# What is a good Crowntail?



## Basement Bettas

OK.. education time. Here is a picture I have saved of a nice CT. What I would be working towards as a breeder.



Tell me what you like on him and what you think needs improved. Ignore the color issue for now.. we are talking form. Don't want to hear pretty.. take it down to nuts and bolts.


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## Mo

Well. My skills are a bit rusty and are nothing to be proud of, lol... I don't know much about CT's except the basic stuff.. I really like him and of course his spread which many CTs don't have.the only issues I can see are the dip in the head which IMO is a bit too much but can easily bred out with a good, long bodied female... So nothing to worry about there. He does have a bit of stair stepping on his dorsal fin and his rays are a bit uneven on his tail... R maybe it's stair stepping. But in his tail he has that little stub thing then nice long double rays which I also love, I can't really tell if he has partially double rays and triple rays but if he has both then I guess that's a fault to because it's considered uneven branching...right?. Such a nice fish though


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## Basement Bettas

Spread.. yes you want to see the outside rays go 180. So look at those out side rays. He has the 180 but where can you fault those rays?


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## dramaqueen

I spotted the dip in the head but that's about all my untrained eye could spot. Lol


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## Basement Bettas

dramaqueen said:


> I spotted the dip in the head but that's about all my untrained eye could spot. Lol


Keep looking. We are working the tail now. We have the spread that is 180. Look at that first ray since the bottom one is difficult to see.


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## trilobite

He has short outer rays and uneven web reduction in the tail. Theres also something pretty weird going on spike wise in the middle of his caudal, looks like theres some thin extra spikes that dont belong anywhere.
Anal fin looks messy, stubby first dorsal ray and his body is too thin and weak looking for my liking.
But overall a much nicer ct than the majority of them


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## bambijarvis

first ray on the tail is short, also looks like a mix of single and double?(I haven't slept n 48+ hours, eyes are blury).
also web reduction isn't even, the dorsal looks like it has too much/more than 50% and it's not even with the tail's


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## Basement Bettas

the first ray is short... you want that as long and straight as a halfmmoon's. You do not want rounded edges on the CT either



And the reduction is inconsistent. He could probably get away with this in a show depending on the competition.. but as a breeder you want to look hard at this and work for evenness here.


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## Basement Bettas

You also want to see that web reduction the same in all fins. He is pretty good in this area.. often you seen the dorsal has huge reductions and the other fins not so much..


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## Basement Bettas

Now what about his over all balance? You want to connect the tops of those rays and see what you have. Should see good HM type form. How does he do in that area?


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## dramaqueen

Ok, I'm seeing the unevenness of the web reduction. And I'm seeing the short ray, too.


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## Basement Bettas

dramaqueen said:


> Ok, I'm seeing the unevenness of the web reduction. And I'm seeing the short ray, too.


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## Basement Bettas

When you connect those rays.. you see his balance is not bad. The anal is a tad long.. but still nice. I still want to see it level like in HM.. no slope unless we are talking PK


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## Basement Bettas

The color faults should be easy. This is a bi-color fish.His body should be one color and the fins another. The seperation in color should be clean.. no bleeding. To be really competitive you want high contrast colors.. like the old Cambodians. Flesh bodies and bright red fins. Or blue bodies and yellow fins. The MG's of today are bad blue/yellow bicolors. So where are the color faults on this male? Look hard and be picky.


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## dramaqueen

The blue color bleeding into the red.The tips of the rays look dark.?


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## veggiegirl

I am finding this post very informative, never really considered showing because I cannot travel due to commitments and we have no local shows but I am certainly really enjoying learning what makes a good fish show wise.....


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## dramaqueen

Me, too. I'm never going to show but it doesn't hurt to be informed.


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## Basement Bettas

Ya'll got it. Even the dark tips. I did not circle all of them.. but you got the idea.


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## Basement Bettas

veggiegirl said:


> I am finding this post very informative, never really considered showing because I cannot travel due to commitments and we have no local shows but I am certainly really enjoying learning what makes a good fish show wise.....


I do not travel to shows. The fish are shipped. I am in Tx and last weekend my fish were in CA. Monday they leave for Indiana and then a few weeks after that they will go to Houston for final show till spring.

The hardest thing is to breed fish to the standards and to show., with no local show to attend for feedback and guidance. You learn a LOT at a show so I encourage people to go if the distance is do-able. Will try to do a few more of these to get you looking at what we look at as far as form and color.

Would I breed this fish? He has a lot going for him I do like the spread and length of his tail, two areas you find lacking in many CT's today. I would think the reduction could be improved easily to be more consistent in a few generations. But I have just started to raise some CT's so not entirely sure. I also like the color is pretty clean. So yes.. if I had him I would breed him and look for improvements in the female. Have her with good spread and length [don't want to lose that] but improve the color or the consistency of the reduction. And I would expect to have some fish good enough to show in the breeding.

Now go cruise AquaBid CT's with your new found knowledge and see if you can see some of the same faults in other fish


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## Basement Bettas

trilobite said:


> He has short outer rays and uneven web reduction in the tail. *Theres also something pretty weird going on spike wise in the middle of his caudal, looks like theres some thin extra spikes that dont belong anywhere*.
> Anal fin looks messy, stubby first dorsal ray and his body is too thin and weak looking for my liking.
> But overall a much nicer ct than the majority of them


Yeah.. the spikes are not symmetrical. If you follow the branch from the base of the tail it splits, then each split splits again so you go from one to four rays. But some only go to three.. one of the rays do not split again. When breeding I want all of them the same.. so will always look for the one that has most of the rays like I want. Showing.. depending on the competition... you ca probably get away with it. If the competition is tough they will fault him for it if the other is better.


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## veggiegirl

OH wow I didn't realise that the fish could be entered even if you can't attend. So you just ship them to the show and they get shipped back afterwards? Do they handle all that shipping okay? 

I still wish they had some local shows though, it would be interesting to see the quality that other people are offering and I think it would be great fun to just be there, enjoy the atmosphere and see how everything is run and so on. 

Looking at this crowntail before anything was said about him I thought he was pretty nice and I thought he had quite a good spread but I just had no idea about all those other faults. I still think he is lovely in his own right though what you said about him certainly makes a lot of sense. This thread can really help you appreciate a fish with good balance/symmetry/form when you see one.


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## Aluka

Thank you so much for this post. That was very educational! I learned alot!!! =D!!


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## dramaqueen

Yes, I agree. We should do one on halfmoons.


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## GhostFeather

These are really cool!!
I am waiting on the one for HMPKs!
Bill


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## Basement Bettas

HM is coming... learning curve with the photo editing program and time. Got a busy work schedule month of October so the house needed some major cleaning to stay ahead. And had fish to get bagged and ready to ship to the next show in IN.


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## dramaqueen

You're one busy lady! Whenever you have time is fine.


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## Aryia

Thanks for this post, it's very informative. I'm looking into breeding Betta at the moment. I'm kind of curious about what to look for in coloration, so far I seem to gather that even/single or bi colors are desired. Though I feel as if some multicolored Betta look awesome too!

Also I love the Betta that you have up on aquabid!


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## Flare101

Still can't wait for the HM thread.


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## hollyk

I also wanted to say thank you for this post! I'm looking into getting started breeding (I actually have a bid on one of your females on Aquabid right now! :-D ) It's nice to continue learning about genetics and conformation in bettas so I can breed the best possible fish and know what to look for in the offspring to see who's worthy of breeding. I can't wait to have money to join the IBC for even more info! Thanks again! It's nice to have tips from an expert.


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