Is my Betta Splendens too skinny?

Hi Fishlorians,

I rescued Sky Draconis-Squāma last week from my local ptsmrt. He is very active and eats voraciously. I am feeding him once a day with a Top Fin floating betta pellet 42% crude protein (Fish and Shrimp meal as first two ingrediants) and two to three freeze-dried Daphnia from Zoo-Med. Am I feeding him enough? Are dorsal views of body shapes in attached chart useful?

Thank you in advance!

he looks like the ideal picture to me

Skinny or not, you can give it more than one pellet a day, or more than 2 to 3 freeze-dried daphnia. You don't want to overfeed, true, but 2 pellets will probably be just fine.

Looks okay to me. Bettas stomachs are about the size of one of their eyes. After they eat their belly should look round but not bloated.
Is this the food you're feeding? It says to feed considerably more. Now, those packages usually recommend feeding too much, but somewhere in the middle might be beneficial.

Bettas stomachs are about the size of one of their eyes. After they eat their belly should look round but not bloated.

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This is a commonly believed myth. You can read more about it here: Size - eye versus stomach | Fish Food Forum

Beautiful betta!!! He looks fine to me!

I guess every betta is different, but I like to feed three to four pellets at each feeding, and I feed twice a day with at least 8 hours between meals. I also don't have a fast day like a lot of keepers do. I change out pellet foods about every 6 months. When food is opened, it starts to lose it's nutrition. They put so much in one container that if you are feeding only one or two bettas, it would take forever to get through one container. It may sound wasteful, but I read a couple of articles written by aquatic vets that recommend replacing food every 6 months after opening.

For what it's worth, my favorite pellets are Ultra Fresh Betta Pro Shrimp Patties, but I also feed Fluval Bug Bites betta formula and frozen daphnia or brine shrimp when I can get it. Top Fin has a lot of differnt kinds of "meal" and personally I like to stay away from foods like that. Sounds like a lot of fillers to me.

If you're concerned about food sitting around too long, put it in the freezer and thaw small amounts every week or so.

I fear that I disagree with all the ‘conventional’ advice that’s out there concerning the feeding of bettas.

I’ll qualify that by saying that yes, some bettas (& many kinds of other fish as well) can be very greedy feeders and being fat is as bad for fish as for any other creature. There need to be reasonable limits.

But there is sooooo much advice out there about bettas specifically being very greedy and having a stomach that is very tiny and I also strongly disagree with that size-of-an-eye mantra because it makes no sense to me.

A stomach is not a jar or a can with finite dimensions. Stomachs can stretch - sometimes quite dramatically and wild fish generally will gorge when they find food in abundance because abundance is typically temporary.

For fish it’s a case of ‘get as much as you can while you can’ because tomorrow, who knows if you’ll find dinner.

I feed bettas the same way I feed most fish, with a limit on how much time they have to eat the food, if I’m feeding dry food.

For dry food they’ll get as many pellets as they care to eat during a period of time - 15-30 minutes for most of them and maybe 5 minutes for one that always seems to inhale food as fast as it can. After a week of doing that, I have a very good idea of how much a given betta is going to consume and I give that much, mainly to avoid wasting food.

None of my fish have ever become obese or fat with this feeding regime. And none have ever been too thin (except at purchase perhaps), let alone emaciated.

Sadly, I have seen far too many pictures of terribly emaciated bettas whose owners surely must have had the best of intentions but were starving them to death slowly due to fear of overfeeding.

When I feed live foods, which I greatly prefer to do for bettas, they have unlimited access to the live food at all times. They catch and eat what they want when they want.

Mainly it’s scuds & daphnids, but I offer worms when I can along with fruit flies & their larvae, brine shrimp & anything else I can manage to provide. Foods that won’t live too long in water are given with that in mind so there aren’t things like a pile of dead fly larvae lurking later on.

Live fed fish don’t get fat either and I believe that hunting for their dinner provides the best enrichment of their environment that’s possible.

I fear that I disagree with all the ‘conventional’ advice that’s out there concerning the feeding of bettas.

I’ll qualify that by saying that yes, some bettas (& many kinds of other fish as well) can be very greedy feeders and being fat is as bad for fish as for any other creature. There need to be reasonable limits.

But there is sooooo much advice out there about bettas specifically being very greedy and having a stomach that is very tiny and I also strongly disagree with that size-of-an-eye mantra because it makes no sense to me.

A stomach is not a jar or a can with finite dimensions. Stomachs can stretch - sometimes quite dramatically and wild fish generally will gorge when they find food in abundance because abundance is typically temporary.

For fish it’s a case of ‘get as much as you can while you can’ because tomorrow, who knows if you’ll find dinner.

I feed bettas the same way I feed most fish, with a limit on how much time they have to eat the food, if I’m feeding dry food.

For dry food they’ll get as many pellets as they care to eat during a period of time - 15-30 minutes for most of them and maybe 5 minutes for one that always seems to inhale food as fast as it can. After a week of doing that, I have a very good idea of how much a given betta is going to consume and I give that much, mainly to avoid wasting food.

None of my fish have ever become obese or fat with this feeding regime. And none have ever been too thin (except at purchase perhaps), let alone emaciated.

Sadly, I have seen far too many pictures of terribly emaciated bettas whose owners surely must have had the best of intentions but were starving them to death slowly due to fear of overfeeding.

When I feed live foods, which I greatly prefer to do for bettas, they have unlimited access to the live food at all times. They catch and eat what they want when they want.

Mainly it’s scuds & daphnids, but I offer worms when I can along with fruit flies & their larvae, brine shrimp & anything else I can manage to provide. Foods that won’t live too long in water are given with that in mind so there aren’t things like a pile of dead fly larvae lurking later on.

Live fed fish don’t get fat either and I believe that hunting for their dinner provides the best enrichment of their environment that’s possible.

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I am working on the live feed. My building and my fish's grand parents place has a constant infestation of fruit flies. I placed a jar of old tank water and some soil out on my balcony. During the summer months, when infestation is at its worst, leaving the tank uncovered while I am present will be a feeding frenzy! For now, I will feed what ever critter that swims in that jar to my betta Sky as a supplement.

Skinny or not, you can give it more than one pellet a day, or more than 2 to 3 freeze-dried daphnia. You don't want to overfeed, true, but 2 pellets will probably be just fine.

Click to expand...

I increased to two pellets and 2-3 freeze-dried daphnia. Sky was full after that and he left a few extra pellet and daphnia floating, which I removed after 5 minutes.

Is this the food you're feeding? It says to feed considerably more. Now, those packages usually recommend feeding too much, but somewhere in the middle might be beneficial.

Click to expand...

Recommendation on the bottle of Top Fin floating color pellets says 3-4 pellets twice a day. Right now my fish is full at 2 pellets and two to three daphnia.

This is a commonly believed myth. You can read more about it here: Size - eye versus stomach | Fish Food Forum

Click to expand...

Yes, I am pretty sure my stomach stretches after a good Chinese Hibachi buffet. So maybe once a week, I should do a eat as much as betta wants day followed by a fasting day. Then with regular feedings everyday.

Beautiful betta!!! He looks fine to me!

I guess every betta is different, but I like to feed three to four pellets at each feeding, and I feed twice a day with at least 8 hours between meals. I also don't have a fast day like a lot of keepers do. I change out pellet foods about every 6 months. When food is opened, it starts to lose it's nutrition. They put so much in one container that if you are feeding only one or two bettas, it would take forever to get through one container. It may sound wasteful, but I read a couple of articles written by aquatic vets that recommend replacing food every 6 months after opening.

For what it's worth, my favorite pellets are Ultra Fresh Betta Pro Shrimp Patties, but I also feed Fluval Bug Bites betta formula and frozen daphnia or brine shrimp when I can get it. Top Fin has a lot of differnt kinds of "meal" and personally I like to stay away from foods like that. Sounds like a lot of fillers to me.

Click to expand...

I will ask his grand parents to buy Ultra Fresh Betta Pro Shrimp Patties as my birthday gift in February, which will be a good time to get rid of the Top Fin pellets. Thank you for your suggestions

If you're concerned about food sitting around too long, put it in the freezer and thaw small amounts every week or so.

Click to expand...

That is a great idea, doing it now with the bottle!

Just so I don't get reported to PETA... Tonight's meal, plus two other bits of dried Daphnia that I gave to Sky by finger for training purposes.