Allie

Today I noticed Sammy darting at the 5 white cloud minnows a lot. They were going near him but suddenly he would dart at one & chase it down. I had a nap for a few hours this afternoon...came out and the is only 3 minnows left. I look at Sammy who is carrying a very chewed up body in his mouth.
He hasn't flared for a mirror yet...until tonight. He must have gotten feisty from the hunt & kill. I was watching go after one again he got the tip of its caudal fin. I figured Jasper would have been the one to get nasty with the minnows in his tank, there are some fully ignored in the sorority tank too.
YES I know minnows are suppose to be fin nippers but I haven't had any nipping problems ever with them.

Chief_waterchanger

Why didn't you seperate them after the two came up missing?

Allie

They were bought as feeder fish for the Datnoids...so they were going to be food eventually.

Chief_waterchanger

Ahh, just curious. Making sure you hadn't flipped your rocker watching your fish die, but since they were feeders I can rest assured that you haven't gone off the homocidal fishkeeper end.

Allie

lol....tho it is comical to watch fish hunt.

Tom

Have you tried feeding your datnoids well cleaned off earthworms?
Tom

Allie

Nope...they get blood worms & feeder once in awhile.

Allie

So he ate the last 3 minnows by the afternoon...now he's pretty quiet...must be full. So I took all the other minnows out of the other betta tanks...just in case they do eat them. They are the datnoids supper not the betta

COBettaCouple

He sounds like a Betta best kept without tankmates. at least minnows..

Allie

yup...unfortunately I won't get a chance to see if he could have different tank mates...he died overnight.

Tom

I'm sorry to hear that.
Tom

Mari

you think he died cuz he ate too much?

Allie

To be honest with you...I'm not sure if he died b/c he ate to much, ate a bad fish or had fin rot when I bought him. All of these factors killed him.

Tazmiche

Poor little guy but sounds like his last day here was a blast for him. I know it's nature for them to eat other fish and we need to feed them what nature intended but i couldn't deliberately feed live fish.

However the thought of him swimming with a fish in his mouth makes me really giggle, like a dog with a bone!

phlox

Bettas eat insects and their larvae in the wild, not other fish. The thought of another fish being ripped apart and eaten alive sickens me actually.

Allie

Then it's a good thing you haven't gotten into African cichlids or piranha. They both shred their prey or enemy to bits when they need to. Actually Africans are more aggressive than piranha.

phlox

Much as I would love cichlids or pirhana I could not handle feeding live fish. I always want to rescue the poor feeder goldfish and minnows when I see them in the stores.
Many years ago I was given a very large (almost 4 feet long) Savanah Monitor Lizard when a friend had to move and couldn't take him. I could not bring myself to feed him live mice! I fed him only chunks of beef coated with reptile vitamin powder. He ate them and did fine. I tied the pieces to thread and made him chase it around a little to simulate hunting prey. There must be a similar method for feeding some predator fish.

Allie

Yikes a Monitor!! I am not a fan of reptiles. I wouldn't let my bf use mice with our piranha...now that is gross & mean. He brought home 2 feeder mice...which I ended up keeping...which then turned into 9 mice. Needless to say I brought them all back to our LPS.