P5BDeluxe

Im looking for a good tankmates for my female betta.My new tank maybe will be able to hold 40 gallon to 50 still haven't decided yet so im just planing ahead.Any good tankmates for my female betta?

nmwierman1977

Well with any Betta male or female you need to be watch for any aggressive behavior when there are tank mates involved. Some good tank mates that the Betta may not mind in their tank are otocinclus catfish, Cory catfish, loaches, African dwarf frogs. Any type of bottom feeder really would be OK with them. Anything else you are taking a big risk with even if the Betta doesn't feel threatened by them. Those fish fish could be more of a danger to them then they are to them. I'm talking about guppies, tetras, any type of mid tank swimmers only because most of those fish are fin nippers and may see your Betta's fins as playful toys to chase and nip at ad then you will have problems with finrot/tailrot. So, stick with the bottom dwellers only. Hope this helps. Natalie

Jendayi

Jett is in with a good sized Apple Snail. He is curious about her and follows her around some, but is not messing with her at all.

P5BDeluxe

Are they anymore fishes beside that?

Phloxface

Bettas always do best alone or with just a mystery snail. They are not by nature community fish and living in such close quarters with many other fish is stressful to them.* There is also always some bettas that simply cannot get along with ANY fish.* I have 5 females and I would not trust ANY of them with any type of fish. They are much too aggressive. I have a Mystery snail in with one of them and after 3 weeks she learned to stop biting him and he is finally crawling around and cleaning algae although she still goes after him sometimes. A snail has a shell for protection, a fish would have been killed by her long ago, and she is the LEAST aggressive of the 5 females.* Even if you get a female and put her in a tank with other fish, you will always need to have a backup plan (another tank) if she shows signs of stress (stress stripes) or aggression.

armadillo

Aaaah, I was wondering what people used against algae in a betta tank. I've got a couple of questions if you don't mind:

Aren't snails really sensitive to medication? If you have to medicate your betta, do you always remove the snail?

With apple snails, is there the tiniest risk of a snail plague, as can happen with smaller aquarium snails?

Phloxface

Yes, you do need to remove the snail if you medicate. Snails do just fine in an unheated container. Just have the water in the snail tank the same temp as the Betta tank and let it cool down slowly to your room temp. Just make sure you feed the snail* veggies or algae pellets since there will be no algae in the snail tank. Change water every second day and treat with water conditioner such as Prime or AmQuel+ to control ammonia.

Mystery snails require both a male and female to reproduce. Regular pond snails do not which is why if you have even one, you will soon have hundreds. No danger of that if you keep only one mystery snail. You don't want more than one anyways because they poop a lot and it is too much of a bioload to keep more than one.* The tank does require regular gravel vacumming and big water changes each week (about 30-40%) to keep things clean. They do a fairly decent job of cleaning algae but I try to scrub the algae off of the tanks sides and ornaments myself so the snail will concentrate on cleaning the gravel and plants. If you have lots of algae you don't need to feed the snail anything extra. It will make him lazy and he won't clean algae. If you don't have much algae then a half of an algae wafer every second day should do. Put it right in front of the snail or the Betta will steal it from him.

armadillo

Thanks for that! I'll think about it.

Jendayi

What she said Great answer, and I can confirm all of this based on my experience with Fuji. The only problem I've had so far is that I had to stop feeding her algae wafers because Jett won't stop eating them, too. I have been adding a few more pieces of vegetables in her veggie clip and she seems to be fine with that. She eats algae too, but she's not great at it. I just use a soft piece of filter media to scrub my tank since it's acrylic.

Fuji came to me 'in a family way' from the community tank at the petstore, and I learned the hard way to check up under the light hood for eggs. She had laid three clutches before I discovered them, and at least part of two had managed to not get cooked by the light and hatch. I got 17 baby snails out of my tank into a cup, and now they are living in my one gallon tank with gravel and a filter. I know I missed one baby, but I haven't seen him in a while, hopefully he is just being elusive and not dead. One of the forum members here said they don't breed until they are a half-inch in size, so before that time I will take them back to the LFS.

armadillo

Mmmmm, am after an algae eater to go with a betta. If that snail doesn't eat algae, it rules it out for me am afraid.

Snail eggs under your light hood sounds gross! I'd definitely not enjoy that little surprise.

Would otos be OK with a betta?

nmwierman1977

Yes, you can put an oto in with a Betta, but just remember to watch out for any aggressive behavior. They can be aggressive with anything that comes in contact with them. They are usually ok with Oto cats because oto cats don't usually get in their way and if they do try to chase them the oto cats are much faster than the Betta is. Natalie

armadillo

Yeah, fast they are! Thanks, for that Nathalie.

Phloxface

Mystery snails will eat algae but only if you have algae for him to eat and you DON'T feed him anything else. If you feed him other food of course he will not be hungry and will get lazy and not go looking for algae. I have never fed my snail anything. He has plently of algae in the tank so he never goes hungry.

Otos are usually fine with a Betta, but, you never know. Some Bettas are so aggressive that they will chase and harrass and eventually kill any other fish. You always need to have a back-up plan with Bettas. Snails are usually safe from them because they have a shell and they don't move fast so Bettas won't chase. Bettas will get curious and nip at them at first for a while but then just leave them alone.

armadillo

I went to another fish store today and saw a whole bunch of adult mollies with a male betta, and they were all really peaceful. The LFS told me the betta was an adult (lack of aggression not explained by the fact that it was a juvenile). Could it be that American bettas are more aggressive?

COBettaCouple

well, bettas don't really know what country they're in.. the betta could be sick or bullied by the mollies that outnumber him. he could be just new in the tank.. who knows? it's hard to know what conditions, etc are in the tank.. bettas pretty much are bettas. they have personalities of their own, but in part do what instinct and breeding tell them to

armadillo

They don't know what country they're in, but there could be different local breeding selections going on, or local genetic trends.

I"ll ask him how long that set-up was going on for. LIkely not so long given the turnover of sold fish.