Hehehe. I oopsed - but nicely!
A few months ago, I purchased what was supposed to be a nice trio of young females. After a month or so, I realized that either one was a, shall we say 'happy and gay' female or a strange looking male. Turns out I have a male
Betta imbellus (sp?). Well, after he ate three guppies and two ghost shrimp (several of which were nicely gravid). I placed him in a betta bowl of his own (I keep the girls in a 'community' aquarium only taken out for breeding, which I had decided to wait on until I knew my males were feeling better (reference 'sick and dying bettas' post). Anyway. He built a nice little bubblenest and seemed content enough on his own. I had a female start getting PMSy so, for lack of a better place, I threw her in there with him. I thought that since he grew up with her, it would be ok. I also thought it would be acceptable since
B. imbellus are supposed to be difficult to get to breed. Boy, was I wrong! I now have 8 little week old
B. imbellus X
B. splendens crosses. Tooooo cute! He is such a gentle breeder (what a nice change of pace, and an incredibly attentive father. Unfortunatly, I wasn't expecting babies, so a clutch of about 25 eggs only produced 8 babies, but I am thrilled to have them. Also, Lucy, the female likes him so much now, she won't give the
B. splendens males the time of day now. *sigh* I may actually try this cross again, the babies are so much more active than the pure
B. splendens. I will place them with family and friends that are aware that they are crosses. I have an experiment to try. I keep you posted on results.
Oh yeah, since he was doing so well, I went ahead and started the breeding up (slowly) with some of the
B. splendens that showed no signs of illness. As of yesterday, my buckskin male, Troy is now chasing after and guarding his nest of gnats, I mean fry.
Poor guy, this is his first clutch and they are driving him nuts. He looks about ready to pull his fins out! lol
These should be little beauties. He is technically a chocolate (but I think he looks more buckskin colored) bred to a pretty little tan female named Peaches. Wish us luck. I just put little Sky with Hugh - he's a steel blue crowntail, she's a steel blue double tail. Yeah!
If anyone is interested, I have a funny about Switch (the female turned male), I'll post it sometime if you like.
Anyone need a nice baby betta? lol
Linear Mode
