Where does a betta REALLY live in the wild?

[Featherfin]

All information is taken from Labyrinth Fish: The Bubble Nest Builders

Written by Horst Link

Published by Tetra in 1991

(Okay, just in case some of you don't know, there are MANY species of betta. The veil tails and fancy bettas you usually see don't ever exist in the wild because they've been bred to look the way they do by natives in Thailand, Borneo, Maylasia, etc..but to keep this from getting insanely detailed, I am going to focus only on the wild form of Betta splendens, the original form of the Siamese fighting fish, as it is most pertinent.)

Link says:

"In my opinion, the natural distribution range is very much smaller than had been supposed until now and is, in fact, restricted to central, western, and northern Thailand...Betta splendens lives in paddy fields and associated ditches, in marshes and flooded grass pits and in the klongs (canals) of the residential parts of towns and villages. At different times of the year, they may be very numerous."

"These fish are seen to best advantage in a smaller tank 70cm long by 40cm wide and about 30cm high containing plenty of plants in parts...(he goes on to list what kinds of filtration, lighting, heat...species of plants...the kind of gravel. He's very particular - but notice that he believes they should have all of these things to be healthy)

you'll need to know this word for the next paragraph:
ten·a·ble http://cache.lexico.com/g/d/premium.gif http://cache.lexico.com/dictionary/graphics/luna/thinsp.pnghttp://cache.lexico.com/g/d/speaker.gif (https://secure.reference.com/premium/login.html?rd=2&u=http%3A%2F%2Fdictionary.reference.com%2Fbrowse%2 Ftenable) /ˈtɛnhttp://cache.lexico.com/dictionary/graphics/luna/thinsp.pngəhttp://cache.lexico.com/dictionary/graphics/luna/thinsp.pngbəl/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[ten-uh-buhhttp://cache.lexico.com/dictionary/graphics/luna/thinsp.pngl] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–adjective 1.capable of being held, maintained, or defended, as against attack or dispute: a tenable theory.


The view that fighting fish often live in mudholes and therefore can be kept in such conditions is not really tenable. The fish will exhibit their full finery in a well-established, balanced aquarium and it is only under such conditions that their keeper will be able to appreciate their beauty at its best."

---

Here is a klong:
http://gregoire.leclercq.free.fr/en/travels/asia/thailand/0038%20-%20Bangkok%20-%20Klong%20by%20boat.JPG


a paddy field:

http://www.aquarticles.com/images/ZhouHang/pThailand/61%20thailand_paddy_field_canal.jpg



These aren't mud puddles, obviously.


Just because they have labyrinth organs doesn't mean they can live in a cesspool. It just means they can live in warm, shallow, slow moving water with a low oxygen content.


In conclusion, let's treat bettas like all other fish, and give them enough room, flow, filtration, plants, heat and food to thrive.

[soobie]

Hear hear! :clap:

[feemia]

:clap: :clap:

[Malefic23]

Very good post!

[silentskream]

I agree with everything in this thread.

anybody willing to make it a sticky? (i know its fairly specific to be made a sticky, but i will definitely keep this in my list of "quick reference links" to send to the many people that need to read it.

[vampie]

That's the wild bettas. The ones from the LFS? Their natural biotope is a plastic cup.

I kid, I kid.

[severum mama]

That's what I've read about them too.

You'll notice when you upgrade a betta from a 5 gal to a 10 gal, that it is in fact happier! Their natural environment is not the mud puddles that some folks make it out to be. In fact, I keep a couple of female bettas in a heavily planted 45 gallon, and they are great community fish, and they love to rest on the leaves of my plants and hide throughout the plants and rockwork. I had 3 females, but the odd girl out had to move to her own 10 gallon. Again, she's happy.:)

Great post, very informative! As we all can see, they do NOT live in puddles!!!

[Jessu]

:iagree: :y220e:

[feemia]

From http://betta.tasarin.net/aquarium.php

"There is a stereotype that in the wild, bettas live in tiny muddy pools, and therefore that it is acceptable to keep them in small tanks, but bowls are usually too small. In reality, bettas live in vast paddies, the puddle myth originating from the fact that during the dry season, the paddies can dry out into small patches of water. It is not a natural state of affairs by any means, and in the wild, fish trapped in such puddles are likely to die in a short period of time when they dry out."

When I was planning to purchase my betta, I remember thinking that a 10 gallon tank for one fish was a waste of space, but I wish now that I'd gone with the 10 instead of the 5. He seems a bit bored in the 5, and I think he would move around and display himself much more in a 10. It's actually a waste of a fish to put a betta in a tiny bowl.

[spirals]

heres a site which gives info which misleads ppl on the whole, mud puddle thing...
"the betta originally comes from mud puddles in southeast Asia"

http://www.timstropicals.com/FreshwaterFish/Gourami/Betta.asp

[Cracked Tank]

Featherfin: Thank you for the outstanding post. It is ine of the best written on the site. Well done and thank you for the information. I have been giving some consideration to a betta for a very large community tank and your post was most informative!

[J double R]

When I was planning to purchase my betta, I remember thinking that a 10 gallon tank for one fish was a waste of space, but I wish now that I'd gone with the 10 instead of the 5. He seems a bit bored in the 5, and I think he would move around and display himself much more in a 10. It's actually a waste of a fish to put a betta in a tiny bowl.

hehe.... my betta has a 20gallon all to himself, and he likes it that way.. so do i.. :D

excellent writeup Feather!

[iamgroovy]

Excellent article! My betta is in a 16g and very happy! It's very sad that so many people are given misinformation and so many bettas are mistreated as a result.

[Plecosterone]

Excellent post. My betta is in a 75 gallon heavily planted tank and he is always swimming through the plants hunting for swordtail or platty fry. Even in small tanks I feel they need plants to swim through. Wild caught or farm raised, as most of the ones we buy now days are, makes little difference in the way they live. Instinct is something very hard to breed out of a species.

[Dwarf Puffers]

Sweet!! Time to print this out and shove it in my LFS's face!!

[Sploke]

Nice writeup. Instead of a sticky, we need to have some sort of table of contents or FAQ post with links to posts like this. It avoids having 30 stickied posts, but makes them easily accessible. This is something everyone needs to read, whether they own bettas or not.

[lovejonesx]

GREAT POST Feather!!!


But be sure to note EVERYONE that bettas have been & are found in puddles in their natural environment. That is no lie. It's not much different than the conditions that you find all over the world & on almost every continent for fish who have their pond, stream, lake etc... dry up & the ones that are able to survive in puddles until the rains come,....DO! But puddles are far from their natural environment.

LJx

[Sploke]

The point that a survival mechanism is just that, an adaptation that allows an organism to survive seriously adverse conditions for a short amount of time. It can't be extrapolated to say "it happens sometimes so its ok to keep them like that all the time."

[Flaringshutter]

These websites do not have photos of betta splendens, but a good habitat photo of the closely related species smaragdina can be found here:
http://www.plakatthai.com/smarag.html

The Plakatthai website has many different sections that describe the Thai style of collecting fighting fish.

These websites are from a man who collects many different species of betta. He always includes habitat photos as well as photos of the fish. I think his site is particularly interesting because he gives a good representation of wild betta habitat, common to all the different species.
Organized by species:

B. pulchra, B. imbellis
http://www.ikanpemburu.com/html/field/pontian.htm

B. imbellis, GREAT habitat photos:
http://www.ikanpemburu.com/html/field/pontian.htm

B. bellica, B. coccina, B. persephone
http://www.ikanpemburu.com/html/field/Ayer_Hitam_last1.htm

Many different species native to Thailand, with photos of exactly where they were collected:
http://www.ikanpemburu.com/html/field/Thailand2.htm

From just a quick glance at these photos, it's obvious that these aren't mud puddles. To an oblivious tourist, maybe. But they are obviously complex habitats, and far more extensive than just a mud puddle. Just because it doesn't look like a huge lake doesn't mean there aren't hundreds, if not thousands, of gallons of water in those shallow swamps.

[jm1212]

aweomse info. this should be a sticky

[feemia]

I agree that this should be sticky. Along with "What can I put with a Betta?"