# My breeding methods.



## hrutan (Jun 25, 2014)

This came up in one of the Facebook groups that I'm a member of, and I thought the compiled information was useful enough to cross-post here. Breeder methods vary. Not all breeders do things the same way; this is what works for me.

*Equipment needed for 1 spawn:* MINIMUM 2 empty 10 gallon tanks. Floating plants. Submersible heaters for each tank. Appropriate lighting. Brine shrimp hatchery of choice. Aquarium salt. Seasoned sponge filters for each tank. Lids or hoods for each tank. Indian Almond Leaf. Clove oil. Dedicated bucket and siphon. White (or in my case, yellow) bowl. Water aging tank, with heater. 1/2 quart and 1 quart jars. Heat tape & accompanying equipment. Shelving unit to store it all. Turkey baster.

*Food needed:* For adults: frozen blood worms, frozen brine shrimp (I use hikari brand) Ideally also live white worms. For babies: Vinegar Eels or Microworms or Walter Worms. Brine shrimp eggs. Decapsulated Brine Shrimp Eggs. Golden Pearls (100-200 micron size). Beef heart or frozen seafood mix (recipe in the files section, but I alter based on available ingredients).

*A note on water changes: *I don't usually bother with water changes until well after the tank is full of water. I start adding water around 1 week in, a half gallon or so at a time. Water gets DRIPPED in at a rate of 2 or 3 drops per second. Alternately, I may use a large deli cup, scoop water from the water aging tank, and float it for a half hour in the spawn tank to adjust temperature before GENTLY adding the water. Keeping the water disturbance to a minimum is important during the first couple of weeks.

When changing water, move slowly. Siphon with a very gentle siphon or air tubing. The waste water goes into a white or light colored bowl. Let it settle for 5 minutes or so after it's full, and examine the waste for living fry. No matter how hard you try, there WILL be some in there. Suck them up with the turkey baster and put them back in with their siblings. BE PATIENT. This is part of why I prefer to breed in a larger tank with a good, seasoned sponge filter. Less water changes are necessary early on. Also, note that the little critters are faster than you think...

*Start:* Select the parents. This is determined by a number of factors, including desired tail type, color, and form of the parents. I am likely to ask for advice from a more accomplished breeder during this step.

*Step 2:* Fattening. If these are my own fish, this step is unnecessary since all of my fish are breeding ready at all times. However, often pet store fish are in bad condition. Fish that I am unsure about or have had a poor quality diet are fed heavily for at least 1 week. They get alternating brine shrimp or blood worms, and are fed each meal (2-3x per day) until they slow down eating.

*Step 3:* Setting up the spawn tank. I use 10 gallon tanks (this is large, most people prefer 2.5 or 5, but I have the most success in 10). Water level is left at about 4-5 inches - above the heater. I drop an almond leaf in there and some floating plants. The male is added once the water is brought to temperature. The sponge filter is left running the whole time...the initial water level is just a little over that plastic tube thingie that the bubbles come out of. Some breeders bend the tube at a 45 degree angle to increase the effectiveness of the filter. I don't bother; the 10 gallon is large enough to handle the waste for quite some time.

*Step 4:* Adding the female - I put the female in the spawn tank, cupped, and watch the behavior of both fish. The male should be flaring and showing off for the girl. He will probably pick a spot to rush back and forth from -- usually the almond leaf. That is likely where he will build his bubble nest.

The tricky part here is the female, not the male. The female's body language needs to indicate breeding readiness. Some people rely on vertical stripes - I do not. Not all females stripe. The female that gives me the largest spawns does not. Instead, I watch how she is swimming. What I WANT to see is her tilting her head down and wiggling back and forth in a snakeline pattern. This may look like "glass surfing" in the cup. If she's good and wiggly, and her nose is pointed DOWN, that's the equivalent of "Come here, Sailor Boy!" and she may be released immediately. Otherwise, I fill the cup close to the top and let her be. She'll jump out on her own when she's ready.

Both male and female get as many white worms as they want to eat, at this stage and until the male is out. They can be safely left on the floor of the tank, the fish will eat when they are hungry.

*Step 5:* Breeding. I generally keep an eye on the pair, but leave them as unmolested as possible. In my size tank, they usually wrap in about 2 days. A smaller tank will accelerate this. Moderate fin damage is to be ignored. The female is removed when the following things occur: A) Failed breeding. Female has body damage, female is floating at the top, or "playing dead" at the bottom of the tank. B) Successful breeding: Male has driven the female away from the nest and is no longer flirting. Eggs are present in the nest or on the tank floor.

The female is removed by hand if possible, or with a brine shrimp net if not.

*Step 6:* It's Nursery Time: The male tends to the nest. He gets as many white worms as he wants. All should be quiet at this stage. The eggs should start hatching in 1-2 days. Tiny tails should start dangling down. Hatching eggs and fry will fall from the nest; Daddy will scoop them up and spit them back into the bubbles. "Dead" fry should be ignored. Dad will eat them if they are really dead. They may lay on the tank floor and absorb their yolk sac.

If the eggs aren't fertilized, the dad will eat them. He should not eat them if he has been adequately fed and they are fertile.

*Step 7: *Male comes out: When the little dangly tails go from horizontal to vertical, and the fry venture out on their own, Dad needs to come out. Some breeders leave the father in for 1-2 weeks. For your first spawn, play it safe and have him out.

*Step 8:* Feeding the fry: For the first 2 weeks, the baby fry get vinegar eels or micro worms or walter worms. This food MUST be discontinued at 2 weeks from hatching. Only a little bit of food is necessary - in a small tank, a little smudge at the 4 corners of the tank should be enough ... just a fingertip or a drop or two. In a large tank like mine, I do a drop at each corner, and a line of 3 drops in the middle.

Starting at around 1.5 weeks, BBS get added to the diet. No matter what hatch method you choose - in-tank, DIY hatchery, disc hatchery - BE CAREFUL to not overfeed, and BE CAREFUL to avoid getting unhatched eggs in the tank! Otherwise, the babies may end up with swim bladder problems, and there's nothing sadder than having to cull due to your own mistakes...

At 2 weeks, the fry are on alternating BBS and powder food. I alternate BBS with one of the following: Golden Pearls or Decapsulated Brine Shrimp Eggs.

At 5 weeks, I move the fry to Beef Heart. BBS may still be fed.

At jarring age (varies depending on the spawn) I will start them on pellets along with frozen food.

*Step 9: Culling.*
Culling starts at 3-4 weeks. I remove very tiny fry that do not appear to be thriving. If they are quick and alert, they do not get culled even if they are small. They are small enough that I can feed them to larger fish, even though I don't have a proper "cull fish."

At around 5-6 weeks, I can tell if they are having other problems. If they are twisted, if they have severe SBD and aren't swimming properly, or if they are malformed, they are removed as they occur from this age on. These are culled on a case by case basis. They get put down with clove oil, usually.

*Step 10:* Grow Out: If things look crowded, I split the spawn around 4-5 weeks of age. I prefer having around 30 fry in a 10 gallon, although I've done as many as 50-60 without issue. But crowded conditions increase the amount of necessary water changes. Transfer fry by adding them to a deli cup or other container, floating them in the new tank for 15 or so minutes, and gently dump them into their new home.

*Step 11: Jarring.*
This varies, but usually for me seems to be necessary around 8-10 weeks. I have heard others say as early as 4 weeks. It does depend on how fast your fry are growing and how mature they are at any given age. The aggresive fish are jarred regardless of sex. I often can't tell the sex at this age, anyway, although the more vibrant ones tend to be male. Culling continues until they are sold.

A note on culling: It might seem harsh, but this is a necessary process. Breeders that have the space will sort their spawns by size, which is lovely. I, sadly, do not have that kind of space, and need to reduce the spawn over time until it becomes manageable. I have room for 90 jars. That's it. 200+ has been a fairly regular occurrence for me, and what happens to the ones I don't have room for? In nature, very few would survive. With no predation or outside factors to remove unhealthy fry, it is up to us as good caretakers to make the decision of who will live to potentially carry on their genes, and who will not. _*If you aren't prepared to cull, don't breed.*_ Letting the sick and deformed live removes resources from the healthy fry, and all - the fry AND the breeder - suffer for it. I'm not going to make that mistake a second time.


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## BlueInkFish (Jan 13, 2013)

This needs to be stickied! There's a lot of good information on breeding, thank Mrs. Hrutan for the generous piece of intelligent context!


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## aaronpham (Feb 15, 2015)

Do you know if they can handle bbs from day one?


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## hrutan (Jun 25, 2014)

They can, but not all of them will be large enough to eat them. You can do it, no problem, but if you do you should also provide a secondary food like microworms or vinegar eels (I prefer vinegar eels) so that the smaller ones have a chance. Most breeders wait at least 3-5 days before adding BBS to the diet for this reason.


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## 172714 (Nov 4, 2014)

you should do a youtube series. im more of a visual learner


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## hrutan (Jun 25, 2014)

I have a bunch of picture tutorials on a DIY thread in here somewhere, if you need me to bump it. But I am not big on the video thing. Too self-conscious.


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## 172714 (Nov 4, 2014)

hrutan said:


> I have a bunch of picture tutorials on a DIY thread in here somewhere, if you need me to bump it. But I am not big on the video thing. Too self-conscious.


cool ill check it out, are you in the golden state betta fb/group? i just joined it recently


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## hrutan (Jun 25, 2014)

Yep. Holly Rutan.


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## logisticsguy (Sep 7, 2012)

Excellent post Holly!


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

Subbing for when I get a chance to start breeding!


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## hrutan (Jun 25, 2014)

I'd also like to note - I cannot edit the original post - salt in the water is very helpful for preventing velvet. 1 tablespoon / 5 gallons or around 3/4ths teaspoon / 1 gallon. YES having salt in the water full-time is just fine, as long as it is pre-dissolved first. Salt helps combat adverse water conditions, reduces stress for the fish, and acts as a mild antibiotic.

I was too lazy to add salt to the water and just got hit with velvet. Darn it, darn it. So learn from my mistake, OK? Having to do 2x daily sweeps for dead fry is not fun. It'll be added to my water aging tank from now on, since the velvet appeared out of nowhere - indicating it probably lurks in my water system.


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## LolaQuigs (Mar 28, 2010)

Thanks for sharing! I'm nowhere near breeding, but I'm trying to educate myself on it as much as possible just in case I change my mind in the future. This will be a valuable resource!


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## fishtankwatcher (Feb 5, 2015)

Also subbed, any chance you could throw a link on here to your DIY thread? I tried to search your posts, but there were alot!! (not a bad thing, I always enjoy reading your posts!)


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## hrutan (Jun 25, 2014)

http://www.bettafish.com/showthread.php?t=497450


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## HmongBettabreeder (Mar 23, 2015)

Amazing man i learn something new.

Thank You


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