Feeding Bettas is actually pretty
easy. Of course there are some consideration depending on what you are trying to
accomplish, but the Betta only wants to eat good food and wants to eat lots of it.
The fish will not need to fed as often or
with as much as it seems to want. Remember that this is a "wild" critter and is
driven by instinct. They will feel that they must "eat it now" for tomorrow may
never come.
As you approach the tank and the fish comes
forward, it is not hunger that drives the fish but the training that you have provided.
One of those instincts is survival but the
driving instinct is procreation. These fish will eat to create the spawn. If you don't
wish to create a situation where the fish is going to spawn, you will not need to feed it
as much nor the same sort of food as you might want to consider for conditioning the fish
for the
spawning event.
Bettas prefer to eat from the upper parts
of the water column. They do not particularly enjoy eating from the bottom of the tank.
We're not saying that they won't eat from the bottom...we see them do that in our shop all
the time.
It's just that the placement of the
eyes and that upturned mouth rather lead us to believe that they eat primarily form the
water surface in a natural environment. That just may be one of the reasons that they are
so fond of mosquito larvae.
Any of the better quality Betta specific
foods are fine for maintaining the fish. We like Betta
BioGold. The fish do fine with these foods and we're sure that other combinations will
be fine also. We feed flakes and pellets as soon as the fish are able to get them into
their mouths. This is generally sometime between the end of month one and the beginning of
two months of age.
We do however, prefer to feed live and
frozen foods. We do this for several reasons. First, it's part of our firm's
"culture" with our association with The
Bug Farm. Second, we have found that the mess that is created by prepared food as
opposed to that created by live foods is tremendous. Using primarily live foods has meant
that the tank (and jar) maintenance is significantly less.
When fish are in our program as breeders or
potential breeders they are always fed from a menu that primarily consists of live foods.
During the conditioning process no prepared foods are fed and the only frozen food would
be bloodworms. We know from past experiences that fish will create bigger spawns which
seem to be more vigorous when they hatch if the diet of the paired fish consists of lot of
protein. We think that the act of "hunting" their food helps to nurture those
internal instincts in addition to adding the vital proteins that seem to create the
vigorous spawns. If you are trying to condition the fish for spawning there are other
things, like temperature, to
consider.
During the pre-spawning period, when the
fish are being "conditioned", we feed a wide variety of food which may
include: blackworms, Grindal worms, fruitflies, red worms, daphnia, mosquito larvae and
frozen blood worms. With the exception of the frozen blood worms, the rest of the foods
are live. During this period the adult fish may be fed 4 of more time per day depending on
how close the fish are to being placed into the spawning tank.
If you are planning
on spawning the fish you will need to consider a few decisions.
Good notes help. |
