Thanks for the comments! I haven't been updating awhile.. but here's a basic update:
I didn't prepare well enough for this breeding. I made the mistake of not feeding baby brine shrimp at all and only feeding microworms and bananaworms. Because of this, I'm assuming that the full grown bettas will be without ventral fins (fins beneath the gills). Also after I got a chance, I was able to count the entire batch of fry.. which only added to about 25-30. I also made another mistake by trying to feed them frozen bbs (which they don't eat) and hikari first bites. They did not eat any of this. So I polluted their tank and was forced to do a 25% water change to remove the dirty food.
The combination of water changing (which you aren't suppose to do for the first few weeks) and the feeding of the uneatened food caused them to starve or stress. Therefore, the weaker ones died out quickly. After I realized that I had made a mistake, I started feeding the live worms. The other survivors quickly consumed these. However, not all the bettas knew what these worms were so some also did not eat these. Those starved unfortunately.
Finally, of the remaining 7-8 are still alive. Some of the fry are dark bodied and others are light bodied. The majority of the them are dark bodied I believe. Another mistake I made was breeding the female I chose. After breeding the pair, I isolated the female and after a month, she started to color up more indicating that she was still very young. Also, the other light colored bodied female also colored up and she has ice blue fins with a marbled body. The dark bodied female hasn't really changed at all so she is probably matured.
The seller I got these from did not indicate their age so I did not know. The mated mother died recently due to fish tuberculosis I believe. I will mate the male again with the other light-bodied female again at the end of august.
So in the grow up tank, I some cherry shrimp in there as a cleanup crew for their uneaten food. They seem to get along so everything is fine. The largest fry are approximately 1 cm from head to fin. One is dark bodied with red-ice blue-ish fins. I can't really tell. The other is light bodied and the fins are kind of light too.
I'm unable to take pictures; I'm in Taiwan for 2 months. All my fish are under my brother's care. He knows how to feed the live worms to the fry, but hatching bbs is a bit complex and I do not want to bother him with that task.
So... basically, expect me to RAOK at least one of these bettas by late august.The reason for this is because they are not show quality. They are deformed physically (lacking ventral fins). However, genetically they are perfectly fine. That means their offspring, if fed the right diet, will still have ventral fins.
I didn't prepare well enough for this breeding. I made the mistake of not feeding baby brine shrimp at all and only feeding microworms and bananaworms. Because of this, I'm assuming that the full grown bettas will be without ventral fins (fins beneath the gills). Also after I got a chance, I was able to count the entire batch of fry.. which only added to about 25-30. I also made another mistake by trying to feed them frozen bbs (which they don't eat) and hikari first bites. They did not eat any of this. So I polluted their tank and was forced to do a 25% water change to remove the dirty food.
The combination of water changing (which you aren't suppose to do for the first few weeks) and the feeding of the uneatened food caused them to starve or stress. Therefore, the weaker ones died out quickly. After I realized that I had made a mistake, I started feeding the live worms. The other survivors quickly consumed these. However, not all the bettas knew what these worms were so some also did not eat these. Those starved unfortunately.
Finally, of the remaining 7-8 are still alive. Some of the fry are dark bodied and others are light bodied. The majority of the them are dark bodied I believe. Another mistake I made was breeding the female I chose. After breeding the pair, I isolated the female and after a month, she started to color up more indicating that she was still very young. Also, the other light colored bodied female also colored up and she has ice blue fins with a marbled body. The dark bodied female hasn't really changed at all so she is probably matured.
The seller I got these from did not indicate their age so I did not know. The mated mother died recently due to fish tuberculosis I believe. I will mate the male again with the other light-bodied female again at the end of august.
So in the grow up tank, I some cherry shrimp in there as a cleanup crew for their uneaten food. They seem to get along so everything is fine. The largest fry are approximately 1 cm from head to fin. One is dark bodied with red-ice blue-ish fins. I can't really tell. The other is light bodied and the fins are kind of light too.
I'm unable to take pictures; I'm in Taiwan for 2 months. All my fish are under my brother's care. He knows how to feed the live worms to the fry, but hatching bbs is a bit complex and I do not want to bother him with that task.
So... basically, expect me to RAOK at least one of these bettas by late august.The reason for this is because they are not show quality. They are deformed physically (lacking ventral fins). However, genetically they are perfectly fine. That means their offspring, if fed the right diet, will still have ventral fins.
