Stop My Betta From Over-eating?

My betta is in a 10 gallon community tank with neons and cories. Every time we fed the tank we would give him 2-3 micro pellets and maybe 10 ish we make sink for the 5 tetras then a sinking wafer for the cories. We realized pretty quickly that he was eating what we were giving the tetras AND trying to eat the cory food which ended in him being extremely bloated. We fasted the tank for a day, then fed everyone again and the same thing happened. We've now tried not specifically giving him any and he still ends up super bloated at the end of the night. We even tried feeding the cory food with the lights off and breaking it up so he can't get the whole wafer but still, he ended up bloated.
We're at a loss on how we can feed everyone without our pain in the butt eating until he looks pregnant. Any ideas? We're going to get peas today so we can give him a piece to deal with his bloating but I have no clue how to prevent this from happening consistently.

 

See if you can switch to a food that will take time for him to eat. I know flakes aren’t as wholesome as pellets, but there are some pretty good flakes on the market like omega one and I believe bug bites now has crisps. What I do for mine is I crush up some of the flakes, and I leave others whole. Bettas tend to go for the bigger flakes first, which also will take them a bit of time to eat. Once they are done, the community fish (whom have smaller mouths then bettas so would struggle with the larger flakes anyway) have finished all of the flakes you slightly crushed because it fits into their mouth better. As for the algae wafer, I try to put it right in front of my shrimp. They carry it off somewhere else. If she (my betta) doesn’t see it, it’s out of sight, out of mind. You could try finding a Cory food that is less appealing to bettas. Most will have some sort of filler that attracts fish, in this case attracting your betta

 

I'l

See if you can switch to a food that will take time for him to eat. I know flakes aren’t as wholesome as pellets, but there are some pretty good flakes on the market like omega one and I believe bug bites now has crisps. What I do for mine is I crush up some of the flakes, and I leave others whole. Bettas tend to go for the bigger flakes first, which also will take them a bit of time to eat. Once they are done, the community fish (whom have smaller mouths then bettas so would struggle with the larger flakes anyway) have finished all of the flakes you slightly crushed because it fits into their mouth better. As for the algae wafer, I try to put it right in front of my shrimp. They carry it off somewhere else. If she (my betta) doesn’t see it, it’s out of sight, out of mind. You could try finding a Cory food that is less appealing to bettas. Most will have some sort of filler that attracts fish, in this case attracting your betta

l will see fI I can pick up some flakes and try that! We do drop it right in front of our cories and our betta will still take it from them. Ill look into different wafers too. Thank you!

 

I'l

l will see fI I can pick up some flakes and try that! We do drop it right in front of our cories and our betta will still take it from them. Ill look into different wafers too. Thank you!

Most algae wafers will have some sort of fish meal in them. See if you can find one more veggie based

 

So over the past 2 months we've tried giveing our betta a big flake and crushing up others for the tetras, we've tried veggie based wafers, we've tried feeding them at night with the lights off, we've done a lot. Will it cause too much stress to our betta to float him in a cup when we have to feed? He's ends up bloated almost every day and we want to fix this issue before we upgrade to a 29 gal because more space=more fish=more food has to go in and the problem will only get worse. We just got a quarantine box that goes in the tank that we might have to use when we upgrade to the 29 if we can't figure anything out.

 

So over the past 2 months we've tried giveing our betta a big flake and crushing up others for the tetras, we've tried veggie based wafers, we've tried feeding them at night with the lights off, we've done a lot. Will it cause too much stress to our betta to float him in a cup when we have to feed? He's ends up bloated almost every day and we want to fix this issue before we upgrade to a 29 gal because more space=more fish=more food has to go in and the problem will only get worse. We just got a quarantine box that goes in the tank that we might have to use when we upgrade to the 29 if we can't figure anything out.

I tried this a few times. Being netted, caught, or chased by a container/net will make your fish feel unsafe. A fish will not eat if s/he does not feel safe. Also it would be stressful for both you and fish (some days will require more chasing and chasing a fish around a tank is stressful for that particular fish as well as the other inhabitants and frustrating for owners)
You can incoorperate fast days and try feeding less and see if that helps any

 

I tried this a few times. Being netted, caught, or chased by a container/net will make your fish feel unsafe. A fish will not eat if s/he does not feel safe. Also it would be stressful for both you and fish (some days will require more chasing and chasing a fish around a tank is stressful for that particular fish as well as the other inhabitants and frustrating for owners)
You can incoorperate fast days and try feeding less and see if that helps any

I assumed so, thank you. Will having fast days affect my cories and neons at all?

 

I assumed so, thank you. Will having fast days affect my cories and neons at all?

No. Fish can go a long time without food, and if they are more hungry they might eat faster

 

Bettas are pretty prone to bloating, especially if they over-eat. As you've obviously noticed.

I like Crimson's idea to try feeding them all at once at once. Bug bites are great food. All of my fish love them, especially my betta and neon tetras. They'll sink and some will reach the ground, so the cories can eat those.

I actually don't feed my cories anything. I just slightly overfeed my fish pellets and flakes. The cories and shrimp eat the rest.

Another idea is to individually feed the betta while the other fish are eating. I handfeed my betta with tweezers and he has learned that I mean food. So he always follows me around the tank. So you can feed him one pellet in a corner, then distract him by dangling food in front of him while you feed the other fish. Then give him a couple more pellets while they're eating.

 

Bettas are pretty prone to bloating, especially if they over-eat. As you've obviously noticed.

I like Crimson's idea to try feeding them all at once at once. Bug bites are great food. All of my fish love them, especially my betta and neon tetras. They'll sink and some will reach the ground, so the cories can eat those.

I actually don't feed my cories anything. I just slightly overfeed my fish pellets and flakes. The cories and shrimp eat the rest.

Another idea is to individually feed the betta while the other fish are eating. I handfeed my betta with tweezers and he has learned that I mean food. So he always follows me around the tank. So you can feed him one pellet in a corner, then distract him by dangling food in front of him while you feed the other fish. Then give him a couple more pellets while they're eating.

We have tried feeding them all at once, the betta will eat his food then go after everyone else. We've tried feeding him on one side of the tank and dropping food for everyone else on the otherside, still ends up bloated. The other day he actually flared for the first time at our cories to get their food from them.

 

One of my aquariums has a piggy in the shape of a Kissing Gourami and he constantly steals food from everyone else (Cory, Tetra, Pleco)......tried a few different things, including being like a Ninja and tricking him whilst sneaking food for the rest of the fish

The only thing that works for my piggy called Hamilton....turn the lights off cos he can't see the food for the other fish cos its too fine, all he can see is his own

Fish are sneaky....you just have to be more sneaky

 

One of my aquariums has a piggy in the shape of a Kissing Gourami and he constantly steals food from everyone else (Cory, Tetra, Pleco)......tried a few different things, including being like a Ninja and tricking him whilst sneaking food for the rest of the fish

The only thing that works for my piggy called Hamilton....turn the lights off cos he can't see the food for the other fish cos its too fine, all he can see is his own

Fish are sneaky....you just have to be more sneaky

Enrolling in ninja school now then lol. We only feed them with the lights off now and we don't see him get the food but in the morning hes bloated so he definitely finds it somehow. We'll just have to count on ninja training and being extra sneaky lol

 

One thing they don't tell you about when buying fish......you need to find your inner Ninja if you want to get the better of your fish's bad habits and weird behaviour.....fish have the unique talent of driving you completely up the wall, breaking your heart, emptying the bank account and being totally captivating & enchanting at the same time

 

If possible, finding your bettas food preference may help. What I did with one community betta was give her pellets while the other fish ate tropical flakes, as because the pellets had shrimp and garlic in them she preferred the pellets over flakes and went for those first, and by the time she was done all flakes were gone

As pagoda mentioned bettas do forage by sight so distracting her with something. Maybe dangle a treat above the water or maybe a mirror may be enough of a distraction

 

Speaking of mirrors, Crimson_687 has a good point there

I have added self adhesive squares of mirror film to the ends of both of my aquariums and since doing that both of my Kissing Gourami (one in each aquarium after they tried to kill each other) have been completely vain and spend ages looking at themselves, flaring and kissing their own reflections so whilst they are doing that, I get chance to feed the tank mates in relative peace

 

Speaking of mirrors, Crimson_687 has a good point there

I have added self adhesive squares of mirror film to the ends of both of my aquariums and since doing that both of my Kissing Gourami (one in each aquarium after they tried to kill each other) have been completely vain and spend ages looking at themselves, flaring and kissing their own reflections so whilst they are doing that, I get chance to feed the tank mates in relative peace

Never considered the mirror thing. That might just work, thank you both!

 

Never considered the mirror thing. That might just work, thank you both!

You may want to remove it after feeding though. Some bettas will become stressed by constantly seeing their reflection if they feel like their territory is threatened. Every fish acts differently though. I had one betta who was slightly curious but otherwise ignored it and another who was scared of it

 

You may want to remove it after feeding though. Some bettas will become stressed by constantly seeing their reflection if they feel like their territory is threatened. Every fish acts differently though. I had one betta who was slightly curious but otherwise ignored it and another who was scared of it

Definitely, I've never put a mirror to my bettas because it seemed like unnecessary stress so I'll only be using it as a distraction during feeding time.

 

Definitely, I've never put a mirror to my bettas because it seemed like unnecessary stress so I'll only be using it as a distraction during feeding time.

If your betta reacts by flaring, then in small amounts it will benefit by allowing the fish to stretch out their fins

 

mirror didn't work. I should've known because we picked our betta by putting him up to other bettas to see if he would flare, that way we would have a better chance of him getting along in a community tank. He completely ignored the mirror, I tried putting it in different areas of the tank and when he was looking in the direction, nothing. Even with the lights off he still managed to steal a piece of the cories food. I did get him to drop the piece by flicking the light back on then turning it off again when I fell out of his mouth so he struggled to find it long enough for our cory to get to it. If that's how we have to do it, I guess its a temporary solution but I'm all out of ideas