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)