# Rate this gentleman



## meeree (Sep 8, 2015)

Great forum going on here. 
I am curious as to the conformation of my betta, scroll down for detailed pics
http://www.aquabid.com/cgi-bin/auction/closed.cgi?view_closed_item&fwbettashm1441570068

I dont have actual pictures of him in the tank as I won't get to meet him for another 3 weeks but I hope these will suffice. I love the fine dots etc on his tail, they look very much like shards to me. From reading here I figure his anal fin may be long?


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## PurpleJay (Jan 4, 2015)

Nice OHM. And the markings around his eyes made me LOL

I'm pretty sure the red in him would be considered a fault. Might take a few generations to get that red out, unless you breed him to a non-red girl.
The anal fin is a little "blah" and all over the place, which is bad. His dorsal is nice, but it should sweep (what's the word I need?) forwards. Well, it should angle forwards, not backwards. That caudal fin is very nice! Not rounded, which is good.
He has a very nice topline too. And the scale color is very solid without any misplaced scales. Good.
Those ventrals are quite messy. They're quite long and they're not pointed and tapered like they should be.

But he's a gorgeous boy, and a nice find too. 

I think, if you were to breed him, you should aim to get that messy red out. Even out that anal fin, and get those ventrals into a good knife-shape. That dorsal could also be more pointed forwards.

If you were to breed him:

(I barely know anything about this part, but I'll give it a shot.)

HM female, preferably a non-dragon/metallic as they have thick scales and breeding dragon/dragon may cause diamond eye, which you don't want. The male may already have scales growing over his eyes, I'm not sure.
Make sure the female has no red in her, you can ask her breeder whether her parents had red too. She should be solid-colored to preserve the nice body color in the male. Take the best female form-wise out of your first spawn and breed her back to dad.


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## Zhylis (Nov 4, 2014)

You'll also want a female with an excellent HM tail. The upper caudal rays on that male are significantly shorter than the rest of the tail, to the point where his tail looks unbalanced to me. I like his body shape and the dorsal is pretty good, but the ventrals, anal, and caudal are messier than I'd prefer to work with.


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## meeree (Sep 8, 2015)

Really appreciate the insight into my fish, I wish the forum had a rep feature so I could rep both of you, exactly what I was hoping for when I made the thread.

So he's like the type of fish that looks cool and decorative for instagram but not exactly the one you would breed seriously


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## Zhylis (Nov 4, 2014)

Re: Breeding - It depends. Always breed towards a goal, whether that be a specific color, pattern, or form. If your goal is to produce "samurai" HM betta similar to your other post then (with a lot of work) you could use him to start a line. The red would have to be bred out, and marbling in the iridescent layer would have to be brought it. Which would give you time to improve his form at the same time. The thing with breeding is you have to start somewhere. You can wait forever for the perfect fish, but hypothetical fish don't spawn. So the main questions are, what type of betta do you want to breed for and how close is the Aquastar betta to that?


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## meeree (Sep 8, 2015)

Sorry for the late reply- was out of town. But I feel then to minimize the amount work needed to get that type of fish mine wouldn't be the best...But 
https://www.flickr.com/photos/black_warrior/21104281092
https://www.facebook.com/Aqquastar7...3408030143105/133408350143073/?type=1&theater

They both share the patterning on the dorsal fin, except mine has it more toward the back...


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## Zhylis (Nov 4, 2014)

I'm not sure anyone has tried to breed for the dorsal patterning. As far as I know, it's a throwback to the original wild-type _B. splendens_. It's been bred out of most bettas, but it can still pop up, possibly as a reversion to the wild-type. I have no idea how it's inherited; although that would be an interesting thing to test out.


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