Female betta/or not???

[plaakapong]

Hi all, any betta experts out there? I just rescued this lovely"lady" from PETSMART to give my guy a little action, then to a 20gal. I have needing some color. He doesn't seem to be paying her much attn. yet(only 24 hrs) so I began wondering if I truly have a female? I've done a little research and I guess it can be difficult at times. The ovapositor is clearly visable but I guess that's not always exclusive to males? Any opinions??? Thanks!



This is obviously the male.

[mistergreen]

You see the white nob close to her anus?
that's an ovipositor, used to lay eggs.... And only girls lay eggs.

Beautiful bettas btw.. nice find.

[plaakapong]

^^^ In my searching I've found several references to the odd male having what appears to be an ovipositor.

Thanks for the compliment! I'm pretty fond of him and hope to grow fond of her.

[valerietheangel]

Males will have a breeding tube in egg layers but generally it's much smaller than the ovipositor and will be much thinner in diameter. That looks like a female to me. If it is of a similar body size to the male I think you can safely assume it's a female. Also, chances are if it was two males, one of them would be pretty abused by now.

Oh, keep in mind, fish in stores aren't always kept in the best shape. They will need time and good food to get into breeding condition. I think with bettas you are supposed to keep the male and female separated until they are ready to breed.

[@marko@]

that is the classic female (i have bred bettas successfully, though it was just once, so i think i can tell the difference, i hope)
obvious ovipositor (it is HUGE)
gills fit neatly into covers (the males often have their gills sticking out more then females)
stripes
pale area above ovipositor=eggs

show her the male (float in a cup for a few min a day, put tanks next to one another, etc.), feed her a LOT, and watch her belly swell with eggs in 2 weeks.

[kana]

That is a beautiful "female" Betta!

I bought a pale little pearl colored female Betta at the Mart because I felt sorry for her. She turned out to be as beautiful as the one that you have there and is going on 4 years old. It is difficult to believe that both of ours are female because of the striking color, but females can be as nice looking as males.

[plaakapong]

Thanks all for your replies! I didn't make it clear but she is in a breeding box floating in the same tank. The reason she caught my eye was her beauty and appearance of good condition, not really the norm at PETSMART. Then I started to wonder if maybe she was too good looking? I'll pump her with bloodworms and brineshrimp and give them some time. She ate a pea today for brkfast.

[Blue Ridge Reef]

That's a nice female! I tried my hand at breeding bettas, but raised few that looked as good as the breeder male, and females were nearly impossible to sell! I'm glad folks are appreciating the females of this species. FWIW, the biggest mistake I made was putting what I thought were females in group tanks, and being wrong! Also, you really need a warm room. When the air got cold (even in heated water) I lost fry and juvies. Good luck!

[joy613]

I have what I thought to be a female betta. I put a male in a cup in its tank to see how they would react, His bib came out and he was ready to do battle. When I took an eggy female and did the same thing with he was totally different and actually built a big bubble nest. The first one he built since I had him. He has the same shape of fins and body as yours, only is blue. I have one that was sold as a female but is actually a plakat he is at least 3 1/2 inches long. When I got him I knew what I was getting

[Blue Ridge Reef]

What's a plakat?

[mistergreen]

They're really easy to breed.. Make sure you have fry foods ready.
After the fries are free swimming, feed them infusoria/paramecium for a few day... You can grow these... It's not crucial but it helps a lot. Half a week later, you can feed them microworms or bbs.

[mistergreen]

Originally Posted by Blue Ridge Reef

What's a plakat?

short finned, a little bigger betta... And more aggressive
that's a male btw.

they're the kind used for fighting.

[lauraleellbp]

Originally Posted by Blue Ridge Reef

What's a plakat?

Plakats are short-finned fancy bettas.

You can see tons of Plakats plus other betta varieties on AquaBid (get your bib ready...)

http://www.aquabid.com/cgi-bin/aucti...cgi?fwbettaswt

Any of those inspire you to want to breed again, Blue?

Another tool betta breeders commonly use when conditioning betta pairs is a glass chimney (the hourglass type used for hurricane lamps). You rest one end of the chimney on the bottom of the breeding tank and place the female inside. As soon as the female is filled with eggs and showing her breeding stripes and the male keeps trying to coax her to his bubblenest, you simply lift the chimney out of the tank; it can be a little less disruptive than having to pour or net the female out of another container.

Having lots of floating plants helps both the male maintain the bubble nest plus attracts infusoria for the fry.

EDIT- LOL ninja'd!

[Blue Ridge Reef]

Man, a lot of my males turned out like plakats! I had three or four generations going when I realized that airline hose and mason jars were going to going to dominate my basement and I couldn't sell what I'd produced. I wasn't willing to feed them off, and each one I thought was going to look a certain way once their fins grew, but most of them never grew long fins! A few turned out really nice, though. I got a dollar a piece for those.

[lauraleellbp]

I had 80 mason jars on a shelf in a 10'x8' room in college, plus 2 20gal growout tanks of females, plus my adults, plus BBS cultures... about 300 fish in all, and my room wasn't that close to the bathroom... OMG my room STANK!!!

LOL my husband knew me then and has FORBIDDEN me to breed bettas again (till I have time and work on him to let me again, that is...)