read in book, suggest 1 male and 2 female betta in one (large) tank. Wonder.

I was reading through a book in the store that was focused on recreating natural habitats in the aquarium for specific regions. Now mind you, the focus in the book was not centered just around fish, but concentrated on substrate, plants, other natural decor, and even filters, lighting and water parameters, but they did list the regional fish, and some suggestions for stocking. They also leaned toward very light fish loads. Their sample tank for Southeast Asia was a 44 gallon, and when they mentioned fish choices one was 1 male betta and 2 female betta. This regional tank was also extremely heavily planted (enough that you couldn't see the back of the tank), like the natural shallow water tropical habitat there (not mud puddles or any of the nonsense the betta bowl people try to lead you to believe). They didn't specify ornamental or wild bettas, although the picture was a typical veil-tail.

This seemed to be a well researched book, but I have never heard elsewhere anyone suggest putting a male with females in the same tank, no matter how big or heavily planted. Now I hope no one things I'm endorsing the idea, because I am very skeptical. I'm just wondering if anyone else has heard of anyone trying this, or suggesting any such set-up.

Note they did not indicate that the water quality should be poor in any particular way except in the fact that it was slow moving and thus tended to be oxygen poor (the reason for the labyrinth organ), and low pH (largely due to heavy vegetation). I really do not know where some people get the idea that bettas, even wild ones, come from any conditions that resemble a contaminated betta cup. Actually these conditions might by high in dissolved organics from plants, but this is a far cry from living in their own potty water. Actually the vegetation should absorb all of the ammonia and nitrates.

 

It can be done, but is NOT recommended to be done by 95-99% of those that keep fish, because it takes a lot of knowledge as to what behaviors you are looking for and what sorts of items should be in the tank to make this situation work properly, and what size tank/body of water it would require. Items would include plants, decorations/obstructive objects, caves, wood, etc.

Dino has a bachelors in biology and has 30 years in the fishkeeping hobby, and for those two reasons we are able to do some alternative methods of fishkeeping that most do not have the knowledge to attempt.

 

Definitely not recommended for the faint of heart and not recommended with fish you really care about as the potential for loss of the fish is great. If you are a dare devil and just want to see what will happen no one will stop you but realize you are risking your fish. In the wild they would have all kinds of room to find places to hide and infinite room to run away. In even the biggest of tanks there are walls and the places to get away are limited no matter how many plants and caves and places to get away you put in there. Eventually there is going to be confrontation and perhaps a bad outcome. If I really cared about fish (and I do) I would consider their welfare and instinctive traits before my wants and wishes and do what I thought was really the smart thing to do to protect and care for them rather than what was "possible".

Rose

 

I am not sure that a male and female would do well even in our 120g. They'd have to be pretty passive betta. Even then you don't know how they'll act when they see a female that they can touch. Sunny literally bites on the glass dividers....so I really don't want to see what he could do if he could grab the other betta? JB is twice his size and I had to move him away b/c Sunny was scaring him, lol.
A large female sorority tank 30g+ has been working for the betta breeders I have been talk to to & reading up on. Lots of plants, hiding spots and betta girls.

 

My boyfriends father (before we switched to saltwater) had a 75Gal tank and kept two male bettas, and five females.
In the first couple of minutes that he put the two males in, they had one small flareing contest, then swam away from each other. They kept out of each others fins and minded their own for the 3 years he had both of them.
Ha, I NEVER thought that would've worked out (one of the males was actually acting pretttyyy aggressive before they were put in together.)
The females also didnt bother fighting with each other, and they actually swam around together.
The males and females didnt even pick at each other, just bread a lot!
His tank was heavily planted and he had lots of caves and tubes for the fish to hide in and to name their own territory.

I neverrrr thought it would of worked out, but I guess he got lucky.
He was also into fish keeping for the better part of 30 years.

I've also had a male and a female betta in the same tank, and it worked fine.
They didnt pick at each other and showed no sign of being agressive. I did have tetras in there with them, and the male eventually had to be moved because of fin nipping.

The male was actually the boy in my signature, Kiko.

 

I always wondered how Bettas live in their habitat? Nobody separates them in individual cups, nobody limits their food to 3-4 pellets twice a day... How do they stay alive without fighting or overeating to death?

 

The Bettas that live in the wild don't have steady food and live in large bodies of water, so they don't really get a chance to overeat and are able to stake out a territory.

 

As I have said, we cannot keep people from doing what they want with their own fish but we will not recommend that they do things that we feel are not wise. I feel that recommendations that this be done should be done on an individual basis and be clearly stated that the person stating that they recommend it being done is doing so on their opinion only. It is not the position of anyone in authority here that I am aware of that males and females be kept together by anyone who does not have a lot of experience or who is not totally willing to accept the consequences of whatever may happen to their fish. Giving the impression otherwise is not a good idea. We have members who have had a lot of fishkeeping experience who may be able to do things that would not be ordinarily regular fish care for the most of us. But keep in mind that they have the ability and the equipment to deal with the situations. And the knowledge to handle the problems that may arise. Not many of us do.

Rose

 

I always wondered how Bettas live in their habitat? Nobody separates them in individual cups, nobody limits their food to 3-4 pellets twice a day... How do they stay alive without fighting or overeating to death?

Bettas in the wild don't have glass walls to keep them from swimming away from another fish bothering them. Theres just a lot of difference in an open water system and a closed one like an aquarium is, no matter how big the glass box is.
As for food, in the wild they have a bigger selection of natural foods to choose from when they want to choose
Carol

 

Yes, bettas in the wild are also much more active and have to actively hunt down their food. This level of activity would reduce the tendency to get constipated along with a much more varied diet.

I wouldn't want to try to mix males and females in the same tank myself, if I was going to set-up a complicated large natural habitat tank I think there are much more interesting fish selections for that type of tank anyhow.

I did find it interesting to see it suggested in a book, and I imagine that success with this would probably be greater with more wild types of bettas.

 

Betta MahachaI are one that we have no problem cohabitating. We've had a male and female together in a 20-30g tank for the better part of a year now. They don't eat their fry, and we don't pull the fry until they are being sold. (They are prone to jumping though.)

We have 2 of another type of "wild" bettas in a 30g, but they have their occasional bouts unless there are lots of dense plants for them to not see one another.

But I agree that other than the uncommon instances that the keeper has decades of experience with fish behavior and specific indepth knowledge of the species in question (betta splenden), there would be a great likelyhood of semI to full failure of the experiment due to death and/or extreme injury of the subjects (the bettas.)

 

Yea, our MahachaI (5) and Picta (3) are happy in their groups. I believe a few other Betta species can be kept together safely like that.