at _just_ over an inch total length). Like some of my other males I think the issue is that his caudal peduncle seems misshapen/too short and his caudal is oddly shaped. He also has a bent ventral. The caudal fins and ventral fins on his offspring look to be developing perfectly normally, so hopefully they take after the female in shape. 

I only do 2-4L water changes on my tanks once every week or two, so I don't really need to store a whole lot of water. At present I have two 30 litre tubs and one 20 litre tub. I only heat and filter these a day or two before I want to do water changes. 

I'm running 14 tanks at the moment (plus the goldfish tank) and I will be setting up another two. That's about my limit for now, and with these racks I'm using, I certainly wouldn't risk much more weight. In another few years I will likely be phasing out the wilds in favour of Australian natives and replacing these racks with proper long-span shelving that can easily take over 500 kilograms per shelf.


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## MysticSky22301

That would make sense 

My whole fish room is heated, so I just have a couple of stacks of buckets under an improvised table edge XD I always try to keep them full though, in case something goes wrong. I've also got gallon jugs I'm using for individual issues like dosing Betta meds ( even with pristine water I get an occasional case of pop eye or something) Even dosing out a weeks treatment for a fish in a qt cup . It also helps with the gravity water change system I set up for my fry ^^ 

I probably keep WAY too much equipment but I prefer to have everything on hand instead of panicking running to the store at 2 am for air line or parasite meds x.x


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## LittleBettaFish

I wish I could afford to heat my whole fish room. We definitely notice a hike in the electricity bill over winter when the heaters are working overtime. Fortunately, this is a smaller room and seems to stay warmer than where my fish were previously.

Well I definitely think I am reaching the end of the road with keeping and breeding wild bettas. I've been breeding wilds almost exclusively since 2010,and have sold or moved on many species of fish I wish I hadn't, to continue to do so over the years. It's difficult to sell my wilds locally, as I only want them to go to experienced hobbyists, and I don't ship. Matters are made worse by the fact most of my spawns are predominately male, so I waste valuable tank space housing large numbers of excess males. Finally, as I've mentioned before, the number of wild betta enthusiasts in this country (or at least those that have an active online presence) is very small, and apart from FB groups and forums that cater to an international member base, there are very few Australians keeping these fish to talk with. 

Basically, I won't be making any special efforts to breed my wilds. They will be kept in groups where possible (which naturally seems to discourage spawning), and live out the rest of their natural lives here with me. As it's going to cost me a great deal of money to get my fish room set up for keeping and breeding Australian natives, it doesn't worry me if it's 4-5 years before this happens.

For now at least, there were still be plenty of stories and photos pertaining to my wild bettas. However, if the odd Australian native pops up here and there, don't be surprised.

A couple of days ago, I broke down my outside tank. I threw out the duckweed as it was infested with algae and snails, and then very carefully sorted through the vallisneria nana to see how much of it I could salvage. Most of it was in surprisingly good shape, so after a thorough rinsing and going over (I want neither duckweed nor snails in this tank) I filled up a 40 litre tank and brought it inside.

It's going to stay like this for the moment until I can make certain that there are no snails in there, and then I will add a scattering of paperbark leaves to the bottom, and a couple of pieces of melaleuca branches. Eventually (as in another month at least), I want to try and get my hands on two or three young pairs of Pseudomugil mellis (honey blue eye) pairs. Each time I've kept this species in the past I've had no idea what I was doing when it came to raising the fry. However, now I have experience raising Pseudomugil gertrudae fry, I'm really eager to give them another shot.


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## LittleBettaFish

Today I decided to take photos of my tanks. My F1 B. livida, F1 B. sp. api api, and F1 B. uberis tanks are the only ones I missed. 

As I've said before, these tanks have been set-up for my fish first and foremost. I don't use artificial lighting, I don't add fertiliser, I don't siphon the mulm out of the bottom of the tank, and I very rarely do any trimming. I don't care if my plants are surviving or thriving, all they need to do is stay alive. They are in there to help keep ammonia levels down, and to provide cover for my fish. If they look nice while doing so, well that's a bonus. 

None of the tanks pictured below, are larger than 10 gallons. The B. miniopinna tank is the smallest, being only 4 gallons. Plants shown include Java moss, Mayaca fluviatilis, Watersprite, Anubias, and Duckweed. On the bottom of most of the tanks, is sphagnum moss. I only use this when I don't have enough Java moss on hand. 

B. hendra tank. Houses between 10-15 fish. 










F1/F2 B. coccina tank. Houses between 10-15 fish. 










F1 B. miniopinna tank. Houses a breeding pair. 










F1 B. brownorum tank. Houses 5 fish. 










F1 B. persephone tank. Houses two unrelated males. 










F1 B. uberis tank. I forget how many fish are in here, but it's less than 10. 










F1 B. sp. api api tank. Houses between 10-15 fish (all females but the original male and a few fry too young to sex). 










F1 B. sp. api api tank. Houses about 25 fish. 










F1 B. brownorum tank. Houses between 10-15 fish. 










F0/F1 B. coccina tank. Houses about 10 fish. 










F1 B. coccina tank. Houses one male and four females. 










I also took a few photos of my fish. 

This is my Betta brownorum pair. 










One of the juveniles that popped up in my F1 Betta sp. api api tank. I actually don't know if this is the offspring of my F0 pair, or one of F1 females has spawned with her father. 




























One of my Betta uberis males. 










This photo was taken a few days before the others. 










In my last post I mentioned wanting to phase out wild bettas from my fish room. As it's likely going to be a long time in the future before I can afford to set my fish room up to breed natives, I'm debating going back to keeping and breeding killifish in the interim. As they have such a short lifespan (2-3 years for the species I will be keeping), breeding is much easier to control than the wild bettas, and they don't require a particularly large tank, I could easily keep several species now, and then add further species once my older wilds start to die off. 

I've been flipping between Australian natives and killifish for so long now, and I'm thinking that this is a way I could do both.

For now, it's just going to be the wilds because I can't afford to keep anything else. However, in another few months, there could very well be some colourful new additions to the fish room.


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## wildborneo

Nice tanks. 
Once u set the tank up how long does it last before u have to "tear" it apart again?


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## LittleBettaFish

My tanks stay like they are unless I need to completely break-down the tank. I usually only do this if I want to move the whole group of fish, or have to treat for velvet. My Betta hendra tank has been like that for over a year (obviously the plants have grown since then), and I think it's been a couple years since I first set-up my F0/F1 Betta coccina tank.


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## andakin

Hi. I'm setting up a small tank and want to try for a darker look, purely for aesthetics. I'm interested in learning more about rooibos. Do you have any info to share?


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## MysticSky22301

I have 3 species of killifish I want ^^ I need my rack and a few more 10g tanks though- I hate using smaller tanks and can't really find them. 
Rachovii, Nematolebias papiliferus Inoa, and eggersi blues. 

I really need more information, I can't find much online looking for the individual species which is disappointing to say the least. I do know that I'll have very hard water wherever I go in this state unless I get a single line softener system (uggh). I'm working on culturing more live foods too ^^ prepping is easy, being able to afford all 3 species' eggs eggs at once? Not so much.


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## LittleBettaFish

Unfortunately, I don't have all that much information to share. I drop a couple of tea bags into my tanks every now and then, and remove once they stop leaching colour. 

I don't know how rooibos compares to peat moss or IALs, or how much of an effect it has on hardness/pH. I simply use it to darken the water in my wild betta tanks.

Here's a resource that might help with the killifish. I've not kept any of the species you are interested in, so can't offer personal experience. 

http://www.wak.aka.org/Genera_Index.htm


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## LittleBettaFish

My wild bettas must have overheard my talk of phasing them out, as I have a spawn in my B. miniopinna tank, a spawn in my F1 B. coccina tank, and my F1 B. uberis male is busy trying to lure the female back to the nest. However, perhaps the biggest surprise of all, is when I found Zig-Zag guarding a nest of fry! As there had no spawning activity between him and any of the four fish he was sharing a tank with, I figured they all must be male and forgot about the film canisters I left in there. It wasn't until I was replacing the cling wrap a couple of days ago that I noticed a nest in one of them, with a rather grumpy looking Zig-Zag in there. I thought maybe he'd just built a nest as sometimes my males do this, even without females being present, but when I titled the canister up I discovered there were indeed fry. 

Even though there's now irrefutable evidence of at least one female in the group, I still can't figure out which fish it is. Betta brownorum remains the one species I can't reliably sex, not even when the fish are of breeding size. 

Other than that, things have been quiet in the fish room. I did manage to back siphon water into one of my air pumps (not the new one thankfully) so that ended up in the bin. This is a PSA on the importance of using check valves. 

The vallisneria nana I brought in from outside hasn't yet decided if it's growing or dying. At the moment it seems to be doing a little of both. I'm hoping it's just acclimating to the change in conditions, and once the roots hit the clay root tabs, they will start to take off. 

Wilds aren't the only fish I keep, and I think I mentioned previously that one of my goldfish had a perpetually torn and bloodied caudal fin (the fish in question is a long-finned Shubunkin) . There were also these small white 'bumps' around the damaged area, which after doing some reading online, could possibly be the result of past trauma. Originally, I was running three large internal power filters in this tank, and I noticed that this particular goldfish spent a lot of time near the intakes of these filters. Since this injury is similar to injuries I saw in long-finned bettas, I removed the largest filter, and (temporarily) replaced it with a sponge filter. I also turned down the flow on the remaining two internal filters and moved them into the corner where it would be more difficult for the fish to get near them. Lastly, I added aquarium salt, and have been doing 25% litre water changes every couple of days to try and encourage healing. 

So far, the affected fish has been much more active, shown an increased appetite, and its caudal looks to be on the mend. There's less redness i the fin, and the tear itself looks smaller. 

As all three fish also seem to be appreciating the reduction in flow, my plan is to replace the sponge filter and two internal filters with a Hamburg Matten Filter instead. Unfortunately, as this isn't a popular filtration option here in Australia, it looks like I'll have to make my own. I think my main challenge will be finding a large enough (and thick enough) sheet of filter sponge to use. 

I only have a few photos to share, as we were at dog club for most of the day. So I'm going to try and get some photos tomorrow when it's actually daylight. 

Two of my F1 B. brownorum sub-adults. I can never get the one with the spot in focus. 










My male with a chunk of his anal fin missing. 










My female.










The nest in my F1 B. coccina tank.










The male guarding it. 










This is one of the F1 B. sp. api api fry/juveniles that popped up in my all female (except the original male) group. Not too keen on the topline on this fish, so I will have to keep eyes on it (although knowing me I won't be able to bring myself to cull it). 










This male kept putting on a spectacular show .... behind all the plants where it's extremely difficult to get an in focus shot. 










My F1 B. uberis female (she's sister to the above male). 










Before finally, a photo of two of my F2 B. sp. api api males. This spawn looks to be predominately male, in contrast to my all-female group.


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## MysticSky22301

Such beautiful fish ^^


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. Some of them are definitely less 'beautiful' than others, but when they are coloured up and showing off, you tend not to notice the imperfections.


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## MysticSky22301

I'm going to be starting a new journal, something about my multiple collection madness XD I've just been way too busy the last few days. I did add to my collection too XD pea puffers and 2 new goldfish im REALLY asking for a hectic life

I'm definitely getting ahold of a Hendra pair (or trio) in the future, I'm also debating Uberis. <3 I don't know why but I love wild type fish, not just Bettas either. I'm not great at picking out form in the wilds, I think it's the fact ive never seen them in person?


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## LittleBettaFish

If you are thinking of any species from the coccina complex, I recommend only keeping a pair to a tank, if you want to spawn them. I personally believe it adds a lot of unnecessary stress to the male when there are other fish in the tank. In my F1 Betta coccina tank there are four females and one male (they are siblings). The male only spawns with the dominant female in the group, but then the pair of them have to devote a lot of time and energy to keeping the other females away from the nest site, and everyone usually ends up with torn fins with the non-breeding females spending most of their time hiding until the fry are free-swimming. 

The other risks are that other fish may eat the eggs and fry if the nest is left unguarded, and may also cannibalise newly free-swimming fry. 

Basically, I only exclude fish from breeding if they are missing fins, have abnormally short bodies (I never want to compound on this trait), or there are serious irregularities in the topline. Otherwise, my two other disqualifications, are fish that eat their eggs or offspring, and fish that are hyper-aggressive. 

My goal has always been to produce healthy fish that retain their excellent parenting instincts, and where I've _tried_ to avoid selecting for specific traits such as more intense colouration. Betta brownorum and Betta sp. api api are probably the only two species where I've actively tried to breed for a specific trait (presence of the lateral blotch in Betta brownorum and caudal size and body length in Betta sp. api api).


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## LittleBettaFish

I took some photos just before bed tonight. There aren't many, as I have serious algae problems in most of my tanks at the moment, and the inside glass also needs to be cleaned, so most of the photos from tonight's session weren't worth posting. 

Here's my miniopinna female. 










My largest F1 B. uberis male. It was difficult to capture many in focus photos of him as he has a nest (it's got no eggs or fry in it) at the back of the tank and he was busy chasing away his brothers. 



















An F1 B. sp. api api female from the all female group.










My F1 B. uberis male 'Shiny'. You can really see the algae in this photo. 










Shiny showing off to his sister/mate. Unfortunately, he was moving too quickly for me to get any in focus shots of him in full flare. 










I'll have more to post tomorrow as I plan on spending some time in the fish room. But for now, I'm off to bed.


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## MysticSky22301

Algae is a common issue even for me XD and I have mystery snails in the 3 worst tanks. My goldfish tank is never going to totally be rid of algae lol

I understand trying to keep the wild types true to their original form and instincts, it only makes sense, because if you breed certain traits out they won't be wild type! Although I love breeding the common species like guppies that you can manipulate and see what you get


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## LittleBettaFish

With my wild betta tanks, the overgrowth of algae likely stems from the fact that these tanks receive a lot of light in the form of afternoon natural sunlight, and little in the way of fertilisers or CO2 etc. It doesn't help that the java moss and mayaca fluviatilis seem to be magnets for algae and it's extremely difficult to remove without removing half the plants in there. 

I don't mind breeders selectively breeding the ornamental strains, although I do balk at purposefully breeding for a trait that is detrimental to the overall quality of life for the fish. However, I don't like to see pure wild stock manipulated too greatly, even more so when the species in question is on the verge of extinction in the wild. I feel the goal for any captive breeding program should always be to preserve these fish as close as possible to their original form.


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## LittleBettaFish

I couldn't stand looking at my algae filled Betta brownorum tank for one second longer. Yesterday afternoon, I _very_ carefully removed all the java moss and mayaca fluviatilis from the tank, and then took it outside and blasted most of the algae off with the hose. 

This is what it looks like at the moment. I want to buy a large anubias plant to fill up the front left side of the tank, but for now the plants are going to need some time to recover and fill in. 










Here is my Betta miniopinna male doing his best to sabotage my photo. 










At least the female is more obliging. 










I also managed to take a photo of one of my F1 Betta hendra. Fairly certain this one is female. 










One of my F2 Betta coccina males. This male's almost as large as his father, and probably the nicest one in the group. They got rather neglected when they were younger and I think this meant they haven't turned out as nicely as my F1 groups. 










Then here is Zig-Zag! He's definitely one of my fish room favourites, and when I look at photos like these I still can't believe how close he was to being culled. 




























Finally, this is the fish I think he spawned with. It's the only one in the group I've seen interacting with him, and their interactions are more breeding pair than sparring rivals. If it is a female, she's got much larger and thicker ventrals than her mother, and less prominent egg spot, which I think is why I wasn't 100% certain. Unlike most of my fish, these are not a related pair. 










Apart from that, the only real news I have to share, is that the dog owned by our back neighbour, ran away yesterday. Since we put the new fence in, he hasn't been able to get into our yard. However, yesterday he dug under the side fence and got into our neighbour's yard (he was chasing their cat when the neighbour found him). The neighbour caught him and walked him back to his house. Unfortunately, when she tried to put him in the backyard he got loose and ran off. 

I did a quick walk around the block as my mum thought he might come to me, but I couldn't find him.

This morning he still wasn't in the yard. So I don't know if he was found and has been locked inside, or if he is still missing. Harsh as it sounds, I almost think it might be better for this dog to never be found. For the past two or three years, I have watched him live a terribly lonely life. Nothing ever changes, and it's infuriating to watch. 

I've also discovered that a roughly 700 year old gum tree is destined to be cut down to make way for a road widening project. Apparently the Indigenous community is trying to get it preserved because it may be of some cultural significance, but as someone mentioned on FB, shouldn't the fact that it has managed to survive for so many centuries, even facing drought, fire, and clearing, be reason enough for it to stay. 

I'm so bloody sick of seeing mature trees (especially natives) cut down in the name of progress. Sure, the Government might plant a bunch of new trees to replace them, but honestly, do they really think a sapling provides the same benefits to wildlife as a 30 metre high tree? 

I was walking the other day and I saw two units had been built on a block that had a number of mature gum trees. All the gum trees had been cut down, and while there had been new gums planted, it's going to be years before they are large enough to be of any use. 

And I live in a council that actively tries to protect trees. Some of the suburbs in this state (especially the new estates where the blocks are about the size of postal stamps) look like lunar landscapes. They are almost completely devoid of large trees.


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## MysticSky22301

The Hendra is beautiful  zigzag is one lucky fellow^^


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## KaderTheAnt

I couldn't agree more about the tree cutting. I find it horrible that people would cut down something that has been around for centuries and replace it with something younger and much more weak. That tree would (estimate) take about 20 trucks to pull down while a sapling could merely be knocked over by a strong wind or a lawnmower. Replacing older things with younger things is unjustifiable and down right wrong. We don't replace our grandparents with our children, so why would we do it with trees? And as you stated, the saplings the replace it with won't be able to benefit the ecosystem like that tree has for a while. And even when they do get to that point, they'll probably just get cut down again for more expansion. 

Sorry for somewhat raging. Beautiful fish


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks MysticSky22301. I keep trying to get photos of my Betta hendra male, but now his sons and daughters are reaching sexual maturity it's impossible to get him to stay still. All he wants to do is chase them around. 

Don't worry KaderTheAnt. Anyone who feels passionate about the environment is welcome to rage on my journal. 

Worse still, is that it seems like half the time when they cut down mature trees, the trees planted to replace them end up dying anyway. The people over the road cut down a gum tree illegally when they were building. I believe someone in the street reported them to council, and they were supposed to replace the tree, but they never did, and council has never checked. Then when they did some landscaping in their backyard, they ended up killing another mature gum. So on that block alone, there have been two trees lost.

Never mind the dozens of trees I see when I'm out on my morning walk, smothered in ivy that are going to end up dying at some point in the future. 

It doesn't help that gum trees have a reputation for being dangerous and dropping branches. Most people see one in the suburbs and immediately freak out and want to chop it down. These people would have heart palpitations living in our suburb.


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## MysticSky22301

We have the problem with elm trees, and mulberry ( those are delicious by the way). Elm trees when mature can drop massive branches, I had one 3ft across drop just a few feet from me, in my back yard, after an ice storm. I freaked out for a little bit but didn't want to cut the tree down. Honestly if it had hit me I would have been dead x.x but it was because of the ice. 
People here hate mulberry trees with a passion, I don't know why either. They are a soft wood but grow slowly, the berries are delicious but everyone is convinced they are full of bugs and won't try them. Because humans won't pick the fruit the birds eat them and poop purple everywhere ( I guess that's a reason to hate a tree?) . A little secret? The inner bark contains a coagulant ( blood clotting agent), and easily stops minor bleeding! I've used it many times because I'm accident prone, it does sting a little though. 
People here hate most plants associated with traditional medicine, I'm learning how to use them instead!


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## LittleBettaFish

We had a large gum tree drop a branch, which crushed our shed. Unfortunately, the tree was in decline, so we had to get it cut down. Gum trees are called 'widow makers' for good reason (especially certain species) but I think some people blow the risks way out of proportion and entirely disregard the benefits they offer, not only to wildlife, but also to humans. 

We also had a large gum near our house that was cut down years ago as it had started dying back. However, my mum left most of the trunk behind, and hollows have started forming, which I hope over time, will be used by birds to nest in.

My now deceased grandparents, used to own a sheep (they ran Merinos) farm, with a mulberry tree out front. We spent a lot of our childhood stripped down to our underwear eating mulberries, and my mum would make jars of mulberry jam. Sadly, we heard from my mum's brother (he lives down the road from the farm) that the new owners had cut it down. 

Mulberries are delicious, and I don't remember there being any issues with bugs with our tree.


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## LittleBettaFish

A couple of days ago, I moved my F1 B. brownorum group into their new tank. There were more than I expected (13 in total), so they will likely need an upgrade to a 10 gallon at some point in the future. There's a few tattered fins, as they sort out their pecking order (this always happens when I separate young fish from the adults), and as I want to avoid using java moss in this tank, I will have to get some watersprite and/or anubias to provide more cover. 

As soon as my pair realised they were alone again, the female immediately started making advances towards the male. Judging by their behaviour, I wouldn't be surprised to see a spawn in the next few day. And here I was thinking I could stop my wilds from spawning! 

Meanwhile, I discovered my F1 B. coccina pair with the partially blind female, have spawned. I don't know how much vision she has, but it seems to be enough for her to successfully spawn with the male. These two haven't spawned in months, so obviously as soon as I want to keep less wilds, they decided it's a good time to start producing more! None of the young males dare go near their father while he is guarding the nest, but I would think the smaller fish will pick off the fry as soon as they go free-swimming. 

There's also fry swimming around in my other F1 B. coccina tank, which I've been guilted into feeding. 

I think Zig-Zag and his female also spawned again, as she was barred up and flirting with him yesterday, and now she looks noticeably slimmer, and he is nowhere to be seen. I have to move the film canister to a spot where I can actually see what's going on. Again, I wonder how many fry will actually survive given the other three fish in the tank. 

Finally, I decided to break-down the tank with the vallisnera nana in it, remove the sand, replace it with my remaining aqua soil, and then use this tank as a B. hendra grow-out. There's simply too many B. hendra in their current tank, and it's better than having this tank sitting empty. The vallisneria will stay to provide cover, although I will be keeping it in a pot to avoid it taking over. 

I only took a few photos today. All of which are my F1 B. sp. api api females. 

This little female was busy chasing every other fish in the tank away. Didn't matter if they were male or female, or twice her size. 



















I like this photo as for once the flash didn't wash her colouring out. 










Also, the dog down the back turned up after I got my hopes up it was gone for good. It was great to be able to take Clio down into the lower part of the yard without having her going into a frenzy at the fence. It's almost impossible to stop her once she's started, as she will just run up and down the fence barking at him. No matter how much focus work I do, or how rewarding I make myself, unless she's physically restrained, I can't get her to stop being so obsessive. 

He was gone for about four days and then yesterday morning he was up at the fence. Our boy Ares absolutely hates this dog, as he's been in our yard probably over a dozen times in the past, and there has been a scuffle between them. Ares came down with diarrhea yesterday, which we think is due to the stress of having the dog back, as the same thing happened when the dog kept getting into our yard, and he ended up with an anal gland abscess. 

So until we can afford to get a solid fence installed, I have to keep Ares and Clio in the upper levels of the yard, which gives them very little space to run around and chase their balls. 

I also don't think the neighbours realise how persistent this dog is. We had to drop sleepers in to stop him digging under, and the only reason he doesn't climb the temporary fencing is that the metal is thin and cuts into his paws (doesn't injure him it's just uncomfortable). Unless they've really put something solid where he is getting through, he's just going to dig under it or climb over it again. 

Of course, this dog isn't neutered, so just giving those of us with entire pets who keep them responsibly secured, a bad name.


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## MysticSky22301

I have a question for you. If you don't mind would you message me some information about the Hendra some time? I've found scientific statistics on them but nothing about care, feeding and such. It's frustrating because I have the same problem with killis  just when you have the spare time of course! 
Personally for the dog situation, a temporary fix could be plywood?


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## LittleBettaFish

If it's alright, I can answer your questions here. If you want detailed information on how I keep, feed, and breed my wilds, check out my blog. As it's been running for a number of years there is lots of info available. 

Red Wine Bettas - Blog

Basically I treat all my coccina complex wilds the same. 

A 5-10 gallon tank, dimly lit, heavily planted, dark substrate, water stained with tannins (this is very important if you want to see these fish at their best ALL the time and not just during courtship/spawning) is ideal for a breeding pair. Temperature on the cooler side at around 24-25 degrees celsius, and water needs to be soft and acidic with a pH of 6.0 or below (some hobbyists disagree with me on this point but then wonder why they struggle to get their fish consistently breeding). 

It's very easy to overfeed these fish. Don't power feed them like you would fancy bettas, or you'll end up with obese fish. They mature more slowly than fancy bettas, but while most fancy bettas seem to 'peak' very quickly, I had fish from this complex spawning weekly at over three years of age. I feed every couple of days, and the bulk of their diet is live/frozen mosquito larvae, frozen bloodworms, and frozen spirulina enriched brine shrimp. They _can_ be weaned onto pellets, but as my pairs tended to be constantly spawning and constantly fighting, I wanted them to be in peak physical condition, and I feel like even the best-quality pellet can't compare to the conditioning and healing powers of live foods. I only feed rich foods like blackworms and white worms sparingly, perhaps once a week if that. 

Basically, if you get their water conditions and diet right, they will thrive. Wilds are not difficult fish to keep. As long as you remember that they do best in set-ups that have been designed _specifically_ to meet their needs. Thinking they would be happy in a brightly lit iwagumi set-up for example, is foolish. 

Finally I want to offer a little tip. Many hobbyists have issues with shyness when it comes to this complex. This has never been a problem for me. With newly arrived fish, I will tap gently on the glass before I put food into the tank. I've found within a matter of days, even wild-caught fish will quickly associate the tap with food, and by extension, you with food. All of my wilds will come rushing to the front of the tank when they hear me tapping on the glass, and none of them, not even the wild-caught fish, have the slightest fear of me. In fact I usually have to push them away from me when I am doing maintenance. 

I thought of putting corrugated iron or something similar along the fence. But my idea was nixed by mum as she was worried about aesthetics. Never mind that she's never the one who has to try and catch Clio.


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## MysticSky22301

My water is very hard, it will be something like 7-7.5 when I move (yes I tested it) how can I fix that?

I do tap training with my fancy bettas ^^ it's very cute!

I'm going to be setting up a brine shrimp grow out I can't get many to survive in the gallon grow I use for my larger fry and the puffers. So I'm going set up a tote instead and try that XD I don't have white worms yet I do have Grindal worms and I'm going to set up a red worm culture 

What about driftwood? Plants? Can I feed them twice a day like my fancy bettas?


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## LittleBettaFish

If you want to keep the coccina complex wilds, you'll have to use RO water with a pH that high. The pH in some of these habitats can be as low as 4.0, and even captive bred fish will do best at a lower pH. While B. hendra is not as sensitive as some of species from this complex (such as B. miniopinna and B. persephone), I personally wouldn't go any higher than 6.5 with them. 

I like to use plants that do well in low lighting, low nutrient set-ups, and that can handle a low pH. Plants I have had success with, include java moss, anubias, water sprite, water wisteria, mayaca fluviatilis, duckweed, crypts, and java fern. 

Driftwood is fine. I use mostly Malaysian driftwood in my set-ups to provide cover. 

I only feed my wilds once a day. I've never seen the need to feed them twice daily. 

Hope that helps.


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## MysticSky22301

It does  thank you.
I may not be able to get RO water, but I have been looking into the water softening pillows for filters. I'll do some more research and see if I can do anything else

What about sponge filters?


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## LittleBettaFish

I use sponge filters in all my tanks. However, they are simply there to move the water around, as in such a low pH, the growth of beneficial bacteria is greatly inhibited. This is where the plants come in, as they help keep ammonia down.


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## MysticSky22301

I did some research, I can use peat moss to lower the hardness and pH which is much easier and (in my case) cheaper than going out and buy RO water every time they need a water change or an RO system 

The calcium carbonate adheres to the peat ( as does another element I can't remember right now) and can't flow back into the tank in a hanging filter, a bucket with a circulator or hanging filter would work to get everything balanced out between water changes ^^ so long as the water flows through the peat. It also releases a mild acid and tannins which helps with pH 

Considering the main killi fish I want is a peat spawner it works out and cuts my work load/ supply cost! It also darkens the water much like almond leaves do


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## LittleBettaFish

I'd definitely recommend testing your water regularly if you test the peat moss route. Based on what I've read online previously, it seems some hobbyists have great success using peat, and others struggle to keep their parameters stable long-term. I think that's why so many use RO water instead. Just easier I guess. 

Was just in the fish room and took a few photos before I fed everyone. 

Here's one of my B. uberis males putting on a show. 





































Followed by one of the smaller B. livida males. The realisation was made today that I _may _need to move this group into the 12 gallon long as there are so many of them, and they are one of the larger species from this complex. I also need to clean the inside glass on this tank if I want to take decent photos. 










Before wrapping up with a photo of my largest F2 B. coccina male. I was teasing him with the mirror trying to get a photo of his other side, as his blotch is larger. This photo is a terrible representation of his colour. In real life it's a similar tone to red wine. 










Now I just need to feed everyone and break-down and refill the B. hendra grow-out.


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## MysticSky22301

^^ I understand ease of use but money can be a big problem for me, I also keep hard water fish like guppies and snails so it's less hassle to do a couple of tanks with peat than use an RO system and have to add calcium to most of my other tanks

I saw 3 pairs of sangria (spelling?) on eBay today omg <3 ! 

Your ubris male seems to have a dark green spot on his side simaler to the coccina male? It's sort of hidden in his shine but I saw it in all the photos ^^


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## LittleBettaFish

Do you mean smaragdina? I kept a pair of Betta stiktos, a close relation, and they were very beautiful. 

And yes, he does in fact have a green spot underneath all that sheen. All the B. uberis males I've owned have shared this trait. You just don't notice it as much when they are fully coloured up. It tends to be more prominent when they are stressed or young.


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## LittleBettaFish

Okay this is getting ridiculous! Since I said I was going to stop breeding wilds, my fish have been doing nothing but! 

Today, I charged up the torch I use to check my fish for velvet (it's much brighter than the torch I usually use), and I discovered at least two B. miniopinna juveniles swimming around! This was after months and months of checking the tank and thinking that there wasn't a single fry to be found. I don't know if these are the only two youngsters, or there are more in there, but as the tank is too small for more than a breeding pair of wilds, it looks like I'm going to have to set-up a grow-out at some point. 

Meanwhile Zig-Zag has been continuously spawning, and it looks like my other Betta brownorum pair also spawned. Add to this the B. coccina and B. sp. api api fry that just seem to appear out of thin air, and I think it's going to be another seven years before I'm rid of everybody. 

Anyway, everyone has had a water change over the past couple of days, and I completely tore apart my F1/F2 B. sp. api api tank as the algae was getting out of control. It's pretty easy to remove by simply blasting the affected plants with the hose, and there's a couple of other tanks I need to do the same for. 

I am contemplating setting up my 12 gallon long again. If I move my F1/F2 B. sp. api api and F1 B. uberis tanks from the top shelf of my 1200mm wide rack, onto the top shelf of my tall 900mm wide rack, I can just fit the 12 gallon long next to my BBS hatchery. It's too nice a tank not to use, and at the moment it's just gathering dust in the top of my wardrobe. I just hope I haven't taken any chips out of the bottom, as I've tossed about a half a dozen tanks out to the shed for this exact reason (I will be cutting them up to use the glass as lids etc.) and it was a fairly expensive tank. 

After that, the decision would be what fish to stock it with. If Sundadanio axelrodi were still available here in Australia, I'd go with those to fit the SE Asian 'theme' of my fish room, but I may divide the tank in half with a sheet of filter sponge and use it to breed honey blue eyes. 

In other fish news, my goldfish's caudal has been slowly healing up now I replaced the main internal filter with a sponge filter. As I found it with its caudal fin pressed up against the intake of one of the remaining internal filters the other night (it was sleeping not stuck), I do think this is the cause of the damage. 

The injured goldfish has also shown an improvement in behaviour. Before, it was spending most of its time on the bottom of the tank, but as the caudal has started to heal, it's back to its previously boisterous self, and was actually chasing the other two around yesterday after being fed. 

I found a stockist in NZ that ships poret foam to Australia, so I will definitely be installing a Hamburg mattenfilter in their tank as soon as I can afford to. In the meantime, I am debating whether or not to put a stocking over the two intakes. I just worry that with the amount of waste the goldfish produce, it's going to quickly clog and make a mess. 

Finally, after all these years of trying, I got my goldfish to take blanched spinach! I was feeling guilty the other day after watching Solid Gold Aquatics on Youtube, so I clipped some in a peg and dropped it in. No one paid it any attention and I thought it was another failure until I came back later and found it gone. Then a couple days back I attached some the side of the tank and came down to find all three of them tearing at it. 

Unfortunately, I am starting to think that the camera needs a service. It just hasn't been focussing as sharply or as closely as it used to, and it's gotten slower and slower between the time it's taken one photo, and when it's ready to take another one (how many great opportunities I've missed thanks to that damn 'busy' signal!). So I only have a few photos to share, none of which I am happy with. 

This is my F1 B. coccina male, who is father to the male in the post above. He's huge because I always seem to run out of frozen foods when I get to this tank and a lot of the time they end up getting white worms instead. He absolutely dwarfs the female. 



















Then this is his female. Originally, I thought he had fully blinded her, but based on her reaction to him and other fish, and the fact she always seems to know when I am at the front of the tank, I think she can at least partially see. She's forever showing breeding stripes and chasing the males around, and today she was attacking the siphon, so I think she's adjusted very well to being visually impaired. 










Finally, the large leaf in this photo is from one of the Lilly Pillys in our front yard. I had read that these were fish safe, and they haven't caused my B. persephone any harm. I like the shape of them even if they don't release a great deal of tannins. The smaller leaves are from the paperbark down our sideway (also fish safe as I've used them for a couple of years now).


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## MysticSky22301

The leaves are really cool ^^ in the united States you have to be very careful, crops are sprayed relentlessly and the run off from fertilizer and pesticides and fungicide.. it's in everything even remotely close to farm land and urban areas. I simply order almond leaves when I realize I need them it's bad enough I trust the water company not to perge the system when I need to change tanks x.x 

I keep wondering if my puffers spawned? My larger one keeps guarding a little glass jar of Java moss for a few days at a time then interacting with the rest of the community as normal.i know you don't have puffers but it just Crossed my mind XD 

I joined a wild bettas community on Facebook, most people here keep "Mac" and Persephone I keep looking for a us breeder for the species' I want and can't find any. What's with all the hybrid bettas lately? They have popped up all over the place and I was convinced that hybridization wasn't common in the wild community?


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## LittleBettaFish

I don't worry too much about pesticides here. None of the neighbours are the types to be spraying chemicals around (our neighbours on one side have bees) and the trees are pretty far back from the road. 

I like IALs, but they break down too quickly and make a mess if you use them as leaf litter. Also, it becomes fairly expensive when you use as many as I do. Unfortunately, I don't live up north where I could easily grow an Indian Almond tree. The paperbark leaves take forever to break down (I swear I had some in one tank that were at least a year old) but they are so small and it takes a great deal of them to make leaf litter. I would use oak leaves (there's a tree outside my dad's house), but I don't like how they look. 

Lol I don't even think we can purchase freshwater puffers here. I know next to nothing about puffers and their courtship/spawning behaviour. But hopefully you've had a spawn. 

I'm not sure if the number of hybrids being produced has increased, or they are just being advertised more frequently on places such as FB and Aquabid. There's always been hybrids around, but it seems breeders from SE Asia are producing the bulk of them. Perhaps because pure wild stock is more easily obtained?


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## MysticSky22301

I have snails that munch the decaying leaves, once they aren't useful they get eaten XD so still useful

I should make a video of my little puffers ^^ I love these guys. I'm not sure if fry would survive the guppy gauntlet but if they ARE spawning periodically it means I'm doing something right ^^ in the videos of their behavior the male follows the female she chooses a spot and deposits an egg, he fertilizes it and they play tag again usually dropping the eggs around the same plant. the eggs are really big compared to the size of these fish o.o I was impressed it would be like a betta dropping eggs 3 times the usual size ( around the size of their eye) 

I mean it's possible. The fish are beautiful too but it's not really what I want. Hybrids only interest me as a neat little oddity to watch but I'd never breed them unless it was for a specific goal into my common domestic line. Although it would be cool to see what these hybrids produce for the domestic betta like the way the dragon trait was developed


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## LittleBettaFish

I have had issues with pest snails in the past because of the high level of mulm and organic waste in my tanks. It was an ongoing battle when I was running my Pseudomugil gertrudae tank as the mess they made was very visible on the sand substrate. I don't have anything to eat the snails, so it's basically a matter of me squashing them when I find them. I don't know how they manage to survive in such a low pH, although their shells do seem to become very fragile. 

Hybrids are beautiful, but my tastes run towards fish that haven't been altered from their original form. Nowadays, I find I don't even like man-made colour variations, or purposefully selecting for a trait (such as albinism) that would be detrimental/rare in the wild. 

Been a while since I've posted here, but rest assured everyone is doing well. 

I recently received close to 70 IALs from a hobbyist friend in exchange for a starter culture of white worms (this was more leaves than I was expecting but greatly appreciated by my fish). She lives nearby and was the breeder of Atlas, and the owner of my Betta sp. wajok male fondly known as 'Jar Fish'. The timing was great as it looks like my usual supplier of IALs was out of stock, so I've been able to add leaves to all the tanks. 

It doesn't seem like spawning has slowed down any! I'm finding more and more B. miniopinna fry each day, so I will be setting up a second tank in the next couple of weeks to move the pair into. My B. brownorum pair have spawned several times. I have yet to see any fry, but I don't doubt they are there, as this pair are good parents. I'm not sure if Zig-Zag is still spawning with his female, but he seems to vanish for days at a time, so I suspect he has been. I've also found young fish in my F1 B. sp. api api and F1/F2 B. coccina tanks that are too small to be runts, so I think they are fry that managed to survive. 

So, I guess we can say my plan to phase out of wilds has not been going well!

Meanwhile, a co-worker of my mum's purchased a betta recently, and yesterday we went to my LFS to pick up a new 11 litre tank, 25 watt heater, and anubias on a piece of driftwood. This is because Kevin only has a very small tank, and the current heater is non-adjustable and not heating to an adequate temperature. So I get to hear about what Kevin's been up to, and get bombarded with questions regarding his care. I did have to remain silent when it was suggested by the store employee that a single corydoras would do well in the 11 litre tank. Fortunately, my mum has learned a lot over the years (although I still get a lot of 'what's this fish' questions) and we didn't end up walking out with what would have likely been a doomed corydoras. 

I did spot a tank that I wanted while I was there. I'm not sure what the dimensions were, but it looked like an upsized 12 gallon long. It was $200, so I am going to have to find some way of justifying its cost, but it would be perfect for a small group of Melanotaenia pygmaea. 

There were also some Microdevario kubotai, which until recently I thought had been lost entirely from Australia (sadly no signs of sundadanio axelrodi), and a small number of CPDs. Both of which are way out of my budget. Unfortunately, we didn't have much time to look at fish, but we will be visiting there again in the near future to buy a tank for my B. miniopinna fry. 

In dog news, we've started working on Clio's reactivity again. We went to the local park yesterday, and they were inflating hot air balloons a few metres away. When the air balloons started taking off, she's not paying any attention to them. Instead, we are watching the man riding past on his bicycle. I seriously cannot predict what will set this dog off. Today there were more people around, and she didn't bark once, although you could see her thinking about it. I can definitely tell that she's staying under threshold more often now, as she is starting to get more reliable on her obedience when at the park. 

We took her to a show last weekend for socialisation and she was really well behaved. It's so frustrating that she can go to club, where there's dogs of dozens of different breeds everywhere and people shouting and making loud noises, and be relatively well behaved. However, she'll go crazy at a perfectly neutral person on a walk around the block. 

Meanwhile talking to show people about the importance of temperament and strong nerves is like talking to a wall. If someone says the words 'dark mask' to me one more time I may scream. Like I said to someone, what's the point in having a dog with a black face (it's a desirable trait in the show ring), if you have to stand miles away from everyone because it's reactive. 

To wrap this post up, I have some photos of my fish to share. 

First up is my F1 group of B. coccina. 










I like this photo the best. 










This is the mother of the above fish. She lives in a separate tank to them. 










Then this is a younger full sister to the fish in the first two photos. 










F1 B. uberis male.










Unfortunately I forgot to clean the glass in this tank before taking the photo, but this is my F1 B. coccina male. He's roughly the same age as the fish in the first two photos. He's the mate to the partially blind female from previous posts. 










Then last, but not least, my Betta hendra male sitting on a leaf.


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## MysticSky22301

I have the issue with barking from all 3 of my dogs but if you want to wait for them to realize " this person is OK" they are wonderfully affectionate and will smother you with cuddles. They react but non aggressively. 

I do understand the situation with weirdly reactive dogs. my dad has a miniature Pinscher that, after I moved out, took over the house. He's a jealous crabby dominating little jerk. He's not really mean but he makes anyone who isn't confident nervous. I walk in the house and he instantly behaves like a good dog should, probably because I did most of his obedience training from 8 weeks old. I've seen this little jerk push other dogs off my dad's lap, steal and hoard toys just because someone else was playing with them, and pout like a toddler because dad was holding my daughter. He also chooses what to bark at for a day, sometimes it's people, or something as simple as a plastic bag blowing down the road, then not bark at the person who walks up to the house unannounced 🙄

That leaf really gives a size comparison for Hendra o.o so little so much beauty in a teeny package!


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## LittleBettaFish

No photos for now, but there's some changes going on in the fish room. 

Yesterday, I purchased a new 61x30.5x37cm (odd dimensions) tank. It was rimless and braceless, and only cost me $50. Obviously the silicone work isn't as neat as the higher end brands, but I still think I got a bargain. 

This tank will be used for breeding Melanotaenia pygmaea, more commonly known as Pygmy Rainbowfish. I've been wanting these fish for a while, and they are finally back in stock. All that's going in this tank is a thin layer of ADA Colorado sand, some pieces of Melalueca root to provide an area of cover, a scattering of paperbark and native riparian leaves, and a spawning mop. I will be using crushed coral in the filter as I want to bring the pH up to around 6.8-7.0 so that it can be cycled since there will be no plants to absorb ammonia. 

I have a soon to be empty 10 gallon tank that will be used as potential (depends on how successful I am with breeding these fish) grow-out for young fry and juveniles. I'll likely be using native Hydrilla verticillata in the grow-out, as this is a fast growing, non-demanding plant. Depending on how successful I am with breeding these fish, I will probably purchase a second 61cm tank to house older juveniles and sub-adults. 

Because I want to dedicate my 900x600mm rack entirely to natives, it means I have to move three of my wild betta tanks. As I don't currently have space on my remaining two racks to fit these three tanks, I will be breaking down my three separate B. sp. api api tanks, and moving all of the fish in them, into my 12 gallon long. 

As my 900x600mm rack is only 900mm tall, I will be swapping out the uprights for the 1800mm ones. This will then give me an extra shelf to work with, and means I have the space to house a second group of Australian (or even PNG) natives. As much as I want to dive into the world of Rhadinocentrus ornatus, I sadly don't have the room to house multiple 15 gallon tanks. So it's likely I'll go with Pseudomugil gertrudae, although I would like to work with a different strain/locality than my previous groups. 

I've also got to move my Betta hendra group into a 10 gallon tank. Originally, I was only going to move the young fish into this tank, but to save space and discourage the original pair from spawning I've decided to move the whole group across. I'm also planning to move my Betta miniopinna group into a larger tank in the next week or two. There's simply too many fish for that small a tank. 

I've got a parcel due for delivery today. It includes my new air pump, Ocean Nutrition Formula One pellets, Ocean Nutrition brine shrimp eggs, a sponge filter for my rainbowfish tank, 10 metres of airline tubing, and the Sera ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate test kits. My wild betta fry and juveniles have been without BBS for about a week now, so I'm going to get the hatchery set-up as quickly as possible and give them a good feed tomorrow. I'm also eager to see how my wilds take to the Ocean Nutrition pellets. I know my F1 Betta livida group take pellets, and I don't think it will be too difficult to transition some of the other fish across, especially the younger fish as they try to eat anything that goes into their tank. 

My goldfish are still doing well. I've been doing 25% water changes twice a week and once the new test kits arrive, I will be checking to make sure this is enough to keep the nitrates at an acceptable level. My injured goldfish was _this_ close to being fully healed, and then it went and tore its caudal up on the filter intake again. I'm considering purchasing a couple of extra large sponge filters to replace the remaining internal filters, until I can get a Hamburg matten filter installed. I'm just not certain whether sponge filters will provide enough biological filtration for three six inch shubunkin. 

Other than that, my skin on the left side of my face has had a complete breakdown. I have these three horribly inflamed blind pimples on my left cheek, and this is after I had a very swollen and painful pimple on my lip, and another further up my cheek. The only explanation I have is that recently I have been supporting that side of my face with my hand while using the laptop. It could also be caused by the extra dust in the air from renovations. I can't even disguise them with make-up because you can see the lump. It looks and feels terrible, and I'm concerned about scarring, as I already have scarring from similar pimples in the past (even when I didn't pick at them). 

What makes it even more frustrating is that I finally worked out the triggers for my acne and got it under control. I hadn't had a new pimple in ages, my skin was clearing up, I was almost to the point where I felt like I could go to the shops with bare skin without feeling self-conscious. 

I swear, the older I get, the worse my skin gets. I can't even remember having anything more than the odd pimple when I was younger, but now my skin is so dry and sensitive. I remember I tried a cheaper brand of BB cream once and I had to get home and wash it off as my skin felt like it was burning. 

I'm not even going to talk about Clio after she disgraced herself at dog club last weekend. Suffice to say there's still a very long road ahead with her.


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## LittleBettaFish

Unfortunately, the pellets were a failure. Most of the fish struggled with them, and they were much too large for the younger fish. I was afraid someone was going to choke, or even break their jaw trying to get them down. So it's definitely back to the drawing board. I think realistically my options are flake food (which caused bloating and swim bladder problems in my wilds previously), Golden Pearls (have no experience with this food and not sure how easy it is to source), or Repashy (still expensive and supply seems sporadic at best into Australia due to strict quarantine regulations). 

However, I was able to use my new test kits to determine that the pH in my goldfish tank had crashed, leading to a reading of .5ppm of ammonia. Nitrates were also high, so I'm going to have to rethink how I can perform large water changes without causing a massive crash in pH. I think adding more crushed coral to the filter, and also using Seachem Neutral Regulator (or a similar product) is my only option. I will say I was impressed with the Sera test kits, even though they were slightly more fiddly than the API test kits I've used previously. 

I also underestimated the size of the sponge filter I will be using in my rainbowfish tank as you can see in the photo below. This is the 61cm tank set-up and waiting to be filled. As this is a breeding tank and not a display tank, I wanted a layout that would still make the fish feel comfortable, but that would be easy to clean, and where spawning outside the mops provided would be discouraged. One thing I do want to add, are some large river pebbles. I also wish I had more of this wood! I think it is mangrove wood, but I've yet to find anything that looks like this in other stores, and the store I purchased it from changed hands and all they seem to sell is the usual Malaysian driftwood and Goldvine. 










I'm going to get this tank filled today, and I will be ordering the fish early next week. It's been months since I purchased any new fish, and as I've been after this species for a while now, I can't wait to see them in the flesh. 

I did take some photos of my fish while I was in my fish room this afternoon. They got a good feed yesterday, and I had freshly hatched brine shrimp for the youngsters, so everyone was happy. 

First two photos are of my F1 Betta coccina group. 



















Then this is their mother chasing one of their younger siblings. 










Shiny flaring at a pen. This was one of the tanks I moved the other day. It's now on the bottom shelf, which makes taking photos much easier as I don't need to get up on the step ladder. 










Shiny's brother in the neighbouring tank. 










Shiny's sister and breeding partner. 










F1/F2 Betta coccina tank. I also moved this tank from my 900x600mm rack onto the bottom shelf of my 1200x600mm rack. There's a lot of mulm on the bottom of this tank mixed in with the sphagnum moss, so it needs a bit of a clean.


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## Nimble

Golden Pearls SHOULD be pretty easy to source. I get mine via eBay relatively inexpensively, but I don't know how things work in getting it to Australia. Best of luck.


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## LittleBettaFish

Unfortunately, I don't believe (could be wrong), you can bring ornamental fish foods into Australia without it being a real headache, and financially out of reach for the casual hobbyist. Although it's _totally_ okay to import frozen prawns and subsequently infect our domestic prawn stocks with whitespot. 

I think this is why the supply of Repashy is so sporadic. Apparently back in late 2016, AQIS decided that the Grub Pie food needed treatment to be allowed import into Australia. The product then had to be recalled as it was adversely affected by the treatment and I have yet to see it come back into stock. 

I have seen Golden Pearls available here, but I'm just not sure if they are a regular import.


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## wildborneo

I am using Hikari Micro-Pellet, which can be crashed into powder form easily & the F1 fishes love them but not all the wilds. Some of the wild F0 will only stick to live food.


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## MysticSky22301

Why not make your own gel foods from dried insects, zukini, spinach, spirulina and gelatin? Or if you can raise your own bugs like I do they work well too. My Bettas love my "snello" I only add calcium because it's the main diet for my Mystery snails but packing it with insect protein would work wonders as a staple for betta  
I powder the dry insects and set them aside, blend the raw zukini and spinach until smooth and heat the veggie purée until it bubbles, fold in the dry ingredients and add 2-3 packets of dry gelatin per 4 oz of veggie purée 
Pour it in a baking dish or cookie sheet with raised sides, tap on a flat surface to remove bubbles and pop it in the freezer for half an hour before cutting


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## LittleBettaFish

None of my wilds have shown any interest in pellets crushed into a powder. They just stare at it, confused, until it sinks to the bottom, and then they all wait for me to put their frozen/live food in. 

I do think the coccina complex is one of the worst to try and wean onto pellets. I never had any issues transitioning my larger mouthbrooders or even my Betta stiktos onto pellets.

Just saw your post MysticSky. The idea with feeding pellets is not just to cut costs, but also to simplify my life. I don't want to go to the hassle of making foods, particularly as I spent ages making gel food for my goldfish once and all they did was spit it out. Now we have the four dogs, they consume a lot of time I previously dedicated to my fish. 

Today I decided to move my Betta miniopinna group into their new tank before the pair had the chance to spawn again. I got the breeding pair and larger fry moved across easily enough. However, there were a number of fry that were maybe 5mm total length. Trying to find them in among the sphagnum moss and mulm was challenging to say the least. 

Finally, after about half an hour of staring at the bottom of the tank with a bright light, I thought I'd caught everyone, so I poured the remaining tank water into a bucket. I then cleaned their tank out with white vinegar and poured this white vinegar into the bucket as well. I had the bucket out on the front porch ready to tip it out on the garden, when I see a single fry swimming around in there. With this last fry netted, I have ten Betta miniopinna fry total. This is about double what I was expecting, although still not as many as there should be, which does still make me suspect one of the adults is eating the eggs or fry. 

I also moved my Betta hendra group into a 10 gallon tank. It gives them a few gallons of extra space, and more horizontal swimming space. All the plants in their tank were in very good shape (the anubias had at least doubled in size), so all this tank needs is some IALs and time for the plants to fill in. 

My rainbowfish tank is also filled, and I put my order in for the fish today, so hopefully I can have them before the end of the week.


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## LittleBettaFish

My Melanotaenia Pygmaea are getting sent out next week. I'm hoping I can have them in hand by Tuesday. At the moment, their tank is a cloudy mess, and while I was trying to remedy it, I moved the wood from where I had it, so lucky I took a photo before I filled it. 

Meanwhile, my wild bettas are doing well with all the moving about. It looks like at least my larger Betta miniopinna fry have survived the move. The male is still taking some time to settle in, although he's been chasing the female around and responding to her advances, so I think it was mostly the strong bubbling from the sponge filter that was disturbing him. 

My Betta hendra are also doing really well in their new tank. The young males are showing the best colouration I've seen on them, and there's enough room for the males to carve out their own little territories. 










I think this is the wild-caught/original female. 



















My Betta sp. api api group also seems to have settled in well. I'm seeing some intense red on the F2 males, although I think the F2 males were a bit shell-shocked at first, when they were suddenly surrounded by all these mature males. 

This is one of my adult F1 males. 










F2 male chasing off what I think is one of the runty F1 females. Although it could also be his sister. 










F1 male. 










Finally, one of my beautiful F1 females. As you can see, this IAL is a hotly disputed territory.


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## MysticSky22301

These guys are adorable, next to the almond leaf you can see how tiny they are ^^


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## LittleBettaFish

Especially considering that the IAL is probably only about 6 inches long. 

I received an email this morning letting me know that my Melanotaenia Pygmaea were being shipped out today. As it's overnight shipping, they _should_ arrive tomorrow. I'm hoping they handle the trip well, and like their new tank. I'm determined to stick it out with the rainbowfish this time around, as I have more room for them than I have had in the past. 

I've also got some Seachem Neutral Regulator coming to help remedy the problem of the pH crashing (and the cycle subsequently stalling) in my goldfish tank every time I do a large water change. Until it arrives, I'm holding off on water changes as I don't want to temporarily raise the pH (pH of our tapwater is higher than that of the tank) and increase the toxicity of any ammonia present. This is why I hate fiddling around with pH/hardness. It's such a delicate balancing act trying to get everything right. 

I also ordered the Sera pH test kit as my API test kit is fairly old and I think I've accidentally caused some cross-contamination with the solution in the past. The Sera test kit supposedly can measure down to 4.5, so I'm interested to see where the pH on my wild betta tanks sits.

In other news, we had a horrible experience at the local park on Saturday. We took Clio for a walk and she was doing well until we had a loose Boston Terrier looking dog (this park has signs *everywhere* telling owners that their dogs must be on lead) comes running up to her. Clio of course, starts barking and lunging at this dog, which just kept coming until my mum physically stopped it. Then my mum starts a yelling match with the owner (which did not help the situation) who then starts yelling at us that we shouldn't have a vicious dog at the park. 

By the time the man left, I was in tears. I was angry at the man, angry at myself, and angry at Clio. At this point, I don't know if I want another German Shepherd. This breed definitely has problems with reactivity, especially around other dogs, and as I suffer very badly from anxiety, I need an 'easy' dog. One that I can take a walk around the block without having to be on constant alert for potential triggers. If all four dogs were like Eos and Ares, it would make life so much easier. Even though they don't want to be best friends with other dogs, it's only an issue if the dog gets right up in their face, and even then, they aren't likely to start a fight unless the other dog instigates it. Most importantly, they don't feed off my anxiety, especially Ares. Much as I try to relax with Clio, it's impossible to do so when I know how she will react if she is triggered by something. 

Given that we've tried positive only methods, and progress has been inconsistent at best (I wonder if it's purely coincidence that I rarely, if ever see extremely reactive adult German Shepherds in positive only training videos), and as dealing with strange dogs is basically a necessity in the suburbs, we are going to be purchasing a 'dominant dog collar', to hopefully control her outbursts better. Obviously, it's suppressing rather than addressing the behaviour, but my thought is that if I can stop the reaction before it starts, get her focus back on me, and break that cycle of seeing another dog and immediately going over threshold, it will do more good and cause her a great deal less stress than continuing as we are. The outbursts also need to stop, because I know how terrifying it would be to have an out of control 25kg German Shepherd barking and lunging at you. 

I'm sure I've said this on here before, but I've never both loved and been exasperated by a dog as much as I have with Clio. I mean some days I just want to leave her tied to a tree in the park, but then we'll be sitting together and I'll be holding her paw, and the barking and the reactivity is forgotten. 

How could you not love this cheeky face?


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## sabrinah

Have you tried resistance training for reactivity? My favorite trainers (k9-1 specialized dog training) have a video about it on YouTube. My dog is both reactive and aggressive and it does work if you're consistent with it


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## LittleBettaFish

I just searched on Youtube, and found a website (I think it's the same business) and I'm slightly confused by this method? Can you explain it a little for me?


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## sabrinah

It goes by the basic principle that dogs will resist the direction they're pulled in. This is one of the reasons why harnesses are the worst things for training dogs. If you pull on the dog, the dog pulls in the opposite direction. In phase one of training the dog is given the "place" command (it means to go to his raised bed and stay on it) and he's given gentle pressure forwards. If he moves forward he's told "no" and placed back in the proper position. Soon the dog will stay in place and not move when gentle pressure is put on the leash from any direction. It is then retaught in a "sit" and a "down". Then, when a trigger is seen, the dog is placed in a "sit" and the leash is pulled gently towards the trigger. The dog resists the pull and stays firmly in place. Duration is built up gradually, so the dog should only hold position for a couple seconds initially, be freed and rewarded, then immediately put back in position. If the dog breaks position and lunges, you need to shorten the duration between being freed and rewarded. They have a full training session on YouTube if you want to see it in action. There's a particularly reactive pup in that video that breaks repeatedly but eventually he starts getting it.

So once you taught Clio that putting her in a "place", "sit", or "down" has an automatic "stay" attached to it and she doesn't move when pressure it put on the leash in any direction for a fairly long duration, you would apply it outside. If you see a dog, put her in a "sit" (or whatever position you like) and pull her leash towards the dog. Free her, reward her, and place her back in to the "sit." If she breaks and lunges guide her back in to the sit and have her hold it for a shorter duration before rewarding next time. Eventually you'll be able to have her sit and resist the pull of the leash towards the dog for the entire duration of time it take the dog to walk past.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks for explaining, I will have to have a look further into it. My only concern is that in the video I watched, none of the dogs were hitting anywhere near the level of arousal Clio reaches when she sees another dog. She gets so over threshold she's almost frothing at the mouth, and there's no way to guide her back into a sit. Are you supposed to start with the triggers at a distance after the initial commands have been taught? I'm just wondering what happens with those dogs that when they see the trigger and pressure on the leash is applied, they continue to blow through the command and any correction that is given to get them back into a sit/drop? Do you just up the correction or increase the distance? 

I actually have already been working on implied stays with sit, down, and stand on and off lead, but have admittedly slacked off with her training after being a bit disheartened with her reactivity. The main obstacle to proofing her obedience outside of the house is getting to a place where there are plenty of distractions, but where I can still put distance between us and any potential triggers if she does have a meltdown. I don't have a license because of my anxiety, so I have to rely on my mum to drive me around. Unfortunately, we have been butting heads recently over the dogs, because almost all of their care is left to me, and I personally don't feel we have been adequately meeting their mental or physical needs over the past few months. I do think this most recent incident helped to drive home how much of an issue Clio's reactivity is, so hopefully I can get her more on board with working this out. 

It's just frustrates me, because you have these people rabbiting on that it's 100% how you raise them. I feel this is an unfair judgement for owners with reactive dogs, as Clio was _already_ exhibiting this behaviour as an eight week old puppy, and so we couldn't even begin to socialise her in the same manner with did with previous dogs. 

However, it's not _all_ doom and gloom. Clio hasn't barked at a person for months now, and it's only been this dog, and a couple of dogs at club that she's barked at recently, and she was acting weirdly at club prior to that so that was a mistake on our part for not noticing earlier that she was very stressed (I know when she's stressed as she stops listening and starts obsessively sniffing). It's just when she does react it's so over the top that it tends to eclipse any earlier successes.


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## sabrinah

I believe all those dogs had gone through previous training with the company before, and they had been taught the process before so it definitely wasn't their first time practicing. You would start at a distance. While this company does use prong collars they never advocate strong corrections. There's actually a video where the owner puts on a dog costume and a prong collar and gives the leash to a dog to yank around. Corrections are always gentle and are aimed to be not much more than incredibly annoying. It's pretty much a bunch of quick, light pulses on the leash. They call them "onion chops." If the dog fails repeatedly training has moved too fast and you need to take a couple steps back in training and increase the distance from other dogs. It can be a major pain in the butt to get the hang of it but it does work if you can stick with it. If I can't handle the stress of it (I have anxiety and depression) I do my best to run away from the other dog, and use treats to keep my dog from turning around and lunging. I've also found it works to throw a treat on the ground a few steps ahead of us and tell him to "find it" so he's more focused on the food than the dogs while we escape. I can't recall whether Clio is food motivated or not so I'm not sure if that would work for you. 

I can understand huge reactions eclipsing success. There's this horrible guy in my neighborhood that I call "brown dog guy" and even though he is well aware that my dog is highly reactive and not the least bit friendly, he will follow behind us for an entire walk (an hour), cut us off on the sidewalk, or let his dog run all over my yard when I'm trying to get my dog home. It doesn't help that my dog already had an immediate hatred for this dog even before the guy became a problem. He screws us over at least 3 times a week.


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## LittleBettaFish

I thought they had prong collars on. Prong collars are actually illegal here, which is why we were looking at the dominant dog collar. We can use the dominant dog collar at club and at the vet then. An e-collar was an option but the quality models are pretty expensive and I am concerned about how Clio would handle a correction from one. Plus I'm not sure if I'm coordinated enough to use one. I had enough trouble with the clicker, which is why I started using 'YES' instead. Unfortunately, Clio isn't highly food motivated. I mean I do marker training and use food as rewards, but even in low distraction environments it's not always enough. 

Honestly, I don't understand why some dog owners are like that with reactive dogs. If I see a reactive dog when I'm out on a walk, I keep as *far* away from that dog as possible, not only because I know what it's like as the owner of a reactive dog, but also because I don't know just how under control the other dog is. It's like the man with the loose dog the other day. He made no real effort to call it back until my mum started yelling at him. I always think these people have never seen a serious dog fight, and don't understand, especially in the case of a large breed vs a small breed, just how quickly serious injuries can happen. Our older two girls have fought in the past, and even though it's never been with the intent to kill, it's still resulted in stitches.


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## sabrinah

I actually have a dominant dog collar, which my dog wears with his prong collar most of the time just in case the prong collar pops open. They do work wonderfully, but sizing can be a pain. I did have to exchange it for a smaller size and it's seemed to stretch out a bit since I got it so it slides down now instead of remaining at the top of the neck. It's very sturdy though and you'll never have to worry about it breaking or slipping over the head. I highly recommend them. They're also super easy to wash if your dog has a habit of rolling in stinky things! Are Starmark collars available there?


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah, I watched a couple videos on correctly fitting a dominant dog collar and sizing it correctly. I'll definitely be erring on the smaller side. 

Unfortunately, I think a collar with any sort of prong action to it is banned. It looks like the Starmark collar is a plastic prong?


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I'm going to be putting in a plant order over the weekend, so I can _finally_ start replacing the Mayaca fluviatilis in my wild betta tanks with watersprite. I'm also going to be ordering a couple of bunches of Hygrophila difformis and a number of Cryptocoryne lutea (I actually wanted wendtii 'green' but that was out of stock) for my B. livida tank. I plan on emulating a photo I found online with the crypts, and the wisteria will be used to keep the water quality in check. I also plan on getting several Anubias barteri (I would have preferred Anubias coffeefolia but again that was out of stock). Eventually, I want to have Anubias and Watersprite/Wisteria (going to see how the latter does) growing in all of my wild betta tanks. 

With all these new plants, I will need to get some proper lighting. This time around, I will also be dosing liquid fertiliser, as I want to encourage fast and healthy growth. Finally, I will be installing some backgrounds on my tanks, as I hate being able to see the wall behind and all the power cords/airline tubing when I am trying to take photos! 

I figure it's going to be years before all my wilds are gone and I don't want to be staring at a bunch of algae-ridden tanks in the meantime. 

Other than that, it seems I have finally got my goldfish tank back on track. With the arrival of my Sera pH test kit on Tuesday, I now have a full set of test kits again, so I have been closely monitoring the parameters in this tank. After I added about a fistful of crushed coral, the pH has increased and is now sitting stable at around 7.0. I also now have Seachem Neutral Regulator on hand, so I will be making sure this keeps the pH stable after large water changes. Ammonia has gone back down to 0ppm now the pH is higher, and the nitrates are back under control with a couple of 40 litre water changes. 

Unfortunately, I've now been having issues with ammonia in my rainbowfish tank. They arrived safe and sound after a two day travel, but even with frequent 50% water changes, the test kit keeps telling me their ammonia levels are dangerously high, as in fish should be showing signs of extreme distress, high. However, the fish seem fine. They're eating, swimming around, and I caught the male showing off to the biggest female. So I've taken a chunk of filter media from the goldfish tank and stuck it to their sponge filter, and I'll see if this doesn't help. I simply can't see how how five relatively small fish can produce so much ammonia in such a short space of time. 

I definitely think I'm going to need to keep spare cycled media on hand if I'm going to be keeping/breeding rainbowfish. 

I also tested the pH in my F0 B. brownorum tank with my new test kit, as it supposedly can measure down to 4.5. According to this, my B. brownorum tank is sitting at 5.5. So I'm going to test the rest of my tanks and see what the results are. It might give me some answers as to why some tanks have produced more males and vice versa. 

Apart from that, there's not been much happening with the fish. I've got no photos to share at present, as I'll be doing water changes today and tomorrow and it tends to make the water cloudy. 

Clio's being her usual bratty self. She did have a few good days at the park last weekend. We got rushed by two off lead Schnauzers, but I had her turned away and going in the opposite direction this time. The owner was also a lot more understanding about her reactivity and even asked if we wanted to bring her over to meet his dogs. Meanwhile Clio isn't barking at the dogs. No, she's barking because mum stayed behind to talk to the man and she's not happy about it! 

I've also discovered that Clio seems to like it when I act crazy. As in I will just start randomly running when we've been walking up until that point, or I'll start walking funny, or even encourage her to run and play on lead. I've also been working on her obedience at home and been incorporating a lot more obedience into our walks, but in a way that she finds challenging, like a drop stay on a narrow bench. 

I know as soon as she goes into that sort of frenzied head down sniffing, she's feeling stressed and it's time to end whatever we are doing on a good note. So I've been watching out for that behaviour a lot more now, as this seems to be when she's more likely to react to another dog. 

I think we're going to club on Sunday, so I'm going to take the Jolly Ball toy that she loves and really try to get her fully focused on me. Club is always a challenge for her. She actually does better at shows, and when there are a lot of dogs around, but if there's only a few people and their dogs, that's when she tends to have issues. Club has always been where she's least responsive, so I really want to change that.


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## LittleBettaFish

I've finally caught up on all my water changes. It's a good thing too, as it turns out the heater to the F1/F2 B. coccina tank was unplugged. I have a feeling it may have been unplugged since I moved the tank onto that rack as the cord was curled up behind the tank. Fortunately, we haven't been getting down into single digits overnight yet, although we've had a few cold and miserable days. Everyone looks healthy and is behaving normally, so hopefully no damage has been done. 

I went to the aquarium yesterday and picked up some Hikari frozen spirulina brine shrimp, Ocean Nutrition Formula One flakes, and a 3L bag of ADA Malaya. I think I'm going to ring around and see if any local stores stock the Ocean Nutrition frozen formula foods. They look to be a more balanced alternative for my wilds, as at the moment they are surviving almost solely off frozen bloodworms and brine shrimp (although I will say that the smaller wilds do surprisingly well on such limited diets). 

I'm going to order the lights and plants later this week. I'm glad I did some further research on the cheaper LEDs I was originally considering. I thought the price was too good to be true, and even though the manufacturer states they are meant for use in planted aquariums, after doing some reading it appears that they grow algae far better than they grow live plants. 

I've also got the urge to try my hand at Boraras Brigittae, as well as either Celestial Pearl Danios or the Emerald Dwarf Rasbora. I've got a shelf spare on my rack that I can fit three 10 gallon tanks. I keep seeing them in fish stores, and I would love to do some biotope style set-ups. 

Watching Rachel O'leary's Youtube channel is a form of torture. So few of the species she features are in Australia, and most will likely never reach our shores unless illegally imported. But that's okay, we still allow the import of livebearers and goldfish into the country. I mean it's not like a _goldfish_ is a risk to the environment. 

Meanwhile, I've got the ammonia down to 0ppm in the Pygmy rainbowfish tank with the help of a sponge filter taken from my goldfish tank. They're still frustratingly skittish, but hopefully that will settle with time. They have been taking pellets and flake food, as well as live and frozen, so at least they are easy enough to feed. I just wish I could get a photo of the male coloured up, as he is very striking. 

Speaking of photos, I've only got a few to share from this afternoon. I'd just done water changes and everyone is hungry so they weren't particularly cooperative. 

This is my original wild-caught B. coccina male. 










Then just a couple photos of his female. 










That's the male in the background of this photo likely chasing one of his many offspring. 










In dog news, we went to the park on Sunday, not realising that there was a fundraising walk organised. There were people everywhere, and at one point we had to sort of join in the walk with Nike. Nike is fine around people, but while we were alongside the path, a dog went past within about a metre. This is _extremely_ close proximity for Nike, and although she hackled up slightly, she was wagging her tail and looked more excitable than murderous. We did have a couple of young boys ask if they could pat her. While Nike's been handled many times by strangers at shows and at the vet, I prefer not to let her be approached too closely, especially by kids as she did have issues in the past. It's a shame we didn't have Ares (he was suffering from an upset stomach) as it would have made his day to get a pat. For a dog that has had almost no exposure to children, he is absolutely bombproof with them. 

It made me laugh as they make a big deal about the 'crowd test' at breed survey, and all it is, is a very small group of people that basically just mill about. I think what Nike did on Sunday was much more challenging test of character, and I personally think even pet quality animals should be able to handle that sort of environment without turning into a reactive mess. Sadly at this point in time, Clio would certainly fail that test.


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## MysticSky22301

You've been busy XD

My fish room is nuts right now too, I have a visitor, a baby bunny( who was obviously dehydrated and abandoned when I found him) and a new species addition! My Nematolebias papiliferus Inoa arrived and about 12 fry hatched out over 3 days.

I'm glad to see something is working for Cleo it's wonderful to hear ^^


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## LittleBettaFish

Only busy recently. I've admittedly been very slack in the fish room of late. 

I checked out those Nematolebias papiliferus Inoa just now. They are a very striking looking fish. Did you get sent eggs? 

I'm just taking it one day at a time with Clio. We've got club on Sunday, so we'll see how she handles herself there. That's definitely where we have the most issues. 

Meanwhile back in the fish room, it seems that the Ocean Nutrition Formula One flakes are a success. All but my B. hendra group will eat them, and I haven't seen any fish suffering from bloating or 'floatiness' so far. I'm hoping I can use this as the staple of their diet, and then supplement with live and frozen foods. 

There will be some photos posted later today. I just have to wait for my camera battery to charge.


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## MysticSky22301

Yes they sent me approximately 30 eggs, so far only one 11 or 12 are willing to hatch. I'll wait a couple weeks and try again I've cleaned out a 10g for them when they are bigger except for the mystery snails XD So. Many. Snails. 
I hope to eventually offer eggs to others ^^ they take about 10 weeks to develop so they grow slower than some of the other killies
I need to vacuum the fish room, with a baby bunny I have wood shavings EVERYWHERE lol. I also need to order heat packs before I offer my Bettas for sale on eBay and before long I need to figure out how to ship Cory's o.o with 50 fry growing quickly I'll be overrun * again checks prices of a rack system and my wallet *


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## LittleBettaFish

I've always stuck with the killifish species that would happily spawn in a mop. I was far too impatient to wait the time needed to incubate the peat spawning fish. Are yours annuals, or are they more long-lived? 

Because the cats share my fish room, I have to vacuum it at least twice a week as kitty litter gets everywhere, and as we use crystals, it hurts when you step on it or kneel in it. 

I was just in the fish room testing the water in my rainbowfish tank (parameters are finally spot on although the pH is a little low still), when I thought I'd check the spawning mops. As the rainbowfish spend about 99% of their time hiding, and as there's been issues with the water quality, I wasn't expecting to find anything. Surprisingly, there was around 20 eggs in one of the mops (they seem to prefer the mop on the bottom of the tank). I've set-up a small hatchery tank, so in another week or two, maybe I'll start seeing some fry appearing.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think I've collected close to 100 eggs from my rainbowfish group over the past few days. I picked 34 eggs off the spawning mops yesterday, and will be checking them again today. 

If all these eggs hatch I'm definitely going to have to add an extra shelf to this rack, and likely buy a couple more 15 gallons to serve as grow-outs. 

Unfortunately, the fish are still extremely skittish and whenever I'm in the room they tend to hang out at the back of the tank and glass surf. The tank is now consistently reading 0ppm for both ammonia and nitrite, and the pH is exactly 7.0, so water conditions spot on. They have a voracious appetite and are obviously happy and healthy as they are spawning. I am wondering if it's the tank location, as it's only knee high and I do tend to cast shadows over the tank, which I read they don't like. This is exactly why I stopped keeping rainbowfish in the past. I've never had any issues with my wild bettas, yet every time I've kept rainbowfish, they've always spent all their time hiding.

Speaking of wild bettas, there's still been no issues with feeding flake food. Some fish are still refusing to eat them, but I'm hoping with time and some 'persuasion', they will eventually take to the flake. Funnily enough, the rainbowfish won't touch the flake food. They much prefer the Formula One pellets, although I think maybe I should choose a more vegetable based food for them. One thing I did underestimate, was how much flake food I use each feeding. I think I'm going to have to invest in a larger container next time. 

I've put my plant order in (10 bunches of Watersprite, 5 Anubias paco, 5 Cryptocoryne lutea, and 5 bunches of Water wisteria), so hopefully that will arrive later this week. I still have to order the lights, as the store I was originally intending to purchase from, won't ship them to my location. Frustrating, as they had the best price, and a flat shipping rate. 

This brings me to my next question. Has anyone on here tried a hydrogen peroxide dip for new plants? I want to kill any potential bacteria and parasites, as I certainly don't want to have velvet infect my fish again. I'm just wondering how effective a hydrogen peroxide dip actually is. 

Not much else to report from the fish room. I still want to set-up biotope style aquariums for Boraras brigittae, Celestial Pearl Danios, and perhaps even some Emerald Dwarf Rasbora, but those plans have to be put on hold until I work out how much space my rainbowfish are going to require. 

I did take a couple of photos while I was in my fish room earlier today. They're just of my dominant F1 B. uberis male.


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## MysticSky22301

I did find out the killies are technically annuals but will survive longer in an aquarium because it doesn't dry out ^^


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## LittleBettaFish

I picked another 20 or so eggs out of the spawning mop last night. I'm starting to see a lot of eyed up eggs in the hatchery tank, so I think I might have to get another 15 gallon tank sooner rather than later. 

I took a few photos this morning while I was checking on everyone. I've been fiddling with the settings on the camera to see what works best for my wild bettas. 

First up is the matriarch of my B. coccina tank, and the only fish in my fish room that is makes photos easy. 










Followed by 'Trouble', my F1 B. brownorum male. This tank is where most of the new plants will be going. 










Then we have Trouble's mother. It's next to impossible to catch her with her ventrals down and her fins not clamped. 










F1 B. uberis male again. 










The lighting in these photos was weird, but this is Shiny and his female. Of course I managed to miss all the best shots.


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## LittleBettaFish

I saw something odd occurring in my B. brownorum tank. The female was flaring at the B. coccina group in the tank over, when I noticed several small white objects falling to the bottom of the tank. I'm wondering if they were eggs she expelled, as she was very plump, and they were promptly eaten. 

I did manage to snap a quick (but not very good) photo. 










Meanwhile, I've got my BBS hatchery bubbling away ready to be fed in another couple of hours. 










I also got some more photos of my fish, including my B. miniopinna female. 










A diminutive B. hendra. 










And finally, a few of my B. livida group (I can't wait to get this tank planted up with wisteria and crypts as the Mayaca Fluviatilis has seen better days). 



















I also picked up a bottle of Hydrogen peroxide at the supermarket to use as a dip for my new plants. After doing some reading, it doesn't sound like it should harm as the plants as long as I don't leave them stewing in it.


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## wildborneo

what is a spawning mop?
are u separating the eggs from the parent fish and hatch them separately?
I manage to scoop a little of fries before they swam free to prevent them from eaten up by the older fries. The parent fish tend not to spawn further until the older fries are removed from the tank.


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## MysticSky22301

Let us know how the peroxide works ^^


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## LittleBettaFish

A spawning mop is a 'mop' made of yarn that egg-scattering species of fish will lay their eggs on. They are very commonly used by rainbowfish breeders. 

I don't remove eggs or fry from my wild betta tanks. I just let the fry grow alongside their parents and siblings and only separate them if the tank starts getting too overstocked. I've never been interested in producing large numbers of fry as I don't have the space to grow them out separately. If I don't remove fry, I tend to end up with between 10-50 fish reaching maturity. Cannibalism by larger siblings does seem to keep numbers down. 

I do however, remove the eggs from my rainbowfish tanks as they will often pick through the mops and eat them. They are not like bettas, in that they provide paternal care to their offspring. 

Unfortunately, I have some bad news to share. I lost almost all of my rainbowfish eggs to fungus, even the fertilised ones. I have moved the remaining eggs into a small hatching container with strong aeration, some methylene blue to prevent fungus, and have partially covered the tank as I have read the eggs can be light sensitive. I also picked about 30 new eggs from the mop today, so hopefully I can get at least some fry hatching as this is the method I've used previously with my Pseudomugil gertrudae. 

I also got an email notifying me that my Anubias Paco will _not_ be arriving with the rest of my plants tomorrow. They will be getting sent separately at some unspecified date, which I hope is sooner rather than later. 

I've still got to work out the proper dosage/dilution for the Hydrogen Peroxide. I certainly don't want to cause the crypts any excuse to start melting. 

I'm about to turn in for the night, but I've got a photo of my B. hendra male to share (I posted it up on FB the other day). His colouring is spectacular, but I still don't think he compares to the male in my display picture. I wish I hadn't lost that male and his sons. It does seem like I lost my nicest fish to velvet, and got left with the duds.


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## MysticSky22301

Have you tried the herbal rid fungus? It works really well ^^ it's mostly for infections on fish but it works on in tank fungus as well

I also used it on my mystery snails that had white patches on their feet and had great results


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## LittleBettaFish

Is that the Kordon product? I've actually never seen it being sold anywhere here. If it is the Kordon product, it doesn't seem to specifically list ingredients, and I would be hesitant to expose newly hatched fry to a product when I don't know what's in it. They can be so sensitive. I still believe Zig-Zag's spinal deformity (and the lack of fins on his sibling that was culled) were due to the Seachem Cupramine they were exposed to while developing. 

I stick with Methylene blue as this seems to be what most breeders use to prevent fungus, I've had success with it in the past, and none of my fry have ever shown any adverse effects after hatching out. 

I received an email last night, and apparently my plants are in the depot in Melbourne, so they should definitely be arriving today. I still don't know why you would list a product as 'in stock' (and continue to have it listed as 'in stock' on your website) if you couldn't fulfill the order. 

I'm finding it very difficult to pin down what dilution of Hydrogen peroxide to use. Some hobbyists seem to just use straight 3% Hydrogen peroxide without any issues, but then others are talking about how it melted their plants. I just don't want to kill $200 worth of plants.


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## LittleBettaFish

I have a Melanotaenia Pygmaea fry! 

I just checked on the eggs, when I noticed what looked like a fry, caught up in the current created by the airstone. I turned the airstone off, and found that it was indeed a newly hatched fry. I think it was a little stressed, as it was swimming quite frantically, but since doing a partial water change and adding a few sprigs of java moss, it appears to have calmed down. 

Hopefully I can keep this little fry alive, and hopefully this means the other rescued eggs are still viable and will hatch soon. 

I think I might pick up a couple 10 gallon tanks this weekend or the next, as I'm going to be needing them if all these eggs hatch.


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## MysticSky22301

I think it's a kordon product, and yeah I understand not risking something, I had 2 Cory spawns that fungused and melted because I didn't use use water from the tank along with new water. I'm doing the 50/50 mix like I did the first time I hatched eggs. but I added plants so the microorganisms have something more to feed on because I have 2-3 times as many eggs as I did the first time XD 

We are in the same boat needing more tanks, and probably more space I should have ordered my tank rack when it was discounted!


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## LittleBettaFish

The plants have arrived. The wisteria is a little bruised and there were a couple yellow leaves on the crypts (to be expected), but otherwise everything looks healthy. There's more Water sprite than I was expecting, so I think I might put an order in for another 10 bunches in the near future, and I should be able to remove the remaining Mayaca fluviatilis from my tanks. 










I wish I had space for a fourth rack. If my fish room had been in my actual bedroom, I could have done so (likely I could have also had a small rack in the middle of the room). However, the spare bedroom is much smaller, and a lot of the available wall space is taken up by a window and wardrobe. The only advantage is the spare bedroom stays much warmer, so hopefully it will cost less to heat the fish room over the next few months. 

I should have purchased the 1.8m uprights for my shorter rack before I started adding tanks to it. Now I have to take down the shelf that overhangs this rack, drain and (temporarily) move my rainbowfish tank, as well as take out the drawer and reattach that to the new uprights. 

I certainly advise anyone who is setting up a fish room to plan, plan, and plan some more before you make any purchases. You always end up overlooking something.


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## MysticSky22301

I'm actually looking for a new home, with a decent room I can dedicate to my fish, or a partially finished basement. As in divided rooms but without carpet/ easily removed carpet and preferably a floor drain. I'm so ready to actually get upgrades going! I already have my setups planned around a certain shelf system

I'm glad your plants arrived well ^^ I hope we get to see them soon


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## LittleBettaFish

My ideal set-up would be to have a separate 'fish house' that I could design specifically with fish keeping in mind, in terms of insulation, plumbing (I would love to have a sink in my fish room), flooring, power sources etc. Maybe even include some solar panels and a rainwater tank. 

But obviously something like that would cost a fortune, so unless I come into money in the near future, I'll have to make do with a 'spare bedroom' fish room. 

The plants are in the tanks. I dipped them in Hydrogen peroxide (no idea if it was a success or I'm going wake to mush tomorrow) and ideally I should have quarantined them for a couple of weeks, but I really just wanted to get all that brown and dying Mayaca fluviatilis out of the tanks and into the bin. I also didn't want to be moving the crypts back and forth being that they are so sensitive, and I am trying to avoid any major melting from them (usually I tend to be fairly lucky in this regard). Hopefully this decision will not bite me on the butt later on. 

There is also some sad news to share. I was adding new plants to the B. livida tank when I removed one of the hollow logs. In doing so, I uncovered the corpse of what I believe is the F0 female. I hadn't seen her around in a while, but there's 40 odd fish in the tank and I simply assumed she was with the group that stays at the back of the tank. 

I think this is my first fish death in a while, and being that she was one of my foundation stock and has been with me since late 2014, she will be missed. 

While I was in my fish room just now, I took a few photos. Of course the one time I get the perfect shot lined up of my B. brownorum male in full flare, the camera is telling me it's 'busy' and I miss the shot. 

This is one of my F1 B. brownorum. This is Trouble's brother and the only other fish from this group with a lateral spot. 










One of its siblings. 










My F0 B. coccina female. The java moss was actually in better condition than I thought it would be, once I removed the old IALs and blanket of Mayaca fluviatilis from this tank. There's also more of it than my original estimate, so I'm going to steal some for my F1 B. brownorum tank. 



















Then this is my F0 B. brownorum tank on the left, and F0/F1 B. coccina tank on the right. I've got to siphon the detritus and mulm off the java moss in both tanks, and both tanks will be having an Anubias paco added, which will then just be left to grow and (slowly) fill in the empty space. 










Before wrapping up with a couple photos of my F0 B. brownorum pair. They were investigating the changes made to their tank. You can see how much mulm has built up on the substrate in this tank. 










This was the shot I shouldn't have taken, as then the camera would have been ready for the male in full flare. Lesson learned.


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## LittleBettaFish

There are now three Melanotaenia pygmaea fry that have hatched out. I also collected another 20+ eggs from the spawning mop this morning. I did a partial water change on both containers, and it doesn't look like any further eggs in either container have developed fungus. I still have a few eyed up eggs, which I assume will hatch out over the next few days. I'm not yet sure how many eggs from recent collections are fertilised, as some are smaller than others (perhaps deposited by one of the smaller fish). 

My only concern is that I'm not sure if the fry are feeding on the Sera Micron. My Pseudomugil gertrudae fry readily took to it, but I'm not certain if the rainbowfish fry are too small to use this as a first food. This was my biggest worry with raising rainbows. Providing food for such small fry. 

I've got to fill up water aging tubs, set-up the BBS hatchery, do a 40L water change on the goldfish tank, and feed everyone. I'm definitely not looking forward to changing the water on the goldfish tank. This time of year, I tend to lose feeling in my arm as their water is so cold. 

One of the positives of keeping tropical fish!


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## MysticSky22301

Do you have microworms? If you lived in the US I'd send you cultures if you need them  

I'm noticing how live foods are a pain for some people to get I really wish there was a way to change that


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## LittleBettaFish

I do have microworms on hand, but both them and freshly hatched brine shrimp are much too large for my rainbowfish fry to eat at this point in time. I think most breeders use either powdered foods (Sera Micron comes highly recommended) or very small live foods such as infusoria or paramecium. 

I guess it's a matter of wait and see, and hope that the fry grow quickly so I can start transitioning them over to BBS.


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## MysticSky22301

Lots of plants is the only thing I can suggest. Hornwort is great for producing microfawna that you would need


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## LittleBettaFish

I am a hornwort serial killer. I would love to use it in my tanks, but only once have I had success with it. At best it merely survives, at worst it melts away entirely, making an enormous mess. In fact when I got the Melanotaenia Pygmaea I also purchased some native hornwort. 

The hatching containers are Chinese take-out containers, so there's not much water volume. However, I've put java moss and Mayaca fluviatilis from my other tanks in there, as well as some leaf litter to hopefully encourage microorganisms to grow.


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## LittleBettaFish

After losing the remaining rainbowfish fry, I've decided to plant the main tank out with native vals, hydrilla, and milfoil, and turn it into a display tank. Hopefully, I may even find some fry surviving once there is enough plant cover in there. 

It's a shame they remain so skittish. The other day, the male was putting on a show, and his topline and underbelly were bright yellow. It looks like I have at least one other male, as one of the smaller fish was chasing around and displaying to another of the smaller fish. I would have loved to capture it on camera. 

That's the only bad news I have to share today. 

Yesterday, my Anubias paco arrived. Some of the plants consisting of two or more separate rhizomes, so I was able to split them up. I took some photos of the tanks with the new Anubias in. Basically with these tanks, it's a matter of the Java moss and Anubias growing in, and filling up the empty space. I also need to add peat moss and IALs to darken the water in these tanks, as it's almost clear. 

F1 B. brownorum tank. This tank needs to have some of the sphagnum moss removed and more Java moss added. 










F0/F1 B.coccina. I want to get a second, larger Anubias for this tank. 










F0 B. brownorum. This tank only needs the Java moss to fill in and the Watersprite to start sending down roots to the substrate. Although I'm not sure if I want to put some crypts in that front left corner. 










The Water sprite in all five tanks, is starting to transition to its floating form. There's been lots of emersed growth, and the older leaves are starting to brown and die off. So far I seem to have avoided any serious melting with the Cryptocoryne lutea. A few of the larger leaves have had to be removed, but there's plenty of new growth to replace them.

I still haven't decided what fertiliser to purchase. Originally, I was going to use Seachem Flourish. However, there's an interstate business where the owner as developed his own line of fertilisers. They seem to pack more punch than the Seachem fertilisers, so I'm curious to see how they performe. I'm hoping that by using fertilisers, I will get faster and more lush growth, than I was getting previously. 

I am also on the look-out for Asian watergrass. No one seems to sell it, but it performed well in my wild betta tanks in the past, and I like how the roots look when they drape down towards the substrate. 

Eventually, I want to have all my wild betta tanks turned into overgrown (but healthy) jungles. Being that they are purely display tanks now, I won't have to be regularly tearing them down to catch fish to sell, or move to other tanks. 

I did take a few photos of my wilds while I was in the fish room just now. 

Trouble living up to his name! 










My F1 pair of B. coccina. The male was being very gentle with her, and based on their behaviour and her appearance, I would say a spawn is likely in the next day or so. These two, like their parents, have a very strong bond. This is the only female out of the four in the tank that he spawns with. 










The same female from another angle. 










One of my B. livida males exploring the Wisteria. 










Same male showing that he is no threat to his approaching larger sibling. There was a bit of posturing by both fish following this, but then the smaller male wisely decided to retreat. I do love watching the wilds interact. It's amazing how they can so clearly communicate by simple changes colour and body language. 










In Clio news, we took her to a dog show last weekend. It was interesting to see how Clio doesn't really listen to other people, not even my mum, if I'm around. A dog club acquaintance was trying to get her to do some basic obedience to get a treat, and she just sat there staring at him blankly like an untrained beast. I then made her do a sit, stand, drop on verbal cues and with no reward other than a pat and some praise and she did them impeccably. The brat. He wondered why we weren't doing obedience trials with her (they do so with one of their dogs) and I told him she's too much of a handful. Very few people have witnessed a full-blown Clio tantrum. 

She was way overstimulated when she first came out of the car. So I put her back in and took her out a little later. For the rest of the day she was pretty well behaved. It sounds gross, but I've started spitting food at her from my mouth (it's cooked chicken) to get her head up and eyes on me for heeling. The benefit is that it keeps her a lot more engaged than before when I was rewarding her from my hand. I kept things light and fun, and blended some obedience in with play, and when she had enough I put her back into the car to end on a good note. 

After talking to the same acquaintance at club (they also have a reactive dog) we are considering booking her in to see a behaviorist and perhaps seeing if an anti-anxiety medication would help. Her reactivity isn't getting any better, and as someone whose life has been ruined by anxiety I know how horrible it is living with that level of stress day in, day out. 

I also want to get her hips and elbows done ASAP. I have this irrational fear she's going to be diagnosed with elbow dysplasia. After having Nike show no symptoms with her hips (still doesn't except for a slight sway and perhaps a little less rear drive), and a close relative of Clio's failing her elbows after not having taken a lame step that I saw, I just want to know for certain. Especially as elbow dysplasia seems to be basically a death sentence for this breed.


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## Nismo83

your coccina family tanks are always fully covered with plants.. maybe i should consider doing the same as well. 

hope all your fishes are doing fine... i lost quite an amount of fishes lately...


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## LittleBettaFish

Without the plants there would probably be a lot more fights in the tanks where I have multiple males. I lost so many plants when I was using copper to treat for velvet. I want the watersprite and java moss to take over now.

I've only lost my F0 B. livida female. I haven't lost any other fish in months now. 

What happened to your fish? Was it disease or an issue with the water?


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## MysticSky22301

Your tanks look great!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. The watersprite is starting to transition to its floating form and is sending roots down everywhere so hopefully it won't take too long before my tanks are back to being lush jungles for my fish. 

I like how their red colouration contrasts against the green plants.


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## MysticSky22301

I keep killing my water Sprite :/ I used to be able to grow it in the dark ( almost literally) I've had a bunch of problems with plants since I moved here and I don't know why


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## LittleBettaFish

I've given up on trying to understand why previously healthy aquatic plants suddenly die. Perhaps in your case there has been some change in the parameters between your old place and your new place? 

About 90% of the Water Sprite has since died off and been removed from the tanks. However, dozens of new plants have sprouted from the dying leaves, so I just have to wait until they grow in and start to spread. I wish more sellers grew this plant floating, as I hate waiting for it to make the transition in my tanks. On the other hand, the Cryptocoryne Lutea and Water Wisteria in the Betta livida tank has exploded with growth. The hitch-hiking duckweed is also growing well. Unlike many hobbyists I don't mind duckweed, especially in my wild betta tanks being that they are not cycled and it's an excellent nutrient sponge. 

Meanwhile in fish news, I nearly lost my beautiful Pygmy Rainbowfish male yesterday. I was doing a quick water change, and I took my eyes off the tank for a few seconds. Unfortunately, this proved enough time for my male to get himself stuck in the siphon. He was wedged in so tight that the only option I had was to very carefully cut him free. He was scraped up and stressed out when I finally freed him, and I thought that he might have been injured internally. However, he was back to his normal self within a few hours, and is still with us today so hopefully this means that only superficial damage has been done. 

Other than that, my F1 B. coccina male is guarding a nest, as you can see from the photo below (I think there's also a planaria on the glass in front of the canister). 










Then I managed to get a photo of one of my younger B. hendra males. Since the move to the larger tank, most of the 'females' have turned out to be immature males. They are now starting to develop their finnage and adult colouration. 










Finally, a not so great photo of one of my B. sp. api api males. 










I'll have some better photos to share tomorrow. My fish have only just woken up, as it's night here and the light in the fish room has been off. They haven't been the most cooperative of subjects, and I can't get the lighting right so their colours keep getting washed out. 

That's it from the fish room for tonight. I've got to go and see if everyone is awake enough now to eat their BBS.


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## MysticSky22301

I'm not sure, the water company might have added something else to the water, it's literally treated river water, can't even drink it without a bunch of problems. The taste is first ( water isn't supposed to taste like chemicals) , then I get an upset stomach and headaches, but I'm really sensitive to chemicals and I'm pretty sure prime removes most of them. 
Coming to that conclusion I REALLY wish I had an RO system or at the very least a good chemical filter to run my tank water through before water changes o.o

I'm glad your rainbow is alright! I accidentally sucked up a juvenile Cory the other day o.o luckily he didn't get injured and was happily swimming in the mulm at the bottom of the bucket

That is a beautiful little Hendra ^^ Sadly every time I get the money to order my new rack something goes wrong and I can't afford it again, so I can't get Hendra from the seller I've kept in contact with :/ 

I have a cool update for you, my paphilaris Iona killies have started sexing out! I have one big male that's stunning, he's getting the beautiful blue stripes down his sides and at least one smaller male. Pretty sure the other 9 are female. I'm getting ready to move them to their own tank so maybe I can get them to spawn. I also ordered more ^^ I love these little guys


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## ryry2012

How many kinds of wild betta and other fish do you have?


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## LittleBettaFish

I lost my male Pygmy Rainbowfish today. He was perfectly fine last night and was hunting down BBS with the others. Then this morning he was up at the surface gasping with wounds on both sides (at this point thinking it was either columnaris or a late presentation of injuries caused by the siphon) and when I returned later in the afternoon, he was dead. 

This is why I try to avoid talking about losing fish. It seems whenever I mention that it's been a while since I've lost one, a fish will invariably get sick or die. 

I'm really cut up about it, as it was entirely preventable. After all these years I should know better than to take my eyes off the siphon when I am cleaning the tank. 

That's great news with the killifish MysticSky22301. Betta hendra are one of my favourite species. I wish I hadn't lost my previous group, as the males were spectacular. There is a local hobbyist that has a sibling pair from the male in my display picture, but I don't think she's had much success breeding them. A shame, as I would have loved to get that line back in my fish room. 

Ryry2012, I am currently keeping B. sp. api api, B. brownorum, B. coccina, B. hendra, B. livida, B. miniopinna, B. persephone, and B. uberis. I also have four Pygmy Rainbowfish, and three goldfish. I used to keep many more species of wild betta, but I had a particularly virulent strain of velvet wipe almost my entire fish room out a while back, and my passion for wild bettas has dwindled over the years so the species I lost or moved on, were never replaced. 

At this point in time, I'm considering keeping killifish again. I've come to the conclusion I don't have the space to dedicate to rainbowfish at the moment, and I've enjoyed working with killifish in the past.


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## MysticSky22301

I'm sorry about your rainbow  you were so excited to get them


If I do another species of wild betta it will probably be smaragdina or imbellis I'm a sucker for the bright shimmering colors

If you do get killies I'd love to see what species you decide on  I just moved my big male and 3 largest females to a tote because he was guarding the cup of peat moss even from the Cory's who dwarf these guys. I have a smaller male I would love to see mature and possibly a 3rd the other 5 are pretty obvious females with the dark spots


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## LittleBettaFish

I just hate losing fish like that. It feels like such a waste.

The splendens complex species are very flashy. I had a pair of B. stiktos a few years back and I honestly don't know how wild bettas got this reputation as being the ugly cousin of the ornamental strains. 

The only downside to keeping killifish in Australia, is that we are so limited in the species that are available here. You can't import eggs into the country, and although I believe all species from the Aphyosemion and Fundulopanchax genera are allowable imports, trying to source and import them seems to be a very costly and risky venture in terms of DOAs etc. 

Of the species available here, there are eight that I definitely want to keep - four of which I've kept or bred in the past.


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## MysticSky22301

I know what you mean, it really hurts when you feel like it was completely your fault

A few of the more flashy bettas are the only reason we have such pretty domestic Bettas. Many people forget the ones we see every day are hybrids of wilds watered down by hundreds of years of selective breeding by humans. Not that I'm complaining XD I love alot of what we've done with domestic fish 

Eggersi and ravochii are both in the northos. Group the paphilaris Iona I have and I found another I really like. Hypsolebias fulminantis Guanambi I hadn't seen them before but they are a dark purple/blue. A spectrum away from the bright orange with almost neon blues I've been fawning over


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## ryry2012

I'm sorry to hear about the velvet wiped down... :-( You still have many kinds of wild betta. They are natural beauties, while betta splendens are more of artificial beauties. 


How old are your goldfish? I read an article about a 35 years old goldfish in Japan. It's 25cm (10")! When I was a child, I had goldfish and Medaka fillifish. It's a Japanese native rice fish, very plain but easy to keep.


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## LittleBettaFish

I never want to deal with velvet again. It's so insidious, and the treatment was hard on my fish and plants. I think betta fish are more capable of surviving serious infection as they rely less on their gills (velvet targets the gill tissue). 

The only positive to the whole mess, is that it showed me first-hand the importance of proper quarantine procedure for new fish, and why it can be dangerous to share equipment between tanks. 

My oldest goldfish is probably coming on ten years now (well that's how long I've had it), and the other two are maybe six or seven years old. They are Shubunkin, and stunted after an early life of too small a tank, and too few water changes. 

The largest is probably 7-8 inches total length, although the caudal fin counts for almost half of that. 

Eventually the plan is to move them outside into a 100 gallon pond. They are only in a 45 gallon tank, and they need more space to move around. 

I briefly kept Medaka in the past. It's really fascinating how the female carries the eggs outside her body.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I got some new fish. 

I was at the aquarium solely to get some frozen food, but who goes to a fish store and doesn't look at the fish? They had some of the tiniest Boraras brigittae and Boraras naevus, I have ever seen at maybe half an inch total length. There were also some very small Pseudomugil gertrudae that I wanted to bring home, and likely would have, if I hadn't seen the single pair of Pseudomugil luminatus for sale. This is a species I have always wanted to own, and being that there only appeared to be one pair in there, I didn't want someone else taking them home. 

For now, they are with my Pygmy Rainbowfish group, as the tank is fully cycled, and it has always been kept completely isolated in terms of equipment etc. from the rest of the tanks in my fish room. The largest rainbow female did try to attack the male when I first released them, but he very surprisingly gave chase, even though she's about three times his size, and has since made it clear that they are friends not food. 

The pair of them have settled in well, and were eating grindal worms within a few minutes of being in the tank.

The plan is to set them up in their own tank, with a sort of rainforest stream feel to it. As these fish are not long-lived, I do intend to try and breed them. Hopefully I have better luck raising their fry than I did the rainbows. 

There's no photos as they are fast-moving and still settling in. I will probably get some photos once they are in their own tank in another week or so.


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## MysticSky22301

Very cool ! I'll have to look them up ^^

I was a very sad fish keeper today, I lost 2 fish last night likely to getting old. A couple of days ago I lost another fish to tumor complications and last week I lost the fancy male I was going to breed :/ it hurt because the two who passed last night were the parents of my f1 spawn


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## LittleBettaFish

Blue-eyes are awesome fish, and make an excellent alternative for rainbows in smaller aquariums. Really, their only negative is that they have fairly short lifespans so you either have to keep breeding them, or replace them every few years. 

I hate when you lose several fish all at once. I still think betta fish are best at this. They almost seem to synchronise their dying. Sorry for your losses.


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## MysticSky22301

I've been researching new fish, as I'm determined to expand my fish room  

I guess I can look at it positively, I have room to add new genetics to my project


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## LittleBettaFish

Everyone seems to be getting along in the Pygmy Rainbowfish tank. The presence of the P. luminatus seems to have encouraged the rainbowfish to venture out from the back of the tank more frequently. I want to try and get my hands on 10 or so P. tenellus (more commonly known as the Delicate Blue-eye) to add to the tank and act as dithers for the rainbows. 

I'm now working on a tank for the P. luminatus pair. Information on their habitat seems very scant, but I'm thinking of incorporating lots of root tangles, leaf litter, and vegetation for them to play around in. I'm not 100% certain what plants I want to use yet. As the tank will be cycled, I don't need to worry about sticking with fast growing plants, so I was tossing up between Cryptocoryne species or Cyperus helferi. I haven't had any experience with the latter, so for those members who have, is it a difficult plant to work with? 

While I was in my fish room, I took some photos of my B. uberis tanks. 

First up is one of Shiny's offspring. Unfortunately, it looks like all of these juveniles and sub-adults are male. So I still only have four B. uberis females. 










This is the mother of the above fish. 










Then this is Shiny flaring at her. He refused to remain still long enough for my camera to focus, so this is the best shot of him from today.










Followed by two of Shiny's brothers in the neighbouring tank having a dispute. 




























At one point, one of them ended up on his side. 










Other than that, not much has happened since my last post. It's cold here in Melbourne today. I think I need to start buying lottery tickets to realise my dream of living somewhere warm.


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## MysticSky22301

Could temperature have something to do with the gender ratio? Im not sure if it works that way with any type of fish but it's a theory right? Lol.


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## LittleBettaFish

I would assume environmental factors such as water temperature and pH do play a role. However, over the years I've experimented with different water temperatures, and most of my spawns have remained male heavy. I have heard breeders of the ornamental strains state that the age of the pair can influence the sex of the offspring, and I have had a couple of pairs that have produced almost solely female offspring. 

There's also the fact that my pairs constantly spawn, so I have young fish of varying ages growing out together. Perhaps in the beginning, there are a larger number of females, but they are out-competed by their male siblings and perish before they reach a size where they can be sexed.


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## MysticSky22301

Hmm that's​ a good possibility, is there any way you could set up a small tank and either move the parents for a single spawn or remove the young fry before they disappear into the main tank to test that? But you are planning on phasing out your wild bettas so it might not be worth it


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## LittleBettaFish

Yeah, there isn't much point in doing so as I'm not continuing with the wilds. Plus space is at such a premium in my fish room. 

I've started on my P. luminatus tank. The substrate is in, as are the sponge filter and heater. I've got melaleuca branches soaking in the goldfish tank, and hopefully they will be fully waterlogged in another couple of days. The only elements I'm missing are rocks and live plants. I'm still undecided on what species of plant to go with, but after Googling 'rainforest streams', I think I'm going to go with smooth river stones. 

I'm also going to purchase the Universal Habitats 'Basalt' background for both my P. luminatus and M. pygmaea tanks. It's a pricier option, but I really want these tanks to look as natural as possible, and I think it will make for better photos than just having a plain black or blue background. 

I just wish I could get my hands on some Australian native Ambulia. The place I usually order it from hasn't had any in stock for ages now. I really want to use natives over exotics in my rainbowfish tank, just to give it a loose sort of biotope feel.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> Without the plants there would probably be a lot more fights in the tanks where I have multiple males. I lost so many plants when I was using copper to treat for velvet. I want the watersprite and java moss to take over now.
> 
> I've only lost my F0 B. livida female. I haven't lost any other fish in months now.
> 
> What happened to your fish? Was it disease or an issue with the water?


i have no idea... guess i didnt really take care of them well.. my racks are all in the mess.. just hope to move to my near apartment as soon as possible so i can give them a proper place and air conditioning.


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## LittleBettaFish

That's a shame about your fish losses. I hope your B. macrostoma are still doing well? 

Earlier today I decided to pull both mops from my rainbowfish tank and set them up in a plastic tub. There were only a few eggs on each mop, but as I don't know if my remaining male is large enough to successfully spawn, I thought I might as well try and hatch out what I've currently got. 

The tub is white with an opaque lid so very little light gets in (I'm not sure if this was a factor in so many of the previous eggs fungusing). This time I didn't add any Methylene blue to the water, and there's about 10 litres of water in the tub, versus the 1/4-1/2 a litre of water in the plastic container. 

Many of the eggs were eyed up, so I wasn't surprised to see a newly hatched fry when I checked on them just before.

I just hope Sera Micron will do the trick the time. If I'm unsuccessful again, I think I'll try and get my hands on some paramecium or figure out how to make green water. Either that or get a couple of pairs of Guppies or Endlers, and use their fry to teach my rainbowfish to recognise Sera Micron as food. 

It will be interesting to see if the P. luminatus pair have deposited any eggs on the mops. But it would be at least another week or two before I know for certain.

I'll be taking some photos of my wild bettas later this afternoon, once we get back from walking the dogs.


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## MysticSky22301

I have a video for you  culturing paramecium from your filters!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks for the link, I'll watch it once I'm done posting. 

I'm thinking of scooping up some of the mulm from my outside tub and adding it to the grow-out. There's always all sorts of microfauna swimming around in that tub. 

There were promising signs this morning. For starters, I now have at least eight fry. Furthermore, unlike the previous group of fry, they are all swimming strongly and moving around at all levels of the tub. I also believe they are eating the Sera Micron. When I sprinkled some in this morning, most of the fry were up at the surface, and it looked like they were snapping at the food in the water.

So I've got my fingers crossed that the Sera Micron is enough to get them to a size where they can take BBS. 

This has always been my biggest hurdle when it comes to raising Rainbowfish/Rhad/Blue-eye fry. There's no point in purchasing a whole lot of fish if I am not able to keep the resulting fry alive.

If I can successfully raise these M. pygmaea fry, and any fry my P. luminatus pair might produce, I will be a lot more comfortable branching out further into the rainbowfish side of the hobby.


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## LittleBettaFish

At least some (if not all) of the M. pygmaea fry are still alive. I put some Sera Micron in the tub this morning, but as I can only view them from the top, it's impossible to tell whether they are actually eating it. 

I'm going to test the pH of the tub today, and if it's are close enough to the main tank, I will be adding in another 1-2L of water from there. I've also got to add the mulm from my outside tub, which hopefully will have some sort of microfauna in there for them to pick at. 

There's been no progress on the P. luminatus tank. The Melaleuca branches aren't fully waterlogged, and the heater suction caps have perished, so the heater keeps falling off. 

The main M. pygmaea tank needs to have some plants added to it. I'm hoping to pick up a few bunches of Vallisneria this weekend, along with the background for their tank. Whether this will make them less shy remains to be seen, but at least I'll have a nicer tank to look at. 

I took a few photos of some of my wilds while I was poking around in the fish room earlier. 

We've got Trouble here. This tank needs the front glass cleaned, and it's so scratched up it makes for terrible photos. 



















Followed by Zig-Zag showing off. He remains one of the firm favourites in my fish room. I just wish I got him going the other way as his lateral blotch is much bigger on the other size. It does look like at least two of his offspring have lateral blotches, but it's hard to tell until they lose the juvenile horizontal stripes. 










Then last but not least, we have one of my F1 B. uberis males. The front left half of the tank is his territory, while the front right half of the tank belongs to his brother. I love the length of the ventral fins on this male. 










The new plants are still growing well, except in the B. miniopinna tank where most of the Water Sprite has died back. It's probably down to a combination of factors, and I'm thinking of replacing it with Water Wisteria, as it's absolutely thriving in my B. livida tank. 

I still have not succeeded in weaning my B. hendra and F1/F2 B. coccina groups onto flake food. Most of the other fish are happily taking flake, which is making a difference in the amount of frozen food I am going through. So far I haven't seen any swim bladder issues arising from using flake food. I do notice a bit of difficulty in maintaining buoyancy right after a meal, but the same thing happened when I fed pellets, and also occurs if they overeat on live blackworms or frozen brine shrimp. 

Apart from that not much else has been happening with the wild bettas. I still have a few pairs that continue to spawn regularly, but as there are predatory juveniles living alongside them, I'm not sure how many of those fry are surviving.


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## MysticSky22301

I'm glad your fry are alright ^^


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## LittleBettaFish

I have about 15 fry at last count, possibly more as they don't exactly make the job of counting them easy.

Whether or not they are eating the Sera Micron remains to be seen, but I'm fairly certain my previous fry were dead or dying this many days in. So perhaps they are getting enough food to keep themselves going. 

My long-suffering mother drove me to the aquarium today to pick-up the background. I swear it seems a universal rule that fish stores be on busy roads with terrible parking. 

The background ended up costing me just under $200, but it's extremely detailed and beats anything I could put together myself. I also got some of it for free, as the employee said it wouldn't be worth cutting as they'd be left with a length too small to sell. 

Unfortunately, the Vallisneria didn't look very healthy so I didn't end up getting any. Instead, I'm going to order the Vallisneria, and a couple of bunches of an Australian native Milfoil, from the same business that I received all those plants from recently. If I order before Monday, they should arrive later in the week. 

I will be fitting the background in the P. luminatus tank tomorrow (I'm going to wait until the plants arrive before fitting the background in the rainbowfish tank), and I will take some photos of the tank with the wood in there. 

Meanwhile, my mum is trying to work out some way of fitting a lizard in the fish room. We used to have a Bearded Dragon years ago (sadly we made a few serious mistakes with his care), and every time we go to this particular aquarium (they also stock reptiles), my mum wants to get some sort of lizard again. On this most recent trip, she saw a group of Southern Angle-Headed Dragons, so now wants a couple of these. This has resulted in lots of Googling this afternoon when we got home, and talk of renewing her wildlife license. 

I'm definitely going to need a fourth rack if she wants to get a lizard in the fish room!


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I now have at least 20 M. pygmaea fry. The good news is that I can now see them eating the Sera Micron. I put some BBS in there the other day to see if gauge their interest, and one or two of the largest fry were able to eat it. As they predominately feed from the surface, they lost interest in the microworms, as they sink much too quickly. 

I've been doing daily water changes with water from the main tank, and next week, I will start to slowly add in treated tap water. So it will be like 90% water from the main tank, and 10% tap water, and eventually they will be getting water changes using only tap water. I've also got to add a sponge filter and cycled media to the tub now that the pH is stable. I don't want there to be any issues with water quality as I don't know how long it will be before my fish produce more eggs. 

Yesterday I installed the background in my P. luminatus tank. Talk about a nightmare. There wasn't a straight edge on the background, and it was very difficult to cut it so it would fit in the tank perfectly. Unfortunately, I ended up with a gap on one side, but once the milfoil is in, I don't think it will be noticeable. I also don't think the wood I've chosen is right for this tank. I think I need some smaller pieces, so I'm going to have a rifle through the wood box and see what I can find. 

I also cut the background for my M. pygmaea tank earlier today. It still needs some trimming, but after the nightmare of yesterday, I ran out of patience and for now it's stuck to the outside of the tank with sticky tape. 

Stupid me forgot that there was a 5pm deadline on Sunday if I wanted the plants to come this week. This means I'm going to have to spend another week and a bit staring at half-finished tanks. 

My wild bettas are all doing well. My F1 B. coccina females are fighting over who gets to spawn with the male, my F0 B. brownorum male is guarding a nest, and I think my F1 pair of B. coccina (the pair with the blind female) spawned recently as there are bubbles coming out of the film canister and the male keeps coming out to chase his sons and daughters away. 

I took some photos while I was in there earlier. I think either the camera needs a service, or it needs to be replaced (there was talk of going halves in a new camera) as it is so slow. If I use the flash, it gets stuck on the 'busy' signal for ages, and it doesn't seem to focus as well as it used to. I keep missing all these shots of my fish because of it. 

Anyway, first up is one of my B. uberis males. I love the red on the pectoral fins of this male. It's something that seems to randomly pop up in this species, as a previous male and his daughter exhibited the same trait. 










The same male showing a better view of his red pectoral fins. 










The male from the photos above is the one hiding under the IAL.










Here is Shiny flaring at his female. He is full brother to the above males. I love how even though they are the same species and full siblings, there are still enough differences between them that I can tell them apart at a glance. 










This B. coccina male is so frustrating. That green almost seems to glow when he's under the right lighting, but he just wouldn't let me take a photo tonight. This was the best I could manage - at least he is in focus! 










Finally, this is one of the squabbling F1 B. coccina females. Her brother and sister are parents of the above male. 










At this point in time, I'm considering selling my B. hendra group. I just didn't like this pair as much as I did my previous group, and they admittedly were an impulse purchase made when the import laws were changed. The difficulty is in finding a buyer that not only has experience with keeping wild bettas, but won't lose interest and sell them to someone else in a week. I don't want them being jostled from one home to another as otherwise, they might as well stay here with me. I am also considering selling my B. livida group. They like my B. hendra tend to be overlooked in my fish room. The issue with this group is that there's a great many of them (about 40 at last count) and the majority are male. The whole group could live comfortably in a 15-20 gallon tank, but most hobbyists don't seem to want to take on a large group like this. 

I feel like I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place with my wilds. I would love to free up more space in my fish room, but I don't want to do so at the expense of my fish. Once they have left my fish room, I have no further say in who they are sold to, and what sort of care they receive. 

In spite of what I've written, it's very likely that both my B. hendra and B. livida will end up staying here. I'm too much of a soft touch when it comes to my fish.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yesterday I pulled the mop from the M. Pygmaea tank, and discovered some eggs in it. Any eggs my previous male fertilised, would have been eyed up by now, so it looks like my smaller male is spawning with the females. In fact after a feed and a water change last night, I caught him chasing the females up into the mop. I removed the mop from the grow-out tub (all the eggs have now hatched) and swapped it for the one in the main tank. So in another week or so, we will see if these newest eggs were successfully fertilised.

The M. pygmaea fry are thriving. I've been feeding Sera Micron 2-3 times a day (going to try another feeding of BBS on the weekend), and have been doing daily water changes. I added a sponge filter to the tub last night, and cut off a chunk of seeded media from the main tank. The pH in the tub is over 7.0, and there's no plants in there like my other tanks, so ammonia/nitrite poisoning is a real risk.

The fry aren't at all concerned by my doing maintenance on their tub. In fact, any time I put my hands in the water, the fry start snapping at the surface because they think they're getting fed. As soon as they are large enough to not be eaten (so about the size of my P. luminatus), at least some of them will be added to the main tank. The bulk will likely be sold, as with the amount of eggs my adults have been producing, I will very quickly be overrun with M. pygmaea.

Meanwhile, I had to remove my P. luminatus from their new tank. They started behaving oddly, and I was concerned it was the background even though it is aquarium safe. I think I'll wait until the plants are in, and the water's been given the chance to settle, before introducing them again. I also think I'll have to source another couple of pairs. There was an aquarium in the city that was selling them, but that was back in May, so I will have to check if they have any in stock.

I spent this morning in the fish room working on my tanks. Everyone's been fed, had their inside glass scrubbed, outside glass cleaned, and had their cling wrap replaced. I will try and get some photos this afternoon once they've been given a chance to let their food go down.

I've also offered to take in the sick office betta from my mum's work and see what I can do. A couple of people in the office purchased the fish, and my mum got him a heater and a 3 gallon tank, as she didn't want to see him mistreated. Unfortunately, I don't know how consistent maintenance has been, and today I got a call wanting to know how to euthanase 'Kevin' humanely as he was non-responsive on the bottom of the tank.

I did test the water she brought home last night and it all checked out, but if the pH has been fluctuating every time they do a water change (Melbourne's soft tap water) or the ammonia has been allowed to build up in between water changes, obviously this will cause problems.

I was hesitant to say euthanase, because lethargy is such a vague symptom and could indicate anything from cold water to velvet.

Obviously, he is going to be completely isolated from the rest of my fish. I'm not taking any chances, so his tank will be set-up at the other end of the house. 

At this point in time, I'm not sure if he'll even survive the day, but I'll post an update when mum gets home from work. 

Also after reading an article on a non-fish related forum earlier today, can I just say how disgusting I find it when I hear people talking about the fish they've lost with what is almost an air of pride? It's why I very rarely discuss my fish with non-hobbyists. It's almost like they can't wait to tell me how many fish they have killed over the years. 

There's no photos of my fish to go with this post, but here's Clio holding my bed hostage. She does this every morning when I go to make my bed. 

I can't believe how grey in the face she is now. She's not even three yet and she's already got more grey on her muzzle than Nike! I laugh when I think of mum telling me that she'd grow out that white puppy goatee. 










She's sleeping in her crate now. It was heeling practice in the yard today (working on our turns), and her brain is tired. So I am enjoying this rare moment of quiet. 

Also, if you read the rant thread about Ares and his lumps, it looks like the larger lump was caused by some sort of infection. At this point in time, the vet is recommending that surgery is not necessary and it's a case of 'wait-and-see'.


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## Bettaloveee

Oh goodness, Clio is absolutely beautiful. She looks like such a sweetheart!

So, the lumps on Ares aren't cancerous, right?


----------



## LittleBettaFish

Haha sweetheart is not the word I would use to describe her. Brat is more apt. Today while I was in the fish room ignoring her, she scared me multiple times by standing right behind me and suddenly barking to get my attention. She then stole and chewed up one of my pieces of aquarium wood, before sneaking back in and trying to run off with an IAL. I don't even bother trying to take photos of my fish on the lower shelves with her in the room, as she will just come and stand in front of me blocking my view.

Clio is like a young child. If she is quiet she's either dead or doing something naughty.

And no, the vet doesn't think they are cancerous at this time.


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## Bettaloveee

LittleBettaFish said:


> Haha sweetheart is not the word I would use to describe her. Brat is more apt. Today while I was in the fish room ignoring her, she scared me multiple times by standing right behind me and suddenly barking to get my attention. She then stole and chewed up one of my pieces of aquarium wood, before sneaking back in and trying to run off with an IAL. I don't even bother trying to take photos of my fish on the lower shelves with her in the room, as she will just come and stand in front of me blocking my view.
> 
> Clio is like a young child. If she is quiet she's either dead or doing something naughty.
> 
> And no, the vet doesn't think they are cancerous at this time.


That's great that the vet doesn't think they are cancerous right now, that has to provide some relief!

My neighbors have a German Shepard and she is super needy! And very naughty! She has destroyed all of their window screens, she's eaten the furniture, she's even jumped through the windows and ripped through the screen. She's extremely protective of their young children, which is great. They just got her spayed and thought it would maybe help calm her down, but instead it's just made her more needy. She's quite hilarious, but I myself could never handle her. They as well often describe her as being like a young child. Right now, they're talking about getting her a trainer. Curious to how that will turn out, knowing her!


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## LittleBettaFish

If they have a brain (I've found some of the show lines and 'pet' lines can be rather brain dead) they really _need_ some sort of mental stimulation otherwise they will find something to do, and that something is usually destructive. Especially once they hit 12-18 months. It's why so many at this age find themselves in shelters. They are not the sort of breed that you can just chuck out in the yard and forget about. 

Unfortunately, a great many nowadays are reactive and suffer from weak nerves. Clio is one such dog. Some things have improved with age, but many things have not. 

But I still love her, and even if she doesn't love me, I'm the only person she listens to. 

Well Kevin the fish is in pretty bad shape. It looks like he's got some fin rot going on, his slime coat is shedding, he's bloated, and he's got two fuzzy spots on his face. He's also extremely lethargic, although he did try to eat the white worm I put in to see if he still had some appetite. 

At this point in time, I'm just going to see how he responds to warm, clean water. I don't want to hit him with medication when he's in such a weak state, especially when I don't know exactly what is wrong with him.


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## MysticSky22301

I'm sorry scaping the tanks isn't going as planned, you'll get there! I'm still trying to scape my 35 with fish in it x.x the Cory's keep digging plants up and killed the cambomba so I've switched tactics to bulbs and root tabs. They can't seem to pull the Lily's an lotus's up as easily 

I'm glad it's nothing serious with Nike if it was an abscess he probably needs antibiotics huh?


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## LittleBettaFish

I'm going to have to euthanase Kevin. His condition hasn't changed, and if it was one of my fish, I'd have already ended their suffering. He remains non-responsive and motionless on the bottom of the tank. If it wasn't for his gills moving, I'd think he was dead. He's also still extremely bloated and I think I'm starting to see the beginning signs of dropsy. 

I feel sorry for my mum, as she has had to watch his slow decline over the past few weeks, and has done her best to try and educate her coworkers. Hopefully there will be no more fish after Kevin. 

In happier news, we went to visit Nike's breeder as she has recently moved into a new house, and Nike's sister also had a litter. The puppies were about four weeks old and adorable as all puppies this age are. They were a little shy at first as they haven't met many people, but it didn't take long for the biting to start! Kimmy (their dam) reminds me so much of Nike in both her appearance and her mannerisms. 

We're planning to go back up in another couple of weeks, as the previous owners apparently had horses, and there were all these bathtubs around the place brimming with mosquito larvae! There must have been thousands of them, and I was kicking myself that I didn't have a net with me. So I've made her promise not to empty anything until we can get back up there. There's also lots of duckweed, so I'm going to take some of that and cultivate it in an outside tub. 

I still cannot get this P. luminatus tank right. I just can't find the right combination of wood. Even though I will have to make adjustments to the background (or cut out a new one entirely), I think I might upgrade to a 10 gallon tank. I'm not sure this tank offers enough swimming space, and it would then allow me to use longer pieces of wood. 

Your corydoras sound like my goldfish. I once attempted to grow vallisneria in their tank. They became masters at uprooting it, even when I thought I'd outwitted them for sure. 

No, Ares wasn't prescribed any antibiotics. I'm not sure what was meant by 'infection', as my mum was the one who took the call. I don't believe it's an abscess. When our cats have had abscesses in the past, they've been very painful and caused issues if not treated. This lump doesn't cause him any pain, not even if you press down hard on it. 

At this time we've just been told to wait and see, with surgical removal being an option at least for the smaller one if anything changes in the future. 

There's no photos tonight. I did water changes on eight of my wild betta tanks, my M. pygmaea tank and grow-out tub, and I've still got to do a water change on my goldfish tank, in the dark (it's almost 8pm here) with the water in the tank sitting at about 10 degrees. To top it off, I have to go out in the freezing cold, to fill up the bucket with the hose as there's no internal sink down there. This is definitely where tropical fish have the advantage. I doubt I'll be able to feel my arm after this.


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## LittleBettaFish

Sadly, Kevin has died. The lesions on his mouth rapidly increased in size, so I suspect it was columnaris. I was going to euthanase him yesterday, but when I went to check on him in the morning, he was already dead. 

Yesterday, I also finished water changes on the rest of the tanks in my fish room. I also did a water change on my goldfish tank late last night. Unfortunately, my 'problem goldfish' now has an odd growth on its caudal fin. I'm going to catch it to have a closer look today. This fish is definitely not as healthy as the other two. I think it has now lost sight in one eye, and while the other two are fairly active for this time of year, and are still eating well in spite of the colder weather, it tends to spend most of its time on the bottom of the tank. If I'm honest, it's really not been the same since it was affected by nitrate poisoning. Even though at the time, I very quickly got the nitrates back to safe levels and kept them there, I think some permanent damage did occur. 

The M. pygmaea fry are continuing to thrive. More of them are starting to try and eat the BBS now, and you can definitely see a difference in size between the oldest fry and the recently hatched. I did a water change yesterday, using only treated tap water. There haven't be any deaths, so from now on, I'll start doing water changes with tap water only. 

The spawning mop in the main tank was full of eggs, so put it into the grow-out tub and we'll see how many more fry hatch out. I'm hoping that maybe there are some P. luminatus eggs in this lot. Although I'm wondering if they'd prefer a mop with finer yarn. 

I've also finally found the right combination of wood for my P. luminatus tank. I had all these thicker pieces of melaleuca sitting around, and they are the perfect size and shape for this tank. I think I still need some smooth river stones in this tank to really complete the picture. I was hoping my plants would get sent out today, but so far I haven't received any shipping notifications. Once the wood and plants are in place, and the heater I've ordered has arrived, my P. luminatus pair will be going back in. I'm hoping with more cover, the fish will be more settled than previously. 

My wild bettas are doing fine. My B. miniopinna male built a nest right after I did a water change and has been flirting with the female this morning, and I think my F0 pair of B. brownorum spawned again. The entire mat of Mayaca fluviatilis in my F1/F2 B. coccina tank died, so it's gone now, and will be replaced with Water Sprite when my plant order arrives. They are definitely not happy with the lack of cover, especially as there are so many males in this tank. 

I took a few photos while I was doing my morning checks. 

First, are a couple of B. sp. api api females. 



















Followed by my B. miniopinna male (it's next to impossible to take good photos in this tank)










Then just a view from the fish room. 










Clio had a massively successful long weekend at the park. She _did_ bark at the Vizsla that lives a couple doors down, as I got her out of the car not noticing them coming down the street. However, she didn't get anywhere near as out of control as she would have previously, and it sounded more like frustrated excitement than aggression (not that I think she is aggressive just fearful). 

Then yesterday, we had our biggest success in a long time. A small dog went past on the path, and I let her have a look, and then turned her away and got her engaged, before making her heel towards it, and walk parallel to it (we were some distance away). She didn't hackle up or bark, and after a while she ignored the dog and started paying attention to me. 

Then as we were heading to the car, we saw two Dachshunds being walked on the path. We were much closer to them, and Clio was watching them, but as soon as I gave a 'leave it' command, she turned her attention back to me and soon lost interest in them. 

I'm finding letting her follow behind dogs (obviously at a safe distance) is helping with her reactivity, as it gets boring fairly quickly for her, and she's also not being jerked away from the dog and having her frustration increased. 

We had to go past the playground to get the to car. There were dozens of kids running and making noise, and riding around on scooters. Clio was allowed to stop and check them out, and there was no reaction. I'm never going to trust Clio 100% around strangers, especially children, and I personally prefer a dog that remains aloof. However, if I can get Clio to pass neutrally by strangers on our walks, no matter if they are wearing a hat or making a lot of noise, I would consider that a success. 

She's also playing with her new ball regularly at the park. The other day, she looked like she might bark at a group of women walking by, so I got her ball out and used it to distract her. In the past she would have ignored the ball and likely barked at the women. But this time, she went after the ball, and was happy to play a game of tug. It wasn't just half-hearted tugging either. She was fully engaged the whole time. 

One funny thing from yesterday's walk, was that I wanted to see if I gave Clio a command (in this case a sit/stay) and then mum said the word 'okay' whether she would break. She didn't. Instead she waited until I told her it was okay, before she would move.


----------



## LittleBettaFish

I hate buying things sight unseen, and this is why.

I received my plant order yesterday. The Anubias Barteri was in great condition, and larger than I was expecting. Some of leaves would have to be more than 10cm long, so it will provide plenty of cover. The Milfoil was also green and healthy, and I will be planting it out tomorrow. Unfortunately, the Water Sprite was rather limp and anemic looking, and a couple of the bunches appeared to just be leaves bundled together with no sign of any roots. It was a little disappointing as the Water Sprite I'd received in my previous order arrived in such excellent condition. The Vallisneria also wasn't looking the best. A large number of leaves had to be removed as they were yellowing or dying, and the remaining leaves are a very light green.

However, hopefully, the Vallisneria and Water Sprite will make a quick turnaround as they are both fast growing plants.

The Vals have gone into the M. pygmaea tank. I definitely need to get another bag of sand, as what I had left was barely enough to cover the roots. However, I'm thinking I might go with a different sand substrate. I'm using ADA 'Colorado' sand at the moment, but I'm not 100% happy with it. I want something with a slightly larger grain and more texture, as I feel it will look more natural. Unfortunately, replacing the substrate will mean a complete tear-down and my rainbowfish are a lot more sensitive to change than my wilds. 

With all these new plants, I definitely need more lights. Presently, I've just got the one 2ft light that is currently being rotated through the fish room over the course of a day. I was going to get LEDs, but for now I think I might just go with some shop fluoros with 6500K tubes, as they are cheap to buy, and none of my tanks require high lighting. 

My only issue is that I will probably need another power point installed. I think there's only two in that room, and I'm running four 6 outlet power boards, but between the heaters, lights, and air pumps, they are nearly full up. Speaking of air pumps, mine don't really seem up to the job of powering so many tanks. I think as I start phasing the wilds out, and start increasing filtration in my tanks, I am going to need to invest in a more powerful pump.

I'm going to clean the glass on my tanks and try and take some photos of my wilds later today.


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## MysticSky22301

I've ordered a 120g rated air pump, I have 5 smaller ones running around the house right now and 2 of them are in the fish room. Consolidating is so much less hassle. Eventually I want to get an industrial size pump and just run PVC wherever I need it, this comes down to the fact I'm going to have a room full of tanks in the future XD

I'm so glad Clio is making progress! You're doing a wonderful job ^^
Congratulations on all those eggs and fry!


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## LittleBettaFish

I've got two Resun air pumps. I think one has six outlets , and the other four (or it might be eight and six - I can't be bothered to check). The six outlet air pump has no problems handling my 1.2m rack which holds eight tanks and the BBS hatchery. The four outlet is the one that struggles. It's divided between two racks, but at the moment, is only running air to my P. luminatus, M. pygmaea tank and grow-out, and my B. hendra tank. The tanks are all pretty close together, but if I try to run a sponge filter in my water aging tub (on the floor beside the pump) or the tanks on the upper two shelves of the taller rack, it just can't handle it. 

Eventually, I want to run PVC as well. However, the layout of my fish room will be changing dramatically in the future, so I don't want to put PVC piping in, only to find it's in the wrong spot at a later date. 

I'm really happy with how the M. pygmaea fry are growing out. I'm going to get a larger tank for them next weekend, and hopefully they will continue to thrive. With how productive my small group of rainbows are, I can see why so many breeders raise them in ponds. I'm just hoping I get some nice males from this group, as knowing my luck I'm going to end up with all females. 

The P. luminatus will be moved into their tank next week. I'm really desperate to get some eggs from these guys, as I'm assuming they only live for 2-3 years like other species from this genus, and their period of peak fertility is very short-lived. I'm not experienced enough to be able to determine whether or not any of the fry in the grow-out are from this pair. 

I wouldn't say I'm doing a wonderful job as I'm so green to dog training, but I do feel like we are slowly inching our way there. Clio's always been 'my' girl, but I really feel like our bond has strengthened over the past few weeks. I don't think it's just because she views me as a treat dispenser either, as she wants to spend time in my company even if it's just to curl up next to me on the bed or keep an eye on me when I'm doing something.


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## LittleBettaFish

My P. luminatus tank is almost ready. The wood is finally waterlogged, so I could remove the rocks holding them down. The milfoil has gone in, and I threw in a handful of riparian leaves and seed pods, which should hopefully sink over the next day or so. 

The water is cloudy because I stirred up the sand and the plants will have to be given time to grow in, but I don't think it looks too bad. I'm no aquascaper, but I've tried to both create areas of cover, as well as open space for the fish to move around in.



















All that's needed now, is a large water change, a spawning mop, and a heater. 

I was planning on purchasing a tank for my M. pygmaea fry today, but our hot water system decided to die instead. We're going to drop by tomorrow on our way home from dog club. I'm going to check if they have more P. luminatus, as I would prefer to have more than a single pair to breed from. Although, I'm sure most of the P. luminatus in Australia are related, as they only came into this country in small numbers and through very dubious means. 

I'm wondering if the aquarium still has some of those tiny P. gertrudae in stock. I don't know if they came with a locality name attached, but my M. pygmaea may need some companionship once the P. luminatus pair are moved out. I think I will be waiting on my P. tenellus for a while yet. 

I've also yet to find a dried food my rainbowfish and blue-eyes will eat. They're really only enthusiastic about freshly hatched BBS and live mosquito larvae. The largest M. pygmaea female will take other foods such as frozen bloodworms and brine shrimp, but she pushes everyone else out of the way when they are eating and steals most of the food. 

I have been trying to get my hands on Repashy, but it seems that the issues with its import are still ongoing. 

I do know that many breeders recommend feeding rainbows a diet consisting of mostly plant and vegetable matter, so maybe they might find a veggie based pellet or flake more palatable. 

Obviously if they are spawning regularly, they are receiving enough nutrition. I think it's more that they seem to prefer to pick at the food, rather than gobble it down in one go. 

My M. pygmaea fry are absolutely thriving. The largest are starting to look like actual fish and they are getting large enough now to tackle microworms, although it still takes them a couple of attempts before they get them down. There's also some much smaller fry that I believe are only recently hatched. I'm still hoping that at least a few of these eggs were laid by my P. luminatus pair. 

I'm too inexperienced to tell the difference between a rainbowfish and a blue-eye fry at this size.


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## MysticSky22301

You'll know as they grow if you have any blue eyes fry  
That tank is simple but beautiful  

For a different food for your fish, can you get ahold of grindal worms? I use them on all my small fish and they don't stop hunting for them until they can no longer smell them ( I feel like I've asked before but I don't remember)


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## LittleBettaFish

I did have grindal worms. Unfortunately, their culture got invaded by white worms through cross-contamination, and then we had a stretch of hot days and being in my fish room, the worms took a beating. Now I think mites or something similar have infested these new cultures in spite of my best efforts, and even though I feed the cultures regularly and have them in a cool part of the house, I am not getting any real growth in numbers. 

I was going to try and get my hands on some 'clean' white worm/grindal worm cultures, but it's not been a priority. 

This is mainly because I personally don't like feeding too many grindal worms/white worms/blackworms. Plus I would prefer to feed predominately flake/pellets to the rainbows and blue eyes, and _supplement_ with live and frozen as it's quicker, cheaper, and I know most hobbyists will want fish that will readily take dried foods.


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## LittleBettaFish

The camera is out of batteries, so I'll be taking photos later today, but I do have some news from the fish room to share.

On Sunday, we went to the aquarium as I needed supplies. I came home with a 39 litre tank, a couple of heaters, a sponge filter, and a pair of Chromaphyosemion bitaeniatum 'Lagos'. 

Originally, my mum wanted a betta to put out in her study. However, my track record with bettas isn't great, and I didn't want her to get upset if something happened to the fish. Knowing that my mum also likes killifish, I suggested killifish might be a better option, as I can always breed more to replace the original pair. 

I normally won't bring fish home unless I have a tank for them to go into. But I know my mum had been after a fish for her office for a while now, and I knew that I had enough on hand to put together a decent set up. 

The pair are starting to settle in. Both of them have been eating and the male was showing some beautiful colour yesterday. His caudal fin is a bit tattered, as there were several males in the store tank, but with time it will heal up, and increase in size dramatically. 

Meanwhile, I moved about 90% of the M. pygmaea fry into the 39 litre tank. I think some fry got caught up in the spawning mop, as when I put it back into the refilled hatchery tank, there were about a dozen or so fry swimming around. I now have over 30 M. pygmaea fry, and I just put a spawning mop full of eggs back into the hatchery tub this morning. I'm definitely going to need to work out how to squeeze some extra rack space out of my fish room, as these fry will need a 2-3ft tank to grow out in. 

My P. luminatus pair are still sharing a tank with the rainbows. I'm waiting on a heater for their tank, and then they can be moved across. I'm happy with how their tank looks at the moment, I just hope that it proves conductive to spawning! 

I have a pretty big order coming in later this week. I've got two 50 watt heaters, three sponge filters, 100 metres of airline tubing, two packets of IALs, vegetable based flakes for my rainbows, Sera Micron, a Sera KH test kit, a 500g bottle of Seachem Neutral Regulator, and some air control valves as I never seem to have enough of those. The order has been shipped, so I'm hoping it's here before Friday. 

I've also got to get some lights for my fish room this weekend, as in some tanks, the plants are starting to suffer and it's basically throwing money down the drain. There has been a significant difference in how much sunlight this room receives in winter, compared to summer, and I wasn't expecting it to be so dark in there, even on days when it's not overcast.


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## MysticSky22301

I have to use floor lamps but I'm going to eventually get led strip lights with the right spectrum for plants. It's not only economical but in my opinion much simpler, and obviously more compact

I also want to use flexwatt heat tape to warm the tanks because running individual heaters takes up so much space


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## LittleBettaFish

I am just going to pick up some cheap fluros for now, but 'eventually' they will be replaced with LEDs. It's just the initial cost of LEDs (especially those suitable for aquatic plant growth) is so much higher than fluorescent lighting, and I don't want to be spending hundreds and hundreds of dollars on lighting at the moment. 

Even though I've never used it, I just have this distrust of heat tape. I have a long-standing fear of house fires, and I just prefer my heaters in the tanks rather than outside them, even though I'm sure the likelihood of a fire starting is very low. 

I definitely need to add one or two more power points to this room. Although electrician older brother is currently avoiding us as he's pulled down half the wall outside to put a door in and then didn't finish the job.


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## MysticSky22301

Flexwatt is supposed to be the safest option on the market, I know a few aquarists on YouTube use it  

Yeah it's a little expensive up front but in the long run it's much cheaper


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## wildborneo

looks like you are going away from Wild Bettas. I will miss reading this forum.


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## LittleBettaFish

I wonder how effective heat tape is at heating larger aquariums, and what the cost of running heat tape with larger aquariums is compared to running an aquarium heater. Most of the Youtube videos I see where it's used, it's for heating only small volumes of water. 

Wildborneo, it's going to be a few years before I stop keeping wild bettas entirely. I may have stopped breeding them (although _some_ of my pairs are still producing fry), but most of my wilds will still be staying here with me, as I don't trust them in the hands of anyone else, and I feel the older fish deserve a good 'retirement'. 

So there will still be updates and photos.


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## Nismo83

LittleBettaFish said:


> That's a shame about your fish losses. I hope your B. macrostoma are still doing well?
> 
> Earlier today I decided to pull both mops from my rainbowfish tank and set them up in a plastic tub. There were only a few eggs on each mop, but as I don't know if my remaining male is large enough to successfully spawn, I thought I might as well try and hatch out what I've currently got.
> 
> The tub is white with an opaque lid so very little light gets in (I'm not sure if this was a factor in so many of the previous eggs fungusing). This time I didn't add any Methylene blue to the water, and there's about 10 litres of water in the tub, versus the 1/4-1/2 a litre of water in the plastic container.
> 
> Many of the eggs were eyed up, so I wasn't surprised to see a newly hatched fry when I checked on them just before.
> 
> I just hope Sera Micron will do the trick the time. If I'm unsuccessful again, I think I'll try and get my hands on some paramecium or figure out how to make green water. Either that or get a couple of pairs of Guppies or Endlers, and use their fry to teach my rainbowfish to recognise Sera Micron as food.
> 
> It will be interesting to see if the P. luminatus pair have deposited any eggs on the mops. But it would be at least another week or two before I know for certain.
> 
> I'll be taking some photos of my wild bettas later this afternoon, once we get back from walking the dogs.


lost some mac fries, the adults are doing good.. in fact spawning until i have almost 200 young fries now..


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## LittleBettaFish

Wow that's a great accomplishment, considering how reluctant the macs can be about holding to term.

I have some tragic news to share. I lost my P. luminatus male today. After not having lost a single wild to jumping for all these years, I came into my fish room to find my P. luminatus male dead behind the tank. 

I removed the spawning mop from their tank this morning. So I'm not sure if he jumped out then, or found the one gap near the cords that I was unable to completely cover even with cling wrap, and got out through that. 

Either way, I'm very upset. The female has been moved back into the tank with the Pygmy rainbowfish. I will leave the P. luminatus tank running empty for the next 2-3 weeks, in case by some miracle, the pair spawned on the plants (although this is doubtful as I can't see anything). 

I do have the one P. luminatus fry in my grow-out. But even if this is a male, I don't know how fertile my female will be by the time it reaches sexual maturity.


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## MysticSky22301

Maybe try again? you may have more fry as you had mixed the eggs in the hatching tank


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## LittleBettaFish

I don't think there are any fry in the hatchery tub, as I've gone over them with the torch, and none of them are displaying the neon blue eyes and sides. I would be very surprised if any further fry showed up from this point. 

Unfortunately, it will be difficult to try again, as these are quite a rare fish here in Australia. Furthermore, most of the breeders working with this species do not ship and live interstate. They are also still fairly expensive, especially if you purchase them from a store. I paid $50 just for a single pair, and they do best in groups, so that could end up costing a couple hundred dollars. 

So unless I can source more P. luminatus, I'm likely going to either break the tank down, or purchase a group of something like P. gertrudae to fill it. 

I swear it's always the favourite fish, or the rarest fish that you lose prematurely. Never the deformed fish or the culls.


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## LittleBettaFish

The camera nearly ended up going through a wall today. My pair of B. miniopinna were spawning right near the front of the tank, and I could not for the life of me, get the camera to focus. It doesn't help that they spawned in a particularly shady spot, and that the water in this tank is very dark. 

This was literally the 'best' photo I got after sitting there for a good half hour. This is the male for those unfamiliar with this species. 










Next up is Zig-Zag. He refused to move to the side of the tank that didn't have water marks on the glass. His offspring are doing well. They are growing slowly because I've slacked off on water changes in recent weeks, and one seems to be suffering from problems with its swim bladder, but the rest are healthy and you can definitely see a lateral spot forming on at least one of them. 










I also took a couple of photos of one of my B. uberis males. One of the females (I think it was his mother) was barred up, and so he was keeping all the other males away. 



















Finally, here's one of my B. hendra females. I honestly can't tell if this is an F1 or the F0 female, but she's been in the wars. This sort of fin damage looks worse than it is. A healthy fish should recover from this without any problems at all, and much faster than you would think. Although I found this female picking fights with the younger males in the tank so I don't think those tears will be healing any time soon. 










Not much has been happening with my wild bettas. Later today I'm going to combine tanks 6 and 11, which both hold B. coccina, so I can start consolidating all my wild betta tanks onto the one rack. My main concern is that the male from tank 6, will start fighting with the males from tank 11 (his brother and nephews). It's been a long time since he has had to share a tank with other males, and his brother is a large and dominant fish. 

Meanwhile, I pulled another mop of eggs out of my M. pygmaea tank yesterday, and I am hoping that there will be more eggs when I check the mop again today. There have been a few deaths in the grow-out tank, but I've still got between 15-20 fish, and there's at least that many again in the hatchery tub - not counting the unhatched eggs. 

The vallisneria in the main tank has taken off. Some of the older leaves are yellowing, but it's sending out runners and new leaves everywhere, and has already started to spread, so hopefully that corner of the tank will fill up entirely and I won't be able to see the sponge filter. The milfoil in the P. luminatus tank is still green, but I can't tell if it's growing, and it has collected detritus on its leaves. 

Finally, the killifish pair are doing great. I've caught the male showing off to the female and trying to chase her down into the sphagnum moss to spawn. They were a little shy initially, but they are starting to become used to my presence, and spend less time hiding out of sight.


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## LittleBettaFish

Unless Photobucket reinstates free third party hosting, or the cost becomes more reasonable (I'm certainly not forking over 400 USD a year) I won't be continuing with my journal on this forum. Literal years of photos have been rendered useless, and without them, my journal is a shadow of its former self. 

I've also got some personal stuff to deal with at the moment, so I'm likely going to be stepping away from the forum for a while. 

I do still have my blog RedWine Bettas, which I will be reviving with weekly/fortnightly updates on the goings on of the fish room.


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## MysticSky22301

Can you use imgr? My room mate suggested it


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## ThatFishThough

Nooooo! LBF! ;-; I'll miss your pictures & advice.


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## Aqua Aurora

LittleBettaFish said:


> Unless Photobucket reinstates free third party hosting, or the cost becomes more reasonable (I'm certainly not forking over 400 USD a year) I won't be continuing with my journal on this forum. Literal years of photos have been rendered useless, and without them, my journal is a shadow of its former self.
> 
> I've also got some personal stuff to deal with at the moment, so I'm likely going to be stepping away from the forum for a while.
> 
> I do still have my blog RedWine Bettas, which I will be reviving with weekly/fortnightly updates on the goings on of the fish room.


I know your frustration, even if we were to take the many hours to transfer images to a different hosting site we can't edit our old posts to make them work again., makes the whole thing seem futile...
Hope personal troubles sort out for you.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks for the kind thoughts. 

It's not so much going forward that's the problem, as obviously there are alternatives to PB. It's the fact that more than 200 pages of photos, adding up to hours and hours of my time, have been effectively erased. What saddens me most, is that I can explain in words the steps of courtship, or the differences in each species, but I can never illustrate as clearly or richly with my words, as a single photograph. Without photos, a great deal of context and valuable information has been lost. 

To make matter worse, I have been unable to download my albums from PB. Fortunately, I think most of my images are saved onto an older laptop, but I doubt it is all of them.


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## Nismo83

i wonder if skydrive or google drive helps?..it will be waste not to see your updates..


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## LittleBettaFish

Okay, I've created an account with Imgur and will take some photos later today to see if I can post them on this forum. 

So far, I've been unable to download my albums from Photobucket (it either freezes or in the one instance it was successful I didn't find the email until too late), so hopefully they don't go out of business any time soon. Fortunately, many of the photos are saved on an old laptop so I do have back-ups. 

Since I last posted, there's been a few changes in the fish room. 

The biggest change, is that all of my wild bettas are now on the main rack. All that is needed are lights, and some live plants, and that is how those tanks will stay for the foreseeable future. 

My rainbowfish are thriving. The three remaining adults are much friendlier, and now come to the front of the tank when they see me, although they remain very easily startled. 

I've had no problems with the rainbowfish fry, and I am still collecting new eggs weekly. Recently I received brine shrimp eggs that I believe got too hot in transit. I couldn't get them to hatch, so the growth rate on the fry has slowed, as they have only been receiving powdered foods/crushed up flake and microworms. However, I have new eggs arriving today, so hopefully these have a much better hatch rate and I can get them onto daily feedings. 

The four P. luminatus fry are doing well. Like the rainbowfish, their growth has slowed considerably. I think in another month or so (maybe even sooner with better food) they will be large enough to join the adult female. 

The killifish pair are also alive and thriving. The male has coloured up beautifully, and the extensions on his caudal fin have doubled in size. I haven't attempted to collect any eggs as I've got my hands full with fry at the moment. However, I don't doubt that they are spawning in the sphagnum moss as the male is constantly harassing the female. 

In a twist for me, I am actually due to receive a trio of guppies today! They are 'See-Thru Tuxedo' and have been imported from Thailand. They were an impulse purchase, as I normally don't go for man-made strains of fish. However, I saw their video on the seller's FB page, and next thing I know I was emailing her. 

I had bad luck with guppies in the past, as I didn't properly understand my soft tap water. However, now I have worked out how to keep the pH stable and above 7.0, I am hoping I will be more successful. 

My only concern is how sensitive this particular strain is. For example, I believe albino strains are supposed to be weaker, but not many people in Australia seem to work with the 'see-thru' guppies. My greatest fear is that I will lose them before they can give me any offspring as that will be $75 down the drain. 

I will have more to post later today, so that is it for now.


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## MysticSky22301

Oooo! New fish ^^
I'm setting up for a species of shell dweller cichlids so I understand that excitement! 

I'm glad you didn't give up on this thread <3 I really look forward to your posts


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## LittleBettaFish

Firstly, the guppies arrived alive and well. They handled the journey from QLD so well in fact, that the male was bothering the females only minutes after being released into the tank. 

They are quite small, with all three being only about an inch total length.

Even though they were an impulse buy, and guppies aren't a fish I would normally keep, I don't regret getting them now I have them in hand. 

I tried to get some photos of them tonight, but these three are constantly on the move. I need to move their tank up onto the second shelf so I can get some better photos as these don't do them justice. 




























I got the new brine shrimp eggs hatching, so the rainbowfish and luminatus fry all got a good feed. Unfortunately, I forgot to get coffee filters in last week's shop, so they will have to wait until Saturday when we do our weekly shop. 

Meanwhile, in my previous post I mentioned that I thought it likely my killifish pair were spawning. Today I discovered that there is at least one fry in the tank. Based on its appearance, it's not a newborn fry, so who knows how long it has been there. At least it's a sign that my pair are happy and healthy. 

I did water changes on six of my wild betta tanks this morning, and the remaining tanks will be getting done tomorrow. I've slipped again with my maintenance, but I'm determined to get back onto a schedule of weekly water changes with my wilds as I feel a lack of regular water changes might have contributed to the bent ventral fins I see in some of my younger fish (especially the B. sp. api api). 

I've been maintaining a rigorous schedule of water changes in my rainbowfish tank and grow-outs. The grow-outs get at least a 25% water change once every two days, and the main tank gets a 25% water change twice a week. I know TB is a common affliction among rainbowfish, so I want them to stay as healthy as possible. 

That's it for tonight. I've uploaded my photos using Imgur, so I hope they work and everyone can view them.


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## LittleBettaFish

Today I came into my fish room to find my pair of B. miniopinna spawning. During water changes the other day, I removed the film canister from the tank to discourage spawning. Earlier this morning the male gave the middle finger by building a nest right at the front of the tank, and when I went in to check on everyone just now, I found the pair wrapping under the nest. 

Obviously I missed the best shot of the day, which was of the female stunned with eggs falling to the bottom of the tank. I was waiting a good fifteen minutes for them to successfully wrap again, but for some reason they were having great difficulty coordinating themselves today. If it wasn't for the juveniles and sub-adults sharing a tank with them, you'd think they were a virgin pair. 

This is the female putting eggs into the nest. 










Followed by the male making some adjustments










The male waiting under his nest for the female to return (she wouldn't stop searching for eggs)










Female returning briefly to the nest










Followed by several minutes of just cringing awkwardness





































The male sort of semi-stunned himself here. The female is in the back checking up on him










In other news, the guppies have settled in great. They've coloured up nicely, have a good appetite, and are showing no signs of parasites or disease (obviously they are in quarantine). They've had no problems with water changes, and their tank parameters are excellent. 

I reckon my rainbowfish and blue-eye fry have grown since being back on the BBS. They've been getting daily feedings, as I want to get the blue-eye fry into a tank with the adult female. I doubt she would bother them at the size they are now, but they are the only four P. luminatus I have, so I can't afford for anything to happen to them. 

For now I've ceased collecting rainbowfish eggs. I've got only a half a dozen small fry left in the hatchery tub, and as soon as they are big enough, they will be moved into the grow-out tank. The hatchery tub will be going into storage for the next few months, and will instead be replaced with a 10 gallon tank, which will house my group of P. luminatus. I still haven't decided how I want the tank to look. I want to try Blyxa aubertii, but I'm not sure if this would require CO2. I don't mind if it grows extremely slowly, but I don't want it to die off. 

Now my wild betta tanks are all on the main rack, I want to remove all the algae-covered, slowly dying plants. I am considering Hygrophila corymbosa 'angustifolia', and cardamine lyrata. Part of me wants to attempt Java Fern again with consistent lighting and fertiliser dosing. I just love the vivid green leaves as they contrast beautifully with the colour of my fish. I've also looked at Saggitaria Natans or Cyperus Helferi, which are completely different from anything I've done in my wild betta tanks before. 

However, I'm definitely going to need new substrate (I would wager any nutrients in my ADA Malaya has long been depleted), and part of me is leery of making any drastic changes while all my fish are healthy and doing well. 

I also have other news to share. Since the dog behind us has not been seen for months now, I have been able to work with Clio in the backyard and start proofing some of her obedience. As a result, her engagement with me when we are out at the park and at club has improved dramatically. She still reacts to dogs and you can see she's not 100% comfortable being in close proximity to strangers all the time, but she's responding much better to cues, even when she's getting over threshold. 

She's also behaving herself much better at club now. Before she'd be dragging me everywhere, but now she's starting slowing down and checking in, and listening to my commands rather than ignoring them. Last week she was basically in standing heat, and she still behaved herself relatively well. 

This is a dog that not that long ago, wouldn't chase a tennis ball and was either too stressed or not interested, in playing with toys outside of the house. Yesterday, we took her to the oval and she recalled perfectly each time (we've been working on that the past couple of weeks) and even left treats she'd been given to chase the ball. 

These seem like such small victories, but I feel like we've climbed Mt Everest to reach them. 

I've also started working with Nike. I think a lot of Nike's 'quirks' relate to her fearful nature. For example, I think she pulls so strongly on the leash because she is stressed and over threshold, and that is just how she copes with it. You start to see a less confident dog when you ask her to slow down and start to increase exposure to things that cause her stress (such as other dogs). 

So like Clio, my focus has been to work on obedience and engagement. Nike's had very limited training, so she's taken to marker training much more quickly than the two older dogs that have almost a decade of bad habits to unlearn. She actually picks things up fairly quickly, and so far I've taught her touch, standing on a verbal cue, weaving through my legs, and perching. I've also been working on an automatic sit and implied stay with sits and drops. We've also just been having fun. The other day at the park, I just got her chasing food in my hand and playing with a tennis ball. That might not seem like much, but this is a dog that usually won't even respond to her name when she's on a walk and whose interest in food and toys was pretty much zero. 

That's it from down here in grey, miserable Melbourne. I might go sit in my warm fish room and pretend I'm at the beach.


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## MysticSky22301

It absolutely sounds like you're doing great! You have made fantastic progress with the dogs ^^ those guppies are adorable and your fish seem to be doing very well. I'm glad the struggles are fading away behind you ^^


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## ThatFishThough

how do you train basic commands like come, sit, and stay? One of my neighbors have an Aussie that really needs training but lacks the focus for me to do it the way I learned.


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## LittleBettaFish

So far things do seem to be on the up, at least in the fish room. It's part of the reason I'm so hesitant to make any changes. My main goal at this point is getting the rainbowfish fry to a size where I can sex them and sell them. I have about 40 of them, and I only want to keep 1-2 males and 2-3 females. 

ThatFishThough, I use luring and marker training. I personally wouldn't use any other method as when done properly, dogs pick up new commands very quickly. 

The first thing I do, is teach focus. I teach the watch command as a way to get the dog's attention onto me. When I say watch, Clio knows she has to look at me and hold my gaze until she is released. If she's looking at me, there's more chance she's listening to me, than if she's staring off into the distance. 

I think the most important thing with training sessions are to keep them fun, keep them short, and break everything down into small steps. For example, I wouldn't put a dog in obedience classes down at club because they are too long, and too boring, and most of the time the dogs are just going through the motions. 

I think you also have to find what motivates the dog. Does it love tugging or playing with a ball? Does it prefer to work for food, or is it one of those dogs where praise alone is enough (I think for most dogs praise alone is not enough unless you are heavy-handed with the corrections). 

I'm not a 'positive only' trainer. I do use corrections. However, when the dog is learning and I am still proofing the behaviour I do not correct. Instead I use the word 'no' to indicate that the dog needs to try again. Only when the dog understands the behaviour 100% and reliably performs it even under heavy distraction, do I use any sort of correction for non-compliance. I also like a dog that responds speedily to a command. As I progress with my training, I slowly taper off the rewards until only a fast, precise response gets a reward. 

However, in a new or high-distraction environment, I do lower my criteria (I think that's the correct term) and reward more heavily even if the dog was slow to respond or isn't completely in the right position. It wouldn't be fair for me to think that just because my dog performs brilliantly at home, she will perform equally brilliantly at dog club. Far too many dog owners make this mistake (I am guilty of it myself) and it can lead to a lot of frustration for both dog and owner. 

I like to watch trainers like Michael Ellis and Denise Fenzi (highly recommend you check them out) on Youtube. I want to see happy and engaged dogs. Nothing turns me off a trainer faster than seeing videos of stressed, unhappy dogs skulking along. Just because a dog is too afraid to leave your side for fear of being corrected, doesn't mean it's 'heeling'.


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## LittleBettaFish

Here's a few photos of a fish that I have so far failed to capture looking his best. It's my Chromaphyosemion bitaeniatum 'lagos red' male. He lives with the female in an 11 litre tank down in the study. His fins were really battered when we first got him home, as there were other males in the tank, but now it's just him and the female, they have grown quite long.




























Even though I'm not trying to spawn them, they have produced at least one fry that I can see. Unfortunately, the male is constantly chasing and harassing the female so she's lost condition and I might have to temporarily separate them. 

Because they don't get much human interaction, they are probably my shyest fish. It makes taking photos difficult as the male doesn't cooperate. It's a shame as the colours and finnage on the male are amazing. The female is bland by comparison, but I like the subtle hints of colour in her fins that match those of the male. 

In other news, I have _finally_ installed the background in my rainbowfish tank. Because of a slightly messy silicone job on the tank, it doesn't sit completely flush, but you don't notice so much when you are looking front on. 

Unfortunately, I made the mistake of not taking a photo of the tank before I broke it down. There's only three pieces of wood in the tank, and I could not get one of the pieces back in its original position. In the end I think it was pretty close, but just not close enough. 

I mixed some milfoil in with the vallisneria, but I feel it looks too contrived, so I'm going to pull it and replace it with more vallisneria. I was worried the rainbowfish would go back to hiding all the time with so many changes, but they were at the front of the tank wanting to be fed last night, and are out and about today. 

We're going to have a few days of weather in the mid to high teens (this is degrees Celsius), so I've got a container down the side of the house and hopefully it will attract some mosquitoes. Now that almost all my wilds have transitioned to flake food, it's more for the rainbowfish, killifish, and guppies. I really should have weaned my wilds onto flake food years ago. It's so much cheaper and easier than feeding them frozen/live foods, especially now I'm not focused on breeding them. 

Finally, we had a bit of drama in the fish room last night. I came up after dinner, and found Kanika lying in an odd position on the floor. A closer inspection showed that she'd got the cord that connects the vertical blinds, wrapped around one hind leg and was stuck as it hadn't pulled completely free from the curtain. I don't know how long she'd been trapped like that, so rather than grab a pair of scissors, I went over to see if I could unwind it. This caused Kanika to panic and she started biting and scratching me. So I'm sitting on the floor shouting for mum to come and help while she's downstairs with the television blaring unable to hear me. Meanwhile, the cat is stuck to my arm and biting me any time I try to dislodge myself. After a few minutes mum comes in, and after some prompting, cuts the cord. 

Kanika was shaken up but fine. I escaped unscathed as she wasn't trying to hurt me, and I removed the offending cord so that it can't happen again.


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## MysticSky22301

Aww poor Kitty

Wow that's a beautiful fish! I don't know why so many of the fish you have get so little public attention


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## LittleBettaFish

I think it's because many of the fish I keep, are more 'specialist' species. You can't just stick them into the average community tank and expect them to thrive. Many require very specific water conditions, and of course, rarity often means a higher price tag. The 'average' hobbyist is not going to pay $50 for a pair of fish that only grow to an inch and have a life expectancy of just a couple years. 

Then there's the fact that if the fish are rare, breeders are going to be reluctant to hand them over to buyers that have no interest in breeding. The average hobbyist may struggle to even find these fish in their LFS, as most are sold through forums and FB groups. 

Finally, you have to remember also that I try to capture my fish looking their best. Some of the fish I keep can look downright ugly if not kept in conditions to their liking, and wild bettas have a reputation (undeserved in my option) for being shy. I've seen wild bettas in store tanks, and _very_ few were showing anything close to their true colouring. Someone less familiar with these fish is not likely to pay top dollar for a drab, brown fish that spends all its time hiding.


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## LittleBettaFish

I'll have some fish photos to post later today, but first I have to share a Clio 'brag' from this weekend. 

Last week, I started working with Clio out in the front yard. I have just been taking her a short distance up the street one way, and then a short distance up the street the other way, as well as working on her obedience commands on the front lawn.

On a walk Clio never relaxes. She always looks stressed and it affects her ability to listen to, and obey, commands. 

These short walks are all about maintaining calmness and focus. If something scares Clio, I want her first reaction to be looking at me for guidance, not feeling like she has to immediately escalate to that fight/flight mode. 

So far I've noticed a real change in her demeanor. The worried look in her eye is starting to go, the tail is starting to come down, and her focus is starting to shift from what's going on around her, to me and what I'm asking. 

At this point in time, distractions have obviously been kept to a minimum. Once she is reliable in a low distraction environment, I will be increasing the distance, and then slowly increasing the level of distraction - such as choosing a time of day when more people and dogs are around. 

Today we went about 100m down the road, which was longer than we usually do, and for the first time, I had a dog that looked comfortable and confident, even when there were several neighbourhood dogs barking in windows and behind fences. Not only that, but I had a dog that was checking in and actually eager to engage with me. She was walking beautifully on a loose lead, and when I stopped at the side of the road she even did an automatic sit without any sign of stress. 

Yesterday there was a German Shepherd specialty show on down at club, as well as an All Breeds show, so there were also dozens and of other breeds present, everything from Dachshunds to Bernese Mountain Dogs. 

Clio was amazing. 

Even when one of the German Shepherds lunged and barked at her, she didn't even hackle up. She got within about a metre of a Dachshund, and couldn't have been less interested. Less than a year ago, I would have been struggling to drag her away. I deliberately took her to close to some sort of Corgi looking dog to see how she'd respond, and her eyes didn't even leave my face. When we were waiting in the tent she laid quietly at my feet. When she was put back into the car she just went to sleep even when the dogs in the car next to her barked at everyone and everything that went by. 

Best of all, she walked politely on the lead. Gone was the dog that would pull me around club like a bulldozer. 

The only reaction she had the whole day, was when mum thought it would be a good idea to let her sniff a dog in a trailer that she used to play with (the dog's owner is Nike's breeder and had no problems with it). I let mum hold the lead and she missed the signs that Clio wasn't comfortable, so she did snarl and growl. However, it was pretty minor compared to what she was capable of in the past, and at least mum now knows that sometimes I'm not just being paranoid. 

There have been days when I came home from that club crying because Clio had been so out of control. Anyone who has read this blog knows how much I've struggled. It felt like for every one step forwards it was two steps back. Hardly anyone at club could offer any useful advice, and it felt like secretly many of them thought her reactivity was our fault. 

So for the first time in years, I was genuinely proud of something I'd achieved. I wasn't out to beat someone, or holding myself to an impossible standard and feeling like I was still falling short. 

Yesterday it just felt like everything was starting to fall into place.


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## MysticSky22301

That is absolutely amazing! I wish I could hug you ^^


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## LittleBettaFish

Well it seems my good luck in the fish room has run out. 

About two nights ago, I noticed my largest P. luminatus juvenile behaving slightly oddly. It was skimming along the surface but not touching the food I put in. However, the room had been dark so I assumed it was just taking longer to adjust to the lights being turned on. 

The next day I found the same juvenile belly up. It was still alive, so I caught it, intending to cull it. 

Surprisingly, once the juvenile was in the container, it righted itself and started behaving normally. Thinking perhaps it had damaged its swim bladder somehow, I set-up a small hospital tank using water from the main tank and put the juvenile in. 

At first the juvenile seemed okay. Then it started to swim erratically. It would put on a sudden burst of speed before rolling over and over. It would then right itself, and repeat the process. 

When I came in to check on the juvenile later in the day, it was dead. 

None of the remaining fish in the grow-out were showing any signs of distress or illness, so I just chalked it up to bad luck.

This morning I was in my fish room and all the fish in the grow-out, including the remaining three P. luminatus juveniles were behaving normally and appeared perfectly healthy. 

Then this afternoon, about an hour ago, I found one of the P. luminatus juveniles belly up but also still alive. The same thing happened when I caught the juvenile and put it into a container. It righted itself, and started behaving perfectly normally. I was going to cull it, but so far its been swimming normally and hasn't gone belly up again. 

Even though I've seen zero signs of aggression from the M. pygmaea, or the P. luminatus towards each other, I am wondering if it is purely coincidence that the behaviour started after I removed most of the cover from the tank to make cleaning easier.

Therefore, I moved the remaining two healthy P. luminatus juveniles into their own tank, with the 'sick' juvenile sequestered in a container so that the others can't bother it. In case this was caused by injury, I've added lots of cover to the tank, and I will see what happens over the next 24-48 hours. 

I tested Ammonia, Nitrite, Nitrate, KH, and pH when I noticed the first sick juvenile and all the parameters were perfect. So I don't think it's a water quality issue. 

It's just really bizarre, as these juveniles have been thriving up until now. In fact I was considering moving the largest juvenile in with the female in another couple of weeks. 

To make matters worse, I lost my killifish juvenile. Also to unexplained causes. I hadn't seen it in a while, but I was putting BBS in for it to feed on as I assumed it was hiding. Unfortunately, this morning I discovered it dead on the bottom of the tank. 

Fish keeping certainly is such a relaxing hobby.


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## LittleBettaFish

The good news is that I haven't lost any further fish since my last post. Both my guppy females are pregnant, I have discovered more killifish fry, and my P. luminatus and M. pymaea juveniles all appear healthy. 

The three P. luminatus juveniles have been moved into a 40 litre tank. After catching two of them sparring (possibly the cause of their older sibling's death), I wanted to give them more space. Once the smallest juvenile is about twice the size it is now, I will be adding the adult female. I will also be adding substrate, a background, and planting it out. 

Today I'm going to move a couple of the largest M. pygmaea juveniles into the main tank. They are probably about an inch total length, so I'm hoping the adults won't pick on them too much. If there aren't any issues, I will add in the remaining larger juveniles. The 40 litre grow-out is getting too crowded, and they are getting more food than the smaller juveniles and fry. 

As mentioned, my two guppy females are pregnant. I can actually see the eyes on the developing fry in one of the females. I forgot how relentless male guppies are. As I've read that birth can be hard on the females, I've been feeding a mixture of high-quality flake, BBS, grindal worms, live mosquito larvae, and frozen spirulina brine shrimp to keep them in peak condition. I still haven't had much success taking photos of them. The male is constantly chasing the females around so as soon as I get a good shot lined up, he ruins it. 










Meanwhile my three rainbowfish have become so friendly, it's difficult getting a photo of them doing anything but staring directly at me. The male is slightly more skittish than the two females, but at least when I look in the tank now I can actually see fish. 

This is their tank at the moment. The background is in, and I'm slowly increasing the amount of leaf litter on the bottom (last time I added too many paperbark leaves at one and the water started frothing). I still have tape stuck to the side of the tank from where it was holding the background in place, so that has to be removed. I need to purchase a couple more bunches of Vallisneria to fill in the front of the tank, and I'm debating about putting in some sort of small native lily. 










Sadly, I think I need a better camera and camera set-up if I want to take decent photos of my rainbowfish. This camera is so slow to focus and the tripod isn't functional. I'm also stuck using the flash on the camera, and it keeps washing out the colour of the rainbowfish so they look grey/brown rather than blue. 

I did get this photo of my male. Unfortunately, it doesn't do any justice to his true beauty. I'm hoping that there's at least a couple males among the young fish, as they put on such a show when they are sparring. 










I'm not taking any photos of my wild bettas until I get their tanks looking better. There's just dead plants and algae everywhere. I'm definitely getting rid of the java moss in the majority of the tank as all it does is collect algae and detritus. 

It's just going to be such an expensive, fiddly, time-consuming project that I keep putting it off.


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## ThatFishThough

I hadn't some young mollies that did the spirally-spin thing; it almost looked like a perfectly thrown football, correct? Then a few hours later --- BAM --- dead.


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## LittleBettaFish

The affected juvenile would just suddenly go belly up, and then briefly float or swim upside down, before righting itself and swimming normally. As its condition deteriorated it did start to spiral because the time between episodes was getting shorter and shorter. 

Oddly, the smaller juvenile that I found belly up in the main grow-out is perfectly fine. It hasn't had an episode since, so the cause is still a mystery. One of the juveniles is definitely male. He's colouring up, his fins are starting to lengthen, and he's been showing off and chasing around the other two.

I now have eight of the largest juvenile M. pygmaea in the main tank. The adults don't bother them, and it's interesting watching their behaviour change as they start to follow the lead of the other fish, such as gathering around the front of the tank when they see me. 

I can't wait until they are large enough to start sexing out. The challenge will be not to get too attached as I can't keep them all. 

Finally, I have a question for those that breed guppies. 

Today I noticed something protruding from the side of the most heavily pregnant guppy. It's lower down on her stomach, and I can't tell if it's something harmless like a loose scale or something more sinister. The male has been constantly pestering the two females and tearing up their fins, so I moved him out into his own tank earlier today as I don't know if she's been injured. 

Her behaviour has also changed and I'm not sure if it's because of the protrusion or because she's close to giving birth. She is hanging up at the surface more and not moving around much. Being that she is a glass belly/see-thru, you can see the eyes of the fry and there seem to be quite a few in there. I have read about guppy females close to birth looking 'squared off' and her stomach does seem to be a slightly different shape to the other female in the tank. 

I just don't want her to drop fry while there is no cover in the tank. I meant to buy plants this week, but maybe it might be better to move her into a small container or tub with some sphagnum moss to provide cover for the fry. I'm thinking maybe the 25L tub I used as a hatchery for my rainbows. It's not a cramped breeder box, and it's white plastic not clear, so she should feel more secure. 

I just really hope that this protrusion isn't cause for concern. These three have become fish room favourites with their antics. I also don't know if I would be able to replace the female, as I wouldn't want to leave the remaining female alone with the male.


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## MysticSky22301

Yeah your guppy is about to drop a bunch of fry ^^


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## LittleBettaFish

My female dropped her fry this morning! Yesterday, I moved her from the tub into a tank, as I think not being able to see out the sides was causing her stress. This morning I came in to find her looking noticeably slimmer and chasing several fry around. I moved her back into the tank with the other female (the male is still separated) and she's eaten some flake food and doesn't look any the worse for wear. 

The protrusion on her stomach seems to have decreased in size, so hopefully it was just the result of an injury rather than something more serious. 

There's about 9-10 fry that I've seen so far. They all seem healthy and are swimming strongly. I know nothing of guppy genetics and I'm not sure what are traits are dominant/recessive. Anyone have any idea what I should expect from a pairing of two See-thru/Glass belly tuxedo guppies? I just hope these were virgin females and the sperm wasn't from another male. 

The other female still looks to have a little while to go before she drops. It looks like I'm going to have to set-up _another_ tank as a grow-out for the fry and use this 30cm tank solely as the 'birthing tank'. This guppy project seems set to take over an entire rack. 

The seller of these guppies had videos of 'Magenta See-Thru' guppies taken a couple years ago. If I am successful with breeding and raising my current guppies, I want to see if I can get my hands on a trio of the above guppies and work with these as well. Another strain I'm interested in, are the Wild Golden Red Lace Glass Belly guppies. 

Meanwhile male is not happy about being separated from his girls. I'm not going to put him back in with them until the other female has given birth, and I have more cover in the tank. It was making _me_ exhausted just watching him chasing and pestering them.


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## MysticSky22301

You choose what you like with guppies, it's normal to have a strain change some over time. Go for strong color on both males and females, avoid normal defects you find in fry


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## LittleBettaFish

Well looks like all three of my P. luminatus juveniles are male. They usually stay around the back of the tank near the filter, but yesterday they came right up to the front of the tank to investigate me. With them so close and with the overhead light on, I got a better look at their fins and colouring. I was thinking the two larger juveniles were male, but was hoping the smaller one was female. 

This is always what happens in my fish room. You can bet that the entire group of M. pygmaea juveniles will be female, because I need males. 

Yesterday, I carried out some much needed maintenance on my wild betta tanks. It took at least a couple of hours to do water changes on eleven tanks, partly because I used water change straight from the tap, and partly because I had so much algae, dead plants, and detritus to remove. 

I think I'm going to stop fussing around with aging water and just use water straight from the tap on my wild betta tanks. I doubt the minor rise and drop in pH is going to cause any real harm to the older juveniles and adult fish. They certainly didn't show any ill-effects after receiving quite sizeable water changes yesterday. They were more concerned about me increasing the flow from the sponge filters. 

The reason for the switch back to tap water, is that I was delaying water changes when I was using aged water as it became too much of a hassle to disinfect the tubs and fill them back up with the hose every week. There's some body and fin issues in a number of my F1/F2 fish that I think are purely down to me not doing enough water changes while the fish were young. 

My aim is to get back to a schedule of weekly 25-50% water changes (depending on the size of the tank and stocking levels). I'm also going to make up a concentrated tea from IAL, and use this to keep the water in the tanks dark. 

I will be placing an order for new plants this week, and then it will just be a matter of making sure I stay consistent with water changes and maintenance. 

While most of the tanks are not in any shape to be photographed, I did get a few photos of one of my B. uberis males. 





































The final count for guppy fry was thirteen, and as of this morning, all of them were still alive. I did a small water change yesterday and removed almost all of the sphagnum moss from the bottom of the tank. I'm slowly trying to increase the pH in this tank without causing the fry any harm. 

Meanwhile the M. pygmaea juveniles I added to the main tank are thriving. They are following the lead of the adult fish and learning to take flake food, mosquito larvae, and frozen foods. Their presence also seems to have brought the male more out of his shell. He was actually eating flake food last night, which I've never seen him do before. 

I'm glad I persisted with the rainbowfish. Their shyness was exasperating at first, and although they are still easily frightened by sudden bright lighting or sudden movements outside their tank, they will come out of hiding when they see me. Before I would be lucky if I got a quick glimpse of the male, but now he's out and about with the others. 

I should have put the macro lens on, but I did get a couple of photos of my M. pygmaea juveniles. The colour on the ones in the main tank is really starting to intensify and they have definitely grown. 



















I also have got my goldfish eating duckweed. When I had the internal power filters the duckweed would get sucked in or blown apart before the goldfish had a chance to eat it. With the sponge filters, the goldfish are able to munch on it between feedings. Once this cold weather is past I'm going to set a tub up outside so I will have an endless supply of duckweed for them. 

And that's it from the fish room for today's post.


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## MysticSky22301

I have a guppy strain throwing almost all males x.x everyone loves males but when you're breeding? Not so much XD


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## LittleBettaFish

That's why I have so many wild bettas. You're just trying to get those few females to keep your line going. At least there's a market for excess male guppies, not so much for the wild bettas. 

In an unrelated tangent, I personally feel a consistent 'out' is a command all dogs should know. Nothing irritates me more than to have to wrestle something out of a dog's mouth. It's why I spent a lot of time working with Clio on this, and unless it's something extremely high value, she's fairly reliable. 

The older two dogs however, are not so reliable. I think it's mainly because my mum has a tendency to snatch and create conflict, which only makes the dog want to hold onto whatever it has got in its mouth even more. 

Recently, I've been working with the oldest two to improve this. Today I was playing ball with Eos and Ares in the backyard. Eos was mouthing the ball while I was holding it, so I just kept it still (and thus boring) until she released it, at which point she is rewarded with more play. Unfortunately, I wasn't paying attention, and next thing I know she's crunched down on my thumb and it's pouring out blood. 

This is why I like to teach things properly the first time, and why I prefer to start with a puppy. It's much easier to teach a new behaviour from scratch, than it is to trying to fix mistakes.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think if anyone is responsible for the largest juvenile P. luminatus dying, it was his siblings. Last night I witnessed the two larger juveniles sparring. They were lip locking, hitting each other in the gills, and in the end I had to separate them by poking them with my finger. Keep in mind these are fish that are perhaps 2cm total length. It was more savage than any battle I saw taking place between previous blue eye males. 

So today, I decided to introduce the adult female and see if that wouldn't prove a distraction. As soon as I put her in, one of the males who isn't even half her size, rushes over and starts flashing his fins and showing off. I don't think I should have been so concerned about her eating them! 

Now she's in, I can start turning the tank from a grow-out into a display/breeding tank. Hopefully the female is still fertile by the time the males are large enough to spawn. 

Meanwhile, once I've done water changes today I'll be adding more of the largest juvenile M. pygmaea into the main tank. I think the eight already in the main tank have doubled in size since they've gone in. Some will have to remain in the grow-out, as I simply can't fit all of them in the main tank. 

I probably won't be collecting eggs from this species for quite some time, as I will have my hands full with other projects. 

One such project are my Chromaphyosemion bitaeniatum 'Lagos Red'. The male hides himself away so today I'm going to be removing most of the plants to make certain he is still there. I want to collect some eggs from this pair, so I will be adding a spawning mop, and removing and relocating any juveniles/fry that are in the tank. 

I've also decided to try and rehome my B. hendra and B. livida groups. This is purely a practical decision, as it means I will only need to purchase two 120cm LED lights instead of three, as the wild betta tanks will only be taking up two shelves on the rack. 

Hopefully, I can find some buyers for them.

I did take some photos while in the fish room before. Unfortunately, most had to be deleted because they weren't in focus so only two were worth posting. There is definitely something wrong with the camera. I feel it shouldn't take like 30 seconds of the 'busy' signal after I use the flash before it is ready to take another photo. It's frustrating because I miss a lot of awesome shots. 

This is a photo of one of my F1 B. brownorum sub-adults. 










Then this is 'Trouble' brother to the above fish.










Yesterday, I worked out a plant list for the wild betta tanks. I will have to order from two separate businesses, but one provides free shipping over a certain dollar amount. I'm going to attempt java fern again. They are so much cheaper and faster growing than anubias, so it would really be useful if I could keep them alive long-term. 

In non fish related news I just received the most beautiful throw, cushions, and cotton quilt. Because everything was on sale I saved something like $300. I've been searching high and low for eucalyptus green bedding, as I want to create a sort of rustic Australian style bedroom with lots of textures and handmade ceramics etc, and this is not only my favourite shade of green, but also Gum trees are so quintessentially Australian. 

I swear, the first animal in this house to pull even a _single_ thread in the yarn throw or cushions will find themselves up for adoption.


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## LittleBettaFish

There's been no problems with the P. luminatus group apart from some sparring between the males. As the adult female always comes up to the front of the tank when she sees me, the juveniles are losing some of their skittishness. Today I tried them on frozen brine shrimp, and although they went for it, they were still too small to eat it. I have a packet of daphnia in the freezer, so I'm going to see if this is a more suitable food. 

I think my pregnant female guppy is _this_ close to dropping her fry. She was at the back of the tank today and has been more lethargic than usual and that definitely isn't how she is normally. I've moved her into the tank the male was in, and the male is back with the other female. I'm still not sure whether to remove the male from the females once these fry have been dropped. Even though he doesn't like being by himself, he's just so rough with them. I think it was him that injured the smaller female, as he constantly pecks at their stomachs while he's trying to breed with them. 

The thirteen guppy fry are still all alive and doing well. They eat whatever I put in the tank, but I have to watch when doing water changes as they like to swarm around my hands and the siphon. 

There's been no problems with the rainbowfish, apart from some algae growing on the glass and vallisneria because the light is so close to the tank. The eight juveniles in with the adults are now starting to take frozen foods, and I _think_ there may be a potential male among them. 

Now that the sun is reaching my fish room again, I'm hoping I can get some better photos of these fish, as they really do look best under natural sunlight. 

I did manage to get a decent photo of the male. If only he would open his fins. He was teasing me, coming out just long enough for me to focus the camera, before darting back in behind the wood. 










This is one of the juveniles in with him. You can see they are starting to get their adult colouring.










Yesterday I did water changes on almost all the tanks in my fish room, including my wild bettas. They seem to be appreciating the weekly water changes, and I'm hoping it helps with the growth of some of the remaining juveniles and sub-adults. There's also less detritus and algae building up on the plants as I'm siphoning it off. 

Having to do near daily water changes on my grow-outs has definitely got me working harder in the fish room. After two hours of carrying buckets back and forth, and climbing up and down the step ladder, I felt like I'd been to the gym. 

The only tank left to tackle now is the goldfish. I would really have to like a species of fish to get a cold water tank again. It's definitely not tank I look forward to cleaning in cold weather. 

I also moved the killifish pair up into the fish room. They weren't getting enough human interaction in the study, and any time I went near the tank, the male would go into a blind panic. Being that I'm in the fish room on a daily basis, I hope they get more comfortable with my presence. 

I found two juveniles when emptying the tank to move it, so I set-up a grow-out tank for them. This means I am now running twenty tanks (not counting my BBS hatchery which also has its own heater and airstone). I think this is the most tanks I've had in a while. 

Today we went to dog club, and Clio was great. She was either calmly walking around with me, or quietly laying on the grass. She snuck in a quick play with the male dog she adores, before his owner took him back to the car. We got quite close to Nike's breeder's two puppies, and she was comfortable being dropped about a metre or so away. She did bark at a couple of dogs when she was in the back of the car by herself and they went past, but that was it. 

It's hard to believe that up until recently, this was a dog that would go to club and be over-threshold, completely switched off, and just drag me around barking at everything. 

I've been teaching her some new tricks, and I'm going to get my dad to help build some jumps and a positions box, as she has difficult obeying commands at a distance (she always wants to return to me first). I was trying to teach her to do weave poles, but it's not been particularly successful as she doesn't get very enthusiastic about food or toys and that seems to be an important component to training them. 

I just wish we had some acreage. It sucks trying to do obedience in a backyard that slopes and turns to mud when it's wet. More than once have I found myself on the ground after slipping over during recalls and heeling practice.


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## LittleBettaFish

I now have my second batch of guppy fry (so far I've counted 17), after the female gave birth this morning. Almost all of the fry were up at the surface, but fortunately the female showed no interest in eating them. As there were no complications, I moved her back into the main tank and she's eaten some flake and reacquainted herself with the other two. The fry will remain in this tank for another few days, and then I will move them across to the grow-out tank and the male will return to his 'bachelor pad' as the other female already appears to be carrying eggs. 

I did notice that one of the older fry seems to have developed black markings on the outside of its caudal fin as well as at the base of its dorsal fin. This colouring is similar to that of the females, so I'm hoping I get at least some offspring that resemble the adults. 

Yesterday, I moved more of the rainbowfish juveniles into the main tank, so there's now about twenty fish in there. They handled the move without any issues, and quickly integrated themselves with the rest of the group. 

Earlier this week, I purchased five Java Fern, and about fifty stems of Hydrilla Verticillata. I thought the plants would be arriving today, but the tracking information hasn't changed since yesterday. It's been sent by Toll, a company that I used to have no problems with, but lately it's been a miracle if the parcel arrives. I had one parcel go completely MIA, another parcel delivered to someone else's address, and then my rainbowfish went back to the depot after being driven around in the delivery van all day. 

I still have to purchase two 4ft LED lights, and more plants for the wild betta tanks. Only the Java Fern is going into the wild betta tanks. The Hydrilla is for the guppy tanks and various grow-outs. 

The rest of my fish are doing well, although I don't know why I bother doing water changes on the goldfish tank. Last night I spent at least an hour scrubbing algae, rinsing off sponge filters, and siphoning out poo. By this morning the bottom of the tank was already covered in poo again, even though they hadn't been fed since very early yesterday morning. It's truly mind-boggling the amount of waste goldfish can produce. 

Meanwhile, I took what I thought were all some nice photos of the rainbowfish male and some of the juveniles to share. Only to find that all of them were out focus when I uploaded them onto my laptop. Deceived by that tiny camera screen once again. 

I did get a couple photos of my B. uberis male though. I was experimenting with lighting the tanks from the front, to see if it made a difference. 



















That's it from the fish room for today. Tomorrow I'm going to lock myself in the fish room, and try to get some decent photos of the fish.


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## LittleBettaFish

The plants arrived today. All the plants were green and healthy, including the Utricularia (I believe this is what it is called) that hitched a ride on some of the Hydrilla verticillata. As I have read that some bladderworts can potentially eat small fry, I removed any strands I could find. As I still had some hydrilla remaining, I planted several stems in the main rainbowfish tank to help fill in the right side of the tank. 

I did try to uphold my promise of photos, but after about half an hour of crouching on the floor of my fish room in the dark I gave up. 

I did however, get a slightly more flattering photo of my M. pygmaea male. I definitely need a couple more males to get a better photo of him. 










I also got a couple of photos of one of Shiny's sons. This young male was posturing and chasing his mother and brothers around. Until Shiny came out of hiding. 



















At least the B. uberis boys are reliable when it comes to taking photos. 




























This is what I usually have to deal with when trying to take photos of my fish. I definitely think the more fish you have in the tank, the harder it becomes to take a decent photo. Especially with the bettas as they are always squabbling and chasing each other around. 










Now the only thing left to do for the night, is to feed everybody.


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## LittleBettaFish

Been a while since my last post. Yesterday I had my third drop of guppy fry.This time there were 25 of them, and of course the female gave birth in the main tank _after_ I had added ten of the largest juveniles to it. Fortunately I don't think any of the fry were eaten, and they have been moved into a smaller tank until they are large enough to be safely added to the grow-out. 

As I know nothing of how guppies develop, I don't know at what size or age you can correctly sex the young fish. At the moment it looks like the anal fins on all of the larger juveniles (just under an inch total length) are the same. Does the gonopodium form as the male starts to mature, or is it there from the beginning? As these fish are being bred purely to sell, I don't want to end up with all females. 

Last time I checked, I had two killifish fry. However, I've had issues with the fry coming from this pair, and these two seem fairly fragile so I'm not certain if they will survive. The two older juveniles are doing well, with one starting to show orange colouration in its fins. Its fins are also longer than its sibling of the same size, so I suspect this might be a male and its sibling a female. 

The rainbowfish and blue eyes are thriving. At this point in time, I've decided not to breed the P. luminatus. There's multiple hobbyists working with them now, and they even appeared on a wholesalers list, so I'm going to wait until I'm able to get my hands on some younger females to breed from. Being that they are such short-lived fish, you get a very small window of peak fertility. As the four of them have been added to the rainbowfish tank, I will be using their old tank for a new species. Either another species of Blue-eye (likely mellis or gertrudae), or Rhadinocentrus Ornatus. 

I think I need to buy a decent liquid fertiliser. I've been using Seachem Flourish, but the faster growing plants are struggling. I'm definitely not happy with how the rainbowfish tank is looking. I need to add more substrate so I can add more vallisneria to the left side of the tank, but I'm going to have to find a way to do so without removing or disturbing any of the fish. 

I did get a photo of one of the largest juvenile rainbowfish. Unfortunately, they tend to congregate on the left side of the tank, and the brown background washes out the colour of the fish, which is why I am wanting to add the vallisneria. 










I have at least one male among the young. I caught him flashing at one of his siblings, so he will definitely be staying here with me. Ideally, I would like a ratio of one male to every three females. 

Meanwhile, my wild bettas are doing great. They are a couple of days overdue for a water change, but I've been waiting on a delivery of IALs. Since I've been doing water changes weekly, the water in most of the tanks is fairly clear. The plan is to make up some IAL extract and dose it following each water change. I'm not going to add actual leaves to the tank as it gets too expensive, and makes a mess in the java moss. 

Funnily enough, the java fern I had no real hope for, is growing well. I have decided on a system of benign neglect, and so far it seems to be working. Who knows for how long, but it would be good if I could keep it alive for at least a few years. 

I've also _hopefully_ found a home for my Betta hendra group. They will possibly be going to a local hobbyist friend, so I know they will be looked after. I've always regretted buying the original pair, and with them gone, I will have a tank free to move my rapidly growing Betta miniopinna group into. 

I have some big changes in the works in regards to planting out the wild betta tanks and moving some fish around.

I want to take up as fewer tanks as possible with my wild bettas, so I will be condensing my Betta uberis, Betta coccina, and two of my Betta brownorum groups. Now I'm no longer breeding, there's no need to have multiple tanks running for each species. 

That's about it from the fish room. We did have a medical emergency yesterday, with our Siamese cat Kanika. I came into the fish room to discover her with sore ears and a massively swollen lower jaw. She was also very lethargic and throwing up bile. Of course after driving for an hour or so to the vet, the swelling had gone down and she was back to her usual noisy self by the time we arrived. However, the vet gave her a couple of shots, and some tablets just in case, and today she's feeling and looking better. 

We are still puzzled by the cause of it, as she is an indoor only cat and 99% of her time is spent sleeping in the fish room. 

Now I have about three hours of water changes to do. Any future fish rooms will definitely have some sort of automatic water change system, or at the very least, a sink.


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## ThatFishThough

I forget... Which fish is the one in your avatar? How do you care for them?

Which of your current wild betta group is your favorite? Easiest to care for?

I'm tearing down a ton of my smaller tanks and setting up two or three big divided tanks, which means I will have a 10G open... Looking into a pair of wilds!


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## ThatFishThough

My computer decided to restart in the midst of me editing...

I think your guppy fry will grow into their fins, because I am 1000% positive that my rescue guppy, who is around 2 ish months old, was a female 2 days ago. I am also positive that s/he did not have a yellow tint or cobra spots two days ago. >.>


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## LittleBettaFish

The fish in my display picture is a Betta hendra male. Personally, I prefer species from the coccina complex. However, they can be delicate and require more specialist care than some of the other wild betta species, so not a great 'starter wild'. If you are new to wilds, you cannot go past Betta channoides or Betta albimarginata. They are extremely peaceful, and a pair or reverse trio (being mouthbrooders it's better to have more males than females) would do well in a 10 gallon tank. They are less fussy about water conditions and as long as your water is soft to neutral, with a temperature range of low to mid seventies, they will do fine. A well-planted tank with a dark substrate and subdued lighting will bring out their best colours. Like all wild bettas they can and do jump, so you need either a very well-fitting lid or cover the tank in cling wrap. It can sometimes be challenging to wean them onto dried foods, so you may need to provide live and frozen foods depending on the fish. 

I did read an article just before that said the gonopodium develops with age, so hopefully I do have some males in the group. 

I just got back from a walk in which some Blue Heeler cross ran out at us. Luckily I had Eos with me, so she just stood there while I yelled at the dog to get out of it. There was no owner in sight, and it was still running loose on the way home. However, it disappeared when this woman came out of one of the houses so I wonder if it was theirs. 

I have been really working with Nike on her dog reactivity issues and making some real progress, and I would have been peeved off if the dog had ran out at her. We almost ran into a loose dog the other morning on our walk. It was some Labrador sized dog that came running out of a house with its hackles up and chased a lady walking in the other direction. Honestly, how difficult is it to keep your dogs contained and on lead. If you can't recall your dog 100% of the time in any situation, don't let the damn thing off. 

Maybe if more people had witnessed an actual dog fight and seen how quickly it happens and how difficult it is to break up, they would be more careful.


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## ThatFishThough

We had a German shorthair chase and nearly catch one of you cats, who are indoor/outdoor, but only stay out for an hour or so at a time. We only were able to get him inside because he nearly broke the sliding glass door in an attempt to get away from the dog. Yes, they have claws. They're also big cats, but they were trained to be lap pets, not dog fighters.

Peeved me off to the point where I posted online about it. It's the fourth time I've seen it, once I caught it and some guy came and got it. My mom said she's nearly hit it with her car a couple of times.

Really, it isn't that hard to keep them contained.

ETA: Just went online and found the Ph of our water and my possibility of wilds went out the window. Apparently it's between 8.8 and 9.2 *sigh*


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## LittleBettaFish

Wow, your pH is insanely high. Unfortunately, it is likely too high even for species that tolerate higher pH levels such as Betta mahachaiensis. You'd probably have to use RO water if you wanted to keep wilds. 

We also had some sort of GSP come into our front yard to chase our cats. It stopped coming around after I lost my temper and shouted at some lady who was walking down the street and whose dog I believe it was. The best was the lady with two large dogs that told us she didn't think they would hurt our cat as they had him bailed up down the side of the house. 

I have no patience for dog owners with loose dogs that they can't control. Last dog that started heading towards our cat got a pair of garden clippers thrown at it (with the intention of scaring it off not hitting it) and its owner got a piece of my mind. The neighbour across the road who is terrified of dogs, did tell me that when she walks past our house now the dog is on a leash. 

We only have one of our cats as indoor/outdoor from necessity, but after catching him down on the main road the other day, I am going to try and convince mum to build him an outdoor run for both his safety and the safety of the local wildlife. 

Speaking of dogs, there is something weird going on with Clio. Clio's always been 'my' dog in the sense that she is very attached to me, and I'm probably the only person she really respects and listens to. 

However, yesterday when we were playing in the backyard it was like she suddenly didn't recognise me. It seemed to be triggered by the words 'hit it', which is what I say to our other dog Ares when he noses his ball around and I'm sure she's heard them countless times in the past. She started staring at my face strangely, and would run off if I approached. If I called her, she would come over, but she would grovel and lick my face like she does when she meets strangers. She would still obey her commands but if I made eye contact for too long she wouldn't look comfortable. And this is a dog whom readily seeks eye contact with me as it's been so heavily rewarded, and who sometimes looks at me for so long I feel like I'm in a staring contest with her. 

I was getting a little uneasy about the whole thing, which I don't think was helping, but it was honestly like she didn't know who I was. 

So I put her back in her crate, she slept for a couple of hours, and when she came back out she was her normal self for the rest of the day and night. 

Then this morning we were playing, when I spoke in a sort of growly voice, and she looked at me strangely and ran into the other room where she stood staring at me. Now anyone reading this is probably thinking I scared her with the weird voice, but I always talk in weird voices when I am playing with Clio and she's never had any issues. I know I can sometimes accidentally freak out other people's dogs because some of them aren't used to that, but I've been playing with Clio like this for two years now and never once has she responded in fright. 

She was actually running away from me, and her body language was screaming fear. I did get some treats out and she was responding to her obedience commands perfectly, but as soon as I released her, she became frightened again. She kept following me around staring at my face, looking at me like I was a stranger. She's sleeping in the other room now, so I will see what happens when she wakes up. 

I don't think the fact Clio is so nervy is helping things. If something did happen in the yard and she associated it with me or something I did, it may take her ages to get over it. I mean I quicked her nail _once_ when I was cutting them, and it took weeks and weeks before she was comfortable with me doing them again. 

I'm just hoping there isn't something going on health wise with her. 

Meanwhile Kanika's health has not improved. The swelling on her face has gone, but she's got diarrhea, has been vomiting, and has gone off her food. So it looks like we will have to go back to the vet. 

I swear we can never catch a break with our animals. It's so unfair that you can do everything right, and still have nothing but problems.


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## ThatFishThough

Yeah, the pH is crazy here. Recently they did a bunch of stuff with the river (diverted it, built a dam, etc.) and the water jumped from like 7.4. to 9.2 and the lowest I've seen it since is 8.5, but the city says 8.8 is the lowest. I'm going to try some stuff with driftwood and IAL but I don't think that will help.

How does RO water work? I've seen it around (and I believe they sell it at WalMart) but haven't ever researched it. If I used RO could I keep a pair of B. Hendra in a 20G long? I recently found space in my room after cleaning off my bookshelf for a 20G and was thinking of keeping them there instead. Do they appreciate live foods, or is frozen okay? Are there any tankmates they can be with or is that not recommended?

Sorry for all the questions, lol. I've always followed your journal but am just now having the opportunity to get a pair and I'm excited to see if I can find a way to make it work.

The next time I see that GSD I'm going to try to get it to come to me and then take it to the shelter or call the police. Apparently it attacked the German Shepherd that lives down the street. Scares me to think what it would have done should it have caught our cat.

Hopefully Cilo comes around. Maybe just spend some time hanging out without obedience? Snuggle up on the couch with a book or something. Sit in the fish room with her. Just hang out if you can. I'm wondering if something scared her and she related it to you. Although I've trained dogs, I've never had to... "bond" doesn't seem like the right word, but whatever... really get to know the dog? I've never had a dog with behavioral problems, I guess, so take my word worth a grain of salt.


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## LittleBettaFish

Personally, I think a 20 gallon tank would be massive overkill for a pair of Betta hendra. They would get lost in a tank that size being that they are small fish (about 1.5 inches total length), prone to shyness (never been an issue for me but I know it is frequently an issue for others). I keep my coccina complex pairs in 5-10 gallon, heavily planted tanks. 

I don't put tankmates with my wild bettas. For me, wild bettas do best in species only set-ups, and due to their precarious situation in the wild, should be kept with the intention of breeding. 

With wild bettas, you design the tank around them. I see too many wild bettas thrown into tanks that are too bright, lacking cover, and have either a light substrate or no substrate at all, so all that beautiful colour washes out. Some hobbyists only see their fish in full colour when they are spawning. In suitably designed tanks, they should show their best colours 99% of the time. 

As the water here is basically RO water straight from the tap, I've never had to use it, and I'm unfamiliar with how it works. I think you can either use pure RO water that is then remineralised, or use a combination of half tap and half RO water. However, this would be something you would have to read up on. Personally I think these fish do best at a pH of 6.0 and below.They _can_ be kept at a slightly higher pH level, but being that most of these fish are either wild-caught or only a generation or two away from wild-caught, and have evolved to live in bodies of water where the pH can be as low as 3.0-4.0, I think it's best to try and get the pH as low as possible. 

Live foods will give you the best results in terms of breeding. However, frozen foods are also appreciated, and depending on the fish, you may be able to wean them over to a high-quality flake food. Don't overfeed foods such as blackworms, white worms, and grindal worms. This can lead to obesity and you see far too many wilds that look like sausages with fins. I made this mistake in my early years of keeping wilds, and the shape of my fish then, was vastly different to the shape of my fish now. 

I'm not sure if you've read my blog or I've linked it before, but have a look at RedWine Bettas for as much information as you'll need for keeping coccina complex wilds. I information on tank set-up (link in the menu bar). 

I think I did something out in the yard with Clio and she associated it with me being angry, hence why she keeps looking into my face and alternating between grovelling and running away. This is because I killed a spider with a shoe that evening, and she started acting as if she was frightened of me again. My mum actually thought I was exaggerating her behaviour, so she was quite surprised to see her behave like that. 

We did go on a walk yesterday and she did great. There was a charity run on, so we had to walk through a crowd of people and pass a footpath width away from a small dog. The only response was a hackle up and some prancing. She did have one bark at a Labrador, but a single collar correction and being told 'no' was enough to get her listening again. This is a dog that in the past would have required almost being choked to the point of unconsciousness to stop her reacting to other dogs. 

Kids are also her trigger, so I was really happy she was able to watch two young kids kicking a soccer ball around only a metre or so away, without any reaction but an interested expression. 

Then on the way back to the car we were passing quite close to a dad and his young son getting bikes out of the boot of the car. The son dropped his helmet and it made a clatter on the ground right next to Clio, and she didn't even flick an ear. 

We also stopped for a while and did some obedience training. The focus so far at the park has been for Clio to relax and learn to be around strangers and other dogs. Being that it's such a distracting environment, I was concentrating more on reliable obedience and engagement over precision and speed. 

It was funny to see the difference in Clio's attitude when I handed the lead over to my mum. I've told mum she's going to have to work more with Clio as her timing for praise and corrections is way off and it's confusing to the dog. Now that Clio knows with 100% certainty what heel position is, the only heeling that gets rewarded is head up heeling with the dog in the correct position, remaining close on turns and not forging or lagging behind. For example, when I am heeling with Clio, if she drops her eyes, she is told 'No, watch', and if she doesn't comply she is given a correction. As soon as the eyes come back to my face she is told 'Good' and we heel another couple of steps and then she is rewarded. The criteria and consequences are crystal clear to Clio so there isn't any confusion. 

My mum's criteria are less clear, and I think it definitely affects the performance and attitude of the dogs. Most of what she learned about dog training was very old-school with little emphasis on engagement or making the training fun and exciting for the dog. I think that's why our older dog Ares hates obedience training. With Clio, she knows that 'No' means to try again. With Ares, if he's told 'No' during training, he immediately goes into avoidance and just shuts-down mentally. I think the difference is that when she is _learning_ a new command, Clio has never received a correction. It's not until she knows the command inside and out that corrections are introduced. At dog club however, it seems like dogs are corrected even during that initial learning stage. They don't sit when asked, straight away it's a correction. Ares is an extremely intelligent dog and he has great food and toy drive. It's a shame that his early obedience training seemed to crush rather than encourage these qualities.


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## ThatFishThough

Tysm, LBF! I've scanned your blog before (and it came up in some of my Google searches! ) but I haven't read it in detail yet.

Would it be better to start with a pair in a 10 and then, should they breed, move them to a 20? Or would it be better to divide the 20 in half with a solid black divider and get two types of wilds?

Looking into RO water it seems pretty simple, but you have to hook the system up to a sink or something and our sinks don't have hose adapters. I'd have to hook it up to the hose, which means the water would be freezing cold and have even more chemicals. If it is possible I'd like to find one that you can just fill with water and let sit.

Als I'm going to load it with IaL and driftwood with black sand and a black background so it's darker and they feel secure. Hendra are bubblenesters, correct? How do, if they breed, they find the eggs?


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## LittleBettaFish

It would probably be better to keep the adult pair in the 10 gallon, and then move their fry to the 20 gallon once they are at a size where it would be safe to do so. Other hobbyists may have different experiences, but I've found spawning almost completely stops when these fish are kept in groups, so it's better to keep the breeding pair in their own tank. 

Yes, Betta hendra are bubblenesters. This whole complex of wild bettas are bubblenesters, except for a couple of species that have been known to both bubblenest and mouthbrood (very rarely). I've never had any issues with my wilds finding their eggs in dimly lit, heavily planted tanks. One suggestion I will make, is that if you can do so, try and get your hands on some black film canisters. When I was breeding, I used them in my tanks, and the fish preferred them almost exclusively over other more natural nesting sites.


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## LittleBettaFish

I thought guppies would be easier to take photos of than my other fish. But even though they all congregate at the front of the tank when they see me, they are constantly on the move. There's about twenty fish in this tank and out of all the photos I took, only two ended up being relatively in focus. 

This is one of the juveniles. 










Then this is the larger of the two females. 










My interest in the guppies has been short-lived. I think I'm going to eventually sell the whole colony, and use the space their tanks are taking up for more natives. I've come to the conclusion that I just find guppies so 'samey'. They remind me of the goldfish. 

I will say I've had one success in that the hornwort I received last week hasn't melted. Every time I've tried to put hornwort into one of the wild betta tanks it has shed all its needles and never recovered. I'm wondering if the difference is that the tanks it is growing well in, are cycled with a much higher pH. The fish room also receives much more natural sunlight at this time of year, and I've noticed the hornwort has already put out some new growth. 

The Vallisneria nana was in rather rough shape when it arrived. I've put the worse affected plants out in the tub pond, if they recover that's great, if not, it's no great loss. The rest has been planted in the rainbowfish tank and I can already see it's starting to bounce back. 

I also received Coomalie Creek Hairgrass. At the moment it's in the empty 10 gallon (I'm still waiting for Pseudomugil gertrudae to become available), but I forgot how large this plant grows so it needs to be replaced with a more suitable plant. I'm thinking the hairgrass can go into a future 2ft/15 gallon tank, and I will plant out the 10 gallon with native ambulia and small water lilies. 

I've been searching for a sand substrate that looks natural. The relatively uniform colour and grain size of most aquarium sands looks too artificial for me. A business interstate sells river sand, but it's a minimum 20kg order. Then I remembered a substrate I'd used in the past: Brunnings brand propagating sand. I picked up a bag from the local nursery, and after rinsing it to hell and back, I was left with a coarse sand substrate, and a small amount of very fine sand substrate. As I wasn't going to rip up all the plants in my rainbowfish tanks, I simply sprinkled it over the top of the existing sand substrate, covered it in leaf litter and I'm pretty happy with how it looks. 

In other news, I thought the killifish fry had died, so I was going to empty the tank they were in. That was my plan until I discovered a handful of fry swimming around. I also sucked a fry out of the main tank when I was doing water changes, so I assume that even if the killifish aren't spawning on the mop, they are spawning on the plants in there and some fry are finding enough cover to avoid being eaten. 

The wild bettas are doing well. I've got to do water changes on all their tanks today and give them a feed. Frustratingly, the more the rainbowfish juveniles colour up, the more I think almost all of them are male. I mean I wanted some males, but not that many males! I swear I've only ever had a near 50:50 sex ratio with one species of fish. 

I did try to take some photos of the rainbowfish this morning, but artificial lighting washes their colour out too much. I'm going to wait until this afternoon when the sun hits their tank, and then I'm going to see if I can get some better photos. 

Meanwhile, poor Kanika had to go to the vet on Saturday because she was still having intermittent vomiting and diarrhea following the swollen face incident. The vet agreed that she didn't look right (her normally shiny coat was is dull and dry) and gave her some fluids, as well as taking blood and urine samples. She mentioned that even though she was slightly dehydrated, her urine was very dilute, meaning there could be something wrong with her kidneys. Hopefully we will get the results of the blood tests back today.


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## LittleBettaFish

Of _course_, the aquarium in the city has to advertise Pseudomugil luminatus pairs for sale, when I have to wait until Saturday to get over there. Knowing how sought after they are, they'll likely be all sold by the time the weekend comes around. Although I'm hoping maybe the high price tag might put some potential buyers off (I would assume they are around the $50 a pair mark). I just need 2-3 pairs to get started. They are so easy to breed, and it's not difficult to raise the fry. I'm still annoyed at myself over the male male dying prematurely, although his sons are maturing nicely. 

I managed to get a few photos of the wild bettas today. Although not all of the fish are in focus. It's definitely harder to take photos the more fish there are in the tank. Just when you get that perfect shot lined up someone comes along and ruins it. 

This is my absolutely favourite male in my B. livida group. Unfortunately, he wouldn't turn side-on for a photo as he was too busy fighting with his brothers. 










One of his sisters. 










The B. livida need to go into a taller tank. They sort of swarm over each other in the 60-F. 

An angry B. coccina male. This male was actually threatening the male behind him, not showing submission. 










I think this is the original B. hendra male. It's next to impossible to get good photos of this group. 










One of the B. hendra females.










The B. miniopinna female. You can see how dark the water is in their tank. Such a shame this pair doesn't have the characteristic bright red ventrals. She is busy helping the male defend his nest from their juvenile and sub-adult offspring so I just had to point the camera at the tank and hope I got a decent shot. 










Finally, this is one of Shiny's sons. The second photo is out of focus, but I just liked how he was looking at me with an expression of 'What?' I love watching all the young males sparring and trash talking each other, only to be on their best behaviour when their father comes out.



















We also got Kanika's test results back yesterday, and apparently they suspect it was mild pancreatitis. Everything else seemed to be where it should be. They did try to push one of the Hills Science diets on us. However, not only do I think this brand of food is low-quality and packed full of fillers, but Kanika projectile vomits up any food that contains cereals or grains. I don't know if the vets think we are lying about this to avoid buying the food, but I feel like a broken record trying to explain why we don't want to use it unless absolutely necessary. 

We are still baffled as to the cause of the facial swelling and her subsequent illness, but apart from some diarrhea she seems to be on the mend and is back to her usual self.


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## LittleBettaFish

Today I was foolishly optimistic, believing I could take at least one in focus photo of the rainbowfish juveniles so I could share their progress. Not only did they pull their standard 'moving at all the wrong moments' trick, but their newest trick is to just swim right up to the glass and sit their staring at me. 

I did manage to get four photos that looked okay on the camera. However, only one was actually in focus once I uploaded them onto the laptop. Unfortunately, it was the only photo that failed to capture the blue colouration they've developed. For an idea of size, the fish below is probably just under 1.5 inches total length. 










I definitely need a new camera and a better macro lens. Although I just about died when I heard the price of one of the newer cameras someone had at dog club the other day. 

I'm starting to doubt any of the juveniles are actually female. I know I wanted males, but 40 or so may be slightly overdoing it. I suppose at least people _want_ male rainbowfish. Next time I'm ready to breed this species, I may adjust some of the parameters and see if this makes a difference. 

I had a delivery of BS eggs today. I purchased them yesterday from interstate, and they arrived this morning, so I couldn't have asked for faster service. As BBS is one of the only foods the four P. luminatus eat, I was concerned that they were going to have to go the whole weekend without. 

Speaking of P. luminatus, another local-ish aquarium mentioned on FB that they were also going to be stocking P. luminatus shortly. I really want a couple pairs of these. I caught two of my young males fighting quite viciously again, so I think I need a larger number to spread out the aggression. They're aggressive little fish. One of them was even fighting with some of the M. pygmaea juveniles. 

Another fish that has really come out of his shell, is my Ch. bitaeniatum lagos red male juvenile. I was doing a water change on their tank today, and he was so brightly coloured up I thought he was his father. It does look like the other juvenile is female, which is ideal, as I wouldn't want a lone female with three males. There are at least five fry in the grow-out. Depending on how they sex out, they'll either be kept or sold. Likely sold, as I don't want to be keeping killifish forever. 

So far today, I done water changes on 13 of my tanks, with another five remaining. My B. miniopinna male decided the day before water changes was a good day to build a nest. As this is not the first time I've accidentally destroyed one of his nests (at least this time there weren't any eggs or fry in it), I decided to put a film canister in the tank. He's now happily nesting away in the canister. 

Bizarrely, while doing water changes, I found a desiccated fish between two tanks on the bottom shelf. It was covered in hair and lint and looked like it had been there for a while. Because of this, I can't tell what species it was. I wonder if it jumped out during water changes or when I was feeding them, and I didn't notice. Poor thing. I felt horrible when I saw it lying there. 

Also, I thought the blind B. coccina female had finally passed away. I hadn't seen her for ages, and as I usually hand-feed her, I thought she must have starved to death. Then yesterday afternoon, who do I see at the front of the tank looking perfectly healthy, but the blind B. coccina female! I swear I've written this fish off as dead so many times now that when she finally does pass away I'm not going to believe it.


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## LittleBettaFish

I think the camera is on the way out. If I use the inbuilt flash, it takes at least 10 seconds before I am able to take another photo. This isn't even after multiple photos have been taken, this is after each photo. Sometimes even just trying to get it to focus gives me the busy signal, even in brightly lit tanks. It definitely doesn't focus as sharply as it used to, as I can't remember having to delete this many photos due to blurriness when I first started taking photos with it. 

It would have to be at least a decade old now, and I've taken thousands of photos with it. It's probably long overdue for a service, but I think mum wants to buy a newer model instead, as they have more features. 

This is why I haven't posted in so long. I just haven't had any photos worth posting. 

My guppies obviously did not get the memo about being fry eaters. The other week, I came into my fish room to find a group of newborn fry waiting at the surface with the adults and their much larger siblings. I now have something like 90 guppies, and at least one of my females is pregnant again. I also caught some of the sub-adult males trying to breed with their sisters, so I've split the group into two. One tank houses the females, and one tank houses the males and fry that are still too young to move. 

Unfortunately, the quality of the offspring has been a very mixed bag. None of the females are showing the orange colouration of the adults in their caudal fins so they look pretty drab. And only about 50% of the young males are showing a full orange caudal fin (I've only got a small number of males that have reached this size so far). 

This is one of the larger sub-adult females. 










Then this is one of the larger sub-adult males. Some of the other males have no orange at all, and instead have a sort of pale blue caudal fin. 










As I mentioned in a previous post, I've lost interest in the guppies. Once the males and females are larger, I will be putting them up for sale, growing out any remaining fry and then putting them up for sale also. 

I've given up on trying to grow hornwort. It just melts no matter what I do. I have two pieces in the rainbowfish tank that haven't melted, but I'm not holding my breath. I like the look of hornwort, and I always talk myself into believing that maybe this time I'll be successful. No more. From here on out, I'm sticking with native ambulia and milfoil as at least I know I can grow these. 

The rainbowfish and P. luminatus are doing great. Yesterday, I moved the remaining juveniles from the 40 litre tank into the 2ft tank so I can separate out the P. luminatus female and one of her sons. He's too nice a fish to waste in a display tank. The only thing I'm not looking forward to, is trying to catch these two out of the main tank. 

The rainbowfish are taking a _long_ time to mature. I thought they were all male, but it looks like I do have a couple of females that I will be retaining. The largest sub-adults are around 3cm total length. I'll probably wait until they're around 4-5cm before I put them up for sale. At this point I'm thinking of keeping three of the young males. Just got to work out which ones are the keepers. 

I've moved some of the wild bettas around. There's been some scuffling going on as new pecking orders are worked out in some of the tanks, but I'm hoping once I add more plants and the existing plants grow in to provide more cover, this will lessen. 

In other news, I _finally_ got my hands on some Repashy Grub Pie. It arrived today, along with the flake food I'm currently feeding, as well as some Ocean Nutrition Brine Shrimp flakes to try. I'm curious to see how the wild bettas react to the Repashy. I figure if no one wants to touch it, the guppies will more than likely eat it up.


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## ThatFishThough

Those are better pictures than what I can get of my guppy fry and LBD fry. I understand the pain, as they're incredibly fast. My wimpy camera (that has, admittedly, been dropped in water multiple times) and impossible-to-focus phone camera make me want to rip my hair out. Sometimes I wish I could smush them up against the glass!

I personally like the look of your guppies. I've never been able to get them to successfully breed; my guppy fry now was a rescue from a piranha (yes, piranha) tank. They were used as feeders, and I'm assuming one of the females aborted babies early. He's turned out to be cute; yellow cobra with a big black and irid dot on his side. Almost big enough to go into the 15 with the three other males.

How are the wilds doing? How are the dogs?


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## LittleBettaFish

I put some of the Repashy Grub Pie in the guppy tanks and everyone was congregating around it eating, so I think I will do the same again today and try and get some better photos. They just get so frantic when they see me, as they think I'm going to feed them. 

I wish my guppies would stop breeding. I was sort of relying on their reputation as fry eaters to keep numbers down to a manageable level. I have a suspicion at least one of the larger female sub-adults might be pregnant. 

So far my females have handled their pregnancies without any issues, even the female with swim bladder problems. What usually happens is they get close to giving birth, I spend a few days worrying, and then suddenly there's all these new fry in the tank and the female is swimming around wanting to be fed. 

The wilds are doing fine. I did have to euthanase a B. coccina male after both his eyes were severely damaged. Being that I have one completely blind B. coccina female, and a couple of fish with permanent damage to their eyes (all of which have occurred in different tanks at different times), I think it was caused by one of the other fish in the tank. The other day I combined the two groups of B. coccina, to hopefully disperse some of the aggression. 

The B. uberis group also got moved into the one tank, although I definitely need to get some more plants in there. The B. livida group are now in a standard sized 10 gallon tank, as are the B. miniopinna group. I was going to combine the two groups of B. brownorum, but I was concerned the two males might fight with their father. So I'm going to purchase a 10 gallon tank for the group of sub-adults, and the adult pair will be going into their 5 gallon tank. I also want to move the group of B. brownorum with Zig-Zag into a 10 gallon tank as now his offspring are at breeding size it's getting a bit cramped. 

I did try the Repashy in a couple of the wild betta tanks, and I think some of the fish had an investigative nibble. What I'm hoping for, is to use this in the tanks where the fish won't take flake food (the B. hendra group in particular). 

The dogs are the same as always. Nike had a phantom pregnancy so was carrying around her toy screaming hysterically and wanting to be with me at all times. I did say to mum that we should probably get her desexed next year. Really the only reason haven't got around to it yet, is that the coat can change in desexed German Shepherds. Rather than blowing their coat a couple of times a year, they are just perpetually shedding, and it seems like the the coat never looks as glossy as it does with intact dogs. But pyometra is a real risk given her age, as it is with Eos, so I think it's better that the two girls get done sooner rather than later. 

We went to a dog show on the weekend with Clio. Even though it was down at club, she was on edge when we first arrived. She just wasn't listening and sort of felt like a volcano waiting to erupt. I think there was the comment made again that my anxiety is solely responsible for Clio's reactivity. Which is exasperating given that I'm basically the only person Clio will obey, and that with me her reactivity has improved in leaps and bounds. Yes, I suffer from anxiety, and yes, I know me being tense doesn't help, but me being relaxed is not going to magically erase weak nerves. 

It's been a while since Clio has been allowed to play with any other dogs. All it takes with Clio is one bad experience, as she simply doesn't have the strength of nerve to bounce back. So I'm very careful as to what dogs she interacts with. 

There's a female around Clio's age that used to play with her. The owner knows about Clio and her issues and so I'm more comfortable letting Clio play with her dog as she is pretty vigilant about Clio not getting overwhelmed. Well they had a great time playing. What I found absolutely adorable was rather than completely tune me out like she used to, she kept stopping and looking back at me, almost to ask if it was okay for her to play. 

After a while, one of mum's friends came over with his older adult female. She actually used to regularly run with our girl Eos to get fit for shows. This dog is really gentle and I can't remember ever seeing her being aggressive with another dog. At first I was a little hesitant to let Clio go up to a strange, older female, but she was actually really polite. We just did a quick sniff and lick, but it was another positive experience for her. 

We did have one 'uh-oh' moment. We were standing by the ring near the end of the show and there was this young male standing close by. I didn't know the dog or owner, but next thing I know the dog's jumped on Clio and I can hear her give a little yelp of fright. However, once we had their leashes untangled, she was eager to play with him.

Her sire was at the show. Unfortunately, he was really flat so didn't do as well as he likely should have. Clio really resembles her sire, although she definitely didn't inherit his profuse coat. He has so much coat that I think it's only the lack of fur in his ears that prevent him being classified as a LSC. The two things owners of his progeny always talk about, is how vocal they are, and how intelligent they are. 

The woman that stands Clio's sire, mentions she is likely going to cross him onto one of her females that my mum has always liked. So then on the drive home mum starts talking about getting a fifth dog. I am just sitting there shaking my head in the passenger seat. I swear, getting another dog is mum's answer to everything. She has been told in no uncertain terms that she is not getting another dog until at least two of ours have passed away. Preferably three, being that I would like to go back to only having two dogs. The problem is that she misses conformation showing and none of our current dogs are suitable: Nike because of her hips, Eos because of her age, and Clio because of her ear. 

Me, I don't want to own another show bred German Shepherd period. I just wish I was capable enough to do a Malinois justice. I just love their intensity and drive.


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## LittleBettaFish

The rainbowfish are now readily eating the Repashy Grub Pie. I think the young fish picking at it encouraged the fussier adults to give it a go. This means I no longer have to hatch quite as much BBS, although the blue eyes appreciate live foods. 

I put a spawning mop in the rainbowfish tank today after a water change. The adult male knows what it's all about and immediately started chasing the females around. However, some of the sub-adult males were also putting on a show, sparring with each other and showing off to the females. It's a great feeling watching fish you've bred and raised grow into happy and healthy adults. 

I can't wait to add further rainbowfish and blue eye species to my fish room. My one concern is that rainbowfish seem especially susceptible to mycobacterium marinum. I suppose all I can really do is ensure to only purchase quality stock from reputable sources and ensure that the conditions I keep my fish in are top notch. 

I did manage to get some photos of my wild bettas to share. 

First up is a photo of one of the B. brownorum tanks. Eventually this tank will be replaced with a 10 gallon aquarium. It also needs more floating plants. 










Followed by one of the occupants. This is an F1 fish that I _believe_ is female. 










The B. coccina tank. This also needs more floating plants. I won't even mention how well a certain plant is growing in case I jinx myself. 










One of my B. uberis males. This looks like one of the younger males. 










One of the older males in the tank. 



















The wild bettas are all doing well. There's still been a bit of fighting in the B. uberis tank and someone does have a chunk taken out of their head. However, this group has always been aggressive and as long as there's more than one male in a tank they'll find something to squabble about. 

My one mission in the fish room remains catching my F0 B. brownorum male and reuniting him with his female. He's a cunning fish. I only get one opportunity to net him before he hides himself away in the moss. 

The B. hendra group have got to go soon. I need their tank for my F1 B. brownorum group, and I want to use their plants in Zig-Zag's tank. I'm going to contact my hobbyist friend to see if she still wants them. Otherwise I'm going to have to advertise them for sale online. The plan is to have them gone within two weeks.

That's about it from the fish room. My laptop is lagging something terrible, so I can't be bothered posting more.


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## LittleBettaFish

Last night I sat crying on my fish room floor, convinced Zig-Zag was dead. I was feeding the fish, and normally Zig-Zag hovers around the back of the tank, but will come to the front when he sees food. However, I had recently found a dead fish on the floor (unfortunately it had been there too long to get a species ID), and when Zig-Zag was still nowhere to be found, I started to worry. I removed everything from the tank except the sponge filter and heater, and there was still no sign of Zig-Zag.

To cut a long story short, I eventually found an injured but very much alive Zig-Zag inside the sponge filter (this is a favourite hiding place for my wild bettas). 

He was really stressed and had a pretty significant injury to his head. So earlier today, I went to the store, and purchased 3.8L jar. The jar sits inside the tank as you can see in the photos below, and Zig-Zag is able to interact with everyone from the safety of the jar (it's covered with cling wrap so he can't jump out). This tank is going to be upgraded to a 10 gallon soon, and I will then be planting it out with Hygrophila angustifolia and various floating plants. 










This is a terrible photo of Zig-Zag's son. I did think there was at least one other offspring that had a lateral blotch, but now I can't find any. But fish have mysteriously vanished from this tank before. Perhaps there is a serial killer in their midst. You can see that Zig-Zag didn't pass his spinal deformity onto any of his offspring. 










Then here are two of my F1 B. brownorum having a disagreement. The male on the left is brother to Trouble, and one of only five B. brownorum in my fish room to have a lateral blotch. I like how he is keeping an eye on his sister in this photo. 










This is the same male, but towards the bottom of the tank, so the flash washed out his colouring. Both him and Trouble are nice males. It's been tough trying to resist the urge to breed them. 










Looking back now, I wish I'd done things with my wild bettas differently. I think if I could do it over, I'd keep the pairs separate (either with a divider, jar, or breeding net) and then have breeding tanks and grow-out tanks set-up separately. That way I could give each spawn my full attention and get a better idea as to growth rates, sex ratios etc. Plus with each set of tanks on a separate 'system', the risk of losing an entire species greatly diminishes. I feel like the way I did things, I didn't produce as many high-quality fish as I could have. 

This hobby certainly is a harsh teacher.


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## LittleBettaFish

Zig-Zag's wound looks like it's healing, and if he's behaviour is anything to go by, he's certainly feeling better. He's been flaring at everyone from inside the jar, while the female flirts with him through the glass. 

I've been spending a lot of time trying to take photos of the rainbowfish, and today I did get a couple of photos worth sharing. These are of the larger sub-adult males. These fish are almost at breeding size, according to online sources, and although I haven't seen any nuptial stripes on them, they definitely have been showing interest in the breeding mop. I think I'm going to purchase another 2ft tank and move the sub-adult females and three or four of the sub-adult males into it. I don't like having all my fish in one tank.



















This is the tank at the moment. I've decided that I want to rip out the vallisneria at the front of the tank, and replace it with Vallisneria 'erecta'. This variety comes from the Daintree River, and reportedly only grows to the surface of the water, instead of developing extremely long leaves. To make the background feel more natural (it looks rather stark to me) and provide a nicer background for photos, I'm going to plant the vallisneria along the back half of the tank instead. I'm just waiting for it to come back in stock. 










You might notice that there is a spawning mop in the tank. The other day I pulled a mop out of there with over twenty eggs stuck to it. I was surprised given the number of fish in the tank, and the fact the mop had been left for a couple of days. I thought they would have eaten all the eggs. I know I said I wasn't going to collect eggs from this species for a while, but I really want to master the art of hatching and raising rainbowfish before I move into the rarer species. 

This tank definitely needs a new light. The current light does nothing for the rainbows, and I don't think it's doing much for the plants. I recently discovered the online business I purchase all my dry goods from, is stocking an Australian made (and supposedly good) All-In-One fertiliser, so I'm going to order a bottle of that and a 50 watt heater for the empty 10 gallon. 

I'm hoping to get the tub outside filled with Australian native plants. At the moment it's been neglected, and the only things that are thriving are string algae and duckweed. I want to try something like Pygmy Perch in there, but I'm a little worried the plastic might leach harmful chemicals. 

As an aside, do dragonfly nymphs heavily predate mosquito larvae? It seems I have a heck of a lot of dragonfly nymphs in the tub, and very few mosquito larvae. They are nasty looking things and I don't want them getting into any of my tanks. Obviously, if I add fish, I will be adding a cover so that the nymphs won't eat any resulting fry. 

Meanwhile Clio has been busy learning some new things. We've been practicing position changes at a distance using a cardboard box (I'm getting my dad to make me one out of wood) and she spends half her time in the box arguing with me. We do a sit while barking, we do our platz (this is a fold-back down versus a casual drop) while barking, and sometimes on our stand we jump out of the box and come running to mum and then stand in front of her. I do wonder what the neighbours think of our noisy training sessions. However, the box has been helping her learn that if I say sit or platz or stand, it means do it wherever you are, not come to me first and then perform the command. The other day I was a few metres away and got her to stand and she took a step forward, looked like she was going to take another, but then stopped herself and stood rock still before I could signal her to wait. So obviously she is starting to understand what it is I want. 

I did have to laugh today when she did a platz and then somehow jumped up sideways into a stand. 

I still wish she looked more enthusiastic in training and preferred tugging as a reward. I love flashy heelwork, and hers looks so sedate. The only way I can really get her 'up' is when I puff my mouth and she thinks I'm going to spit a treat. Rewarding with tugging/play seems to create more energy and drive than purely using food. I do use the food like a toy, and that has helped, but Clio still tends to get very flat during training sessions even when they are kept short and fun. 

At least she's a very fast learner. 

So far, my biggest training challenges remain the drop/stand/sit in motion, and the drop on recall. I have been dabbling with go-outs but I need to invest way more time in them. I also want to teach Clio to retrieve a wooden dumbbell, and perhaps even directed jumping. Thank God for Youtube and all the 'how to' videos dog trainers and owners post!


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## LittleBettaFish

The rainbowfish eggs have started to hatch. I found a fry swimming around in the tank earlier today. I hope at least a few of the eggs belong to the P. luminatus group. Now I'm not certain if those small pest snails are capable of eating fish eggs, but when I was checking through the mops to see how the eggs were developing, there seemed to be less eggs than there were previously. I've only seen one fry so they obviously didn't hatch out. Perhaps now they are eyeing up, I simply didn't see them, but I removed all the snails I could find just in case. 

Meanwhile, the B. hendra group are likely going to their new home on Monday. I was sad because I saw a photo on FB of someone's B. hendra male on FB, and he looked very much like my previous male (the fish in my display picture). It really drove home the fact that I just never formed an attachment to most of my current wilds having lost so many of my favourites. 

The only problem is what to do with their empty tank. Originally, I was going to use it for my F1 B. brownorum group, but now I'm debating whether to set it up for my P. luminatus pair. My plan was to heavily plant the tank with Howard River Milfoil (it's very fine and feathery) and then leave the pair in the tank for a week or so feeding them on BBS and mosquito larvae, move them back to the main tank and _hopefully_ there will be some eggs left behind. The male I want to breed from is just getting better and better with age. It's a shame I'm just not able to capture him on camera. After the untimely demise of my original male, this tank will be well-covered! 

I did also do something I probably shouldn't have today. I ordered some more rainbowfish. A group of six Melanotaenia Maccullochi 'Burton Creek'. I kept these in the past but never gave them the chance to settle in and be at their best. Eventually I will be getting another 2ft tank for them, but for now they will be quarantined in an empty 10 gallon. 

Along with the rainbowfish, I also ordered some more plants. Specifically Howard River Milfoil, Darwin River Ambulia, native Water Sprite, and Java Moss. The Water Sprite will be going into a fishless emersed set-up, which will also be planted out with the remaining Coomalie Creek Hairgrass, and a few stems of Ambulia.

In other fish news, one of my guppy females dropped her fry, which look to have been promptly eaten now by the others. The other female looks like she will burst if she doesn't drop fry soon. Later this week I'm going to take some photos of this group and put at least the larger fish up for sale. It does look like the orange is filling in on the caudal fins of a couple of the males, and some of the females are also starting to show an orange tinge to their caudal fins, so perhaps they will develop their colour further and start to more closely resemble the adults. 

Now if I ever mention getting guppies again on this site, feel free to come to Australia and slap some sense into me. They definitely are not the fish for me, and I'll be glad to see the back end of this lot. 

Today I only have a couple of photos to share. I'm going back in there later this evening, to try and coax some of the fish into cooperating. 

First up is my F0 B. brownorum male. I wish this photo had been side on, but my camera was doing its usual 'BUSY SIGNAL! BUSY SIGNAL!!' routine. I have no idea what the mark is behind his pectoral fin. I call it his beauty spot. It's been there for as long as I've had him (must be well over a year now) and doesn't cause him any problems. 










Then this is probably the best photo I've taken in a long time, and demonstrates beautifully why I find it so hard to fully tear myself away from the wild bettas. This is one of my F1 B. coccina males. I'm always proud when I manage to produce such a beautiful fish. 










With the B. hendra group gone, I should have enough plants to fill out both the B. miniopinna and Zig-Zag's tank. The Java Moss I have coming will be going into the B. livida tank, with any leftovers going into whatever tank needs it. I still want to purchase Cardamine Lyrata and Hygrophila angustifolia, but I have gone _way_ over my fish budget, so these plants will have to suffice for now. 

The wilds are all looking good, and seem happy enough. About the only issue is that the water in some of the tanks is pretty clear following water changes yesterday, so I'm going to brew up a big batch of rooibos tea and add it to the tanks. 

That's it from down here in Melbourne. It's apparently 32.5 degrees Celsius outside, and probably close to that temperature in the fish room! I had to move my whiteworm/grindal worm cultures downstairs where it is cooler. At least the fish don't mind the warmer weather.


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## blueridge

I know I don't normally commit, but glad to hear things are working out for you LBF! Can't wait to see your new rainbows! Are you going to be sticking to smaller species or will you be working with larger ones like Boesemani? Also looking at all your wilds makes me miss keeping my rubra pair.


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## LittleBettaFish

No, I'll definitely be sticking with the smaller species. This means fish I can house and breed in a 2ft tank. There's a couple of different populations of Melanotaenia maccullochi I want to get my hands on (Skull Creek and Eubenangee Swamp), as well as Melanotaenia utcheensis. 

You know, I was sitting there in my fish room the other day desperately wishing I could get in a time machine and go back right to the beginning with my wild bettas. Now it's too late. All my rare species (B. persephone and B. sp. cf. rutilans green in particular) and best breeding fish are gone, and these new import laws in Australia mean I can no longer purchase wild-caught fish from my favourite seller. Even if I wanted to start over I couldn't. 

I think if I could still easily import fish from overseas I likely would have done a total reboot on my fish room and gone back to keeping and breeding wild bettas. Even after all these years, they remain by far, my favourite fish to work with. It's a shame that only when it's too late, do I have success with my wild bettas and find my interest in them renewed. 

I wish I could say that some day it would be easier to import wild bettas into this country. But sadly it seems like the laws only get more draconian here, not less. 

While I was moping about in the fish room, I did get a couple photos of one of my F1 B. brownorum males. I've actually got his mother and father separated out into their own tank in the hopes they will breed. It seems like they've produced almost entirely female offspring, so I want to see if altering either water temperature or pH has an influence on the sex-ratio of their offspring.


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## LittleBettaFish

I've been doing some serious thinking these past few days, and I've decided I'm not entirely finished with wild bettas. 

Now, I've never been happy with my current group of B. sp. api api. The main issue has been fin and spinal deformities, particularly in the males. However, these fish weren't raised under the best conditions, so I've never been able to tell if these deformities are a result of genetics or environment. 

Therefore, my plan is to trial a new method of breeding and raising these fish. I will be selecting the 'best' male and female from the group. These fish will go into a 5 gallon tank that has been divided. I'm leaving the divider clear so the pair can still see each other and interact as I find the wilds prefer to be a with a clear divider, so they can still see each other and interact. Then a second, 10 gallon tank will be set-up, and once the pair are conditioned and ready to spawn, they will be moved across. Once the fish have spawned, the female will be removed, and the male will be removed once the fry are free-swimming and he is no longer caring for them. The fry will be grown out in the 10 gallon tank until they are at around juvenile size. Then if I want a second spawn from the adult fish, the juveniles will be moved to 15 gallon grow-out tank. 

I think this method of raising fry will also give me a truer idea of sex-ratios in my wild betta spawns. Presently, I have no idea if spawns start off as male or female heavy, or it's simply a matter of one gender being stronger than the other, and thus able to out-compete their siblings. 

The end goal is to have a group of healthy, deformity free fish that can then be used as future breeding stock when the need arises. 

While I was in the fish room today working everything out, I did get a few photos. 

First up is a photo of my F1 B. brownorum male. It turned out a bit blurry simply because he was in the dark at the bottom of the tank and I saw his eye and just quickly took a photo. 










Then this is a sub-adult B. miniopinna. I am 99% certain that this fish is female. 










I don't think many fish rival a B. uberis male in full flare. 










It's a shame this B. coccina male was showing stress stripes while flaring. 










Then this is Zig-Zag still recovering from his head injury safely inside the jar. This tank will be getting more plant cover shortly. 










In other news, it seems like the rainbowfish eggs have been a failure. There's still only one visible fry, and very few eggs left on the mop. I'm not sure what has gone wrong, but if no further eggs hatch, I'll use the tank for something else. It could be that the fry are hiding on the bottom of the tank being that rainbowfish fry are so small, so I'll give it another week or two before I drain the tank. 

My new rainbowfish should be arriving tomorrow. Being that I've had several issues with this courier company in the past, I'm just hoping they arrive safely. 

Meanwhile, part of the air pump came loose the other night, meaning all the filters in my fish room stopped working. The rainbowfish were fine, but as the guppy tanks are very heavily stocked, this did lead to some water quality issues. Last night I combined the two groups and moved them into a larger tank, but the sooner they are out of the fish room and no longer my concern, the better. 

Other than that, there's not much else to report from the fish room. We have had a number of very hot and humid days recently (with quite a dramatic couple hours of lightning on Friday night), which has lead to an explosion of mosquito larvae in the outdoor tub. There's still a number of dragonfly nymphs in there, so I have to be careful these don't end up in my tanks. 

I did want to share something that happened the other day while out walking Clio at the park. We were walking along and went down onto the grass and passed by an elderly couple. Being that Clio hadn't been out for a walk for a week (it's been so hot and sticky and we haven't been able to get down to the park), I thought she was going to be a nightmare and either drag me along or bark at this couple. However, I swear she knew they were watching, as she pranced past them, head up, at my left side, giving me her full attention. It was one of those moments where you look like a better dog owner than you actually are. 

It turns out the couple were German and the man had actually been an instructor at the branch of the club we used to take the dogs to. 

This was the first compliment Clio has ever received for being well-behaved while out on a walk. Just the whole walk she was a joy to have on the end of the lead. Out of all the dogs, she has the most beautiful loose lead walk. She watched a young girl on the swings, and she stopped and waited quietly while mum talked to a woman with a young boy on a bike. Then just as we were about to put her in the car, a white Husky looking dog walked by with its owner. We started to follow it, and she did briefly start pulling and thinking about having a reaction. Then it was like something in her brain switched on, and she stopped herself without any encouragement from me, gave me eye contact, and wanted to engage with me rather than continue following the dog. 

I do think Clio is gradually switching less into that immediate flight or fight response when something frightens her. We're ordering a new collar for her tonight, which will hopefully further help with her reactivity, so we can start moving closer to other dogs and proofing her obedience in more distracting environments. Even though Ares has some holes in his foundation training, he went to dog club almost every weekend for several years, and so he will do rock solid stays etc. even when other dogs are around. I haven't really been able to proof any of Clio's obedience commands around other dogs because of her reactivity, so it would be great if I could teach her that 'stay' means 'stay', even if there's another dog doing cartwheels or making faces at you from a metre away.


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## LittleBettaFish

Yesterday was a tough day in the fish room. I made the decision to go through my B. sp. api api tank and cull any deformed or sickly looking fish. In the end, I culled about 18 fish, most of these being male. While I still have about twenty fish left, I don't think any of the remaining males are breeding quality. 

However, it does seem that it is possible to get at least _some_ of the coccina complex species into the country still. I've sent an email to the woman who I used to import my wilds through, to see if it's possible to purchase a a new pair of B. sp. api api, as well as see if she is bringing in any other coccina complex species. 

I've got everything crossed that it's not a complete impossibility. Even if it takes until the new year before I can get them here. 

I feel like I played at keeping and breeding wilds in the past. I wasn't dedicated enough, and I was too inconsistent with my care, which shows in the quality of some of my fish. 

I want to try and get to the aquarium this weekend, to purchase supplies for my B. sp. api api breeding project. I still haven't worked out how I am going to divide the tank for the pair. I don't like how the DIY dividers look, and they tend to be rather unstable unless permanently attached. However, most of the commercially produced dividers have holes that look large enough for the fish to potentially get stuck in. I did think of some sort of Hamburg Matten Filter divider, but then my fish wouldn't be able to see each other, which is what I wanted. I'll probably just go with a DIY craft mesh divider as it's cheap and easy to put together. 

Only once the fish are settled and have gone through 3-4 weeks of quarantine, will I put them together in the 10 gallon breeding tank and see if I can get a successful spawn. Only once those fry have reached sexual maturity, will I attempt a second spawn. This is only so I can see what the sex-ratio is like, and whether any parameters in the breeding tank need to be tweaked. 

Yesterday, also brought the arrival of my new rainbowfish. They were about twice the size of what I was expecting, so I think I'm going to need to move them into a 15 gallon tank sooner rather than later. They'll still settling in, and I need to make some adjustments to their tank, but at least the six of them arrived without any issues. A minor miracle when you consider all the problems I've had with this courier company. 

I also received some plants. Among them, were two baseballs' worth of java moss, which went straight into the B. sp. api api, B. livida, and B. miniopinna tanks. The B. sp. api api definitely appreciated the added cover, and some of the males have coloured up beautifully. Then we have the B. livida group which immediately start squabbling over who gets to lurk where. 

I think for some hobbyists, there are fish that you find yourself constantly coming back to. For me, these are definitely wild bettas. I spent more time crying and sweating over these damn fish than I care to admit, but I still can't find it in myself to give them up. 

I've made so many stupid mistakes in the past. Mistakes, which have cost me dearly, both emotionally and financially. But they have also taught me some valuable lessons. They have taught me the importance of doing things properly from the start. I want to be prepared, not rushing around in a panic at the last minute, because this is when you do make mistakes. I'm not going to purchase new fish unless I have a tank set-up and waiting for them. I am going to quarantine fish correctly, and not share equipment between even established tanks without disinfecting it first. Most importantly, I'm not going to procrastinate on water changes, and I am going to do my best to raise my fry to healthy adults. I am going to keep records on tank parameters, sex-ratios, and growth rates so as to better understand how they all fit together. 

Finally, I'm going to have fun! Looking back, it became almost a chore to care for my wild bettas. I want to have fun with the hobby again. I don't want to burn out six months from now, and be back here talking bitterly about how I should have sold all my fish off. I get so caught up on competing against some imaginary standard that it sucks the fun out of anything I do. This is the root cause for all of my mental health problems, and I'm sick to death of it. For once, I am going to find enjoyment, true enjoyment, in doing something I love. 

I'm going to try and get some photos of my fish later today. It's going to be 34 degrees here today, so I want to get out and do all my outside chores before I melt.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I heard back from the importer, and sadly there will be no new wilds for me this year. The good news is that she's looking into doing a pre-order next year when the weather cools down, and I certainly would be purchasing enough fish to make it worth her while. 

I definitely want at least B. sp. api api and B. hendra so I hope both are available. If I could get my hands on B. miniopinna and B. persephone, that would just be the icing on the cake. I'm just not sure whether I should purchase two pairs of each species, as this gives me more chance that at least one pair will make it through the quarantine and import process. However, as each pair is likely going to cost upwards of $100, it's going to be a pretty expensive to do so. 

Putting a positive spin on things, I now have plenty of time to prepare. I've got fish to sell, tanks to move, and lots of things I still need to purchase. Most importantly, the plants will have time to grow in, and the tanks will have time to mature, before the fish are introduced. The import process in Australia is pretty rough. With wild-caught fish, they often have to be shipped from their country of origin to Thailand for export. Then, they have to spend seven days in an approved quarantine facility in Australia, before being shipped out to the buyer. After all the problems I've had with velvet, I want to keep the stress levels in any newly arrived fish, as low as possible. 

Meanwhile, I only have one photo to share from my fish room that I took the other day. It's just been too hot to spend more time than necessary in the fish room. Now the weather has cooled down, I will try and get some more photos of my fish. The photo below, is of one of my B. sp. api api females. 










In other news, we're due for a drenching. Something like 300mm of rain over the next two or three days. Our suburb seems to either get the worst of the rain, or no rain at all. Right now we seem to have missed the worst of it, but I can see a new band coming across on the radar. I just hope the power doesn't go out as pretty severe thunderstorms are also predicted. 

I think I might invest in a couple of battery powered air pumps. I am worried about the predicted black-outs over the summer. This is one of the main benefits to keeping wild bettas. If the power goes out, all you have to worry about is heating.


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## LittleBettaFish

Some not so great news from the fish room. Zig-Zag's head wound still isn't healing. In fact, I think it's actually increased in size, and I suspect there is some sort of infection going on. I think the jar was causing him some disorientation, so I've set-up a small hospital tank and moved him across. I'm going to monitor his condition over the next 24 hours, and if it worsens, I'll have to start treating with medication. At the moment he's hiding from me. I'm almost 100% certain he's in the tank, as it would be nearly impossible for him to jump out, but I also know I won't be able to stop myself from pulling everything out of there to find him. It's amazing how well these fish can hide themselves in only a few litres of water. 

I think if Zig-Zag does recover, he'll remain in this tank permanently, as I don't want to risk him being attacked by the other fish again. 

The B. hendra group went to their new home on Monday, although we did have one that stayed behind. A couple hours after the buyer had gone home, I discovered one of the male B. hendra lying in a puddle of cold water at the bottom of their now empty tank. Somehow I must have missed him when I was checking the wood. I thought he was dead until I dripped water on him, and he moved. As I had nowhere else to put him, he's now recuperating in the B. brownorum tank. I don't know how I missed this male, but I'll be sure to check everything I remove from a tank even more carefully in the future. 

My P. luminatus group gave me a scare recently. I still don't know if the issue is now resolved, or if there's some sort of infection going on, so both their tank and the rainbowfish tank are under quarantine. I noticed the female and one of the males had been clamping their caudal fins, and then I found the male going crazy flicking against whatever he could. So I moved the Melanotaenia Maccullochi group into the main tank (this decision will likely come back to haunt me later) and put the P. luminatus group in the now empty 40 litre tank. When I had a look at them with the torch I couldn't see any signs of external parasites, and the parameters in the main tank are always perfect. I darkened the water and dropped the pH in the 40 litre, and so far the clamped fins and flicking has stopped. They're behaving perfectly normally, as are the fish in the main tank, so for now everyone is just under close supervision. 

Meanwhile out of all the eggs I collected from the rainbowfish tank, only one P. luminatus fry hatched. I just hope it's female and not another male. 

On Sunday, I went to the aquarium and purchased a 22 litre tank and ADA Amazonia powder. This is the start of my new wild betta rack. Now I just need another five tanks. The store had several substrate choices that were similar to ADA (Black Earth and Seachem Aquasolum), but the powder was finer, had a more natural texture, and I know it gives good results. Plus it was decently priced. 

One of the issues with my current wild betta tanks, is that they don't have a background. So, I've decided to paint the back of the new tank black. It'll hopefully not only make the fish feel more comfortable, but also give the whole set-up a cleaner look. 

I'm going to heavily plant the breeding pair tanks with Water Sprite and/or Willow Hygro. I just wish I could find some Asian Watergrass to use as a floating plant. Everything else is either noxious or doesn't grow well in a covered aquarium. Plus I'd like to keep that sort of SE Asia feel. 

I've also ordered some blackwater extract to use on my current wild betta tanks. The water is almost clear in several of the tanks, and the fish don't like it. You definitely notice it most in the B. livida tank. Their colour is just so washed out. 

And that's all the news from the fish room today. 

I did manage a few photos, even though my fish were being uncooperative. I caught one of my B. livida males flaring. You can see what I mean by the crappy colour. The flash didn't help. In real life this fish is almost maroon in colour, with a green sheen to his sides. Somehow I can also never capture the unusual green eyes of this species (it's where they get their name from)


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## LittleBettaFish

Zig-Zag is still alive, but still caught in a sort of limbo. His health isn't improving, but it's not getting worse. He's still hiding and panics when I come near the tank, but he did show _some_ interest in the grindal worms I put in yesterday. I thought perhaps the wound looked a little less red and angry, but perhaps that was just wishful thinking. I've put a clay cave in his tank so he has somewhere to hide, but where I can easily monitor his progress with the torch. I really just hope he pulls through. At this point, I don't think euthanasia is necessary, but if he continues not eating and his wound doesn't heal it's something I'm going to have to consider, much as it pains me. 

Yesterday, I did water changes on all the wild betta tanks. I had the opportunity to try out the new blackwater extract. Unfortunately, I don't think it's concentrated enough for my needs. Even after using half of the bottle, the water in the tanks had only a slight yellowish tint. I did add some IAL to each tank to help darken the water, but it looks like its back to the drawing board. I think I'm going to have to bite the bullet and start making my own blackwater extract. It's only that purchasing IAL gets expensive. Yesterday, I used up an entire packet of 25 leaves. In the past, I was able to purchase packets of 100+ leaves, but now the business only sells them in packets of 25 leaves. 

I wish we could get products from Tannin Aquatics here in Australia, as they have a much broader range of aquarium botanicals. Here I'm limited to what I can collect, which isn't much. Oak leaves are about all I can collect in abundance, as there's a tree right outside my dad's house. However, the leaf shape looks wrong for a SE Asian inspired tank. I prefer the look of leaves such as Loquat and Guava. I can also collect Magnolia, Paperbark, and Lilly Pilly leaves from my front garden, but not in large enough numbers to fill all my tanks. I find it bemusing that I cannot import dead leaves into the country, but nurseries here continue to sell invasive plant species such as Agapanthus, Ivy, and Bamboo. 

The rest of my fish are doing well. Including the B. hendra male that got left behind. The B. brownorum seem to be tolerating his presence, and now he just needs time for his fins to heal. If he lives peacefully with the B. brownorum, he can stay with them permanently. None of this group is being used for breeding, and there are only five fish in a 40 litre tank. 

The guppies are doing their best to overrun the fish room. It looks like all of my larger females are now pregnant (these are my homebred females), and the males just divide their time between eating, fighting, and spawning. I even caught a male that would have been maybe 2cm total length, chasing after one of the smaller females. I also spotted what looked to be a recently born fry yesterday, so I'm wondering if some of the fry are surviving now I've put the breeding mops back in for cover. 

I'm going to get one or two photos of the group later today, so I can finally advertise them for sale. I want at least the larger fish gone, as I don't want them producing any further fry for me to have to grow out. If they can't find a buyer I swear I'm going to ring up every fish store in Melbourne until I find one that wants them. 

The rainbowfish are also quickly outgrowing their tank. I think I'm going to have to put some of these up for sale soon. Hopefully someone in Melbourne is in need of some young M. pygmaea males. At least they eat a variety of foods now. For a while all they would eat was freshly hatched brine shrimp. Now I've got them eating flake food, Repashy Grub Pie, and frozen brine shrimp. I am trying to get all of my fish including the wilds, to take an assortment of foods. I think it makes the transition to a new home easier, as not everyone wants to be stuck feeding only frozen or live foods.

The killifish juveniles are also growing (albeit slowly). When they are large enough not to be eaten by their parents and siblings, I will move them all into a larger tank. I want to do a biotope 'esque' style tank for them, with emersed vegetation. 

I did try and take some photos of my wild bettas today. I definitely think it's a lot more difficult now they are all living in large groups. That's part of the reason I want to keep any future breeding pairs separate, and spread their offspring between a couple of tanks. 

The first photo is of one of my B. sp. api api males. There's a couple of particularly aggressive males in this group, which is why he is sort of skulking about. In the second photo you can see one of these males behind him. 



















Then just a couple photos of some B. uberis males. 



















The camera was having a bad day today. It was taking forever to focus and then most of the photos came out blurry. These were the best of a bad bunch, which isn't saying much. I definitely need to invest in a better camera at some point. It's just the price is terrifying. 

It doesn't help that most of my current wild bettas aren't as nice as my original fish. It's impossible to make an ugly fish look good. 

I just hope that if the wild betta import goes through in 2018, I can get some high-quality breeding stock back in my fish room. I definitely want to add more species to my current collection. Out of nine tanks dedicated to my wild bettas, four contain B. brownorum! I'll probably add species I don't currently own first (although I do think I'll purchase a new pair of B. brownorum if available) and if this isn't a one-off thing, and it's not prohibitively expensive, purchase new breeding pairs of my current species. 

That's it from the fish room today. I've got to go clean the house. I think there's more fur on the floor, than there is on the dogs. 

I do want to say that we had an awesome day at the park on Sunday with Clio. A group of dogs went by (obviously we were some distance away) and not only did she not bark, but she calmed down enough that she was walking next to me, giving me eye contact. We watched a small dog go past on the footpath and she was a little concerned, but simply watched it instead of launching herself into a barking frenzy as would have happened previously.

Clio also didn't do anything when a kid came running right past her while she was sniffing. He was behind her, and I thought it would trigger her reactivity, but although she was startled, she recovered straight away and was more interested in the ball they were kicking around. 

Then we joined the footpath right behind these two Dachshunds and there were no concerns there. 

I don't know if I mentioned it, but we purchased a 'Dominant Dog' collar for her to wear when we have to be in close proximity to other dogs (such as the vet). It's supposed to fit high and tight on the neck, but we didn't realise the measurement included the clasp. When it arrived, it definitely was tight. It wouldn't even fit around her neck! So I think we're going to have to order a new one. 

I did have to laugh the other day. We were at a local reserve where we run the dogs. We had Nike and Ares with us. Now Nike is at least 62-63cm, which is oversized for a female German Shepherd. The standard calls for a maximum height of 60-61cm, although I personally think a size of 58-59.5cm is best. I've been told Eos is too small to be a purebred German Shepherd, and asked if Clio is a puppy because of her height and strength of bone, but it's the first time I've heard someone say Nike looks small. I mean her head is about the same size as Ares's and he's too big as well. 

I don't know why the public think German Shepherds are supposed to be big. They were always meant to be a medium-sized dog. A 50 kilogram dog should be an anomaly not the norm. Although the US seems to have plenty of breeders producing 'old-fashioned, over-sized' dogs with sway backs and the temperament of a Labrador.


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## LittleBettaFish

The water in the wild betta tanks is looking darker now the IAL have had some time to do their thing. Although I think if I want to see the B. livida group really colour up, I need the water to be almost black. 

I took a few photos of the fish today. I've given up trying to get photos of my B. sp. api api males. Instead, I got some photos of the females. 

This is a very unflattering photo of one of the smaller females. 










I think this is one of the better females in the tank in terms of topline and body proportions. 










Then another female. I can't tell if it's the same female as above or not. Their colour changes based on mood and lighting. 










Next is my favourite shot of the day, one of my B. uberis males. He was chasing everyone around being a territorial jerk. 



















I will say even though B. uberis is not my favourite species from this complex, I still think they put on the best show. Just the combination of the finnage and colouring. 

I have come to the decision that the mayaca fluviatilis definitely needs to go. It's been limping along for a while now, but really, it's just dying a slow death. I think it does better planted than it does left floating, at least it seems to trap less algae and detritus that way. 

I am surprised that the java fern in the B. coccina tank is still alive. Usually it has all melted back to the rhizome by now. Although it did take months before the java fern in my B. brownorum gave up and died. For some reason the hydrilla is growing nicely in my wild betta tanks where it receives low light and no added nutrients. I wonder if it simply prefers the softer water. 

The juvenile native lilies I received for free with my plant order, are doing well out in the tub pond. With all these sunny days, at least one leaf has reached the surface. There's also some native pennywort in the tub that hitchhiked a ride with the plants, and seems to spreading at the surface. 

I've got to do some water changes today, and solve the problem of the perpetual cloudiness in the P. luminatus tank. I can't tell if it's the substrate or the rocks, or something else entirely causing it. I'm going to scrub the glass on all sides of the tank, clean the filter, and do a large water change and see if that helps.

Otherwise, it looks like my laptop is going to need to be replaced. I got the blue screen of death this morning, and so I think I'm going to do some laptop shopping this weekend. As I don't do anything more than watch Youtube videos and visit forums, it's not like I need something particularly powerful or expensive. Hopefully I can find something decent for $500 or less.


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## LittleBettaFish

I'm absolutely devastated. Zig-Zag has taken a turn for the worse, and I will be euthanizing him shortly. Realistically I knew this was going to be the likely outcome, but I was hoping for a miracle. Based on his behaviour, I do wonder if there was neurological damage done, especially if the wound had been that deep and infected. 

He's always been tough. I mean it was only a couple of years ago that I was considering culling him because of his severely deformed spine. But the fact that not only did he survive, he thrived stopped me. I never would have guessed that he would have grown into such a beautiful fish. He's certainly the best B. brownorum I've ever bred. 

He does have one son and I believe what are a couple of daughters, so this line does live on. Who knows yet if his son will mature into a fish even approaching the quality of his father. 

I went onto PB and retrieved this image of Zig-Zag in his prime. There are better photos of him, but I couldn't deal with all the pop-ups and ads on PB. I'll try and post some more up later.


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## Aquatail

I'm so sorry about Zig-Zag. I always enjoyed hearing about how he was doing. Hopefully his son and daughters will thrive like he did.


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks for the kind words. He will certainly be missed. After his death, I was able to get a closer look at his wound, and the damage was so severe I doubt even with aggressive treatment he would have survived. Looking at photos online, it seems like there must have been only a thin layer of flesh left protecting his brain. 

I just wish I'd got more offspring out of him. We'll have to see what happens with his son as he matures further. I'm a bit disappointed that he has a much smaller lateral spot than Zig-Zag. None of my current B. brownorum have a spot as large as Zig-Zag's. I was hoping this was something he'd pass on. 

I think my plan will be to import a new pair or two of B. brownorum if possible next year. If I only purchase one pair, I'll put together a sibling pair from my current pair and see what they produce.


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## LittleBettaFish

I lost another fish room favourite today, after making the decision to euthanase my wild-caught B. uberis female. Months ago, I noticed she had developed some sort of internal swelling. As it didn't seem to bother her, I decided to monitor her condition until such a point where she either passed naturally, or her quality of life started to decline. Originally, the swelling was on one side of her body, but eventually both sides were affected, causing her to look severely bloated. When one day she stopped coming to the front of the tank to chase everyone away from the food, I thought she must have passed away. 

Today when doing a complete tear-down of the tank (for unrelated reasons), I found the female still very much alive. While she wasn't in obvious distress, the swelling had grown even larger, and you could see she was struggling to swim. As her condition was obviously terminal, and I was worried the other fish would start to pick on her the weaker she became, I decided euthanasia was the best option. 

I've had her since early 2014, and over the years, she's produced some spectacular offspring, who have in turn produced offspring of their own. So her legacy will certainly live on in my fish room. 

I also lost my original guppy male. He'd slowed down recently, but I thought that was just because of his fins (he's always been a very small-bodied fish). Sadly, while doing water changes earlier today, I found his body under one of the spawning mop. I also had to euthanase the original females recently, as they developed such bad SBD they could barely get off the bottom of the tank, and the males kept harassing them. I don't know what I did wrong, or if I even did anything wrong. I know fancy guppies have a reputation for being fragile, some strains more so than others. 

It's not all bad news however. 

While doing water changes, I did find a welcome surprise in the guppy tank. A single male fry with a twin/double-tail (I'm not sure what the correct term is). I don't know where that particular mutation popped up from, but I've nicknamed him 'Gemini' and moved him to a tank of his own with several similar sized females for company. I would be curious to see if he passes this trait on to any of his offspring, much as I don't need any more guppies. I have so many females close to dropping fry, as well as dozens of recently born fry already swimming around. 

The rest of my fish are doing well. My original B. brownorum male is back to his normal self after being reunited with his adult offspring. He's gone from hiding most of the time, to being constantly out and about. After having lost so many fish recently, I am relieved that his change in behaviour wasn't down to illness or injury. 

I only managed to get two photos worth sharing tonight. I've been fiddling with the settings on the camera, and I'm not sure if I've made things better or worse. It's too uncomfortably hot in the fish room to spend too much time in there so I'll experiment more with the camera tomorrow.


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## ThatFishThough

You're dealing with hot... lucky... It's 68*F in the house and -11 outside. Wind chills have been -45 at the lowest so far but it's predicted to get colder. Brrrrrr... 

If you'd excuse me, I have to go chip layers of ice off my fish tanks! LOL!


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## LittleBettaFish

Melbourne weather is always all over the place. Summer temperatures can go from 45 degrees Celsius, down to mid to low teens. I personally find that sort of weather more difficult to deal with, than consistent heat or cold. We have the well-deserved reputation for having 'four seasons in a day'. 

I definitely could not live somewhere that got below freezing. I think I suffer from mild Raynaud's syndrome (totally self-diagnosed but when it's cold my toes often turn white and go numb), and it's bad enough shivering through a Melbourne winter with its icy winds. I spend the colder months swaddled up in as many clothes as possible and position myself near a heater vent.


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## LittleBettaFish

We had a hot day the other week. The temperature got to about 42 degrees Celsius (which according to Google is 107.6 degrees Fahrenheit). I was worried the fish room might get too hot as the door is kept shut and the ceiling fan doesn't work. But with the curtains closed, it actually stayed relatively cool. Fortunately, I remembered to move the grindal and white worm cultures somewhere cooler, as last summer I forgot to do so, and the culture suffered a mass die-off. 

Not much has been going on in the fish room of late. I've mostly been working out what direction I want to go in the hobby. After looking at the prices of some recently imported wild bettas (around $150-200 a pair), I'm seriously reconsidering whether I want to invest that much money into the hobby at this point in time. If the species I wanted were available and were similarly priced, I could easily be looking at spending close to, if not over, $1000. To be honest, I'd get a better return on my money in Australia, if I went out and purchased a breeding colony of rare plecos. This isn't even including the cost of fitting out each tank, which would likely end up costing just as much. 

I then gave some serious consideration to working with nano species of fish, namely Celestichthys margaritatus, Microdevario Kubotai, Celestichthys erythromicron, various Boraras sp. and Paracheirodon simulans. But if I was once again being honest with myself, having owned a couple of these species in the past, I'm fairly certain my interest would be short-lived. They are fish I admire through photos and videos, rather than fish I could see myself keeping and breeding. 

Much as I love Rhadinocentrus ornatus, I don't think the racks I am using at the moment could safely hold multiple 60cm (15 gallon) tanks. This also meant rainbowfish were out. 

So after looking at what was feasible for my fish room, I'm thinking I may just increase my collection of Pseudomugil species. There's dozens of different varieties available in Australia, and with certain species, a group of ten fish, can cost less than a single pair of wild bettas. The only downside is that they are extremely difficult to take photos of, unless I invest in a better camera, and I do enjoy taking and sharing photos of my fish. 

My current goal is to try and get my P. luminatus group producing eggs. I did have a mop in there but when I pulled it out, there were no eggs. Admittedly, it was in there a few days so I'm not sure if no eggs were laid, or if the eggs were eaten before I got to them. I'm going to try a mop with thinner yarn this time around. I just don't want my female getting too old to breed before I can get some more fry. I'm wondering whether to feed them up, and then move her and one of the males into a separate tank with a spawning mop for a day or so and see what happens. 

The rest of my fish are doing well. The wild betta rack has been receiving regular late afternoon sunlight, so the plants are doing better, especially the java moss. The B. uberis group has been fighting less after I rearranged their tank and added more hiding places, although there's still plenty of chewed fins. The B. brownorum group is also enjoying the extra space, although I think there needs to be some more plants providing cover in the middle level of the tank. The other night I found a rather nice male in my B. sp. api api group, so of course he spends most of his time hiding, while the ugly males are the only ones I can ever get photos of. 

In other news, after weeks of doing nothing, the hornwort I put out in the tub pond has exploded with new growth. As the tub sits in direct sunlight, it was choked with algae. However, since the hornwort started growing, the algae has almost completely disappeared. I have to scoop duckweed out of there at least once a week, and the vallisneria I thought had died off is now lush and green. 

Unfortunately, the plants in my smaller tub pond are not doing well. The water is constantly cloudy and something keeps eating my lily whenever its leaves reach the surface. Tomorrow when it's cooler, I'm going to scoop out as many mosquito larvae as I can, drain 90% of the water out, add the excess vallisneria I have sitting in a bucket in the fish room in, plant the lily into a more nutritious substrate, and refill the tub. As I have duckweed in the other tub pond, I want to add Azolla to this second tub. Both tubs have been producing large amounts of mosquito larvae, so my fish have been getting regular feedings. 

Meanwhile the next door neighbours have bees living in the wall of their house. They were there when he purchased the house from its original owner, and they've been trying to convince the bees to move out of the wall and go into the hives they have set-up for them. Well I think there are sometimes more bees drinking out of the tub pond, than there are in his hives. I think the duckweed offers them a place to land, as I've noticed they don't use the other tub even though it's closer to the house. This means I can only collect mosquito larvae early in the morning or late at night, as otherwise I have dozens of bees flying everywhere. At least where it's positioned now, none of the neighbours can see my out there with my net collecting mosquito larvae. 

I do have some photos to wrap this post up with. I think the changes I've made to the camera settings has made a difference, but my fish didn't want a bar of the camera today. 

First is my F0 B. brownorum male. I've actually achieved the near impossible task of getting him with his fins open. 










This is a bad photo of their new tank set-up. It was the only angle I could get where the flash didn't do strange things to the colouring. It's a 10 gallon tank and I think that's actually the male at the front there, just to give an idea of size. There's over a dozen fish in this tank, even if the photo makes it look like there is only one. 










Finally, this is one of my B. livida males. I made some changes to their tank the other day, so there's been some fighting going on. This male still has a faint lateral blotch. Almost all the other larger males have lost their as they've aged.


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## LittleBettaFish

The small tub has now been emptied, replanted, and refilled. Most of the vallisneria was still green and healthy even after spending a couple of weeks in a bucket, so I planted it out into a couple of pots filled with ADA Amazonia, and fingers crossed it will grow. 

The water looks clearer already, so I think it might have been the propogating sand or old aqua soil that was causing the cloudiness. I want to try some emergent plants in there but last time I had Dwarf papyrus in there, a bloody possum came along and ate it. 

I still can't believe how quickly the hornwort is taking over the larger tub. The challenge will be in me adding it to a tank and not having it melt again. Lighting seems to be more important to its growth than pH or nutrients, so hopefully once I purchase new lighting, I will be successful in growing it in my indoor aquariums. I'm not sure how well it will over-winter here in Melbourne. While we don't get freezing cold temperatures, we get seemingly endless cloudy days. 

Yesterday while cleaning the fish room, I discovered a dead fish under the bottom shelf of the rack. Based on its finnage (the only identifying feature left), it looks to be either B. coccina or B. livida. I think like the other two, it must have jumped out during water changes. In fact I think it was when I was last doing a water change on the B. livida tank the other day, that the phone rang and I stepped out of the room to answer it while their tank was uncovered. It was partially drained so I thought it would be fine, but obviously I'll have to be more careful in the future. Once again it proves my point of when not if, when it comes to these fish and uncovered tanks. 

I've been fiddling with the camera and lighting trying to get better photos. I don't know how successful I was.

First is a photo of two of my B. uberis males. The male at the back is demonstrating how these fish use body language and colour to avoid confrontation. The male at the back wanted to be at the front of the tank, but didn't want to be chased off by one of the more aggressive males. By moving about slowly with his fins clamped and showing horizontal barring, he manged to avoid their notice. The worst he received was a couple of half-hearted flares.










This was just a test shot to see how a change in lighting affected photos. 










Before finally, a photo of one of my B. livida males. It's a shame almost all of them have lost their lateral spot now. But you can see the green tip to the ventral fin here. This, along with their green eyes, are what makes them easily distinguishable from B. coccina and B. tussyae. These are one of the bigger species from this complex. These mature males are probably 5-6 inches total length. 










In other news, I dropped by one of the fish stores near my house today, and picked up some new fish. I only went in for frozen foods but then mum suggested we should look at the fish, and I discovered that they had P. luminatus for sale. Most of the time when fish like this come up for sale you have to purchase them in pairs. However, they were $30 each, or $50 for a pair, so I purchased what looked to be the last two females available. 

At the moment they are very pale, but hopefully once they settle in and gain some size, their colour will improve. While they are in quarantine for the next 2-3 weeks, I will be putting the runty male in with them later tonight. I have two replacements if something happens to him, and the other night I caught both the males _and_ the female chasing him around. The new females are similarly sized so hopefully they won't bully him. 

The store had a pair of B. hendra for sale for $120. I'm not sure if it was a new pair, or the same pair that I mentioned in a previous post some weeks back. They also had several species of Apistogramma. I will admit I was tempted by the Apistogramma panduro. I've always admired this species, so it was probably a good thing I don't have any tanks large enough for them. The one thing that turns me off Apistos, is their aggression. It's bad enough with my wild bettas. I think I've had enough of fish that wake up one morning and decide to maim or murder their breeding partner. 

Not much else to report from the fish room. I've got some water changes to do, and fish to feed, and that's my fish room chores done for the day.


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## blueridge

Just curious have you ever done floating type plant baskets in your outdoor tubs? And if so how did you set them up? Thinking about doing them in my tubs this year.


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## LittleBettaFish

No I haven't. I haven't got any emersed growth in my tubs at the moment, as not only do the possums like to have a snack, but our dog Eos likes to get in and pull plants out of the tubs.


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## LittleBettaFish

I had a bit of a fright last night while doing water changes on both P. luminatus tanks. First, I changed out about 25% of the water in the main tank, and caught the runty male. I then did a water change on the quarantine tank and added him to it. That was fine. The two females seemed to prefer having his company, and within minutes of being in the tank he was already hunting down mosquito larvae. 

However, in the main tank, the two males were looking decidedly unhappy, and worse still, the female was at the surface breathing heavily and fairly unresponsive to my presence (normally she'll come to the front of the tank when she sees me). 

There is plenty of surface agitation in this tank from the sponge filter, I'd used water conditioner, and roughly matched the temperature of the tap water to the tank water. I'd also been very quick catching the male and had singled him out at the beginning rather than chasing everyone with the net. I didn't think removing one fish from the tank would have that much of an effect on their behaviour. 

So I weighed up the risks, and made the decision to combine both groups of fish. Just like that, everyone's behaviour quickly returned to normal. This morning the original female was there at the front of the tank to greet me, so hopefully her behaviour was down to stress and not due to ill health or old age. I know these fish are very short-lived, but I do hope I have at least another 6-12 months with her. 

Obviously, the whole group is now in quarantine. While the two new females appear healthy, that's certainly no guarantee. So fingers crossed that there aren't any issues. 

I will say that they've coloured up better since going into this tank. They are still much paler than my original female, but you can start to see the first hint of orange on their bodies. 

I'm going to try and get some photos of my wild bettas later this afternoon to share. There's more natural sunlight then, and I think this shows off the colour of the fish better.


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## LittleBettaFish

Sadly my optimism failed to translate into reality. I wish I could use a separate photography tank for my wilds, but it takes them too long to settle into new environment and show their true colours. All I'd get would be photos of pale, stressed looking fish huddled on the bottom of the tank. 

Today is another hot one. It's forecast to hit 42 degrees Celsius this afternoon, and it was 39 degrees yesterday. It's not been as hot as places like Sydney and Adelaide, but it's hot enough that fires are a concern. I'm going to get water changes done today before it gets too uncomfortably hot in the fish room. I accidentally forgot I left my grindal and white worm cultures in there. I think the grindal worms should be fine, but I expect to see a drop in white worm numbers. At least I don't rely on these as heavily as I did in the past. 

The P. luminatus group are back to their normal selves. The new females have completely settled in, and are slowly starting to gain more colour. They had a feed of BBS yesterday, and they'll have either flake food or mosquito larvae today. So far there's been no eggs in the spawning mop, but that's what I was expecting. I think I may swap to a finer, lighter coloured yarn and see if this yields better results. 

The two larger males have been showing off to the females and chasing each other around. If you haven't seen Pseudomugil males sparring, I suggest checking out some videos on Youtube. They are spectacularly beautiful fish. Too bad they move too quickly for me to get a photo of them in full display. If I ever get a new camera, I definitely want it to be capable of taking video. Still shots only show so much.

Watching my runty P. luminatus male, I don't know if it's simply a matter of not getting enough food or being slower to develop. He struggles with eating mosquito larvae (even small larvae) and does better with BBS and crushed up flake. He doesn't seem to eat as much as the others, even when there's plentiful food and no competition. He's only about a third of the size of the other males. However, he's got no physical deformities, and he spars and shows off to the females, so unless there's a dramatic decline in his health, I'm not going to cull him. 

Meanwhile, the killifish juveniles are growing out excruciatingly slowly, even with frequent water changes and regular feeding. I want to put them in with the adults, but I think that they'll still be seen as food. There's still only one obvious male. Hopefully I'll get at least another out of this group. I did find eggs in the spawning mop that's in with the adults, but I'm just leaving them in situ and if they hatch, they hatch. 

This weekend I am putting as many guppies as I can up for sale, and possibly some of the rainbowfish. There's way too many guppies in that tank now, so they have to go. There's already dozens of very young fry in there, and I don't want any more. I just wish the males wouldn't have nipped each other's fins. I'm not sure how aggressive guppies normally are, but when they're not chasing the females, the males are constantly chasing each around and fighting. It's not even because there are too many males in the tank, as it was going on even when I had only a few males in there. 

The only guppy I am going to be keeping is Gemini, and I may purchase a small number of Endler males to keep him company. At the moment he's still in with several young females, but once Gemini gets bigger, they will be going back into the main tank. 

I'm hoping I can find some buyers for the rainbowfish being that they are still small and mostly male. I'm going to likely sell the M. maccullochi 'Burton Ck'. They haven't done much of anything and now I have them in hand, I don't like them as much as I thought I would. It's been so long since I last had them, and being that my previous group were very shy, I couldn't remember what they looked like. Plus I can't collect further eggs from that tank due to the risk of hybridisation between them and the M. pygmaea. 

Once I the guppies are gone, I'll have more space to expand my collection of Blue-eyes. 

To wrap up my post, I did get one slightly blurry photo the other day. It's of my F0 B. brownorum male. It's too bad it wasn't more in focus.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I didn't end up putting any fish up for sale. We had a super busy weekend and fish were right at the bottom of things to do. 

Firstly, the P. luminatus group are doing great. The new females have started taking a wider variety of foods, and the runty male has been getting down some mosquito larvae and live bloodworms. I'm going to buy some yarn on the weekend and make them up a couple of new spawning mops. I've decided to do a combination of brown and beige, and see how they respond to the different colours. I want to try and find a feathery yarn, as I think this may make for a more inviting spawning site. 

Hopefully, I will be able to get some fry out of this group. 

Yesterday, I decided to add the killifish juveniles to the adults' tank. Killifish have large mouths, and I was concerned that the juveniles might still be small enough to be eaten. However, apart from some half-hearted chasing by the adults, they have been readily accepted into the group. It looks like I have two males and five or six females in the juvenile group, so that's not a bad ratio. Once the juveniles start getting bigger, I'm going to upgrade the tank to a 10 gallon, and set it up in a loose sort of biotope style. 

Things have just been puttering along in the fish room, so there's not much happening. I've got a heap of empty tanks and empty shelves because I haven't fully decided what I want to do. I'm keep changing my mind. There are too many interesting and beautiful fish out there to make a decision easy! 

My newest infatuation are apistogramma. As mentioned, I have always liked Apistogramma panduro, and seeing that pair in store the other day just rekindled that interest. Watching videos on Youtube really hasn't helped. I think if I can sell of most of the rainbowfish and guppies, I may use the money to set-up an apisto tank. I figure I may as well take advantage of Melbourne's wonderfully soft water while I live here. 

I _did_ manage to take some photos of my wild bettas today. 

Here's a photo of my B. miniopinna tank showing how well the Java moss is growing. 










The next two photos are of Trouble. Unfortunately, he tends to hide out at the back of the tank or swim too fast for me to get a photo of him, which is why these two are slightly blurry. He is the offspring of the male in the above post, and the best of the three young B. brownorum males I have currently. 



















Then some fighting in the B. uberis tank.



















Followed by a photo of one of my B. uberis male's pectoral fin. This red colouration seems to develop with age, and seems to mostly occur on the top of the pectoral fin. 










Moving away from talk of the fish room, I did read that Peacock Bass were recently found in an interstate waterway. It was very discouraging to see the attitudes and ignorance of some of those commenting. Reading some of the comments it's little wonder that fish like this find themselves released into our waterways. With a growing number of people living in apartments and houses with backyards no larger than a postal stamp, I do worry about an increasing apathy towards the environment. 

And that's it from the fish room for today. I have to do water changes on the wild betta tanks and walk the dogs, so I'd better get into that and stop procrastinating.


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## LittleBettaFish

I got through all the water changes in my fish room today. All that's left are the goldfish and I'm going to get to their tank as soon as I've finished posting this. It was very humid today, so the fish room was hot and airless even with the window open. I suppose at leat the heaters should only rarely need to switch on. 

Doing my daily 'welfare check' everyone seems fine. If there's one group of fish in my fish room that look forward to water change day, it's the rainbowfish. They get a 25% water change every 2-3 days because their tank is so heavily stocked, and before I'm even finished refilling the tank the males are trying to chase the nearest females into the spawning mop. I love watching the adult M. pygmaea flashing his colours at the females. He's almost always in breeding dress now, with his bright yellow nuptial stripe. 

I'm finding it difficult to decide which of the young males to part with. I originally intended on selling the largest ten or so, and let the others put on another 2-3cm before offering them for sale. However, some of the larger males are looking superb, so I really want to keep them on. These were my first attempt at rearing rainbowfish fry to maturity after all, and I'm rather proud of my results. They've been given the golden standard of care, and I just want them to go to someone who is going to appreciate them as much as I have. 

I also made some changes to the killifish tank. I moved the two spawning mops to a separate tank as they were full of eggs, and added some Anubias in their place. I also added a background to the tank (propped up against the outside of the tank for now), and already there's been a huge improvement in their colour. I need to get a large Anubias to fill up the back corner of the tank where the sponge filter is, but this will do until I upgrade to a 10 gallon tank. 

I finally managed to get some semi-decent photos of my killifish. The new location of their tank makes it much easier to take photos. 

This is my home-bred male. His father is very shy, and was only coming out of hiding tonight to bite and chase the other fish. This male still needs to mature further in the body, as well as develop his finnage.




























This is one of the juvenile females. 










A size comparison between the male and his juvenile sister. You can see why I was concerned about them being eaten. I shouldn't have been. The larger of the juvenile males has been taking on everyone in the tank, even if they are 2-3 times his size. 










It's just a short post from me tonight. I'm going to (hopefully) get some photos of my wild bettas tomorrow, now their tanks clean and the front glass has been given a good scrubbing.


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## blueridge

Beautiful!


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## LittleBettaFish

Thanks. I think his father is the nicer fish, but he's so shy it makes taking a photo of him near impossible. I'm hoping the young male in the foreground of one of the photos matures into a quality fish as he's already showing some very nice colour in his fins.

Meanwhile, I have a dog related brag to share. 

This morning we took Clio for a walk at the local 'park' (it covers around 120 hectares of mostly revegetated bush and connects to a number of similar parks). Normally we stick to a quieter part of the park away from the main paths. However, today we decided to take Clio along one of the main paths that offers better visibility, and see how she handled it. 

We actually only got a few metres from the car before we ran into our first test of the day. On the main asphalt path was a dog being walked towards us, and at almost the same time, there was a dog and its owner heading towards us on the dirt path that runs parallel to this. There's a thin stretch of land that separates both paths so this is where we stood. Both dogs were maybe 3m away, which is extremely close for Clio. 

I put her in a sit and she got rewarded for remaining in a sit and not reacting to either dog. She was a little stressed, but didn't bark, didn't hackle up, and remained mostly focused on me. Then as we start off down the hill towards the dirt track, and I put Clio into a sit to see how well she was still listening (being that we were moving towards the dog), Clio let's out this terrible yelp. It turns out mum had been watching the other dog, hadn't seen us stop, and stood right on her tail. Even after that Clio didn't bark at the other dogs and was happy to continue walking. 

As I'm sure I've mentioned previously, they have a weekly run on at this park, and we ended up right in the middle of it. Along with the usual cyclists and walkers, we were continually passed by groups of runners, including those with kids and prams. 

We also came across an off-leash Border Collie and its owners. It didn't come up to us at all, and Clio didn't even really glance in its direction. 

She was actually behaving so well that when we passed two people near a bench, the woman made a comment to her companion. 

At some points during the walk you would not have even guessed that she had any issues with reactivity. 

By the time the walk finished, we'd gone almost 3km.

I was _so_ proud of Clio. Not only did she not react to anything on our walk, but she was walking beautifully on a loose lead, and was constantly checking in with me and listening to her commands. She's come such a long way, and we're hoping that with continued training and exposure her reactivity will improve even further. 

Meanwhile, while we were out walking with Eos we went through what I am calling the 'Valley of the Kangaroos'. I like to admire kangaroos from a distance. Up close they absolutely terrify me, especially the males. There were kangaroos everywhere on this track. Some were close enough that you could probably reach out and touch them. So here I am sort of going from tree to another while my mum and Eos are just walking casually along. Fortunately, no one else was around to wonder what on earth I was doing. 

My nan should never have told me about the kangaroo that used to chase her and the dogs when she lived in the country. It just created a lifelong fear of kangaroos.


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## blueridge

I think the fact that you get to see kangaroos casually strolling through a park is amazing! What sight that would be! I only ever get to see one if I go to the zoo or the one lady that goes my tack shop brings her's in.


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## LittleBettaFish

Kangaroos are very common in Australia. Probably similar to how deer are in the US (or at least the parts of the US where deer are common), so I suppose for us the novelty wears off. 

I do cringe every time I see Asian tourists going right up to kangaroos to get photos. We were watching a pair of males boxing today while out walking, and when you see them up close, you realise just how strong they are. 

There was actually an attack on a lady jogging on a trail not too far from our home. I think she was injured enough to require surgery, so they're very capable of slicing you open and breaking bones. 

People seem to do all sorts of stupid things when it comes to wildlife. I've seen videos of Yellowstone National Park where people are chased by Bison because they got too close.


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## blueridge

Yes I guess you're right. Although around here you don't see deer that often. They are there, but they tend to hide more than anything; probably because of hunters. Most of the damage they do is when one runs out in front of a vehicle while driving at night. They can do some real damage to a small car. 

One of the craziest things I've seen was one time I was driving my Grandma back to my house and we happened to come upon a black bear by the road. You don't see much of those that far inland in NC; most of the time they hang around the coast.


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## LittleBettaFish

Kangaroos can do some serious damage if you run into them with a car. They have the tendency to be bounding along the side of the road, and then suddenly jump out in front of your car. We also have feral deer here in Australia, but in spite of the damage I'm sure they do to the environment, people seem to get up in arms when there are calls to cull them.

At least the only 'bears' we have to worry about running into in Australia are Koalas. 

We took Clio along the same walk as yesterday. There weren't as many people, but a number of dogs. We saw a Rough Collie that was staring at her and getting excited. I thought this would trigger Clio, but she barely paid it any attention. In fact she rotated herself into the heel position and ended up with her back to it. Further along, we came around a blind corner and a man was jogging with his Border Collie and another dog. We pulled off the path to let him pass, and not even a reaction from Clio, in spite of it being one of our closer encounters. 

We did have a close shave with a dog that was loose and not under effective control (I have no issues with dogs off lead that are walking nicely with their owners and don't rush every dog they see). We were about to round a corner and I suddenly saw an animal moving in the long grass further up the hill. I thought it was a kangaroo, but then I hear a man yelling and realise it's a dog. We did a quick u-turn and you could hear this man shouting for at least five minutes trying to recall his dog. 

I hate seeing people letting their dogs loose in this park. Worst was a woman from dog club, who I think might have even been an instructor, whose German Shepherd we saw chasing a kangaroo towards the main road. Wildlife have so few places of refuge in the suburbs, and there are plenty of alternatives around here if you want to let your dog off lead. 

Then we get back to the car and put Clio into her crate, a dog and its owner walk right behind the car. The back was still down, so I held a treat in my fingers and let her nibble on it while the dog went by. She was a little stressed (I can tell her level of stress by how roughly she takes her treats from me) but she didn't do anything but look. 

So once again, I'm really proud of my girl. It's been a long and challenging journey, and there's still a long way to go, but I feel like she's made some real progress over the past few weeks. I look back on our early days with her and shudder. Yes, she might have been friendlier with other dogs, but she was just constantly over threshold and her reactivity was out of control. Now I've got a dog that is readily choosing to engage with me on walks, and is looking to me for guidance instead of blindly reacting. 

Undoubtedly, we'll go to the show next Sunday, and she'll act like she's had no training or socialisation at all. That's her usual party trick. 

It's a hot one here today. Expected to get to 39 degrees Celsius. I doubt I'll be spending much time in the fish room today.


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## LittleBettaFish

I found at least three eggs in the P. luminatus mop yesterday. There could be more, but I didn't want to disturb the eggs too much by going through the mop. At least I know one or more of the females are capable of producing eggs. Now I 'only' have to wait three weeks or so until they hatch (that's if they hatch). 

I did notice one interesting trait among my P. luminatus males. A hobbyist on a rainbowfish oriented FB group, mentioned that he couldn't find P. luminatus males with white tips on their caudal fins anymore. So I decided to take a look at my males, and while the two largest males have white tips, the smallest male has orange tips. It will be interesting to see if the white tips are lost in future generations, particularly as I am using different females. 

Meanwhile, the largest male killifish juvenile has developed an attitude. Since being added to the adults' tank, the colours in his fins have intensified, and I think he's even grown. He's been flaring and showing off to the adult females, and squaring off against his older brother. I doubt it will be long before he's trying to spawn with the females. 

I'm going to check on the killifish eggs tonight and see if any have hatched, and if not, how close they are to hatching. I'll also do a small water change, as this seems to help prevent the eggs from fungusing. 

My wild bettas are in a feisty mood tonight. I think it's a combination of the recent water change and the recent feed. There's been lots of posturing and fighting going on. My F0 B. brownorum pair were flirting, and my B. miniopinna male has built himself another nest. Even one of my normally docile B. uberis females was riled up. 










This was the beginning of a rather lengthy battle between these two B. sp. api api males.










Here is Trouble's rarely seen brother, _just_ holding onto that lateral blotch. He'd been squabbling with one of his siblings so his red was a little duller than usual. 










Before finishing with one of my B. uberis males. 










On a totally unrelated subject, my skin is horrendous at the moment. I'm suffering from the worst bout of what I'm fairly certain is hormonal acne (based on timing and location). Seemingly overnight, I've developed these huge red bumps on both lower cheeks. They look awful and they feel awful. To give an idea of the size of these things, they could easily be mistaken for mosquito bites. 

My skin is just one long and painful battle. I find it so frustrating that some women take no care of their skin at all, and have not even a single blemish. I regularly wash my sheets and towels, religiously cleanse (it's a cream cleanser as my skin is very dry) and moisturise, always remove my make-up whenever I get home, keep my hair off my face, and drink a couple of litres of water a day, and my skin is still an embarrassment. Some days it's so bad even make-up can't hide it. Instead I end up with flesh coloured bumps all over my face. My skin just isn't able to clear up and heal before I've got the next lot of pimples appearing.

Much as I hate going to the doctor, I think I may have to go see someone about it. I'm closer to thirty than I am to twenty, and my skin is worse now than it was when I was a teenager. I'm never going to have perfect skin, but I would at least like to have clear skin. 

Rant, over.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I finally went ahead and ordered the lights for my fish room yesterday. I purchased two 120cm lights at $125 each (normally $145), so I'm hoping they perform to my expectations. All I want is healthy and growing. It doesn't even have to be fast growth, just consistent growth. They're also LED, so I'm hoping this will mean some savings in the cost of running them. I've never purchased from this particular website before, but it seems to have good reviews and is located in my state, so hopefully I receive the lights by early next week. 

I'll give it a month to see how the plants do with these new lights, and if everything is still green and healthy, I'll get a couple of 90cm lights to run over my Rainbowfish and Blue Eye tanks. 

I also ordered the plants yesterday. In the end I decided to only purchase ten bunches of Cardamine Lyrata, and two 'Medium' Java Fern. After past failures, I decided it might be better to hold off and see how well the new lights perform, before spending any more money. I don't want to know how much money I've spent on plants over the years, only to have them die. I imagine it must be well into the thousands of dollars by now. 

There's a reason Java Moss and Anubias are the staple plants in my fish room, and it's not just because I like how they look. 

There's been no further eggs from the P. luminatus group, but they have been 'neglected' the past couple of days in that I was sick and so they haven't been fed or had their mop checked. Yesterday they got a water change and a feed, so hopefully I can trigger some spawning. I think this group is going to prove tricky to get a consistent supply of eggs from. I definitely have to fine-tune my methods if I want to sustain this species long-term in my fish room. I am going to trial some different yarn mops on the weekend, and see if they have a preference for a particular texture, colour, or size. 

At least it looks like the couple of eggs I found on the mop the other day haven't fungussed. But there's still a long way to go before they are ready to hatch.

I did however, have a single killifish fry hatch out. I was doing a water change on the hatchery tank last night and checking the progress of the eggs, when I spotted the solitary fry swimming around. I dropped in some microworms for it, and hopefully it won't be alone for too much longer. From the first batch of killifish fry, there were only two survivors (these two hatched out in the main tank and grew out alongside the adults). I ended up with one male and one female. In the second batch I had two males and five to six females. Ideally, I would like to see a ratio of two females to every one male, as like livebearers, male killifish can get rough with the females when they want to spawn. 

Meanwhile a member of the Rainbowfish FB group I am a part of, posted up all these photos of various Rhadinocentrus Ornatus/Rhads. If I was keen on these fish before, I am desperate to get my hands on some now. I find them so much more beautiful than rainbowfish, even if they do tend to be more subdued in their colouring. The main hurdle is availability. I need to find someone who is willing to send me either mops or fish. 

Rhads are like my five year fish room plan, as it's probably going to be that long before all my current fish (except hopefully for the M. pygmaea and P. luminatus) are dead or sold. 

The rest of my fish are doing well, except for my goldfish. The one that suffered from severe nitrate poisoning a couple of years back still routinely turns up with a torn caudal fin even though the tank is bare bottom and the only thing in there are two sponge filters. However, I think I may have discovered a possible explanation for its injuries. 

A few days ago, I saw my oldest goldfish latch onto the other fish's caudal fin. The nitrate poisoned goldfish has a very long, flowing caudal fin that probably measures around 10cm or more in length. It's also almost completely transparent, so I wonder if there was some confusion on the part of the oldest fish, considering that these fish have lived together for almost a decade now and apart from some boisterousness, get along peacefully. Unfortunately, the goldfish live in a room I don't spend much time in, so I'm not sure how frequently this is occurring. 

I've been meaning to add some emersed plants to the goldfish tank to help combat excess nitrates. While at Bunnings the other day, I noticed what appeared to be floating planters for ponds. Unfortunately, I only saw them after we had checked out, so didn't get a closer look, but if these are fish safe and goldfish proof, I think I've found my solution.

These goldfish are my one of my biggest hobby regrets. Shubunkins are a dime a dozen, so finding a good home is hard unless they are high-quality fish. Not only that, but they are dirty fish that require a very large aquarium and frequent water changes, and they are just so long-lived. I'm fairly certain that these goldfish are going to outlive most, if not all, of our current pets. 

Other than that, there hasn't been much else going on. Clio and Nike are both in season. Ares is not allowed near Nike as she's right in, and being that Nike is an absolute hussy, he'll get the leg over if given the chance. Clio has only just come in, and now that Eos has almost her full coat back, I imagine she will be in shortly as well. Along with that, Nike is still dumping coat and Ares just perpetually sheds, so I have to vacuum the house every few days, or you're liable to slip on a fur tumbleweed and break your neck. 

After watching a video on Youtube the other day, I also wish the 'it's how you raise them' mentality regarding dogs would go die a quiet death somewhere. I actually think it's a very dangerous sentiment. It just completely glosses over important factors like breed characteristics. A German Shepherd _should_ behave differently from an English Springer Spaniel. Different breeds are motivated by different drives. Unfortunately, a lot of breeders and dog owners seem to want the Labrador temperament in a German Shepherd body, so a lot of important breed traits are being lost. 

Some breeds were bred to possess natural aggression towards humans and other animals. To ignore this, is gravely irresponsible in my mind. How can you effectively manage potential risks through training and appropriate socialisation, if you won't even acknowledge their existence? 

As the owner of a German Shepherd, I am fully aware of what my dog is capable of. A German Shepherd with an incorrect temperament can be an incredibly dangerous animal. We should be able to talk openly about this fact. Maybe there would be less dog bites and attacks if people understood that physical appearance isn't all that differentiates one breed from another. 

Anyway, I got through most of my overdue fish room 'chores' last night. Now I'm feeling better, it's time to get in there and give my wild bettas before they start cannibalising one another. I'm going to try and take some photos before I feed them, as when they're hungry they stay at the front of the tank. 

So this is me signing off for now, although I will likely post later today if I am successful with my photo taking!


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## LittleBettaFish

The new lights arrived yesterday. 

Originally, I'd ordered the Up Aqua Pro Z LED. However, a few days after I placed my order, I received an email from the seller stating that there had been problems with this particular batch of lights, and he'd sent them back to the supplier. He offered the Up Aqua Pro Z-P as a substitute, and as they are also designed for planted aquariums, and none of the plants I'm growing are particularly demanding, I had them sent out instead. 

They didn't arrive the day I expected them to (based on the tracking info which said they'd been loaded for delivery), and after wading through bad review after bad review for this company online, I was worried the lights were stuck in a depot somewhere. 

They were finally delivered around 3pm the next day. 

I also received my plant order earlier this week, so I could finally bin all that Mayaca Fluviatilis. In hindsight, I should have perhaps ordered the standard form of Cardamine Lyrata, and if I'd known what a pitiful amount of Java Fern I'd receive, I would have left it off entirely. 

The Cardamine Lyrata has already sent out multiple new leaves, and I'm hoping once it covers the surface and starts sending down roots, it will create areas of shade for the wilds, as their colour never looks as good under bright lighting. 










These are my wild betta tanks with the new lights in place (ignore that tangle of airline tubing to the left). I think I'll have to work out a way to hang them, as the clamps are cutting holes in the cling wrap and I don't want any fish jumping out. 

I'm now thinking that it might be better to dismantle the two 90cm racks, measure out the fish room, and install a second 120cm rack instead. This would make it easier to run lights over all of my aquariums, and on the shelves that didn't have lighting, I could set-up my hatchery tubs. The only downside to this plan is that I would have to get rid of the drawer as it only fits the 90cm racks, and likely the shelf as well. I already think I need to add extra support to the first rack as I can see some bowing, so this would definitely be a priority with a second rack as the 60cm tank would be going onto it. I still have to measure everything out before I get too carried away, as I'm not certain a second rack is going to fit. 

I just wish this room wasn't so small. It would be fine if I was just keeping fish for display, but being a breeder, I need the space to grow-out my fish. 

In more exciting news, I had at least three P. luminatus fry hatch! I was checking the mops every few days to monitor the progress of the eggs, but I couldn't find any. I thought I'd been unsuccessful with this species yet again, but decided to leave the mops for another week or so in case I simply wasn't seeing the eyed up eggs against the dark green yarn. Today doing my daily check, I discovered three fry swimming around. Hopefully there's a couple more eggs still to hatch. 

There's a mop in the breeding tank that I'll be going through later this morning. It's been in a few days now and I missed a feed yesterday so I'm not expecting much from them. But you never know. There may be one or two eggs that has avoided being eaten.

Last I checked, I also had four killifish fry, with one egg very close to hatching. Meanwhile, the juveniles/sub-adults are thriving. I have always found it strange that young fish kept alongside the adults seem to grow faster, than those that are raised with their siblings in a grow-out tank. I think I might move this group into the 60-F once the guppies are gone. It's got great dimensions for a killifish tank, and it saves me purchasing a new tank. 

I don't have more photos to share as my camera ran out of batteries. I think I may need to purchase a replacement battery, as it seems to chew through a fully charged battery pretty quickly nowadays. I'll be taking some more photos this afternoon once the camera charges, as the new lights are making it much easier to take photos.


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## ThatFishThough

I have to ask: How do you like those racks? I'm considering getting two 36" ones for my fish room (instead of having tubs on the floor :roll. Are they sturdy (do you ever fear they'll fall or get tipped over?) Worth the price? If you could, would you get one big long one or two smaller ones?


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## LittleBettaFish

These are Rack-It racks from Bunnings, a hardware chain here in Australia. I have seen racks that look similar both here and overseas and things like quality, maximum weight capacity, and overall sturdiness, seem to vary wildly. 

Personally, I don't trust these racks, and I don't like using them for tanks over 10 gallons, particularly if the rack is longer than 90cm/3ft. There's a lot of bowing, and I have heard of the support beams actually snapping. Apparently these are rated for 400kg per shelf but there's no way I would put 400kg worth of aquariums on these racks. I'm actually going to get my dad around to see if he has any suggestions as to how to add additional supports to each shelf. 

I only chose these racks because of the price. 

If I had the money, I would have gone for what I've seen called 'longspan shelving'. It seems to be a slight step down from the racking systems they use in warehouses. This is what the original rack in my fish room was, and it held a 45 gallon tank without any issues at all. 

Right now, I don't need racks capable of holding multiple larger aquariums, so these will suffice. However, in in the future when the wild bettas have gone, and I'm working with Australian natives, I will take down these current racks and replace them with something stronger. 

I do think if you have multiple tanks, a rack is one of the best investments you can make.


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## ThatFishThough

The ones here are called “Muscle Racks”. I see a lot of smaller (1-10k subs) aquarium YouTubers use them... larger YouTubers (with the exception of Rachel O’Leary) either use custom or DIY racks. I don’t have the money or craftsmanship for either of those, lol.


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## LittleBettaFish

I've always wanted custom built racks, but I also lack the skills to put them together myself. Asking my father and two brothers would either result in a rack that doesn't look great, but is serviceable, or a rack that is beautifully made, but never gets finished. 

I would eventually like to install flaps on the front of my racks, so you only see the tanks and none of the lighting, power cords, or airline tubing. I think this just makes everything look neater. I'm also thinking about putting in a shelf for my air pump so it's up off the floor, and running air through PVC pipes under each shelf. I've had to replace so much airline tubing lately because the cat has chewed through it, and I'm sick of the mess of airline tubing that makes it impossible to figure out which filter I'm turning on or off. 

To anyone out there who is thinking of starting a fish room, all I can say is plan, measure, and plan some more. It certainly would have cost me less time and money to do things properly from the start. 

I was just in my fish room checking on my mops and fry. I found four more eggs from my P. luminatus, and it looks like I have four fry rather than three. The number of killifish fry has remained unchanged, so I removed the mop, added some leaves, and did a partial water change (when they are this small I tend to use water from the main tank). 

I also took some photos of my wild betta tanks. My camera does not like doing tank shots, which is why some of the detail is hard to see. All of these tanks are approximately 10 gallons. The whole aim of these tanks is to make my fish feel comfortable, and to provide them with as many hiding places as possible. The number of fish in each tank ranges from around 10-30. 

B. livida tank. 










B. uberis tank 










B. coccina tank










B. brownorum/B. hendra tank (this was Zig-Zag's family group)










B. brownorum tank (I don't even know why I posted this photo as you can hardly see anything)










B. miniopinna tank










B. sp. api api tank. 










The B. uberis, B. livida, and B. sp. api api tanks need to have plants moved around. I put Java Fern in tanks where there was no Anuias to see how it would grow, and didn't bother about making it look 'nice'.


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## ThatFishThough

For the airline tubing, I have the same problem with cords in general. I took a dab of nail polish, diferent colored for each tank, and put a little dot near where they're plugged in. It shouldn't wear off, and if needed you can put a little dot on the corner of a tank or something. Saves a lot of unnecessary unplugging and re-starting of filters (although you use sponge filters, correct? I have AquaClear HOBS which automatically drain to prevent flooding; they don't have an auto-restart...)


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## LittleBettaFish

That sounds like a good idea. The only problem is that I run air to between 10-20 tanks, so I would have to go and purchase nail polish that I wouldn't use as I'm a nail biter. I _have_ numbered my tanks, so I might just get the label maker out once I have all my tanks in position (me constantly moving tanks around is why I stopped marking the airline tubing in the first place), and number the airline tubing as well. 

Following today's walk, it's time for another Clio update. 

As usual we were at the local park. This time we took a different route to the one we usually take. It's still along one of the main paths, so we were hoping there would be a lot of traffic, and we were not disappointed. The weekly running group was going the other way, so we had to pass probably close to fifty people. This included young children and people pushing prams. There were also plenty of bike riders, walkers, and roller skiers. 

Then there were the dogs. Normally we might pass one or two dogs on our walks. Today we had to deal with seven dogs. At least I no longer have to jump into the bushes when I see another dog approaching. Instead I only have to put a distance of around 2-3 metres between us and them, as any closer and Clio starts to get stressed. 

Originally, I used to put her in a sit, continually feed her treats as the dog went by, and not start walking until it had gone past. Nowadays, she might get a couple of treats as the dog approaches (she still finds being approached head-on by another dog challenging), and then we either start walking while the dog is going by, or she is expected to remain focused on me and what I am asking of her. She's allowed to look at the other dog, but she's not allowed to become fixated. 

There was one dog I thought might be an issue. It was a larger dog, and it did pull towards Clio as it ran by with its owner. Fortunately, this was the only dog we passed that showed any real interest in Clio. Although it was interesting to see her face when another German Shepherd went by. 

Then on the way back, we met a woman walking with her dog. I pulled Clio off to the side to let them pass, while mum explained that Clio is reactive and that we are working to stop her barking. The woman stopped, and said that her dog was good with other dogs, and that she didn't mind bringing her dog closer. If this had happened a year or so ago, Clio would have gone ballistic. Nothing short of physically dragging her away would have stopped her. Today all she did was have a good look at the dog, wag her tail, and then turn around and start looking for the treats I'd dropped on the ground earlier. There wasn't even a hackle raised. I'm not comfortable with Clio meeting strange dogs as she has difficulty recovering from bad experiences (such as puppy at club attacking her), but we had a quick talk with the woman about what we were doing and then were on our way. 

The best moment had to be when we were at the rapids observation area, looking out over the river, and Clio is sitting beside me with the happiest expression on her face.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well I advertised the guppies for sale on FB. I'll probably post their ad in a couple more places. Hopefully I can sell the whole group in one go, as I don't want to have to waste more time and tank space growing out the remaining young fish. I didn't even know what to price them at. I have no idea what guppies that might not be show quality, but are a step above pet store fish, go for. 

The five P. luminatus fry have survived thus far. I did a water change yesterday with water from the main tank, and crossed all my fingers that I wouldn't wake up to dead fry. I can't tell if they are eating the Sera Micron. They do go up to the surface and seem to be snapping at something, but as they are in the tub, I can't see if they are getting any down. I'm not sure if they are large enough to take either microworms or BBS yet. I've got brine shrimp eggs bubbling away, tomorrow I'll try them on it. 

I've been regularly collecting eggs from the breeding group now. Not a huge number, but enough that if I can get the majority to hatch and have at least a few females, I can keep this species going in my fish room. The first group of eggs I picked out of the mop and dropped into the tub. By the next day, the one I could see had already gone bad. So next time, I removed the entire mop instead. I think if I am going to pick eggs, I am going to have to return to my previous method of hatching eggs. This means a small, well-aerated container, dosed with Methyelene Blue, and where the water is changed daily until the eggs hatch. It simply takes too long for the eggs to hatch to make removing mops a workable method. As of now, there are four mops sitting in the hatchery tub, where they'll have to remain for the next 2-3 weeks. 

The killifish fry are also still alive. They've been eating the microworms, but I'm going to try them on BBS as well. 

I love watching the main group go about their daily business. I actually took some photos of the two smallest males while they were all out eating. 

This is the smallest male (I'd guess maybe just over half an inch total length). He's only just started to come out in the open with the others.










Then this is the larger juvenile. He's been showing off his fins, and chasing the females around. 



















That's the oldest female with him. I don't know what happened to her eye. I think it must have been injured recently, as I only noticed it looking abnormal a few days back. 










In more good news, P. gertrudae has finally become available again. I think I'll order ten fish, and hopefully I can repeat my success with them. I've got everything I need to set-up a tank for them, I just need the fish. 

It also seems that my wild bettas are appreciating their new plants. I found my B. miniopinna male with a nest full of eggs stuck to the underside of one of the Cardamine Lyrata leaves. Although I may have to move the Java Fern out of the B. sp. api api tank. One of the larger females has claimed it as her territory and has been vigorously defending it against the other fish. I wondered why everyone was hiding and then saw her chasing and biting one of the other females. 

Now I just need to work on getting the rest of my fish room in order.


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## LittleBettaFish

Well it looks like a disaster has been only narrowly averted in the fish room this week. 

Basically, I had ten P. gertrudae delivered on Wednesday. I had ordered eight, but this business usually adds additional fish in case of DOAs. Fortunately, he did, as one of the largest females was dead when I opened the box. I've had great success using the 'plop-and-drop' method of acclimation, and as there was a dead fish in the bag, I thought it doubly important to get the surviving fish into the tank ASAP. So the fish went into the tank, and I left them to settle in. 

A few hours later I return to the fish room, to find most of the fish on the bottom of the tank in obvious distress. On a hunch, I test the pH of the tank water. I know my tap water here is very soft, but the lowest the pH gets in my tanks is about 5.5. I've not actually had it test lower. So I was shocked when the pH of the water in the P. gertrudae tank came back with a reading of 4.5! While know these fish have been found in locations with a pH as low as 3.8 in the wild, I doubt the pH of their shipping water was this low. 

Over the past couple of days, I've been slowly trying to bring the pH up to at least 6.5/7.0. I've done multiple partial water changes, and added some crushed coral to their filter with the result being that the pH is now sitting at 7.0. Thankfully, all the fish seem to have survived without suffering any ill-effects from their ordeal. I do think a move to a 10 gallon tank is in their future. Right now they are in a 22 litre tank, and even though they are small fish, they are fairly active swimmers, so I want to give them the space to move about freely. 

In other news, I now have seven P. luminatus fry with a small number of eggs still to hatch. There are obvious differences in size between the newly hatched fry and the oldest fry, so at least I know they are growing! They get either BBS or microworms in the morning, and then Sera Micron later in the day. 

The killifish fry are also growing. I rarely see them, as they prefer to hide in the leaf litter, but I do get the rare glimpse when they come out to feed. The sub-adults in the main tank are now getting close to breeding size. My favourite has to be the larger of the males. I swear he's grown even more since the last photos I posted. It's a shame when keeping multiple males together that they don't develop those spectacular caudal fin filaments. Although their colours more than make up for it. 



















This is the smaller male. I'd probably still call him a juvenile at this stage. 










I did put an ad on FB to sell the guppies, and it was rejected based on their rules about not advertising live animals for sale. So I assume someone either reported it, or it was automatically picked up by FB. So until I get around to posting a new ad, the guppies are still here with me. 

I'm now moving onto dog stories, so if you are only interested in fish, stop reading now. 

Last weekend we saw a perfect example of why I do not let Clio go up to strange dogs. We were walking Eos behind a rather excitable Bull Terrier. The owners were letting it drag them along, pulling towards every dog that went past, so we kept Eos well away. A man is coming the other way with a similar sized bully breed, and he stops so their dogs can meet. Both dogs are male, and to me, their greeting looked fairly tense. If it had been my dog, I would have decided to continue moving. Unfortunately, one of the dogs did something the other didn't like, and they had a scuffle. It sounded worse than it was, but you could tell the owners of the Bull Terrier were very shaken, and based on their reaction, I do wonder if this was the first time something like this had happened. 

Then after all this, the man with the bully breed lets it pull across the path towards Eos as we are walking by. Mum had to tell him that Eos wouldn't start a fight, but she would finish it and that he'd better get his dog away. 

This is why I don't trust people when they tell me their dogs are 'friendly'. Usually these are obnoxious dogs with no manners and no sense of personal boundaries. 

Meanwhile, I was going through the recycle bin on my computer, when I came across several photos of Clio as a puppy that I had deleted. I don't know why I had deleted them, as I didn't have copies in any of my folders, so I restored them, and thought I would post one from her early days. 










I wish she hadn't gone grey in the muzzle so quickly, as it spoils the effect of her dark mask. She's now got more grey hairs than Ares! I also wish that ear had stood properly. It's an ugly fault. Looking back now, I wish we'd taken more photos of her as a puppy to pinpoint precisely when the issues with the ear started. I'm still not sure if it's the result of a congenital fault, damage that occurred while she was being born (one of her siblings got stuck and a c-section was required), an injury caused by one of her siblings and it went unnoticed because that ear was down, or something that happened during her time with us. I'm still yet to find a German Shepherd with an ear like hers (for those unfamiliar with Clio I'm not talking about an ear that won't stand I'm talking about an ear that sits oddly on her head and sticks out to the side). When we get her hips and elbows done, we are going to get it looked at again. I just want to restore some normal movement in it, so she can fold it back properly, and not just have it stuck out the side of her head.


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## LittleBettaFish

Wow, it's been so long since I last posted. Apart from the odd sporadic update, this will likely be my last post on this thread. I feel like interest in it has waned since I stopped posting about wild bettas, and I don't want to just look like I'm talking to myself. 

First up, is some news from the fish room. 

I lost one more of the P. gertrudae between my last post and this one. I believe it was one of the males and suspect it jumped, even though I've never found a body. Unfortunately, I've had some difficulties with collecting and hatching their eggs. When I was using mops they were either producing very few eggs, or eating the majority of the eggs before I got a chance to check the mops. Bad luck saw the hatching container go without air for a couple of days, which led to almost all the eggs starting to fungus. I thought I had saved three or four, but even though there were no signs of fungus, and the fry inside looked fully developed, they simply never hatched. 

But it's not all bad news. I did manage to hatch out four fry. Sadly one broke or dislocated its jaw and had to be humanely euthanased, but the others are now large enough to be introduced to the adult group. There are also three younger fry. While they could be P. luminatus, I suspect at least the larger two are P. gertrudae, so that's a further boost to numbers. 

In place of mops, I've added a dense mat of Myriophyllum dicoccum to their tank, and time will tell whether this provides enough cover for the eggs to remain untouched. My only concern is the pest snails that came in with the plants. They are reproducing faster than I can remove them from the tank, and I'm not certain if they are capable of eating the eggs. 

I've decided not to continue working with the P. luminatus. I've decided I specifically want to work with Australian native species, so I've not made any attempts to collect eggs from this group. A while back, I did release the seven juveniles mentioned in the previous post (plus one additional juvenile), into the main tank, and so now I have a group of fourteen. 

Oddly, even though most of the P. luminatus were born and raised in my fish room, they are much more skittish than the P. gertrudae. The gertrudae are right next to the door, and they are always at the front of the tank checking me out. The luminatus take much longer to work their way to the front of the tank, and are very quick to startle if I make a sudden movement. 

I did manage to get a photo of one of the P. gertudae males. It's not anything particularly dramatic but at least he has his fins partially open.










The guppies are still with me. There are more of them now and the males are looking even more ragged then usual. There were issues with water quality (a disconnected sponge filter leading to a mini-cycle), and I sadly lost the twin-tail male. However, there have been a couple of very unique new arrivals. One of the females gave birth to two albino fry. At first I thought they were blind or at least vision impaired as they seemed to have difficulty navigating. I also thought their colour might attract attention from the other fish, so I removed both them and their two normal coloured siblings to a separate tank. Once I felt they were large enough that it was unlikely they would be eaten, I reintroduced them to the main group and they have been doing well. 

But not all introductions went as smoothly. I had seven juvenile Ch. bitaeniatum 'Lagos Red' I _thought_ were large enough to be safely released into the main tank. This was based on the behaviour of the original pair when they'd been sharing a tank with their offspring of a similar size. As it turned out, I'd made a tragic mistake. The next morning I found one of the juveniles in the mouth of one of the younger males. It was too far gone to bother making a rescue attempt, and I suspected the rest of the juveniles had met a similar fate. I was feeling sick over this, as I'd been rearing those juveniles for weeks, and my impatience had led to their deaths. 

Fortunately, at least four of the juveniles survived (I can never tell if there's five or I'm simply counting the same fish), and have started to colour up and stop hiding from the adults.

There's also a further two juveniles sharing a tank with the P. gertrudae fry. These will eventually be moved across into the main tank, but I don't want to make the same mistake twice, so it won't be until I am 100% certain they won't be eaten. 

The rainbowfish tank is humming along nicely. Fish numbers definitely need to be thinned out in this tank, as most of the males are starting to hit adult size. Even if it was more appropriately stocked, I think a 2ft footprint is too small for these fish. They are active swimmers and they look cramped. So either I'm going to sell the whole group, or retain the original three fish and several of the younger males and females, and eventually upgrade them to a larger tank. 

Frustratingly, I haven't been able to find Repashy Grub Pie in stock. I don't know what's going on with the importer, but it's been out of stock for weeks now. It was so well received in my fish room that I should have just purchased the 2kg pack instead of the 85g container. 

And that's it from the fish room. I don't have anything much to say about the wild bettas. It's funny that only now when all my best fish are dead and I've lost interest entirely that they do so well. 

I do have some big dog news to share. We got Eos spayed yesterday. She had several lumps on her mammary glands (not surprising given her age), so she went in to get those removed and was spayed at the same time. I'm still not sure what I think of a 'traditional' spay. I have read about Ovarian Sparing Spays but they seem uncommon here in Australia and apparently the reproductive specialist at our vet doesn't like them. Some studies seem to suggest a full spay reduces the risk of mammary tumors, but greatly increases the risks of other due to hormone loss. It just seems so extreme to me to remove everything. 

Eos came through surgery fine. She was very groggy yesterday, didn't eat much, and then threw up what little she did eat. She's been sleeping most of today as well, but her appetite seems to be back and she's moving around without looking too uncomfortable. The only problem has been trying to prevent her from jumping onto anything until her stitches come out. We've had to get creative with crating and baby gates until then. 

She's such a good girl. She just conducts herself with this quiet dignity and confidence. We went to a local maker's market with her last Saturday and she was so well-behaved. She just takes everything in her stride. The vet feels that the tumors are likely benign, but we had them sent off to be biopsied just to be certain. 

Meanwhile, Clio has become a little superstar at the local park. Her reactivity has improved in leaps and bounds since the last post. So much so that we have started moving only a small distance from the path, and passing dogs within a couple of metres. Yes, her hackles and tail still go up, and she might occasionally bark, but you can see her start to cap her anxiety without relying on me for support. Her first instinct now isn't to immediately jump into that fight/flight mode. She's starting to pause and evaluate the situation fully without viewing everything as a threat. 

She's also almost fully stopped reacting to people. She did bark at a man recently, but that was because he came bursting out the bushes in fluro work gear, chasing after a group of kangaroos while gesticulating wildly with his arms. I don't think it helped that my mum shouted at him because she thought he was deliberately scaring the wildlife. But it was only a couple of barks before she quietened down and just sat watching him. 

The biggest test was when we accidentally joined a Scout group walk. Clio's always been very uneasy around kids. There were not only dozens of kids on this walk, but also a number of dogs. The kids were being typical kids, so lots of noise and movement, and Clio handled it like a champion. Even when two boys started fighting with sticks she didn't mind. 

She was a little concerned about the toddler on his bicycle that we passed on our walk. Especially near the end when he rode the wrong way and nearly ran into her. Considering about a year or so ago she was growling at some kids playing harmlessly nearby, it's huge improvement. 

We actually got our first proper compliment not too long ago. Clio was walking along beautifully, and a cyclist rode past and told us she was an awesome dog. For so long Clio's been viewed as this vicious out of control dog. It's been so gratifying to see this change in her. The other day at dog club I saw some things that really put a sour taste in my mouth. Stressed, untrained dogs being manhandled and given unfair correction after unfair correction. I see so many fear aggressive dogs at club and at shows, and my heart breaks because there's no training going on. It's just endless punishment. 

With every improvement in her behaviour, Clio's world gets that little bit bigger. In spite of all the tears and anguish, and moments where I've just wanted the ground to open up and swallow me, I'm glad I've stuck with her. I definitely didn't imagine that I would be signing myself up for something like this when I first saw that little dark face, but she's definitely stolen my heart regardless.


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## Nismo83

missing me already? hahaha.. sorry being busy.. you are doing good girl!.. one of the main reason for me to always come back to this forum is your threads.. i just finished moving to my new apartments and the fish room is still taking shapes.


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## LittleBettaFish

Haha. You've still been posting on FB though haven't you? It seems like most of the wild betta enthusiasts on this forum have moved onto greener pastures or lost interest. 

I wish I had the money to do what I wanted with my fish room. I don't know where all the money I've spent on my fish goes. I'll be sitting in my fish room watching my fish, and I just don't see how I could have spent thousands of dollars on them over the years. 

I haven't been feeling the hobby as much these past couple of months. I'm still bitterly disappointed with the quality of my remaining wild bettas. The condition of the B. sp. api api group has deteriorated so much that I'm actually going to humanely euthanase the worst affected later today. I was considering pairing up two of the best quality fish, but I'm concerned that I'm only going to end up with a similar problem further down the track. 

I don't even want to take any photos of my wild bettas nowadays, because I feel like my fish room is such a shadow of its former self. 

I'm still cut up about losing my original B. sp. api api, miniopinna, and hendra groups, even though it happened years ago. I definitely think when my original B. sp. api api pair died, most of my passion for fish keeping died too, and it's sort of been limping along ever since. 

I keep trying to convince myself to leave the wild bettas in the past, but I just keep coming back to them. It's so frustrating. 

It would be easier if I could still import wild-caught fish (always preferred starting a line with wild-caught stock) for a reasonable price. But my only options are captive bred pairs priced from $150 and upwards. 

Most of the time, you are buying wild bettas blind, so I'm afraid I'm going to end up with fish whose quality I am not happy with. Like what happened with my most recent B. hendra pair. 

I'm extremely discerning when it comes to the quality of my fish, and it's disheartening when they don't meet my expectations. 

I think it's made worse by the fact that some of my original fish were extremely beautiful. Maybe I am simply looking back with eyes clouded by nostalgia, but it seems very few of the replacement fish I've purchased, have ever been of equal quality. 

Australia is a great country, but it's not a great place to live if you are interested in keeping anabantoids.


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## blueridge

Sorry to hear that you are deciding to give up your journal LBF. I really enjoyed reading your posts. I wish you luck in with your fish room!


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## LittleBettaFish

It looks like PB has (at least temporarily) given access to third party hosted images again. I spent some time going back through this thread and saving some of my favourite photos, as it's far easier doing this than trying to use PB. 

It's probably the nostalgia speaking, but I've also been doing some thinking over the past week or so, and I've decided I'm going to give wild bettas a final 'go', before I say a final goodbye.

Looking back, it's not surprising things went as badly as they did. I don't even know what I was thinking doing things the way I did. Suffice to say, this time around, there's going to be a few changes. Gone are the days of purchasing multiple pairs at once. Instead, I'll be limiting myself to at most, two new pairs at a time. My goal isn't to collect the whole complex. I don't have the time, space, or finances, to keep and breed that many fish. To spread myself so thin would only lead to hobby burn-out.

I only want to keep and breed the species that I am most interested in. It was tough, but I've narrowed it down to: B. sp. api api, B. brownorum, B. hendra, B. miniopinna, B. rutilans, and B. uberis. The only change would be that I would replace B. uberis with B. burdigala if I could find the true Bangka form. 

Much as I prefer to use wild-caught fish as my foundation stock, I don't believe their import is permitted. I'll be contacting the main importer here in Australia to see if this is the case. But it looks like I may be limited to captive bred stock. My one concern with returning to wilds is that very rarely do you get a photo or video the exact fish you are receiving. A pair of wild bettas can retail for well over one-hundred dollars, and I don't want a repeat of what happened with my most recent pair of B. hendra. If I'd seen them in the flesh, I certainly wouldn't have purchased them. 

I'm also changing the way I keep and breed these fish. Instead of keeping pairs together and letting spawning occur naturally, with fry growing out alongside the adults, pairs will be kept separated. While they will still be able to see each other through a clear divider, the only time they will be together, is in a separate breeding tank. Once they have spawned, the female will be returned to her original tank, and once the male has finished his parental duties and the fry are free-swimming, he will also be removed from the breeding tank. The fry will remain in the breeding tank until they are large enough to be safely moved, and then they will go into a larger grow-out tank. 

This is being done firstly to minimise damage and injuries. Most of my adult wilds have permanently deformed fins following years of constant damage. I also have several fish with missing or damaged eyes, and over the years, I have lost a number of fish to injuries caused by fighting. Secondly, I want to be able to raise the fry in a controlled environment. Because only a small percentage of fry would survive when raised alongside the adults, I wasn't getting the full picture when it came to growth rates and sex ratios. Thirdly, and most importantly, by raising the fry in a separate grow-out, I won't lose the entire species should the breeding pair or fry become sick. 

The one thing I am debating, is whether or not to individually jar the juvenile/sub-adult males. This is simply because I am sick of looking at fish with torn fins. Also, in mixed sex groups, I've found it's really only the few dominant males that colour up and look good. The rest tend to spend their time trying to avoid notice. Basically I want to try and keep the tank environment as stable and low stress as possible, to avoid velvet getting a foothold in my fish room again. 

It looks like there is a wild betta pre-order coming up soon. Depending on what's available, I may purchase a new pair and see how successful I am, before committing myself any further. 

Finally, we took Eos in to get her stitches removed yesterday and to get the results of her biopsy back. It turns out the lumps were cancerous, so I'm glad we got the biopsy done. However, they were a very low grade, had been excised very cleanly, and hadn't spread into the lymphatic system. The vet also said that her being spayed may help prevent the development of further tumors. Basically we just have to regularly check Eos over to ensure the tumors don't return. If they do, the next step will be to remove that entire row of nipples. 

Eos is just happy to be able to resume her normal activities. We've got a walk planned for later today, which I'm sure she will enjoy. I just hope we don't run into any loose dogs as she is feeling particularly sassy.


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## LittleBettaFish

I've been having issues with the guppy group again. I've come to the conclusion that fancy guppies are just too much work for me. You really do have to be very rigorous with your culling and separating out fish to maintain any sort of quality, robustness, and consistency. The males in this group have always had issues with thin bodies and weak caudal peduncles, so the older males with larger caudal fins sometimes have difficulty swimming. I also can't tell if the older males are simply tearing their fins up (I have caught them fighting quite aggressively), or it's the result of the below problem. 

For some reason I'm also always battling water quality in this tank. Every time I test the tank water, the nitrite level is 0ppm, nitrates are between 10-25ppm, and the pH sits fairly constant at around 7.5. The tank _is_ overstocked, but the sponge filter is rated for a much larger tank, and has additional media attached to it. I do a 25% water change every second day, and most of the time ammonia measures at 0ppm. But then I'll notice that the guppies are hovering near the surface or clamping their fins, and I'll test the ammonia and it will be between 0.25ppm and 0.5ppm. The only time I have issues with my other cycled aquariums is when the pH drops below 7.0, and this is easily remedied with water changes and more crushed coral. But there's so much crushed coral in the guppy tank that the pH never drops below 7.0. 

The benefit of a cycled aquarium is that the parameters remain stable. But I think the parameters in my uncycled aquariums remain more stable than the guppy tank. 

At this point I think I'm just about ready to offer the whole group free to whoever wants them. The longer they stay in the fish room, the more things seem to be going wrong with them! 

I also have news in that I have a pair of B. sp. api api on order. They are coming from Indonesia, captive bred, but I am familiar with the breeder and the quality of his stock. I thought it had become impossible to receive bettas from Indonesia, but I guess something must have changed, or some loophole has been found. Sadly, I think I'm still limited to captive bred, but if it's now possible to receive fish from this breeder, I can possibly get him to choose particular fish for me - like a pair of B. brownorum where both the male and female have the lateral spot. 

I'm not sure when they are due to arrive. If they arrive in Australia alive, they will have to go through quarantine before they can be shipped out to me. So it's probably still another two to three weeks before I'll have them in hand. 

I won't be importing any further wild bettas until I know that I can keep these fish healthy long-term. Velvet remains a concern, but hopefully being captive bred will make them less fragile than wild-caught fish. Being from a breeder, I know they haven't changed hands as many times as wild-caught fish can. 

Speaking of B. sp. api api, I did get a few photos of my current group while in the fish room today. Unfortunately, I did end up culling about half of the group recently, which was as difficult as always, but which I felt was in the best interest of the fish. There's still a few NQR fish in this group, but their problems are cosmetic only and don't affect their quality of life. 

These are all females. You can see the difference in colour, as well as the size and shape of the ventral fins. 




























Apart from that, the rest of my fish are doing well. There's not really much to share as the fish room is simply humming along. I watch my fish, I feed my fish, and I do water changes, and that's about it at the moment. Hopefully the B. sp. api api pair arrives alive and gives me a successful spawn or two, so I'll have something more to talk about.


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## blueridge

Thank you for still posting! It is wonderful to read about your returns to wild bettas. Can't wait to see your new pair of Betta sp. api api. Looking forward to seeing the new breeding implications that you plan on using and how they affect your over all success.


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## LittleBettaFish

Apparently the Indonesian shipment landed earlier this week. I got a generic 'will notify you soon' email from the importer, but I don't know the exact status of my fish. I just hope if there are DOAs, both fish have died and not just one. At least that way I can get a refund, rather than one fish dies and then I have to not only wait until the next shipment, but also pay for additional shipping. 

Some of the pre-order fish got sent out this week, and I was panicking as they didn't even have a tank to go into. This is because I received a plant order earlier in the week in which half the order was missing, and the Willow Hygro had not only been grown emersed, but was in very poor condition. That is one company that has lost my business. While I received another order of plants from a local business yesterday, they don't stock Water Sprite, which is what was missing from my original order. 

There have been some rather sad developments in the fish room. 

The first is that I recently made the difficult decision to cull almost the entire guppy colony. All that remains, are about fifteen fry and one adult male. I think their issues were the result of a number of factors. As I've already mentioned, fancy guppies are much more work than I realised, and with my soft water, I'm fighting a constant battle in regards to maintaining a stable pH/KH level as well as a stable cycle. 

The remaining fish will be grown out and sold, likely as juveniles so there's less chance of the males tearing each other's fins up. 

The second, is that I was doing a water change on the rainbowfish tank. I was siphoning debris off the sponge filter when I noticed the water had a strong smell to it. As I usually do a 25% water change every two days on this tank, I though it was simply because I'd missed a water change and there was more organic matter on the filter. Sadly, as it turns out, the smell was caused by the largest female who was dead and stuck to the other side of the sponge filter. There were no obvious signs as to how she died. She hadn't been sick, and she was always the first to eat. 

This means out of the original five rainbowfish I purchased, only two are still with me. The third female died of a prolapse not long after she arrived, and the larger male was killed when I accidentally caught him with the siphon. 'Big Bertha' was my favourite rainbowfish, as she was so outgoing and had no problems bossing the males around. My one concern was that her death was the result of TB, but that seems to be more of a slow deterioration rather than a sudden death, and I think I would see symptoms appearing on the other fish in the tank such as ulcers, spinal deformities, wasting etc. 

I think I'm going to put the whole group of rainbowfish up for sale. While they are beautiful and I enjoy watching them go about their daily business, they are just missing that spark. I prefer the various species of Pseudmoguil, as while they are shorter lived, they seem to each possess their own individual personalities. 

The other rant I have for today is that following the removal of a 200 year old Red Gum for a road upgrade (it's much older counterpart that was located on the opposite corner had already been removed to make way for a supermarket), I am disgusted by the apathy, if not outright animosity some individuals hold towards the environment. They are removing literally thousands of trees to make way for this road upgrade, and some people seem almost gleeful about the destruction. 

A group is trying to save further trees that are slated for removal, but it seems like the road authority can do whatever it pleases. These are trees I spent my childhood travelling past on my way to my grandparents. This whole area has been swallowed up by development. What were once paddocks dotted with Red Gums are now housing estates. The houses are built eave to eave on tiny blocks, so all you see is a sea of black tiled rooves. 

I hate the argument that I'm a hypocrite because I live in a suburb that was created by clearing. This doesn't mean just because something happened in the past, it should continue to go on in the future. If I had my way, people should only be able to plant species in their gardens that are indigenous to that area. This would go a long way to restoring precious habitat that has been lost. I'm sick of driving past sterile gardens with their manicured hedges, wide expanses of lawns, and aversion to any tree that isn't a Crepe Myrtle or Ornamental Pear. Heaven forbid something be allowed to grow that could provide habitat and food for our native fauna. Some suburbs the only wildlife you see, are introduced pest species. 

It is literal death by a thousand cuts when it comes to canopy trees and remnant bushland. In my suburb alone I have noticed the gradual removal of mature native trees in the name of development, and this is a suburb with numerous planning overlays to protect native vegetation. In some places you are allowed to come in and clear everything. 

It's tragic that we don't have more respect for the natural environment. Most of the fish I keep, are only threatened in the wild because of human activity. You will see someone post on the wild betta FB group I am part of, how a certain habitat has been destroyed. I think one of the Betta persephone localities 'Ayer Hitam' had a road built through their habitat, so now this locality is only found in captivity. I do wonder how many species of betta will become extinct in the next decade. So many of them are found in particularly vulnerable habitats, such as peat swamps.


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## blueridge

I'm also kind of dealing with the fact of people destroying habits around me. I live near a relative small town, and recently the DOT (Department of Transportation) has decided to go around the town. Not only is this going to destroy some of the forests and wetlands around us, but it is also going to go right through people's houses/property. The DOT around here doesn't really care about the public's opinion. We only had one small meeting about it, and then they went from there to decide where it is going to be. It's been pretty frustrating dealing with it, because it is going to be quite close to our property and the small businesses in town are going to have a hard time. I've found that a lot of times the DOT just builds stuff for the "ease" of commute; even though there isn't a problem. Yet other roads in the area have major pot holes in them, and are suffering from neglect.


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## LittleBettaFish

We have a similar situation here. The State Government wants to complete this missing freeway link. However, the option they've chosen is not only going to do nothing to ease congestion for the burgeoning outer suburbs, but it is going to have a devastating effect on local wildlife corridors. Not to mention the numerous homes, businesses, and properties that will be compulsorily acquired. Part of a creek is going to become a concrete drain and they are going to be widening a section of the freeway that is surrounded by beautiful reserves and wetlands - most of which will be lost. 

I feel sorry for the people whose houses won't be acquired, but are stuck living alongside a busy, multiple lane road. 

Our Government always drags it feet investing in public transport, but the solution isn't just to keep building more and more roads.


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## LittleBettaFish

There's been more bad news from the fish room. Yesterday, I was doing a water change on the P. gertrudae tank, and discovered one of the females had died. It was impossible to determine the cause of death, but at least the rest of the group aren't showing signs of illness. Unfortunately, this female's death means I now have a slightly male-skewed sex ratio. I don't want the males to harass the remaining females to the point of exhaustion, so I may have to move one of the smaller males across to the juvenile group.

Anyone who keeps as many fish as I do, knows these sorts of random deaths are inevitable. It's not realistic to expect every fish to reach their full life expectancy. However, I would prefer that the cause of death is obvious. It makes me worry when I have a fish die for seemingly no reason at all. 

Yesterday, I decided it was time to euthanase the runty P. luminatus male. I knew this was likely going to have to happen at some point. I'd only delayed it for so long, because his quality of life wasn't enough to warrant euthanasia. Recently however, I'd noticed a decline in his general condition. He had started to get that sunken stomach look, and I thought euthanasia was kinder than letting him waste away to nothing. 

But it's not all bad news. I received an email yesterday letting me know that the B. sp. api api pair were being shipped out. They have been sent express overnight, so should arrive today. I say 'should', because of course their tracking information hasn't been updated and they are supposedly still in Ipswich QLD. Let's hope this was just an oversight from whoever is responsible for updating tracking information, and the fish are actually here in Melbourne waiting to be delivered. 

I wish I'd had time to purchase more plants for their tank. We had a family emergency and I just couldn't get to my LFS to purchase any. I also never got around to building a divider. As I was already considering using 20L tanks to house the breeding pairs, I may let them have a spawn in this tank, and then move them to a smaller, divided tank. 

While I was in the fish room, I did try and take some photos of my current wilds. I definitely think this camera needs replacing. It can barely focus even after I adjusted all the necessary settings. However, at least a few of the photos were worth posting. 

First up are a few of my B. miniopinna. I can never capture the true colour of these fish on camera. In real life their bodies are much darker than what is shown here.

This is the original female (F1) 










One of her daughters who sports a rather distinctive bent ventral. 










One of her sons. 










Here's one of the B. sp. api api females.










Before the camera finally decided to take an adequate photo after about half an hour of trying.


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## LittleBettaFish

The B. sp. api api pair arrived. As it turns out, there wasn't a problem with the tracking information. They did indeed sit in QLD for almost twelve hours before making it to the parcel processing facility here in Melbourne. Because it was so late in the day, they didn't get sent out for delivery. So they had to remain in the warehouse overnight. It dropped down to five degrees Celsius last night, so I was seriously concerned that I was going to get a delivery of dead fish. 

In spite of the heat pack, the water in the bag was colder than is safe, and the fish were obviously feeling the effects. They were very lethargic when released into the tank, and have been mostly sitting at the bottom with their fins clamped. Velvet is always my greatest fear when fish are exposed to such extreme temperature fluctuations. Particularly as this complex seems especially susceptible. 

I was hoping their arrival would really spark my interest in wilds again, but I'm sort of left feeling ambivalent about the whole thing. I know it's a problem of mine. I have a massive issue when it comes to expectations. I have this 'perfect' image fixed in my mind, and if something fails to live up to this image, it really eats away at me. It's a terrible way of thinking, and it just seeps into every facet of my life, including my hobbies. I think it's why I'm always see-sawing between breeding wilds, and breeding other species of fish. The grass always looks greener on the other side, but once I'm over there, I'll see that there's no real difference at all. It's just so frustrating. 

I'm giving the B. sp. api api pair time to settle in before I bother them trying to take photos. They are still extremely stressed, and I want to let them relax and acclimate to their new environment. Hopefully once they start to colour up and unclamp their fins they will look like completely different fish. 

I also have BSE again. It's been almost a week since I ran out, and the Blue-Eye have getting by on grindal worms, as they refuse to eat anything else. I did hope that I could wean them over to Repashy Grub Pie as they've shown no interest in flake food, but it seems like there's been no new imports of Repashy into the country, or at the very least, the supplier I use no longer stocks it.


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## LittleBettaFish

It's been a tumultuous week or so. Last Thursday, the phone line was ripped in half while the recyling bin was being emptied, which meant I was without internet access. The phone company was supposed to come out on Friday, but that got pushed back to Monday. Then on Monday we got told they couldn't repair it until Thursday. I was dubious that they would make it out today, but it's the one time I've been glad to be proven wrong. 

There's also been calamity surrounding the B. sp. api api pair. A day or so after they arrived, they developed cloudy eyes. With these fish, this tends to mean that there are problems with the water chemistry. I was concerned the cloudiness would result in permanent damage, so I completely broke down the tank, and moved both fish into separate containers. The cloudiness went away almost immediately with the change of environment, and they are back to full health. I'm going to leave them in the containers for another week or two, until the quarantine period has finished and they can be moved onto my main rack. 

I do think these will be the last wild bettas I purchase. There's nothing wrong with the fish themselves. They are beautiful and personable little fish. But it does look like my interest has shifted onto other fish, and at this point I may not even breed them.

However, expect plenty of photos of this pair once they move into their new tank. Until I get a faster camera and better lenses, the wild bettas are the only fish slow enough for me to photograph. 

I also have some suspicion as to what happened to the P. gertrudae female. A couple of days ago, I noticed that the dominant female in the tank was barrel-rolling. I was going to euthanase her, when she suddenly stopped and started behaving normally. This behaviour was almost identical to what happened when my P. luminatus males were juveniles. So it left me wondering if this was the result of aggression from the dominant male. He tends to ram the females quite violently during courtship, and the larger females seem to bear the brunt of it. 

As their tank has barely any areas of cover, I added some hornwort to provide the females with places to hide when the males get too aggressive. So far, there's been no issues, and the dominant female is back to her bullying self. 

It was with some trepidation that I moved the six juvenile P. gertrudae in with the adults. Unfortunately, it looks like the three largest juveniles are all male. So I'm going to have to increase the number of females once they start to mature, as unless the remaining three juveniles are female, I'm going to have way too many males. 

I also recently planted some Thin Vallisneria in the P. luminatus tank. The two adult males in this tank are very mellow. I always joke that this tank needs to be dosed with viagra if I ever want to collect eggs from it. It's been a long time since I've seen them sparring or displaying to the females. Well, after I planted the vals they put on quite a show for me. I hadn't realised how long the extensions on their fins had become. I didn't think they would develop such long extensions in a tank environment. 

Meanwhile, the rainbowfish have been spawning non-stop. Every time I go into the fish room, the males are squaring off and trying to drive the females up into the hornwort. I even caught the M. maccullochi firing up the other day, and that's the first bit of action I've seen from this group since they arrived. Lately, I've found it fun to just sit in a chair and watch them. I never fails to amaze me how richly rainbowfish colour up when they are excited. I wish I'd given rainbowfish a chance earlier. They really do need time to feel comfortable in a new tank before you see them at their best. 

I've now decided that the majority of the young males will be sold, as will the M. maccullochi group. There's more sub-adult females than I realised, so I will retain most of these, alongside two or three of the largest males, as well as the original adult pair. I think the males show better colouring and more interesting behaviour when they have some competition. Otherwise, they don't have to work very hard to get the females' attention. This tank will remain as it is now, purely for display. 

Otherwise, there's not much to update you on the rest of the fish. The guppy fry are growing well. Unfortunately, the adult male has yet to grow his caudal back in fully, so I'm hoping it's not permanently damaged. I actually took a couple of photos of one of the juvenile killifish males earlier today. Given that taking photos in this tank is near impossible, I was actually pleased with how they came out. For once I almost accurately captured their colours. 



















Finally, here's just a lucky photo I took yesterday of one of the B. uberis males flaring.










I did actually think I broke the camera trying to clean it the other day. Fortunately, this was not the case. Although I don't think I'll be attempting to clean it again any time soon!


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## wildborneo

i have problem sexing my miniopina can you help?


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## LittleBettaFish

It was water change day today. Manually changing large volumes of water on thirteen tanks takes a few hours, particularly when you are working with cling wrap, and fish that are determined to get themselves stuck in the siphon. Those P. gertrudae and luminatus are just too curious for their own good. I also have to watch the rainbowfish, as they rush to the surface and splash about whenever I remove the cover glass. The other night I was convinced one of them had jumped out in its excitement. It's already bad enough doing water changes on their tank because there's only a very small clearance between the top of the tank and the bottom of the shelf above it. 

There's always squabbling in the wild betta tanks after water changes. I finally threw out the Cardamine Lyrata that had been floating in their tanks. I think it's not a true aquatic, but I have read it could be grown floating. I never had any luck with it, and it's been in slow decline for the past few months due to a lack of light. Eventually I'll probably buy another light and put some Watersprite in all these tanks. But at the moment, I'm sick of wasting money on plants that only die, when I could be spending it on fish. 

Meanwhile, the Hornwort and Thin Vallisneria in the P. luminatus tank have become overgrown with hair algae. This is likely because the light sits right on top of their tank, and I keep forgetting to turn them off. The hornwort also seems to be adjusting its growth in response to the change in conditions. Its new growth has been much finer and greener, than the plants that I pulled from the outside tub. I actually don't mind algae. I think it gives tanks a more natural feel. However, this is too much algae even for me! 

The new B. sp. api api pair also received a water change. I only siphon out about a litre or so from their containers. Only a few more days and they will have been two weeks in quarantine. I'll have to start setting up their new tank soon. Hopefully this time there won't be any issues. 

I don't know what it is with tank manufacturers, but why do they persist in making lids that only cover about 50% of the tank? These are useless for keeping fish in, so if you're like me, you not only have a lid you can't use, but you then have to go and find a glazier to cut something more appropriately sized. 

I'm so sick of using cling wrap on my tanks. It does a great job at keeping fish in, but it's time-consuming and wasteful. Every time I use it, I feel like somewhere a sea turtle dies. I don't use cling wrap at all on my P. gertrudae or P. luminatus tanks. They have lids that cover almost the entire tank. There are just the two corners cut out, and I've made corner covers for these out of plastic take-out containers. So far they seem to work well at keeping the fish in. Then again, neither of these fish are as determined jumpers as the wild bettas, or even the killifish. 

My other grumble is that I swear the goldfish save up all their poo for water change day. I usually change out about 40-60 litres on their tank at a time, which is quite a lot when you are carrying buckets back and forth. Add to this the fact that at this time of the year the water temperature is lucky to get over 10 degrees celsius, and it's not something I look forward to. So you can imagine my frustration when I come back down an hour or so after I've done a water change and the whole bottom of the tank is covered in poo. 

This is why I will never own another pleco, otocinclus, or goldfish. I don't want a fish that can produce more than its body size in waste in a day. 

Apart from that, there's not much going on in the fish room. I didn't bother taking any photos today, as the water is generally cloudy following water changes and the wilds not in the best mood. I should have some tomorrow though. I cleaned all the glass inside and out, so there shouldn't be any unsightly water marks or algae to ruin the photos. 

This was just a quick update on what's been going on down here in grey and miserable Melbourne.


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## Guest

I think these betta fish are very healthy and charming. Looking forward to your update


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## LittleBettaFish

Because this thread has been going on for so long, I thought it was right to give anyone still reading it, some closure. 

For personal reasons, I will be stepping back from the hobby and selling/re-homing almost all of my fish. There's a great deal of uncertainty about what's going to be happening over the next year or two, and I don't have the time to spend on the fish that I used to. 

The only fish that won't be sold, are the P. luminatus and P. gertrudae groups. 

If the choice had been mine, my fish would have lived out the rest of their lives here with me. Unfortunately, current circumstances have taken the choice right out of my hands. I've already held onto them for longer than I should, because I don't want them ending up in the tank of a hobbyist whose only interest is in their monetary value. 

My 'identity' in this hobby has been tied up with wild bettas for so many years now, it's going to feel strange not having at least one species floating around. 

Right now, I'm not sure when I'm going to come back to the hobby. It certainly won't be for the foreseeable future. 

I also wanted to add a final update on Clio. 

Over the past few months her behaviour had become increasingly odd. She stopped playing with toys and engaging with people, and she started to tire easily, and spent almost all of of her time sleeping even if she'd barely been out of the house. We also started catching her standing in empty rooms, or staring blankly into space. Even my dad noticed her behavioural changes and he started to get concerned that she was going to bite someone as she would sometimes get this strange expression.

This, coupled with the fact she had been steadily shedding for months and yet hadn't had a season or even grown any new fur back in (she had even started to develop patches of bare skin), and was much heavier than our other dogs in spite of receiving very little food, caused us to suspect that perhaps she had a problem with her thyroid. 

As we were already at the vet getting her checked out for an upset stomach, we decided to get a blood test while we were there. The vet thought the hair loss was hormonal and didn't seem to think there was an issue, so was very surprised when it turned out she was indeed suffering from hypothyroidism. 

Within a couple of days of being on the tablets, you could see the light come back into her eyes. Because the changes had been so gradual, we'd simply hadn't realise just how great a change there had been. 

We don't know how long she had been suffering from a low thyroid for. We are starting to wonder if this was the reason for her severe reactivity and fearfulness, as hypothyroidism is known to affect temperament. Since being on the tablets, her startle response has become much less extreme, and her reactivity around other dogs has greatly improved. 

Before she was diagnosed, we took her for a couple of walks with a dog she knew, but hadn't seen in a while. She totally ignored him, and at the time, I simply thought it was down to her training. However, we took them for a walk again after she'd started the tablets, and while she still ignored him when we were walking in favour of me, when given permission to play with him, she actually did so. 

She's also started to grow her fur back, and her energy levels have increased dramatically. I've also noticed an improvement in attitude when it comes to her training. 

Today, I did something I haven't dared to do in a long time. I took her for a walk around the neighbourhood, by myself, and at a time when there were definitely going to be other people and possibly dogs around. While she was skittish at first, she soon settled down and started to focus on me. We saw a few people, and I just let her work things out in her own time. The only time she showed any concern was when a man and two small children came out from a house behind us and were following us. But I was able to keep her going forward and she didn't react aggressively. 

Then my worst nightmare was realised! We were crossing the busy main road at the exact moment a dog was coming down the footpath towards us. From previous experience, I know this dog tends to react excitedly when it sees other dogs. Fortunately, there's a strip of businesses on this corner, so I was able to cut through their carpark to avoid a close encounter. We were probably still only a couple of metres from the dog, but to my surprise Clio wasn't even interested in it! Instead she quite happily jumped over the chain fence surrounding the carpark, and then continued on her way up the hill without giving it a second glance. There wasn't even a hackle raised. 

I'm going to take her out for a similar walk tomorrow morning, and hopefully now we're managing her hypothyroidism and her training is sticking even under stress and in new environments, we will continue to see improvements. 

To anyone reading this, definitely consider looking at hypothyroidism as a potential cause, if your dog's behaviour/temperament changes dramatically, or there are issues with hair loss and weight. I believe it can be fatal if left untreated, and I imagine in some cases symptoms are written off as the dog simply being fat and lazy. I'm just glad we caught it in time, before Clio had to suffer through some of the more severe symptoms.


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## bettatanksalot

Sad to see you go! I hope your dog continues to improve . Oddly enough they just did a full blood panel on my rat-terrier and she has some thyroid issues. They want to do more tests to confirm, so I can relate to your experience! My dog has become lethargic during the day but at night she’s anxious and whimpers a lot. She also has a cataract just starting 😞 hoping her vision is still ok... I feel so bad! I wish you guys the best!


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## Guest

Excuse me, I want to ask you about the plant in tank.I saw some Ceratopteris .Do you know what kind of Ceratopteris are?

I have been browsing through your posts and have learned a lot about the Betta coccina family.Thank you for writing this post, it is very important to me.I am now raising coccina, hendra and uberis. I feel a little sad when I know you have to step back from the hobby. I hope that your future life will be all right.If there is a chance in the future, I hope you can continue to raise wild Betta.

My English is not very good, maybe there will be some grammatical mistakes, I will continue to learn


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