I don't understand why people think Bettas are happier in a small container either. I have been in Petsmart shopping and twice now overheard the sales person talking to customers wanting to buy a Betta that they are happiest in a small bowl or vase
and they like their water cool
and the bowl/vase only needs to be cleaned about once a MONTH!
Both times I waited until the sale person walked away and sidetracked the customer telling them I have a Betta and that they most definately are NOT happy in a small container. I set them straight on the proper care of Bettas and managed both times to convince the customer to buy a little bit bigger container. Neither wanted a big tank sadly
but at least I showed them the BIGGEST bowls in the store (I would guess about 2 gallons) and told them to keep it clean, keep it in a warm place and keep it covered. Oh, can you believe the sales person also told those customers to feed their Bettas 12 pellets twice a day! :
I made sure those people knew that the betta would explode if you fed them that much. Geez if you just read the directions on the package it clearly says 2-4 pellets twice a day! I may not have been able to negotiate a large tank for those Bettas but I hope they'll have a less miserable existance than they otherwise would have. I find if you approach people in a non-confrontational way and try to be helpful they will listen. Everytime Petsmart gets a new shipment of Bettas, they sell out quite fast. I'll bet nearly 99% of them end up in tiny "Betta displays" no bigger than the cup they were bought in, vases, tiny bowls or worse, those tiny HALF bowls (anyone seen these at Petsmart?) or a lava lamp where the fish can live in terror for the remainder of it's short life with a tornado of bubbles and flashing colored lights and NO place to escape and hide! Why does the Humane Society not put a stop to these things??!!
I'm going to write a letter to the head office of Petsmart and let them know how I feel about them selling tiny "Betta containers" and even worse Lavariums (even the name sounds like an insane asylum!) which are downright CRUEL! They are a company who cares about pets so they should LISTEN to the customers and NOT sell things that promote cruelty to animals, and fish are animals too! No one would even think to sell a device that would let you put a cat into a tiny space where it could barely turn around, blowing a hurricane of air into the container and frightening it with colored lights! It would be barbaric and yet no one thinks twice about doing that to a Betta (or Guppy) If Petsmart really cares about pets they need to remove at least these Lavariums so people will know how inappropriate and cruel these things are.
Lava was in that Lavarium for days. He's completely traumatized. He's swimming around my tank right now furiously and flaring at everything. I'm worried he is getting too stressed. He won't eat anything I give him. I tried Hikari Betta Bio-Gold pellets (which Phlox LOVES), bloodworms, and a flake food for Bettas crumbled small. He tried things and them spits them out and takes it again, spits it out and finally abandons it. He does not come to the top when I drop food. He does not trust people anymore. He is physically healthy but psychologically damaged. Maybe in time he can forget his experience in the Lavarium. Right now I'm worried about his stress level. He is SOOO different from Phlox! Phlox is such a friendly, curious little puppy dog-like fish, playing and racing around his aquarium and he always meets me at the top of the tank and practically snaps the food right out of my fingers. Lava doesn't seem to watch my hands and won't even look up when I put food in. He only discovers it by chance and then eats, spits, eats, spits etc. He doesn't respond the way Phlox does at all. He does however watch me when I'm not looking. I find him staring at me. I'm trying to talk to him and get him to trust me. It may take some time...
Even though I wasn't planning on getting him his new aquarium until next week when I get paid, I'm so worried about his anger and stress I've decided to go buy him the same 10 gallon tank Phlox has today. It will have to come out of my grocery money but so what? I can live on mac and cheese for a week.
Hopefully the exercise of swimming around a bigger tank will calm him down. I'll give him lots of bushy soft plants to hide in when he's anxious and his own "house" like Phlox to explore and sleep in. Maybe with some other distractions he can forget his trauma. There's not much I can put in his 2 gallon tank now other than one plant. There's just no room. I'm also worried about causing him more stress by having to clean his small tank every second day. I don't want to give him more reason to mistrust humans by chasing him with the net every second day.
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He was floating at the top sucking what little air he could get and desperately trying to avoid the explosion of bubbles going up the center! He looked near death yesterday so I was hesitant to buy him. I told myself if he's still alive today it's a sign that I was meant to get him. Well, he was still clinging to life. I asked the girl there to get him for me and told them how cruel I think it is to keep any living creature in such a small container! She agreed. (she wasn't the one who put the fish in there) Hopefully that "tank" will remain empty and UNSOLD! 
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