Husbandry of Betta channoides

[mobile2007]

Well, that's because my tank got not many place to hide.

Now i can see the color of the male slowly gaining, differ from the female.
Looks good.

i think 3 of us got the same specie. See who has the lucky pair, breed breed breed !

[illumnae]

the colour in my male came back last night. interestingly, he has a blue/green irridiscence in his caudal and anal fins....very unusual based on pictures i see of betta channoides. the black with white seam on the caudal and anal fins and the white tips on the ventral fins are showing now on the male. sad part is that i hardly get to see the male since ehe hides all day...hope he gains some guts soon

[illumnae]

anyone have suggestions for dithers? my tank looks empty as the bettas are always hiding and the boraras are too small and don't show up well against the dark background

[mobile2007]

Hope bro mez don't mind i post photos of my channoides here.

Male betta
( Still wonder why the color not so red/purple )



Female betta

[illumnae]

i think the full red only comes on during breeding time. mine's about that colour too

[900801]

I think so too.Mine is also like that colour

[Cacatuoides]

Mine is showing faint but visible shades of red even during now times....I'm keeping them in yellowish water from ketapang extract....guess the color will be better when they feel more comfortable in their suroundings....

[genes]

i think the full red only comes on during breeding time. mine's about that colour too

I do not think so. Even when not breeding, mine are still red. The last time i had all 3pairs house in a same tank. Only the alpha male will exhibit the redness. Now that i have seperated a pair out, the lone male also turned red.

Give them more time, it took a couple of days before my alpha male decided to go red.

[illumnae]

mine's a brownish maroon now, with the black and white seam very obvious. however, the pair is still extremely skittish and hiding all the time. hope they get used to their new surroundings and swim around more soon!

this pair is quite refreshing...my 3rd pair of wild bettas, and the only pair that can chill in the same corner together without the male trying to kill the other one.

[Mez]

Mine has a faint red to him, but when breeding he was intense red like in genes photos displayed in this forum.
He has still got the eggs in his mouth, and has not swallowed them (yet).
Is it common for the male to eat the fries?

[mobile2007]

The betta seems to love bloodworm alot. Swallow up instantly when i dropped the bloodworm in. Feed them tubifex, they have problem swallowing it ( as the worm struggle inside ?) always.

Hikari got this freeze dry bloodworm laced with multi vitamins. Do you all think it will help to enhance the color?

[Cacatuoides]

I read that it is common that the male swallows the eggs during holding but not often they will snack on their fries

[illumnae]

mine love bloodworms too

[illumnae]

This is my female:



Still unable to get a picture of the male, but I'm glad that they're both less skittish now and starting to venture out abit more. They still hide alot, but every now and then I see them swimming around. Hopefully I'll be able to see more of them as time goes by and they get even more used to the tank. The male is still dark brown/maroon.

[illumnae]

Here's the male slightly discoloured after eating:







he's still really shy, so no good angles!

[Jervis]

Hello

[leeruisheng]

Not too sure about Betta channoides but if they are always hiding, it could be harassment from other tank mates.

Actually wanted to mention about providing more shade with floating plants or tall plants because the tank might be too bright for their comfort. But then those who have seen my Betta rubra setup, it's very barren (and still no cover) but yet they still venture into the open. Their tankmates are fries and yamatos.

So my guess either it's the tankmates that makes them uneasy or still adapting to environment or water parameters not to their liking.

[illumnae]

thanks for the tips =) for my channoides, the only tankmates are sakura shrimp, zebra otos and boraras, so it's unlikely to be harassment from other tankmates. i do notice that they are slightly more daring now, instead of hiding at the backmost rocks 100% of the time, they venture out more especially to get at food. hopefully given another couple of weeks they will venture out into the open like your rubra

[leeruisheng]

Does your channoides attacked the sakura shrimps? Rubra is one of the aggressive bettas but I think they are intimidated by the size of the yamatos so both live peacefully. But however mac will hunt down the yamatos like no tomorrow. So I'm wondering since the sakuras are smaller than channoides, would the chans not bother them.

[illumnae]

the sakuras are too big to fit into the chanoides' mouth, so i think it's fine. they've been sharing the same tank for half a week and the most i've seen is the bettas inspecting the shrimp. no attacks have been observed yet. i did come home today to see a dead half eaten shrimp, but it was being eaten by his fellow shrimp not the channoides, so i think it died of other causes, not being killed by the bettas