Betta with my oddballs?

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M

Moloch

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Sep 8, 2010
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Raleigh, NC
Not sure which sub-forum to throw this under...

Some family friends of my parents have a betta male that they may not want any more. I don't think it would do well in my 65, but I have a feeling it would be ok in my 55? The stocklists are in my sig. Its my understanding that bettas only flare up against fish similar to them, so I think my closest worry for the betta getting aggressive would be my leopard ctenopoma. The african knife might nip at the fins but I don't think it would be a huge issue....

What do you guys think? I don't know a whole lot about bettas but I think it would be an interesting 'wtf?' addition to my tank.
 
i dunno, i've never tried it, but i've heard that bichirs like to rip their fins up. And if either of the bichirs are fully grown, he might just turn into a meal for them. I also think that once they reach a certain size, pictus can become pretty territorial.
 
i'd think the bichirs would take a snap at him, and eventually the ctenopoma would get big enough to make him a snack.. when did you get the cteno btw? haven't talked in a while
 
Keep it by itself. There's no way you can combine him with fish in either tanks. A 5g tank with filtration will suffice for the fish.
 
Pictus will kill it if bichir doesn't. Get a 10g, plant the hell out of it and give it a decent filter and you barely (note barely, not none, certain water stuff has to be replaced) have to do wcs, just feed the fish :D
 
it would be a nice little rescued snack ^_^ if you dump it in your 55gl
 
Yeah good points I suppose. My largest poly is pushing 5.5-6" right now, the smaller is less than half that size. The pictus might be over 4", ctenopoma is about 1.5" and the knife is probably between 4-5".

I actually had to move back in with my parents recently so I don't have much room to set up another tank, if I did I'd just pull my 20 out of storage and give that to the beta. I'm not too worried about it. Honestly I feel like it would be better for the fish to flourish in the 55 for a few minutes before becoming a snack than it would be to succumb to the slow torturous death of whatever jar they're keeping it in currently.

I've actually raised two convict from 3-5 week old fry to 3/4" & 1.5" in that 55 with the current stock without issue...leads me to believe I have a pretty well behaved group of fish. But you never can tell.
 
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