Okay, the other day I saw a tank at a wonderful LFS that had around five female betas and one male beta. They were all beautiful and they seemed to be getting along. Is it normal for male and female bettas to get along?
I'm wondering because my roommate has a really pretty boy and this great
LFS has really pretty girls...seeing the girls and boy together at the LFS made me think of getting J.W (my roomates betta) a girlfriend.
Would it be an okay idea to get J.W a buddy or would it be foolish? I'm also wondering how and when they breed and even if they would breed. I'm not sure I want baby Bettas but it would be cool if it happened. How do you take care of babies?
Gosh I feel dumb not knowing anything about bettas...please help enlighten me
Full Version: Betta Questions...
I'm not sure why that LFS had the two sexes together...
Males should never be kept together because they will kill eachother. Most females, if introduced to the tank all at the same time in a group of at least 5 with a suitable size tank and lots of hiding places can get along. A lot can't tho. Males and females should never be kept together for long periods, they can kill eachother. They should only be together when breeding, and they must be supervised. Its best to keep bettas alone, they don't really need buddies
Males should never be kept together because they will kill eachother. Most females, if introduced to the tank all at the same time in a group of at least 5 with a suitable size tank and lots of hiding places can get along. A lot can't tho. Males and females should never be kept together for long periods, they can kill eachother. They should only be together when breeding, and they must be supervised. Its best to keep bettas alone, they don't really need buddies
Good posting Kissy. 
When my Betta's spawned,I was totally surprised at how young the fry were when they started picking at each other.It's just natural born instinct I guess. I can't imagine a group of girls and a male,unless they all came from the same spawn.Although my babies picked,I was able to keep them together for a while before I knew I needed a much bigger Fry tank,or that I needed to start seperating them.That's the only thing that I can think anyway. You very seldom see tanks of females often,let alone females with a male. Strange.... 
When my Betta's spawned,I was totally surprised at how young the fry were when they started picking at each other.It's just natural born instinct I guess. I can't imagine a group of girls and a male,unless they all came from the same spawn.Although my babies picked,I was able to keep them together for a while before I knew I needed a much bigger Fry tank,or that I needed to start seperating them.That's the only thing that I can think anyway. You very seldom see tanks of females often,let alone females with a male. Strange....
IF you have 3+ girls in a larger tank (2ft), and IF they're all the same temperament and IF they've been together since they were young and IF there's plenty of places for them to hide, you can get away with it.
That's four IFs in case you lost count.
Two fish would never work. One would have to be the dominator and one would have to be miserable and hide all the time. There's no spread to the pecking order.
Often in a tank full of females with one male, the male ends up hen pecked and miserable since the girls can all swim faster than him.
I have seven girls and three of them are killer dominators, two of them are just a bit stroppy and only two of them are placid enough to get along without arguing, they're also young and sisters. I've had to remove another the same age for picking on one of them and also to separate two other sisters who poked each other's eyes out.
If you got a girl betta, you'd need to get her her own tank.
Breeding bettas means you have to condition the adults on live food, be prepared to have them lose chunks of finnage and also you have to breed live microworms and baby brine shrimp to feed the babies twice a day or they will all die. It's not easy. And if you're successful you have to find around 100 containers for baby bettas and heat them until you find each one a home.
That's four IFs in case you lost count.
Two fish would never work. One would have to be the dominator and one would have to be miserable and hide all the time. There's no spread to the pecking order.
Often in a tank full of females with one male, the male ends up hen pecked and miserable since the girls can all swim faster than him.
I have seven girls and three of them are killer dominators, two of them are just a bit stroppy and only two of them are placid enough to get along without arguing, they're also young and sisters. I've had to remove another the same age for picking on one of them and also to separate two other sisters who poked each other's eyes out.
If you got a girl betta, you'd need to get her her own tank.
Breeding bettas means you have to condition the adults on live food, be prepared to have them lose chunks of finnage and also you have to breed live microworms and baby brine shrimp to feed the babies twice a day or they will all die. It's not easy. And if you're successful you have to find around 100 containers for baby bettas and heat them until you find each one a home.
Is there anything that can go with bettas? a snail maybe?
I have always kept my betta's in 10 gallon filtered tanks with apple snails. They have always gotten along great - although some may not handle it well.
Yep, snails and any tropical fish that isn't nippy (barbs are nippy) and doesn't look like it might be another betta (some fancy long tail guppies look like bettas). Bottom feeders like bristlenose work well because bettas occupy the top part of a tank mostly.
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