Badis badis in a 10g with betta?

B

BCripe

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Dec 9, 2015
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First, I definitely belong on the newbie forums, so feel free to warn me of potential issues and/or give advice as needed. Any tips are welcome.
I have a male betta in a 10 gallon with a female in an elevated bowl inside the 10 (sounds odd, I know, but they seem to like the company). We let her out to swim around once a day or so, and they seem to do well, though he starts chasing her if she's in more than 6 hours or so.
I was thinking of finding another small fish and/or invertebrate for the main tank, and I saw someone mention that a mated pair of badis badis could be in a 10g with a male betta. I would like to do that if it will work, but I'm new enough that I'm not sure if that's a good idea. AQ Advisor mentions that the badis badis may outgrow the tank. (I'm thinking that's even more true with a 1 gallon bowl sitting on a "cave" inside the tank.) Also, would they get along. My betta seems pretty mellow, but that could all change with the addition of more fish.I also considered a small pleco, catfish, or snail in the bowl in addition to the badis badis. Again, I am not sure how they would get along or if this is too much.
Currently we have an Aqueon 20 filter and a 100 watt preset Aqueon heater. Substrate is small Petco gravel. We have a couple of floating "betta" plants we got at Petco with the Bettas. I would love to plant some live plants, maybe some java fern or moss. (I am definitely open to suggestions here; I have been reading, but still don't know what I'm doing.) I love the idea of my fish having more hiding places and having a more "natural" environment. Will the gravel work as a substrate, or do I need to replace it with something more robust? I don't have a light, so we would probably need a light too. I am sad to cover up our open top tank since we love t interact with our bettas that way, but if it will make things better for them we can do that.
I guess my questions are:
Badis badis: yea or nay? If not, other possibilities?
Live plant suggestions/ideas
Do we need a light or any other equipment for our tank?

Thank you in advance!!
 
no badis badis
yes live plants
unless you are really experienced and have other tanks, get rid of the female betta
 
You'll need a much bigger, heavily aquascaped tank to keep something with a male betta. 55 gallons or so would be a minimum. I've seen it work before, but it's not for beginners. At the risk of sounding condescending, if you have to ask, you're not ready. Please don't take that as an insult, but the addition of other fish bumps a betta's care from "beginner" to "expert".
 
No Badis Badis . They are no match for either Betta when feeding and one good threat display and they will stress to death.

Put you Badis in a lightly planted 10gal with some stones or drift wood. Once comfortable they are really cool little fish.
 
Thank you for the replies. It sounds like the betta will be living by himself.
I am definitely no expert. I am terribly green, even for a beginner.
If we were to get rid of one of the bettas, it would likely be the male. The female has a lot of personality. Plus she's my wife's (she got me the male because she thought I should have a fish too. Little did she know what she had started!)
This is the second time I have ended up with fish that no one else can live with. We won a goldfish at the state fair in September, which has since grown by increments to be 3 goldfish in a 20 (each child needed a fish). I thought I could add other fish or maybe plants in there, but apparently only other goldfish can tolerate living with a goldfish.
Then my wife got the bettas. If we moved the male to a gallon bowl and kept the female in the 10, would another fish work in the 10 with the female? I would love to have more than 1 fish in there.
Also, I just got a 30 from a friend (see what I mean about one fish starting something?). Any suggestions there? I thought of cichlids, but apparently that would end up being a single species tank too.
Thanks again for all the help!
 
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BCripe said:
Thank you for the replies. It sounds like the betta will be living by himself.
I am definitely no expert. I am terribly green, even for a beginner.
If we were to get rid of one of the bettas, it would likely be the male. The female has a lot of personality. Plus she's my wife's (she got me the male because she thought I should have a fish too. Little did she know what she had started!)
This is the second time I have ended up with fish that no one else can live with. We won a goldfish at the state fair in September, which has since grown by increments to be 3 goldfish in a 20 (each child needed a fish). I thought I could add other fish or maybe plants in there, but apparently only other goldfish can tolerate living with a goldfish.
Then my wife got the bettas. If we moved the male to a gallon bowl and kept the female in the 10, would another fish work in the 10 with the female? I would love to have more than 1 fish in there.
Also, I just got a 30 from a friend (see what I mean about one fish starting something?). Any suggestions there? I thought of cichlids, but apparently that would end up being a single species tank too.
Thanks again for all the help!
Click to expand...

You're definitely hooked! I know how that feels. I started with a ten gallon myself, then worked up through a 150, 365 and a 510, and now the blue prints of the house I'm going to build down the road includes room for a 2000 gallon built in system lol.

It's like a drug!

The general rule of thumb for stocking a tank is an inch of fish per gallon of tank. So, if you've got a ten gallon tank with a 2-3" betta in it, you could get away with 7-8 one inch fish like guppies or neon tetras. Do be aware that what you see in PetSmart adn the like are often immature fish that will get significantly larger, and significantly larger than their advertised sizes. For example, the often quoted max size for an iridescent shark is 8".

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Lmao!

Take everything from the pet stores with a grain of salt. Double your filtration and balance your stock. There's a saying we had in the Army: proper planning prevents poor performance. This is absolutely relevant to our wonderful hobby!

You're in the right place to learn. There's a ton of knowledge here. :)
 
The combo is a bad choice but I really did not find male bettas that difficult to keep in community tanks. I had one in a lightly planted 29g and a heavily planted 55g with less trouble than one of my 3 spot gouramis. What I can piece together from that far back the 29g was black neons, pleco, yoyo loaches... I can't remember. Maybe another schooling fish. When the betta was gone an angelfish was added. The 55g was congo tetras, larger pleco, otocinclus, another tetra, is that when I tried emperor tetras.... the yoyo loaches were removed from that tank to the 29g because of applesnails. I'd say in a 20g with careful consideration of the other fish that a male betta can do fine. I wouldn't suggest a 10g for a beginner much less with a betta, paradise fish, or the more aggressive of the gouramis. It really would be best to upgrade to a 20-29g minimum tank because the stocking and water parameters are going to be more forgiving.

I just saw your goldfish tank. Not good. Minimum for a goldfish should be a 29g and then most say 10g per goldfish on top of that. That's for fancy types. If you have the types typically sold cheaper or given away you really need a pond. Maybe a 55g with little to nothing else. Goldfish can live more than 30years, possibly 50years, but most don't make 10 because the tanks are too small and being so bulky and messy it rapidly becomes hard to keep the water quality up if you don't go light on goldfish stocking.
 
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I've kept a single male betta or groups of female bettas in community tank settings and I am certainly no aquarium expert. I've never had aggression issues with this.
 
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