spawning 101

just quickly sharing some spawning techniques. you can choose what to experiment with your pair, but knowing this ahead of time usually helps :)

generally, there are 2 ways of spawning (rough and gentle) and both requires some preparation. So let's get to it then...

Preparation:

• always feed more to your male and female, they need it...if possible, give nutritious food such as live food
• let the male build bubblenest, if he can't make the nest, then he's not ready!
• if your male tries hard to build the nest but it kept bursting, you don't have a good conditioning tank, so fix your tank (temp, water parameter, etc)!
• small 12-15" tank is better than large 2' tank
• plants etc optional, preferable not to have them (just disturbing female's view of male's nice nest)
• put something floating so male can make nice nest

Once you've prepared the above, then it's a game to introduce the female. Some would like to float the female or cage her in a transparent chamber. It's your choice, as long you don't disturb male's nest too much. If you release the female too soon (e.g. 1 or 2 days after introduction), then you are doomed to have rough spawning. This is because the male is still very much high on testosterone, he'll beat the crap out of the female. Similarly, the female is also quite high chemically, she's not having her eggs "matured" yet (hey, she just saw that good looking male for 2 days, what do you expect? the eggs are not ready to be handed on silver platter yet!)

Some people will further put temptation on both male and female, such as letting them see each other 10x a day, each for 10 mins window. This could last for 1 full week or up to 10 days. If you play this nicely, you'll have a very nice gentle spawning and be aware!!! you are going to end up raising 500-800 fry!!! You'll notice the female gets bouncy and bouncy on her tummy every day. Do not try this unless you know what you're doing, cause you may ended up with the female dropping her eggs (she just can't hold so many eggs for too long!!! after all, the gorgeous guy usually waiting next to her)

Last variation, which we have been doing for as long as we can remember, is to introduce the female for 2 days, then releasing her for half hour. This will cause the male to chase her up like crazy, the first couple of minutes she's going to entertain him by flaring etc, but then you'll notice that she's trying to get away as far as possible from the agressive male. Once you noticed that, cage her again for 2 more days. She'll grow appreciation of the handsomeness of the male ;)....Once you think she's no longer afraid of the male (and in fact the male doesn't even bother to try to kill her), you can release her again. Usually, in a matter of couple of hours, you'll see them spawning nicely. You may not get that 800 fry from them, but you get enough to keep you busy raising the raskals for months and months :)....and the bonus?? you have very gentle spawning.

Different situation warrants different styles. For instance, if you have very strong female (she's agressive and demand a lot from her male), then you have to use rough spawning technique. Why? cause she wants to make sure the gorgeous male is up to her standard! So, you don't have much of a choice. If you mistakenly use "gentle" approach on spawning, what you will ended up is usually 2 things: either one of them gets bored and not interested, or the female will beat the hell out of the male and your gorgeous male will become 'retarded' (e.g. shock of the spawning and unable to perform future spawning attempts). Hence, that's why spawning is always an "art" in betta keeping. Choosing your best male and female is just the first step on the grande planning to produce your dream goal. Making sure they really spawn usually poses more challenges. Oh, but wait....you haven't experienced how to raise the youngsters yet! Making sure they are on tip top condition so that you can be proud of them. As Homer Simpsons said after building his BBQ pit "Why doesn't mine look like that?!" Your youngster may not even ended up similar to their parents!!! :D :D

That's why some people even had to "take exercises" on mastering the technique. They choose multiple pairs, experiment on them to gain the experience....What do we think of all of these?? Well, some people can learn how to swim by reading books, others actually have to get to the pool and experiment spot on.....So you need to know your strength and weaknesses. OK, from time to time you get one or two people bragging about their spawning techniques....hey, sometimes they strike luck on their first spawning -- so they thought they deserve to brag ;) ;)....Perhaps it's not really bragging, it's more like "sharing your happiness"......Anyway, we advice you to go quietly to your fish room and experiment more. observe your fish, get to know their behaviour, see what they dis/like, and once you're in touch with them, you know when to spawn them ;).....every fish is different, other people can give you opinion, but you are the ones who'd know better, cause you can SEE your fish and observe them (others can only guesstimate what they look like)

Good luck on your spawning. If there are things that we can help to point you to the right direction, feel free to contact us (if we have time, we'll reply....otherwise, go and observe your fish more)

RSS and ATOM links above

Just quickly letting you know. If you'd like to get posted on what we've written here, then there is RSS and ATOM links for this blog made available above.

or alternatively you can always refer to it manually http://breedingsmybettas.blogspot.com/rss.xml and http://breedingsmybettas.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Read the post from any of your favourite readers :)

sample pic

some have been asking whether we can take some samples of what's still avail.

here they are. only 2 samples, sorry, just not having a "good" setup for taking any samples at all (notice how dirty they are, with all the gunks).





Here's avail stock list (each entry is 1 LOT):
* 10-15 long fin HM/SD, pastel mix red, black lace, green mask
* 10-15 short fin large giant cambo red HMPK
* couple of lots (20-25 each lot) of short fin HMPK cambo red, medium size
* 5 breeder quality females, short and long fin traits

If you are interested on any of the above, contact us on mybettas at gmail dot com.
each lot $100, shipping $25 (more or less, depending which shipping method chosen)


edit: strike-through lot is accounted for

the joy of courier

recently we've been having difficulties to acquire FW courier. Either the guy doesn't show up, or he refused to come due to urgent meetings etc. Maybe a simple complaint to FW is sufficient to get him sacked, but that wasn't nice at all.

Anyway, all in all we've dealt with very interesting set of couriers company. Some are more than happy to do business with individual like us, others are turning their cheeks away when they've heard it's "individual".

Most of these couriers have very simple rules, if they agree to deliver your goods, you better NOT let them know that you're shipping live fish. They get so edgy and would rather deny your business than risking compliances with "Aus shipping livestock law". But, if you assure them that the only requirements are to ensure your parcel delivered "on time" and treated as "fragile", most of them are more than happy to deliver them! Of course you lose the advantage of not being able to buy insurance etc, but then they won't be able to insure the kind of things that you're sending anyway ;)

So far, we've found that many local and interstate couriers can do the job for you. but sometimes the price difference is just way too much. FW requires you to buy labels, if you're small shipper, then buying bulk label will last you for years! A very unnecessary upfront investment. However, if you ship regularly, FW is in fact pretty reasonably cheap. Sure, half of the time they are unreliable. How many times the parcel went to another state? lost for a day or two? or you have to call them 10 times just to find out the fact the parcel never left your closest depot? Well, that's FW ! But when they do deliver, they're not so bad at all.... They charge per weight and different locations require different labels, try to keep track of that if you can ! Oh yes, they've got parcel tracking capability, but heck, no one knows how to use it, not even their own employees (try to call them up and ask where your parcel is, their answer will usually "on the way" or "with the driver"). They can't even monitor where their drivers are, so you're left waiting at home for no good reason.

Another alternative, if you're sending to big cities, AP isn't that bad. They've got network everywhere and you can just find nearest office to send your goods ;) They charge per weight and dimension, so you ended up paying different price for different size of order. The weakness is that some people has been reporting lost parcel. We never experienced this, but sure, it happens. You can't track where the parcel is, unless you're willing to pay heaps more. The bad thing for AP is that sometimes some remote locations will take a good 2 or 3 days to get there, whereas other couriers can make sure they arrive in 1 day.

Recently we've been sending some parcels with P&S. They're reliable. They take care of your parcel very nicely. But they charge per volume/dimension and suffice to say "very expensive"! Definitely can't use them on regular basis, though they have been trying to get eBayers' market. They're quite reasonable if you simply want to send your parcels without urgency. Most of our parcels need to get there in 1 day time, so they charge special prices for this urgency. Nevertheless, they're very reliable and ready to send anything you're throwing at them. So you can consider them as nice backup plans, particularly when none of the above options available to you and you need to send the parcel asap.

Other smaller (or bigger) courier companies work in very much same way. If you're lucky, you can even piggy-back your company's courier ;) This way, you can open account with any of the big courier companies and they'll deliver your goods pronto!! If you do have this option and willing to share it with us, do contact us asap. We're more than happy to pay for the shipping (reasonable cost of course) and while we're doing that, you can get some free fish yourselves! (on condition if we still have fish!)

local pickup or delivery beats all of the above. if we have time (which we never had), then we would be able to do it. Otherwise, some people had been very much accommodating us....they're willing to visit us on very awkward time!!

failed spawn, why?

there are a couple of reasons why some spawns failed. here are some reasons and story about them (we thought we better post this to answer some of most-common questions we've got!)

first of all, let's assume nothing wrong with the male nor female genetically. if you try to spawn a pure black melano female, then you're out of luck. you better spend your time and effort watching the grass grows, at least you'll see result that way :)

so let's start....failure could simply be because they are just not compatible. you've heard funny story as "they just be good friends there" when the male and female seemed to be quite happy together and not knowing that they are supposed to do something (or at least pretended to do something when a pair of human eyes keep watching them). this simply means the male and female are not ready. perhaps because they're too young, or they are just not attracted to one another. bettas are like human too you know....if the opponent is considered ugly, they're not doing it (but some bettas are more than willing to spawn with anything!). if you discovered that your betta is a let's-be-friend, then your best course of action is to call off the wedding, cause there won't be any! find another partner that is more suitable. how do you know if they're suitable? try to put the female in a tank with lots of males (caged), see which male that the female has "chosen". she'll flare her heart out to the most attractive male ;).... do the reverse to the male, if you'd like to choose bride for him

some have complained that their bettas are spawning, but none of the eggs hatched. sometimes the male even ended up eating all eggs, or he's just going to leave the eggs falling on the floor without bothering to pick them up anymore. sometimes you know the reason why the spawn failed - maybe they never wrapped after all, the female kept dropping her eggs. egg dropper is simpler to answer, it means either the male or the female has no experience in spawning. it could be that they are to be blamed, but most commonly it is YOU who needs to be blamed. they are inexperienced because they are too young....we have some buyers reporting this to us despite we've been telling them "big body doesn't mean they're ready to spawn". funny sometimes that people associate betta's size with their age. it maybe true for 'standard' bettas, but when they are dealing with giants, it's all different story!

anyway, what would you do with failed spawning due to egg dropping? you've got 2 choices: either you wait till they are mature enough and let them try it out again, or you find a much more experienced partner for them, so they can learn from the best ;).... unfortunately, sometimes fish can pick up "bad" habbit too...particularly the egg dropper female. she hasn't learned how to control her egg-release-valve (doh! what a term!) so that the next time she tries spawning, she may just conviniently drop eggs again. if you notice this, then you really have to get an expert male to teach her spawning lesson.

sometimes, the male and female are very much attracted to each other, but a week, 2 weeks, 3 weeks passed and still nada....this could be, usually, because they are equivalent strength. the male needs to show to the female that he's the "boss", more macho, stronger, and more than capable to take care of her babies. a sissy male will not be respected by a strong female, hence no spawning. if you have a gentle female, then sissy male perhaps sufficient. but if you have strong female (and many giant females are super strong!!), then you need stronger male. that's why in most spawning you see female's fins got torn, not because they enjoy the nipping, it's because it is a ritual for them - to show that the male is capable. if you're of weak heart seeing how the male chased and torn female's fin, then hopefully knowing the above helps you in appreciating their ritual - otherwise you really shouldn't spawn bettas!

sometimes you notice that they won't spawn cause there is no bubblenest in the tank. if this is the case, then you haven't provided the best place for them to spawn! is your tank too humid? too windy? is the water temperature is too low or too high? make sure you've got a perfect tank before attempting spawning, otherwise you're wasting everyone's time (and the poor male could be trying to blow his mouth without any result!). if you ignore this condition, you will end up with male "giving up" and learn that there is no point to blow the bubble anymore. this could have very bad influence on him on future spawning.

another reason for fail spawn, though happens infrequently, is due to the bugger's age...your bettas maybe too old!! they may wrap, they may have eggs, but most eggs could go fungus fairly quick. unfortunately, nothing you could do about this. though, you can try to find another partner for them and keep trying, perhaps you get some success....

so, what do we think of the best age to spawn bettas? in our experience, the best age would be around 5 or 6 months old, upto about 8 months....young bettas, if they are very active, can be spawned as early as 2 to 2.5 months (we did this and others have also done this). oldest bettas that we've spawned were around 1 year 3 month to 1 year 4 months old. again, this heavily depend on the type of bettas you've got, their body and agressiveness, etc.

choosing good male and female is crucial on any spawning. the male has to be larger or more agressive than the female. we've spawned smaller male to female ratio successfully, so we know that can be done, but this is a tough job for the male, cause he has to know the good technique to properly wrapped the female - and most males sux on knowing this! hence, it is much easier to find a larger male to ensure you've got successful spawning ;)........

as for giant short fin, spawning can be totally different game. some fish will be smooth and you aint see any difference between them and your traditional short fin. but for most giant short fin, spawning is a difficult task (go and ask other experts, they'll tell you the same!). the reason is because their body size (or rather their thickness) makes them very difficult to be wrapped. Most giant males can't wrap big-momma female. that's why if you try to buy giants from overseas, they will send you a much smaller female (well, there are many reasons why they send you smaller female, and this is one of the reasons). smaller female ensures that your male can always wrap her!

hope this helps you address your fish spawning difficulties. if you have some other peculiar cases, let us know, happy to add more stories to this blog.

nice surprise: fry under the hood

one of the breeding pairs, soon going to J&BC, had some fry in the tank!!!

we didn't notice this cause we had the tank all closed and we were so busy these couple of weeks. another reason why we didn't notice it is because we always give enough live worms for all of our fish, particularly the invidual tank ones. so there are times that we don't have to check them out for couple of weeks and we know they're still ok there.

anyway, the fry seemed to be of large size already, perhaps about 2 weeks time (where did the time go !). what surprised us is that they survived that long, without us feeding them anything, not even bbs....ok, perhaps it's not really that surprising, but the tank is full of plants :) there are all sorts of small animals there, so perhaps the fry have them as meals.

we were trying to breed the parent but then decided to let them 'stay' there without much paying attention to them. this is their first spawn and they had been chasing back and forth for awhile last time we check. we didn't think they'd spawn, cause the female was very agressive too (or at least she managed to torn male's fin on first round). so somehow the male must have tamed her (without visible torn on the fin too!).

anywho, the parents will go to J&BC whereas the fry will go to CR. There are only about 20 or so that we counted there, but counting is difficult task cause the darkness of the tank and how the plants pretty much took over the whole area. Chances there would be a lot more there, but we shall see later.

what's coming and going

most of our fish went to nice homes, including more than half of our breeders. some will go very soon next week. too bad we didn't have much of the time to take any of their pictures though, cause otherwise it would be nice memory to remind us of them. perhaps we get to see them in a couple of months time.

just news from AK, his share of the small fry had grown to very nice size of nearly 2 cm. not bad for a month old fry. he kindly offered some of them back, which of course we have to reject - cause we don't have the time nor the place to grow them. well, perhaps in the future.

CR is getting new fish imported as well as some of our breeders. Thanks for the offer of giving us the chance to spawn them, CR, we definitely will consider them in couple of months time. just keep them alive long enough waiting for us...

Finally, quickly listing what stock that we still have on us.
Breeder's quality fish:

• 10 HM giant female assorted colour, 3-3.5 months old, 2.5 inches (?)
  
• 5 HMPK giant female red cambo, 2.3-2.5 inches
  
• 2 giant HMPK female intense yellow, 2.4 inches

Standard quality (age 3.5-4.5 months):

• 10 large HMPK males (2.5-2.8 inches), cambo red mix (plat red, red marble, etc)
  
• 10 medium HMPK males (2.3 inches), same colour above
• 15 large HMPK females (2.2-2.5 inches), same colour
  
• 10 medium HMPK females, same colour

Reject quality (age 2.5 months):

• 5 HM giant, damage fin, no genetic fault, flare and fight all the time despite being separated
• some loosely placed bettas

Contact us if you're interested in any of the above, offer reasonable price. Shipping strictly via fastway courier with heatpack, $25. Shipping can be done only on Monday - Wednesday. Pickup can be arranged though shipping is much more preferred.

DOA policy (just in case someone asks), we'll send you replacement or your money back.