i was wondering if there was any if at all a way to encourage the male to build a bigger more solid bubble nest. i've removed the small piece of styrofoam i had in place a much bigger one the smaller was sorta an oval shape 1 inch in width 2 inch in length
the bigger i opted for is a sorta dish styled styrofoam u kinda get from the market that you see they use to package meat but this styrofoam is new never been used 3 inches in width 4 inches in length i'm still kinda new to breeding i've only had 2 breeding attempts under my belt and both were futile because i was ill prepared and didnt know much at the time...but right now i'm pretty well knowledge after reading up on the forums and also looking up various sites i have pretty much everything i need just need more advice from all you experts who've been doing this for years sorry i cant post pictures i have a broken camera and no photography skills :(

Well I never seem to be able to get them to build a bubblenest on command. They either do it or they wait till after they have the female all wrapped up and eggs dropping to the bottom. I notice that after I started using the small cell bubble wrap sheets cut into 2 by 4 inch rectangles, they are more inclined to build a bubblenest before the spawn. Then again each fish is different. Good luck to you!

It's not the size of the bubble nest, it's the motion of the ocean.
:OO

That is cause I fussed after you about it..
4 X 4 is better though.. :Whisssss

you use bubble wrap for them to build their nest under ? i've never heard of that hmmm... i just might try that...i'm not saying i want my fish to build a bubble nest on command lol...i just wana know if i can encourage him if possible any way...

I have found the females LIKE bubblewrap, lol.

try using some indian almond leafs. they seem to help.

hey thanks eastcoastbettas i tried the bubble wrap it works like a charm my male copper imbellis build a huge nest and now under the bubble wrap floats hundreds of eggs now hopefully. he doesn't love eggs more then worms i hope to have fry by tomorrow...thanks for the advice you guys are awesome i love this forum everyone is so helpful and open minded you guys make breeding bettas easy for the rookie like me i appreciate all of your hints and help i've prolly couldnt done it with out you guys :hug: :LOL:

Whooo hooo!!!
We are all godparents to EGGS!!!!!
Congrats on the spawn.

thankz alot la bella got some great news they finally hatched yep theres alot of them on the bottom of the tank i would say majority but they are some that swims up then drops back down...there must be atleast 50 and still some unhatched eggs

That is awesome.
Now comes the hard part..
Stop messing with them, lolol.
Just keep your eye on daddy, but the less fuss the better.

hmmm...i tried not to mess with them i'm really anxious i dont want to even lose one fry...they're atleast 50 or more i really want to do a 50 % water change alot of advice says not to do it until the 2nd week they are almost a week old this friday they'll be a week they look really healthy i tried to feed them bbs looks like bbs are too fast for them i can't get any cultures i'm afraid i'm too late i'm hoping inforsia from the ial leaf can keep them going till they get big enough for bbs...damn i know i suck...i thought i was well prepared for this any ideas how to feed them something better then inforsia or is that good enough cause i dont think that they are starving cause looking in the tank with a magnifying glass they look pretty stuffed....i know i know i need help <_<

Well, keep feeding them BBS.
They are large enough now to eat them, and this is what happens.. BBS are salt water.. being tossed in fresh water, they body's begin to osmotic regualte, and they loose the salt in their bodies, which causes them to move slower and slower..
Eventually they hang at that bottom of the tank, twitching.
THEN the fry can snarf them up, and get bigger fatser.
The only non live foods I have heard of fry that young eating is egg spray, and they might be too big for that.
Is your tank full yet?
At this point, you can start adding about a gallon of water a day
You can fill a gallon water jug, and treat it however you usually treat it, and start a drip line going.
Then tie a knot in the line, or clamp it so it is dripping slowly.
You put this on a hgher plane than the tank, and gravity will take care of the rest
Depending on how tight you tied the knot, or clamped the line, the water will slowly drip into the tank over the course of the day.
Do this every day until the tank is full.. THAT is whenyou ca start thinking about water changing them
If they have full bidies, they are eating something, so don't worry about it, and ocntinue to feed them the BBS, eventually, you will see orange beelies.
If you thik the tank bottom is too cruddy, you can attach a straw, or use a ridged airline to a piece of flexiblie airline tubing, and do the reverse of what you did to add water..
You can use this to slowly suck upo gunk on the bottom of the tank, and have that running into a container, JUST IN CASE you suck up a baby.
As long as you move slowly, though, that should not be a prblem.
I hope this helps.

What bella said! lol

I usually have Vinegar eels or egg yolk for the fry for the first few days. Easiest way to make the egg yolk is mush it in a sandwich bag and then add a bit of water. Mush some more, add more water. I liek to get it a thin sop consistancy. Then I dip my finger in the egg then into the tank or mist lightly with a spray bottle. The action forces the egg off my finger onto the surface of the water where most of the fry seem to go, wheras using a dropper sends it straight to the bottom. And remember to refrigerate the yolk between uses and refresh evvery few days! Congrats on the spawn!

i'm give it a try yea the bottom of the tank is really cruddy i did the baster thing yesterday help out alil bit now i do see them eating the bbs i wonder if i should siphon the tank tomorrow and add the drip line to remove any uneaten bbs...you've help alot labella i always look forward to your advice i appreciate every advice you have to offer :thankssign

I wouldn't worry too much about the crud.
I have found that every time I have been too on top of the tank, the fry died, but f I left it alone, and let it get cruddy, they lived.
Yes, people have a right to be concerned about ventless fry, but this has happened to me just the once, and that was in a tank that had a huge problem with a brown algea bloom.
Other than that, I fully believe the babies are finding little bits and pieces of stuff to nibble on throughout the day, and the crud helps to propigate infusoriansm, which they also eat for quite a while.
That is why when I feed my babies, they do go after the food, but they don't make pigs of themselves, because they have been eating constantly.
If you fry aren't hanging on the bottome of the tank, and the tank is not full yet, I would not worry too much about it just yet.

they are a few that hang around the bottom but they look like they are looking for something and not all of them are at the bottom they hang there and then go elsewhere i do see some brown algae growth i dont really know if its harmful for them but they do look healthy darting around never in one place and they are eating bbs like you said bella i just bast out a small jar of bbs after i got out of work and that was 4:30 p.m and now i looked and theres none to be seen man these lil guys are pigs :LOL: i just want to thank you guys for helping me out i'm sorry if i thanked you guys too much its just that i'm really excited more then 3 survived i wouldn't say its a full spawn but 50 fry's for a 3rd try is pretty good atleast in my eyes :coverlaugh

oh and the other thing has anyone came upon the swim bladder disease feeding bbs to the fry's i've read somewhere that they do not feed bbs to their fry's at all because of the disease they refrain from it i wonder if its due to overfeeding or just feeding bbs period do you guys know of this ?

Bubble nests i think to much worrying is done over them i have had many spawns where the nest was built as the spawning was being done and even this last spawn there was no nest he just kinda threw em all together in a big goo ball lol.as far as disease from bbs i have never seen it happen, although i have had about 12 belly sliders out of thousands of fry if it was from the bbs i really dont know but the numbers are obviously so low i dont worry about it much.feeding my fry at early stages pretty much goes like this i add green water to my spawn tank for one then i do egg mists 3 times a day supplemented with hakari fry food at about day 14 i start them on bbs. :T

We haven't had a problem woth swim bladder from BBS. RC has "bpwn up" young fry from them eating too much (really young fry and it was only from his one line a while ago). We start fry usually on VE's for the forst week, and then feed VEs and BBS for a couple of days, then just BBS and maybe some Betta Starter once a day. If we see some one that is swimming funny, that looks like they are developing swim bladder disorder, we won't feed the tank for 24 hours and usually they are back to normal and we just watch the tank. They do like to pig out on the BBS, but it's no reason to not feed them any!

It is not from eating too many BBS fry get Swim bladder problems... It would seem that if the fry eat the unhatched cysts, they aren't digested, and can press on the swim bladder causing it to not develop properly.
That is what causes the SBD.
And from what I understand, yes, some fry will eat too much, and pop.
Sometimes they'll rupture internally, and you won't know why the fry died, just that it is dead.

I hate when I have a problem with swim bladder, but I think everyone gets a spawn with it occasionally. When the proper actions are taken they can overcome it and keeping an eye on them is the key.

What do you do to overcome Belle? Do you always decap?

I haven't had BBS induced SBD yet.
I think because I have found a method that works for me, that collects very few unhatched cysts.
I have had SBD from that heater incident last year.
I just keep an eye on them, some got over it, and some didn't. One of my Rick fry was trying to be a floater, but it got over it on it's own.
That is my method, either they get better or they don't. If it is really bad, I'll make them more comfortable with their own tank space, and low water levels, but other than that, I do no treatment.

I am confused, I thought you said you only used VEs when the spawn was a small one. Maybe you could clarify?
http://z7.invisionfree.com/Uniquebettas/in...?showtopic=2388

so far i've had no sbd i watch them closely there are the empty or bbs egg shell in the tank they wont even touch it and i dead bbs on the bottom of the tank they wont touch that either but they do eat the live ones i find it very very hard to clean the tank of crud and dead bbs...its so hard to see if i sucked some fry's but now i'm down to 20 fry's there's alot that outgrow they're siblings i prolly have 5 runts in the gang i need to get myself coffee filter paper in order to separate the bbs and the shells much easier...i was also wondering when can i introduce snails in the fry tank right now they are 10 days old i do have really really small snails already in there but i need the big boys to step in and help really clean the tank up...can anyone help..

What kind of snails d you have? Certain snails are safer than others.
Also, a filter is not too good for separating live BBS from eggs and shells.
I use an airline in the midlevel of the water, and go after areas where the BBS have consentrated.Because they are phototropic (I believe that is the word), they tend to cluster up in areas closer to a bright light source, and that is on of the things I use to help me collect them.
I drain into a solid mesh coffee filter, which I happen to like better than a paper filter.. If this thing should get lost, I will be at a loss, because I haven't a clue how to replace it, lol.

Easiest way to collect BBS is using a syringe with a piece of airline tubing attached to the end. Put your BBS hatching device in a dark room and take a small flashlight (I use a 2 AA Maglite with rechargable batteries) and put it against the side of the jar or bowl or whathaveyou for about 10 minutes. Come back and all the BBS are sitting there waiting to get sucked up.

yep i've found by putting a light on the side of container and using a syringe helps alot thanks you guys for the advice my fry's are looking better each day i've counted more then 20 thats cause i have live plants for them to hide in between java ferns and others that i dont know the name of but they are healthy looking swimming everywhere in the tank that i provide them in finally transferred them in a 10 gallon filled halfway for now...just waiting and waiting and waiting for the lil chippers to get bigger so i can start the fun all over again :WOU :Y :T

Awesome! I'm not sure if it's the most exciting or the most stressful time watching them grow up. Exciting cause every day they are turning into gorgeous adult betta fish... nerve wracking cause they can't get big enough fast enough. LOL.

i dont really know what kind of snails i have they dont get any bigger then a quarter of an inch what i do want to add to the fry's tank is some mystery snails since i can't find any malaysian trumpet snails i'd have to go on aquabid but i do want to put a 1/2" sized blue mystery snail maybe like 3? hmmm...just don't know if i should i just need some help to clean the crud off the bottom since i'm not very nifty with siphoning and the baster plus i dont want to accidentally suck up the lil critters i just want to leave them alone till they're about 2 or 3 weeks old then i can do the regularly water changes

Aiwen is selling some MTS right here, if you want to checkj the for sale section..Can you get a pic of the snails you have? I just want to be sure you don't have a pest snail, which can foul your tank faster than you can rid yourself of them... and they are like cockroaches, VERY hard to get rid of once you have them..Plus they migrate, and a self fertile..
A blue mystery snail would be a good choice.They are slow moving, and the only fry they will eat are the weak ones, so they serve as a stage onbe culler almost..
BUT they do make a good amount of mess themselves.
I know I don't bother with water changes until the tank is full, by then they are easy to see and avoid.

yea i think they are the pesty snails you mention i see alot of dudu on the bottom of the tank considering they are only about 5 of them in there and you are right they are self fertile they can reproduce by themselves...i think i might take them out and feed them to my gouramis and silver tips doubt my jardini would eat them....

If they are football shaped, they are the cockroach kind.
Then there are what they call the common ramshorns.
They look just like that, flat and spiraled.
They are pests too..
But the giant ramhorns, people like.
They look like common rams, but they are much fatter, and look almost square when they are babies.

yep they do look footballish but they do a great deal of clean up on the brown crud around the tank too bad they clean and leave a huge mess i see poop everywhere :OO ::hit :opps so i got rid of them atleast i think i did...they are good at hiding i suspect there might be 2 left and i see couple eggs smears on the 2 sides of the tank maybe theres more...if only they didnt poop alot they'd be useful i talk to aiwen about the mts just wondering if i should get them for the fry tank but not so sure since i do have ial in the tank but they would be a great addition to my 45 gallon arrowana tank i think i'm sleep on it for now :LOL: j/p need to get them tomorrow i have really bad green algae growth on the 45 gallon plus my substrate is really dirty...

Not only that but I have seen them attack weaker fry and some not so weak. I don't care who says that's not true, cause I saw it with my own eyes.

alrighty they are now 2 weeks old i'm sorry i cant upload pics in my case i have a messed up camera and bad skills to go with it i was wondering if the water smells slightly foul does that hurt the fry's i kinda dont want to do a water change cause i've heard at the 2 week mark some of them are goin to develop their labrinth organ it doesnt smell that bad its not like its overwhelming me i cant smell it unless i get in the tank and peel of the saran wrap but its got me worried lately its been hot cause i'm from southern cali and the temp is up in the 90's i did notice a temp jump with the thermo it was at 85 now its gettin up to 90 i have no way of droppin the temp but i do want to get rid of the smell it kinda smells like wet clothes if you leave it out to dry without washing it but not as bad...so does anyone have any idea what i should do...any kind of suggestion would be appreciated

I would take the saran wrap off, honestly.
I have never used it, never used a top, I have always used open top tanks, and my fish have developed just fine, and those that don't, well..
That is what survival of the fittest is about, right?
I know, sounds cold, but it is the truth.
How full is the tank?
Forgive me if you have answered this..
I myself start with a 10 (for example) with about 3 gallons of water in it.
For the first week, I just keep the water level steady, and then starting the seoncd week, every day, I slowly add a gallon of water..
There is usually 9 gallons of water in a ten gallon tank..
check it out if you don't believe me, lol.
Anyway, once the tank is full, I start pulling off a gallon of water a day, by sucking gunk from the bottom, and adding a gallon of water for about a week, then I go to 2 gallons for another week, then three, then 4, then 5.
At this point, I hold steady if it is a small spawn, or I move them to the 20 if it is a large spawn.
With the 20, I add 2 gallons of water a day until it is full, then start pulling 5 gallons of water every day, or every other day, again, depending on how big they are.
If your water is smelling funny, you certainly do need to do a water change in my opinion. BUT if your tank is not full, adding water might help.

I will confess here, I do no testing of the water. Not for nitrate, ammonia, nothing. I have just decided not to care.

the tank is filled half way i do have a top now i know survival of the fittest does sound cold but hey sometime thats nature but we're raising them artificially i know people have their own ways of doing things the saran wrap did not work well nor did the aluminum foil so i decided on a hood i just want to keep the dust out and i've read up that people recommend provided some kind of cover to keep the inside of the tank temp same as the water it works for me i'm in no shape to have survival of the fittest because i dont have much fry to consider it but in the future i will have to use that because i dont want a whole bunch of weaklings to raise....i try not to mess with the tank alot i do minimum water changes unless the bottom of the tank is very dirty...i did do a water change to get the foul odor out...but from what you wrote i think thats alot of work to do and it sounds like your in the tank constantly...forgive me if i'm wrong it just sounds that way with all the adding and removing i dont want to criticize how you do things and i'm not saying you are also...right now i'm just trying to rear up as many fry as possible cause since last night i lost 4 fry and one looked big i wonder if i over fed them...hmmm...hopefully this doesnt happen again...

Honestly, it takes me about 10 minutes per tank a day. And my tanks are where I only fuss with them every other day.
I have 8 tanks that are on the water change schedual, and I do 4 each day.. And I can set them all to drain at the same time, so it only takes me about 15 minutes of I do them all at the same time.
Otherwise, I just do one, take a break, yell at some kids, do another tank, wash some dishes, another, yell some more at the kids, do another, play on the puter, cause I am done.
Except for the beanies...

wow that is alot of work you even have a schedule set up for water changes...indeed you either have too much free time or you can multi task multiple jobs...i know i can't its hard enough i gots to deal wid the 45 gal, da 10 gal that house the fry's, and 6 jars containing my favorite pks and sd thats not even close to what you go through...and what takes the most work is da 45 cause i have to run tests in order to keep the water just right....da 45 gal is the most time consuming thing i have to do cause it takes me atleast an hour by mahself 30 mins minimum if i have help all the other tasks are easy get the job done after my normal daily family guy routine then hit the fishes head on with no breaks in between i try to break it up in weeks where i do the 45 gal one week next week i deal wid the 10 gal and jars so i dont get side tracked...i try to involved my family but they do not want to have anything to do with helping only couple my nephews get involve sometimes...my wife helps here and there my daughter is too young she's only 19 months i wish she can help me sooo i can have something for father daughter time...but i guess i can wait till she gets older she loves fishes though just like her dad ! :D