# Age and size difference - First bubble nest, is he ready?



## thatparkerboy (Nov 5, 2012)

So I have a male HM that is about 4.5 months old now and his first real bubble nest is just about finished. My question is...Is the male ready to breed? Is there a chance it will be successful? The female's body is larger than his and she is full grown but her egg spot is showing and she is showing signs of acknowledgement towards him. They have been sitting tank to tank next to each other for about a month. Is the body size difference a huge factor? She is about 2 inches and and he is about 1.5 inches (body length only)

Thank you

- thatparkerboy


----------



## Oldfishlady (Mar 1, 2010)

It really depends on your goals, personally, I like to wait until the HM is closer to 6mo-but only because I want to make sure he can hold his caudal fin so that I don't pass on weakness or inability of the HM to hold his fins in the long term.

I have spawned other tail types- both male and female as young as 3 months and have spawned miss matched sized too-all without problems.

I do like the pair to be close in size or the male a bit larger than the female-so that the spawning process is easier on them. Its not that a small male can't successfully embrace/spawn with a larger female-its just that sometimes it can be harder for the male to get a proper embrace to approximate the vents for fertilization.

The males doesn't squeeze the eggs out of the female per se. The embrace stimulates release of the eggs and the vents needs to be approximated for fertilization and with too large or even too small of female- this can sometimes be difficult and you end up with unfertile eggs.

Or if they have a lot of problems in the spawning process-this can lead to frustration by one or the other-that can sometimes lead to attacks that either injure or even kill one or the other....

With that said-her at 2in and him at 1.5in SL (_standard length_)...IMO/E-they should be fine-size wise to spawn with each other.

Can you post a pic....


----------



## thatparkerboy (Nov 5, 2012)

Thanks! That's whats up. This is the only pic I could catch of them together. You can go to another thread on here to see them separately ---> http://www.bettafish.com/showthread.php?t=118895 <--- Hoping for some unique stuff!


----------



## MyRainbowBettaFish (May 9, 2012)

wow. now thats a TRUE black 
Gorgeous pair!


----------



## thatparkerboy (Nov 5, 2012)

Thank you, thank you.


----------



## homegrown terror (Aug 6, 2012)

he's beautiful...usually when i see "super black" in an auction listing they're either orchids, or have faded-out patches of coloration like a pair of black jeans that's been washed too many times.


----------

