Marine Betta

[ThRoewer]

Beautiful! I have very limited options where I live and apparently ordering them from DD does not go well!

Ordering large ones is OK. They have problems shipping babies, and not to all places but only certain areas where they think they need to add a ton of ice-packs.

 

[ThRoewer]

The dottyback knows something is up, just not sure what ;Joyful how much longer until the eggs are hatching?Are you planning on pulling this batch if you can get your larvae tank ready in time? Thanks for the videos, I enjoy them.

Yep, I plan on raising this batch and will post the progress here.
Unfortunately, I doubt I will get the 350-micron mesh sheet I ordered from Amazon in time for this batch (hasn't even shipped yet) so I will cut up a 5-micron mesh filter sock to make the screen. Hopefully, it won't clog-up too quickly.

BTW, that dottyback is a particularly inquisitive guy who often sticks his nose where it doesn't belong... I think I need to try again getting him a girlfriend or better a few

 

[ThRoewer]

Unfortunately, they hatched Saturday night, 2 nights earlier than I expected.
But now I know when to take them out the next time (evening of day 5).
And I will have the time to get the food cultures into better shape and get the larvae tank ready - still haven't gotten the mesh I ordered for the screen.

I also had to redecorate their tank as I had to remove the Aiptasia infested rocks for Berghia treatment. Right now it's mostly drilled flowerpot caves, not really ideal but the best I could do for now.

 

[ThRoewer]

I caught my Marine Betta pair #2 in the act when they were getting ready to spawn. The female had been pretty plum for a while and the male was chasing her earlier in the day. Unfortunately, the female turned out to be a little prudish and ran away after a while. I'm certain they went right back to business after I left... I will know tomorrow.



I really need an infrared camera for these guys. To my knowledge, nobody has yet filmed this.

 

[Leslie Tabor]

Very cool! There are Red Light apps on your cell phone. Not the greatest but might help. I have been using one to find a jerk fish in my tank after lights out, works pretty well for that at least!

 

[Wolf89]

When you go to collect the eggs, how do you do that? Do you just take the rock out or can you separate the mass from the rock?

 

[ThRoewer]

When you go to collect the eggs, how do you do that? Do you just take the rock out or can you separate the mass from the rock?

The egg-mass is only loosely attached to the rock and I usually just suck it up with a hose or a PVC tube assembly, depending on how easy it can be reached.

 

[TriggerFinger]

Cool!! So you have two pairs spawning now!! And there pops up a little mandarin lol. Any chance of the mandarin trying to eat the eggs? I’m guessing daddy fish won’t let that happen.

 

[ThRoewer]

I checked and it seems they didn't spawn last night. They may do a few trial-runs before actually laying the eggs. I've noticed the same with pair/harem group #1.

Cool!! So you have two pairs spawning now!! And there pops up a little mandarin lol. Any chance of the mandarin trying to eat the eggs? I’m guessing daddy fish won’t let that happen.

Pair #2 has been spawning for a while but the female is still small and in the reef tank they are in offers too many places to hide the eggs. And even if I can see them they are usually out of reach.

I don't think Mandarins go after eggs, especially not those attended by vengeful parents. And the Marine Betta male is the undisputed king of the caves in that tank who at times even kicks the Regal Angel male out if he gets on his nerves.
Also, it seems my Mandarins have plenty of other food available. The male is well fed and the female looks like a balloon. I suspect they are feeding on the Red Planaria I have in that system - the sump tanks and the algae tub (a 44 gal Brute) are covered in them but there is not a single one to be found in the main tank where the Mandarins are.

 

[ThRoewer]

Caught all of my harem group out and in one corner of the tank today:



By the time I had the cable cleared the male had moved to the other side

 

[ThRoewer]

I just caught the male of my second Marine Betta pair protecting a fresh eggmass.
I noticed it when he went aggressively after the female Regal (the Regal in the video is the male) and chased her out of the cave.



This nest is in a convenient position and easy for me to get. It should hatch next Saturday so I better get the larvae tank set-up and the feeds ready.

 

[ThRoewer]

Checked my rotifer cultures today and one had crashed and the other isn't that great either and on top of that infested with copepods - keeping cultures cleen is kind of tricky in a rather crowded setting.
I hope I can get propagate the rotifers enough for both, the next batch bicinctus and the marine bettas. If not, then the bicinctus will have to make do with Artemia alone.

 

[TriggerFinger]

You said you have harems with two females and one male. Would he spawn with both females at the same time? Would the eggs be next to each other so he could guard both?

 

[TriggerFinger]

There was a marine betta on Divers den last night and it was really beautiful. Thanks to your previous post, I think it was a female due to her face shape.

 

[ThRoewer]

Yes, definitely female:

As a wild one at 4.25" (TL) anyway. Wild males will be at least 6" total length.
But $180 is quite a steep price for a Marine Betta! If they stay at that price level then breeding them is even more interesting.

Unfortunately the clutch of my pair #2 was gone in the morning. Since it was only 3 days I assume they were eaten, either by some tankmate or the male himself.
But the large female of my harem group looks very gravid so I think I will have a new nest within a couple of days, possibly today already:

 

[TriggerFinger]

You added me to the list for a baby right?!

 

[ThRoewer]

You added me to the list for a baby right?!

Yes, but let's have some first!

 

[ThRoewer]

You said you have harems with two females and one male. Would he spawn with both females at the same time? Would the eggs be next to each other so he could guard both?

I don't know (yet).
I would think that he spawns with each female separately. But it could be that he does it a day apart so he may take care of a number of clutches at the same time. But more likely it is going to be one at a time and that the females adjust their cycles to time it right for having him busy with one nest all the time. That way they can concentrate more on themselves and get less bothered by him
The smaller female in my group is likely not yet mature. If I find another decent-sized female I may add it to the group to see how that goes. Females seem to get along very well if there is a male in the tank.

 

[ThRoewer]

...and while I was posting the message above they went down to business and spawned:



When I caught them at around 8 pm the female was still in the male's cave but before I could grab my camera she had left.

The last spawn was 18 days ago so when stuffing the female with plenty of Mysis and Krill that should be the interval to expect new nests...

Not leaving anything to chance with the food, I plan on ordering 200k to 300k Apocyclops nauplii from Reed this time.
And by the time the next nest comes around I hopefully have my Apocyclops, Tisbe, and Tigriopus cultures up and running.

 

[ThRoewer]

Unfortunately, the male must have lost the eggs this afternoon. At 4 pm they were still there, though somewhat had come dislodged from the cave roof but when I checked at 6 pm they were gone and the male was out of the cave.

The female should be ready to spawn again in a little over a week. By now she sits waiting for me to drop the krill into the tank and snaps it right away. I may increase the feeding frequency to 2 times a day but the real key is to also feed the male well and he is so far not too excited about shrimp - one of the downsides of raising them shrimp-friendly (I added a female Harlequin shrimp to my display and it was sitting right in front of the male's cave there and he didn't even look at her).

I got more rotifers than I need right now an basically have to feed them to my tanks and the vermetid snails and Aiptasia are having a ball...

The larvae tank is ready:

I just need to find a better place for it - on top of my saltwater mixing barrel certainly isn't ideal.