# For those with sororities



## DuyDawg (Nov 4, 2012)

Have you had much success with them? What size tank and what amount of female bettas are you using? I'm interested in hearing updates about tanks that hold several female bettas. 

I intend to turn my 10 gallon into a sorority house of 5 females.

Im hoping to actually buy some of my females from members on this site, since the ones i've been seeing at PetCo, Petsmart, walmart, etc are poorly taken care of.


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## LebronTheBetta (Apr 23, 2012)

I'm cycling my 20 Gallon for a sorority soon. So I'm going to subscribe. Why don't you add a bit more plants/decorations? Remember, they'll easily fight with all that open space. Unless you're not done yet, but it looks pretty.


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## DuyDawg (Nov 4, 2012)

I forgot to mention that I was planning on adding a lot more vegetation. I was actually messaging several members on this site about the plants they have for sale, because its at a much better price than the local stores around me 

im on week 2 of my fishless cycle, and my ph is 7.6 and my ammonia is still 4.0. nitrite and nitrate are both zero


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## LebronTheBetta (Apr 23, 2012)

Yeah, members here have greater deals. Some people here are very experienced with plants. Try aokashi or kfryman. They're pretty smart on plants. I'm still on week 1 Haha. When I first put in ammonia it was 3ppm. After 2 days it was 1ppm, then I dosed again. Now, it's gonna take a while. My pH is the same as yours, what a coincidence.


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## Knitterly (Jun 3, 2012)

My sorority has 3 females now. It started with 6 females in July. One died mysteriously in about August and then about 3-4 weeks ago, two came down with dropsy. After they had passed (in the hospital tank, not the 10 gal) I treated the entire tank with Maracyn 2, as recommended by our LFS . All is well, now.

I spent some time seriously considering whether or not to bring the number of females back up to 5 or 6. The three I had were not fighting at all. NOT ONE BIT. They were actually more peaceful than they had been when I had 5 in there. 

SO we decided to try feeder guppies in there with them. We were thinking:

1. Smaller, faster, different movement and look
2. less individual than the bettas, as they children were not taking to the deaths very well.
3. "FEEDER" fish, meant we could discuss with the kids that these fish were intended to become food for other fish, so if they were eaten by our Betas, it wasn't too different from what they were headed to originally. Call me harsh, but my eldest understands that animals eat animals and if she could think of it that way, she could handle any deaths easier.
4. at 4 for a buck, I could afford to throw away $1 or so to try out our female bettas with smaller fish.

two weeks later.... three female bettas and three hapily growing male feeder guppies are swimming in the tank. They've seriously doubled in size since we bought them. The bettas took two days to adjust to the little fishies, but now they all leave each other alone. Well, except the guppies who chase each other. LOL. 

I wouldn't have tried it with fancy guppies and didn't want to shell out $15 for a school of tetras unless I knew they'd all work. And dag nabbit, we've all come to REALLY like the guppies. A lot. 

So, I guess what my story says is that 3 females CAN work, and bettas plus guppies CAN work, but you have to be okay with the potential casualties if they don't.


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## homegrown terror (Aug 6, 2012)

from my reading, the traditional rules of stocking get somewhat thrown out the window with betta sororities. the more fish you have in there, any aggression that pops up will be managed better if there's a bigger group to work with. that's why live plants are so helpful in sorority tanks: more fish means more waste, and the plants are great at controlling ammonia and other released toxins. bottom line: lots of plants, and lots of fish. i know of several very respected betta keepers who go as high as ten fish in a well planted 10g.


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## Tikibirds (May 26, 2011)

I got 6 very young females from petco and have them in a 20 gallon long. However one "female" was actually a male. They are all grown up now and I have little to no aggression even with him in there. 

I beleive a large part of being successful is having ALOT of decor. The more stuff yu crarm in there, the less they will see each other. You should have all levels of the tank covered - not just the bottom

I have had one girl that was way too aggressive to be housed with others. There is most likely going to be some degree of fighting, especially at first when they are establishing a pecking order but if things get out of hand, be prepared to remove a very aggressive or badly injured girl. 

First I had them in here - around about March of this year. This is kinda over crammed with stuff. It all came out of the 20g 









But they are now in here. It's been redocorated since I went to all live plants ad I need to redo it again, the place i just ordered some ne wplants from sent me like 3X the amount I actually ordered. :-D


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## shellieca (Jul 12, 2012)

I have 8 females in my 46g, the last 2 added yesterday. Lots of plants & cave structures. They share the tank with 2 CAE's & a Mystery snail. There's been some chasing/fin nipping but overall its peaceful. They swarm the top of the tank whenever they see me or I open the lid it's pretty funny. I'd attach a pic but I'm on the iPad & can't or at least don't know how to without being on the computer.


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## registereduser (Jul 30, 2010)

I started with 3 petco girls who got along great in a 20 gallon regular. Then I bought 6 from a breeder and all went well. Then I bought a school of 8 neons tetra and all died within a week (all the neons). Four of my girls also got sick from them and died. That taught me a good lesson about quarantining new fish.

Since then I added one more from a breeder and a larger baby betta from petco. All were doing well except one female from the first set of breeder bought girls. She never came up to eat and was looking really ragged. I never saw her being chased or nipped but obviously she was low in the pecking order. She died yesterday. 

The rest are still doing great. No torn fins, I never see any nipping, just occasional short chases. No one hides, not even the baby. I have live plants but not much plant cover. The tank has a lot of open space.

I am getting another female from a breeder soon, I hope she fits in! I would also like a few more from petco.

The tank also holds 3 cories and 2 otos and a nerite snail. My plan is to move the cories into a bigger tank this winter and replace them with shrimps. I think they might do a better job of cleaning up than the cories.

Anyway, in my short experience having a sorority has its ups and downs but totally worth the effort. When you establish a nice group they are so fun to watch. I love having a tank full of differently colored pretty girls!


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## DuyDawg (Nov 4, 2012)

awesome! i did not expect this many well written replies. I was checking aquabid for plant deals and saw 7 anubias for 28$ with free shipping! In addition, I will be adding some java moss and hopefully some duckweed or amazon frogbit to float ontop. 

My tank is nearing the end of it's cycle and I will be planting, and reorganizing my current set up. I will post pictures in a seperate thread when done and link it here. =)


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## homegrown terror (Aug 6, 2012)

DuyDawg said:


> awesome! i did not expect this many well written replies. I was checking aquabid for plant deals and saw 7 anubias for 28$ with free shipping! In addition, I will be adding some java moss and hopefully some duckweed or amazon frogbit to float ontop.
> 
> My tank is nearing the end of it's cycle and I will be planting, and reorganizing my current set up. I will post pictures in a seperate thread when done and link it here. =)


i'd recommend against the duckweed...it'll pretty much limit you only to low-light plants for your tanks since it will cover your surface and block out a large percentage of the light coming in.


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## kfryman (Nov 7, 2011)

With sororities, as stated, usually the more fish the better, however that means more water changes. In a 10 gallon 6 or 7 is pretty good. Also, you really want to break up the line of site, if you look from the side of the tank, you shouldn't see the other side. So it doesn't need to be a forest, but you want there to be areas where the girls can escape from, especially in the first week.

You definitely want some more plants. I'm only seeing anubias which is a slow grower, also you have them planted, if the rhizome is in the substrate (it is the thick part where the leaves and roots both come out from) take it out and only have the roots buried, or you can get driftwood or rocks and tie them to it, which is always a nice look. Plants I would recommend for a beginner are wisteria, water sprite (almost looks like wisteria), anubias, java fern, ludwigia, crypts, rotala, amd anacharis. Java fern and anubias also should be placed in the same way I said earlier.

I'm not sure if you have one yet, but for plants to grow correctly you need to have a bulb with the proper temperature. Different temperatures are for different things, 10000k and higher are normally for saltwater and if you are mixing bulbs (if you have a fixture with 2 or more slots for bulbs). So for freshwater 6500k is a good starting point. Don't worry about the "watts per gallon rule" if you have read about it, it doesn't work, only if everyone used the same bulbs, fixtures, and the same height to hang and depth of the tank. 

For a fertilizer for the plants I would recommend using API Leaf Zone or Seachem Flourish Potassium. Potassium is all you really would need in lowtech aquarium as the other macros will be available from feeding (phosphorus) and the fish pooping and the nitrogen cycle turning that into nitrate (nitrogen).


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## kfryman (Nov 7, 2011)

homegrown terror said:


> i'd recommend against the duckweed...it'll pretty much limit you only to low-light plants for your tanks since it will cover your surface and block out a large percentage of the light coming in.


The tank will already have lowlight, if the duckweed is thin and not covering the whole tank via manual removal, it benefits the tank way more since it will uptake ammonia and nitrate.

I don't recommend only having anubias, refer to my previous for other plant options, it grows too slow. You want stem plants that will be growing fast. the top of the tank and break up the line of sight at the top of the tank.

I would recommend going to Petco and looking at their plants. Only buy the ones that I linked though, they sell plants that are semi-aquatic and will rot if fully submerged, reference my list of plants and look up what they look like.


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## DuyDawg (Nov 4, 2012)

Wow thanks for the awesome plant replies.

I have a fish emporium store that opened up a few months ago, and that place is amazing for freshwater and saltwater! They have all sorts of plants, so I will definitely go and find some more plant options. 

My lighting is a 20x10 marineland LED light. It has the bright white light and the blue moon light setting. 

I believe I saw SeaChem excel had their fertilizer and I read good things about them.


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## kfryman (Nov 7, 2011)

Hmmmm... Problem, I believe that the marineland hood while making the tank look nice, doesnt provide the proper light for plants to grow. You may need to either buy another hood that has a T8 or you could go topless, I love the look so much better even with tanks with trim, and buy the Finnex Fugeray on Amazon. It is actually really cheap for how good it is and it won't need replacing for a while. If not having a hood worries you, you can buy a glass top that has a lid and have the light just sit on that with the hinges. Though, it would be more expensive that way then just buying the new hood.


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## DuyDawg (Nov 4, 2012)

I think i'll just order some java fern, various anubias plants, and some java moss for the floor. If that'll survive in my aquarium, i'll be more than happy.

since my tank is 10 gallons, a medium sized anubias plant will reach heights that will block most vision.


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## tanseattle (Jun 28, 2012)

My is 10 gal with 7 female: 4 HMPK, 1HM, 1VT, and 1 PK


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## homegrown terror (Aug 6, 2012)

those dracenia (lucky bamboo) can't be submerged like that...they need to be planted with their leaves above the water's surface.


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## tanseattle (Jun 28, 2012)

My lucky bamboo has been in all of my 6 fish tanks for more than a year. They are find w/o any problem. I even have it fully under water in fry tanks; I have over 200 fries they all still alive.


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## homegrown terror (Aug 6, 2012)

tanseattle said:


> My lucky bamboo has been in all of my 6 fish tanks for more than a year. They are find w/o any problem. I even have it fully under water in fry tanks; I have over 200 fries they all still alive.


that's unusual...i've heard most reports say it'll generally die within a 60 day period if submerged.


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## DuyDawg (Nov 4, 2012)

i had lucky bamboo under water and all it did was make the water a bit dirtier. im assuming with a filter though, this problem is taken care of


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## kfryman (Nov 7, 2011)

Bamboo should be planted where its roots are in water everything else is out, just leaves out is alright but you don't really want to have it submerged. It does much better when given access to the atmosphere. There is no telling how long it can last underwater, but it probably lasts a while. If it works for someone, it doesn't always mean it will workfor you.

Let's keep on topic for what the OP wants.


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