Friday 23 May 2008

Expression of interest anyone?

There are 11 pairs of our best young giants available, for those who are interested. They are exactly 2 months old::
1. gold giant pair HM, 8 rays
2. copper gold giant HM pair, 8 rays
3. black red (green scales) giant OHM pair, 8-16 rays
4. platinum red giant HMPK pair, 4-8 rays
5. platinum red (gold) HM giant pair, 8 rays
6. intense yellow HM giant pair, 4-8 rays female, 8 rays male
7. cambodian red HMPK pair, 8 rays
8. green HM giant pair, 8 rays
9. red loss cambodian HMPK giant pair, 4-8 rays
10. platinum red BF giant HMPK pair (perfect pattern), 4-8 rays
11. intense yellow giant HMPK pair, 4-8 rays

4-8 rays indicates that the fish minimally 4 rays but already has some rays split to 8. All of the above are for breeder-quality giants most with size close to 2 inches (for 2 months old, u can't beat that!).

Any of the above pairs are available for generous donor who support our charity cause, otherwise feel free to offer us suitable price :)

Tuesday 20 May 2008

Questions and Answers

From time to time, we've got a number of questions about bettas that we thought better be answered in this one page :) Thanks AB and PM for list of questions. If you have more questions to ask, shoot us email and we'll list them here. The list will be added from time to time. Here they are...

  1. Q: what size of tank for the giants? A: it varies, but larger size is better. Usually a 10" tank is good for 1 giant, 12" tank is the minimal for a pair.
  2. Q: What is the size of your community tank? A: Our "community" tanks typically the 140+ L plastic container (tank). We found plastic container is more durable compared to glass tank. Ever wondered the experience of broken glass tank? :)
  3. Q: How frequently do you change water, how, and how much? A: everyday, suck all water out to dry & take large bucket to pour to the tank back (mix hot and cold tap to make sure temperature is warm), all of it about 90+%
  4. Q: Do you put other chemical (de-chlorine, multicure, others)? A: no. the fish aint sick, why give meds?
  5. Q: Aren't you worry that you injured the fish? A: no, they are hardy as rock :)
  6. Q: Do you have death on your tank? A: yes, about 1 or 2 fish every week each tank, the weakest dies first
  7. Q: How much you feed your fish? A: each week we spent about $100 to feed them with live worms
  8. Q: Isn't it a little bit too expensive? A: yes, but we justify it as they gave us enjoyment. We believed it's better to feed your fish best food rather than leaving them malnourished :) Their colour is more vibrant, they are more active, and we gets lots of enjoyment from it...
  9. Q: What's the temperature of your tank? A: standard 20C - 28C. We use heaters in the tank (unreliable room temperature)
  10. Q: How many tanks do you have? A: range between 8 to 15. Currently we have 8 growing up tanks, 2 breeding tanks, soon we'll add another 4 breeding tanks, etc.
  11. Q: What's the secret of your successful betta spawn? A: correct tank size, good parentage, ready pair, abundance food, good temperature, and you're ready to go. Spawning is easy, successful large spawn is different. Rearing is different -- it needs diligent and knowledge. Similar to being "good" mother ;) there are tricks not widely available on the books. Individual breeders need to know their fish well (but not too much motherhood!!)
  12. Q: Do you use special technique in your breeding? A: if you mean meds or almond leave, no. Our breeding tanks are bare empty. Sometimes we put plant there for artistic value (not for breeding reason).
  13. Q: What's your smallest, average, and largest spawn size? A: smallest around 50 fry, average around 150, largest 800-1000 (lost count when they're too many of them).
  14. Q: What's the common disease you've experienced? A: old age? we don't have diseases at all. maybe perhaps ick, but that's because sometimes the heater dies (hence temperature drop). dropsy occurs rarely.
  15. Q: How many fish do you have and buy from others? A: the number of tanks give you indication of number of fish :) We have around 500-1000 fish at any single point in time, but usually only about 500. We buy fish from time to time, from local breeders but mostly imported from international breeders.
  16. Q: What do you do with your spawn? A: some are sold to other breeders or interested individuals, some are given away to boyscout members (we're active in boyscout), some going to pet shop, some are given away to support other activities (such as charity etc)
  17. Q: Do you have preferred international breeders? A: no, usually we work based on their words and some pictures. We do have some connections and monitor their stock regularly to see if anything fits our breeding program.
  18. Q: What's most disappointing things in breeding? A: watching the juvies fighting :) They flare very pretty but torn fins never been an enjoyment.
  19. Q: What's some silly questions asked to you from other people? A: not so much silly, perhaps just ignorant. Some didn't appreciate what we have and thought that all fish are "the same", hence expect the same price for example. There are so much different quality of bettas and one has to understand the reason behind a single "price". For instance, you can buy clothing from Target for $40 and that's decent and you can't compare that clothing with the one that you bought in big boutique. Not only the material is different, but the "style" is so apparent and different. Very much like comparing fake diamond and real one ;) The differences are sometimes so subtle...
  20. Q: I've bought fish from you before, can I still buy a pair from the "same" line? A: yes, provided the line survived. Sometimes we had to terminate the line (very unfortunately) due to various reasons.

Saturday 17 May 2008

For Sale or Charity

We have some giants young and adult available for sale or charity (while
stock lasts).

Prices as listed. You either:
  • pay us the prices for chosen fish, or
  • you donate the money to charity (MSF is recommended: http://msf.org.au) and pay us shipping cost if shipping is required
young giant HMPK
- age: 2 - 3 months
- length: about 2 inches
- colour: blue, red, yellow, platinum red, black maroon
* 2 rays pair: $30
* 4 rays pair: $50
* 8 rays pair: $80

adult giant HMPK
- age: 3.5-4.5 months
- length: 2.5+ inches
- colour: blue, red, yellow, platinum red, black maroon, green
* 4 rays each: $50
* 8 rays each: $80

young giant HM
- age: 2 months
- length: about 2.5 inches
- available in DTHM and HM lines
- colour: copper gold, gold, copper black, green, blue,
metallic green, yellow, platinum gold, black blue lace
* each: $40

Note that some fish may have very small nip due to growing and
sharing community tank.

Shipping cost $20. Pickup meeting can be arranged if you live in Sydney,
but not preferred, email us first to arrange time/date (have to bother
neighbour's son to help give fish).

Contact us at mybettas at gmail dot com if interested.

additional disclaimer: if you donate considerable sum to charity and would like to 'redeem' some fish, we're more than happy to choose some of the best of our lines to be sent to you. This is our way to acknowledge how thankful we are for your help to those who are in need. Please do not hesitate to 'redeem', as we're more than happy to share our fish to good person such as yourself. Thank you!

some more pictures of the green and lace. they are taken during feeding, too much disturbance and activity going on :). The green is taken on flash, the lace without flash. No pictures of DT atm, too difficult to take their pics, but roughly same size and beauty.

lace HM giant line

green HM giant line

More pics of the copper gold, DT and single tail HM. A little bit fuzzy but here they are :)

DTHM copper gold

copper gold sideway

Wednesday 14 May 2008

some pictures

here some pics of growout tanks containing red giant lines....

red spawn

another one...

red giant growout tank 1

more...

red giant growout tank 2

sample red platinum boy

red platinum giant boy 2 months

adult 3.5 months, 2.7 inches male

red giant 2.7 inches

its sibling female, larger than the male...at 2.8 inches

red giant female 2.8 inches

These lines are mixture of the pure red cambodian, red platinum, red gold, etc. All of them King Giant Betta HMPK lines (3 inches more).

AB's green spawn

here is the picture of green spawn that we did for AB (thanks for permission, AB).
Basically AB provides us the pair and we spawn them as part of our spawning service. This picture was taken about 1.5 weeks ago. This sunday, AB will take the whole spawn with her, congratulation on growing them up....

By quick calculation, there should be about 500 or 600 fry there, all grown to 3 weeks this sunday.

AB green spawn

Monday 5 May 2008

new blood

Now that we've emptied half of our tanks, time to introduce new bloods to the system :)

Currently we maintain a number of giant HM and HMPK lines including (but definitely not limited to):
  • red gold
  • gold
  • copper gold
  • green
  • melano
  • cambo red
  • intense yellow
  • platinum red
New blood to be introduced:
  • MG
  • copper gold
Apart from giants, we still have HM melano, blue, and yellow.

A few restructuring of the tanks happening as well now. We managed to reduce the number of tanks from 20 to 8. 7 of them are growing up tanks and only 1 tank has breeding pair at the moment (they just spawned yesterday!).