# Critique on my VTs?



## Skyewillow (Dec 28, 2012)

I probably won't ever breed them, but I was wondering if they make a good pair? (two pictures for each, because either their topline was clear, or their fins were...)

Male:
(finnage)

(topline)


Female:
(Finnage)

(topline)


what is good, what is bad about each? Would they compliment each other? Or should I replace one (which) if I do end up breeding?

IF I do decide to breed, my goal would be for showing in the IBC to try to put veils back into the standards and shows under their own class.

Thank you!


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## Marvel170 (Jan 2, 2012)

I love their colors and their finnage looks very nice especially on the girl, I would have a back up pair just incase they don't like each other.


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## Skyewillow (Dec 28, 2012)

More pictures of him.





I have to get numbers of photos, he doesn't sit still and flare, he ZOOMS and flares!!!


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## Marvel170 (Jan 2, 2012)

XD the bane of all the people trying to take pictures of their fish, you have to take like a million pics and then go through them all and see which ones are decent enough to put on here XD I love how even his fins are he is a very fine fish


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## MattsBettas (Dec 18, 2012)

Well, the male has nice, full fins and the female... Are you sure she is a veiltail? Their top lines are OK, his spoons a bit and hers has a slight arch. Their colors are nice for the most part, but the male especially has a lot of red wash. You would get decent fish very similar to the parents (if the female is a vt... She looks like a ct cross to me), but keep in mind that since you can just go buy one for three bucks at any pet store, you will have a hard time selling the fry... IMO if you are going to breed vts you should always go for full finnage and you should add something to make them stand out... Dragonscale or ee for example.


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## Skyewillow (Dec 28, 2012)

As much as I love my EE, and my VT's, that's something I won't breed. No offense to anyone who loves that combo, it's just way too much finnage for me.

As far as Archi's fins, I've asked the forum numerous times to triple check her finnage, and was always told VT, since I'm not far enough along to diagnose finnage types myself, I have to take everyone's word for it. :-D

I also love the simplicity of a "plain" old veil. I probably won't break into DS or anything fancy until I get stock with a correct body and fins.

Baby Steps.


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## MattsBettas (Dec 18, 2012)

You also have to think about what will sell though... Can you really afford to have 200 vt babies on your hands?


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## Syriiven (Aug 15, 2012)

The VT-loving community is actually growing, and Arch and Skerr are both great looking fish. IBC standard VT might be a few generations of work, just to get the right body and finnage, but as a starting pair I think they'd do wonderfully (even though I think they're siblings! xD). 

Still love your fish <3 It's not often you see that full veil instead of the slimmer ribbon that's so common now.


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## MattsBettas (Dec 18, 2012)

It's growing, but the market is already flooded. They are very nice fish and I mean nothing against you Skyewillow! You just need to think about the fact that you could potentially get 200 babies, and those would not sell very well, leaving you with a whole lot of work and a whole lot of jars.


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## Skyewillow (Dec 28, 2012)

Not all of them are going to live, there's going to be culling at some point. And my culls for appearance will most likely be adopted out to approved homes. That's the risk you take with any spawn. Also, there aren't any special varieties where I'm at. It's 99% veils and you may find a few crowns. I've had to drive 30 miles away to get my EE and my Delta. Veils seem to sell just fine here. Also, with girls being able to be housed together, it won't be such a huge issue.


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## Skyewillow (Dec 28, 2012)

And I know it's nothing personal, Matt. I'm just wanting to create quality bettas to START from for the IBC to re-sanction them. I really don't want to continually ignore the beauty of a fish like Skerries or the yellow Pineapple I've found (but didn't adopt).

A good, HEALTHY VT would be an excellent starting point for people to break into the hobby! ^_^ That's how I got my start.


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## Skyewillow (Dec 28, 2012)

Here's the other VT girls









(camera flash)








(^her color under sunlight)


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## MattsBettas (Dec 18, 2012)

Those three are without a doubt vt. If you want the babies to look the same as the parents, use the first girl. I don't cull and I don't reccomend it. The breeder brings the lives into the world, IMO they have no right to take the life away because its to small (ask BeautifulBetta123 the story of her runt.), has bad fins, or not good enough color. Permanent life altering conditions are different of course. That's my view on culling. I have to say that I doubt you could sell 200 vt locally. And let's say, hypothetically, you get 200 babies. 50% male, 50% female. That's 100 jars to clean and at least three large sorority tanks. That's a LOT of work. 

Thanks for not taking it personally. Critique threads can be rough. I'm here to share my knowledge not bash!


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## Skyewillow (Dec 28, 2012)

Matt, did you miss where I said appearance "culls" would be adopted to pet homes?

I don't plan to euthanize unless there's something seriously wrong. More often than not, I'm the person who adopts the severely deformed if they have a remote chance at a normal life.


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## Marvel170 (Jan 2, 2012)

+1 mattsbettas


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## MattsBettas (Dec 18, 2012)

I misinterpreted it lol. You confused me when you said "not all are going to live, some will be culled at some point". That's still a lot of work though...


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## Skyewillow (Dec 28, 2012)

I had this BRILLIANT and somewhat devious idea!!

350 gal stock tank for girls, and probably 2-3 others in case I need them for racks of "jars". The racks of jars would be three liter bottles with holes drilled in them to allow water flow and warmth to transfer.

Honestly, my first concern is confirmation, color can be fixed later.

Also, as a lot of spawns show, some die. Especially with first time breeders as they try to figure everything out. There's also breeders who cut spawning short to control spawn sizes.


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## MattsBettas (Dec 18, 2012)

Believe me, cutting the spawn short is tricky and dangerous. I left the house while a house for an hour, came back, and BAM 200 eggs already in the nest. 350 is biiiiiiig. Good luck hearing it!


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## Skyewillow (Dec 28, 2012)

I would totally set these up. I'm not afraid to have stock tanks around. We wanted hydroponics units!

even if there's 150 girls, a 350 would be more than enough space.


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## Skyewillow (Dec 28, 2012)

I've got big and crazy ideas that just might work! BWAHAHA!


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## MoonShadow (Feb 29, 2012)

I LOVE the male, he has stunning finnage, his top line isn't fabulous but not horrible. I like the girl, she looks more like a comb tail to me, but the vt gene is so dominant I don't think you would see much of those extended rays in the offspring. If this was my pair I would concentrate on A) improving the toplines while keeping finnage as close to the original male as possible! and B) breeding the red wash out of the line, nice solid teal/steel/royal blue veiltails with that males finnage would be show stoppers!!


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## Stone (Jan 6, 2013)

One thing I have noticed is most veiltails seem to be far healthier fish than crowns and halfmoons, I am pretty sure my red and blue veiltails could live through an atomic blast. I guess a lot has to do with how badly inbred they are and I would guess because of breeders turning them out like a puppy mill you end up with a lot of fish that are just sickly.


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## Stone (Jan 6, 2013)

The oen thing I see over and over on this site is members trying to talk people out of breeding veiltails, if someone wants to invest the time effort and money into breeding veiltails, let them, we as betta lovers should not be snobish and brow beat and discourage people from doing something they want to do. We are all well aware of what most people think are the popular types of bettas right this minute, but next year it might not be the same people are pushing hard to get veiltails back in the spot light where they belong, there is just something about a nice veiltail with its long flowing fins that the others jsut can't touch


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## indjo (Jun 6, 2010)

+1 MoonShadow.


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## Syriiven (Aug 15, 2012)

+1 Stone


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## Skyewillow (Dec 28, 2012)

Stone said:


> The oen thing I see over and over on this site is members trying to talk people out of breeding veiltails, if someone wants to invest the time effort and money into breeding veiltails, let them, we as betta lovers should not be snobish and brow beat and discourage people from doing something they want to do. We are all well aware of what most people think are the popular types of bettas right this minute, but next year it might not be the same people are pushing hard to get veiltails back in the spot light where they belong, there is just something about a nice veiltail with its long flowing fins that the others jsut can't touch


+1 Stone!

MoonShadow, my main concern is confirmation and health of my fish, so I agree about getting our unique kinks worked out. I'm absolutely in LOVE with Skerries' finnage, not bad coming from Petco. I can see where they're both a bit spooney in the face (more him), and where her back arches. Once I get the body down, I'll be moving on to color, maybe running two possible lines at once (form and color) and crossing them eventually.

Also, goats and bettas are vastly different, so while I have previous experience with breeding (dairy goats) I'm sure a nice escutcheon would be irrelevant here, so I'm trying to do the best I can and ease into the process. I've never raised betta fry, I can barely do guppy fry at this point, and I don't want to go out and buy some crazy variety that's going to give me headaches because of the complexity of the genetics.

Also, I am LOVING this discussion! Thanks everyone who has replied!


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## Stone (Jan 6, 2013)

Now I love giants they is just something about them, I would love to make a giant veiltail now that would be pretty sweet,but my one concern would be all that finnage dragging the poor fish down, but still just imagine a veiltail with a 3inch body with 3 or so inches of fin, that would be one sweet looking fish


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## Skyewillow (Dec 28, 2012)

That would be awesome! That'd be a real stunner!


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## justmel (Apr 1, 2013)

The problem with a giant VT I would think would be parents size at spawning. If the girl is the giant the male will likely not be able to embrace her. My petco 'king' betta is more than twice the size of any of my VT girls, and might be to big for them. It would look pretty cool though.

I like you bettas Skyewillow, I say go for it. If I ever get a nice pair of VT I would like to breed them myself.


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## Skyewillow (Dec 28, 2012)

Dory is a big girl! Wait till she gets there!


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## justmel (Apr 1, 2013)

Trust me, I can't wait! Told my mom I was getting a Dory fish today & she laughed


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## Skyewillow (Dec 28, 2012)

^_^ I wish I had something to compare her size to, she's just huge compared to my other girls! I think she's bigger in the body than my males too


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## justmel (Apr 1, 2013)

Good, maybe she can help my 2 meanies start behaving.


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## VanBoy (Aug 22, 2012)

Would definitely breed him for his finnage and the red female for her color but not together. Red and blue just don't mix well together and it would take many generations to get rid of red wash. Nice bettas


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## Skyewillow (Dec 28, 2012)

they actually both have a red wash. Her's isn't as noticeable though, because the flash "covers" it.


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