Overbred bettas?

It's a question that has been going around in my head since my betta died in the start of July. I've finally decided to write about it here. I kept him in an 8g (cycled) planted tank. After a few days I noticed he had a funny swim to him, which I had not noticed at the fish store. There was a kind of bend in his spine, which ended up being caused by dropsy. At some point he went more and more into hiding and became extremely bloated as well. Before I knew it, he had passed away.

That was the 3rd betta I kept, with the previous ones not even coming close to the supposed average age of bettas. The first one seems to have died the most 'natural' death, at around 1.5 years old. It started getting lethargic and slowly became less and less healthy without any visible signs of sickness, except of course for the inactiveness and color fading slowly. That was a 'basic' red veil tail I got at a very small local fish store. Back then I was a bit inexperienced with fish so that may have been my fault, but out of the 3 it was by far the healthiest, I'll come back to that later. The 2nd betta I bought was at a big chain store here in the Netherlands called Intratuin. (recently went back there and was shocked to see the state of the fish) I'm never buying fish there anymore, that's for sure. Anyway, back when I still thought they were alright I ended up buying this beautiful and very feisty blue/red/turquoise crowntail. It lived for a few months before mysteriously and quite suddenly bursting. One day it was fine and the next it had died with its organs hanging out of its hind end.

So now for the question, could bettas at this point be so overbred that there is a very high risk of losing them without necessarily doing something wrong? Coming back to that betta from the small store being the most healthy, it makes me think that it could be an issue with big breeders just pumping out fish to keep up with demand of these fish. In a similar way to puppy mills I guess. No hate on the store where I bought the 3rd betta though, since they are amazing for their fish and actually have healthy fish and spacious, clean tanks for them. Just the bettas coming in from bad breeders is what I'm thinking.

So I was curious to hear the opinions on this from other people on this forum. And ultimately I may keep a betta again, but for now I'm leaning more to the side of not buying any bettas anymore, ever.

Note: All of them were kept in the same 8g tank, with being empty between getting the 2nd and 3rd betta and changes to hardscape/plants and at approximately 78.8F.

Excuse me for the low quality picture, it's a screenshot I took from a Snapchat video I made lol. This is to give you a better idea of the tank I kept them in. The pictures are of the 3rd betta.

Just to confirm, you've had three Betta die on you in a short period of time, one after the other? That is sad.

You say that your tank is cycled, but other than the temperature, you give no information about the state of the water and have not said what you did to the tank after each death.
You did mention that the death of the first might have been due to your inexperience...what do you think you did that caused that death?

NOTE that 1 1⁄2 years is nothing for a Betta, which can live from 2 years at a bare minimum, to at least five years if properly looked after.

Obviously, you have a heater, but what about filtration?

What makes you think that the problem is down to in-breeding, rather than disease?
NOTE that you might find that the small fish shop, with knowledgeable staff, still get their fish from the same fish farms as the big stores.

Betas can be funny. I've had ones that lived for a couple years or more and I've also had ones that died the same week I got them. Who knows why ?

Yeah I no real luck with these fish either. I tried 3 times. All male crowntails as that is the only type I really like. The longest I had one for was around a year. He developed a swim bladder problem where he could no longer swim up off the bottom worth anything. He would still eat well and he could STRUGGLE up for a breath of air but it became increasingly difficult for him. Eventually it became impossible and I assume he suffocated one night. After that, I decided to leave Bettas alone.

The thing with Bettas I think is what they are fed to get them to that size and with the fins they have. I started to wonder about how the breeders were doing it. I never found out, but I did breed a number of Bettas over the years and never managed to raise fish like the ones you see imported. More interesting is the fact that the male fish I managed to raise had larger bodies and shorter fins, so I concluded its not just genetics that is the problem with these fish.

Back in the days when a Betta came in two colours...red or blue...and had not overly showy fins and tails, they were a very hardy fish that needed very little special treatment or care. They were pretty much bulletproof and lived for many years, my dad owned a red one that lived a happy and healthy life for almost 7 years. This is 40-45 years ago and long before the desire for flashier colours and massive fins and tails as we have nowadays.

When you sit and think about these fish, relatively small body having to haul fins and tails that are sometimes 3 or 4 times bigger than the body, it logically must cause some problems for the fish physically. The desire for more and more colours and combinations of colours is rarely, if ever, as mother nature produced them.

If you visit Vietnam or Thailand, especially, as I have and gone to the huge fish traders/breeders you will see a vast aray of Betta types, many with frankly incredible colourways and fin lengths. Sadly one of the more recent additions to this aray are the Glo-Betta. But if you then go to the Siamese Fighter fighting clubs, where fish are caught and kept wild and fought weekly, the colours are very drab, fins and tails much more like the Betta of 40-45 years ago that were imported as exotics into Europe, US etc

I think it is inevitable that any animal which is genetically or injection altered will have health issues, will suffer lifespan issues and will be more susceptable to common disease and illness and be harder to treat by virtue of the way it has been bred. Most of this is relatively unknown by the breeder and sadly many breeders do not introduce new blood into the bloodlines, so again inevitably there will be a percentage of Betta who have a double whammy....that of weak bloodline from interbreeding/overbreeding and continued genetic/injection alteration.

Let's be brutally honest here. Humans have a higher rate of disability, both mental and physical, when the same bloodlines produce offspring. It is a medically proven fact that cousins have a far higher chance of having disabled children than non related partners. The exact same happens right across all living species.

So you have the Betta (and other fish) that are bred for their wild aray of colours and fins...bigger and brighter the better cos they are the ones that bring in the most money at point of sale. These breeders do not care what side effects might happen, the store buyers don't care...all they see are bigger and better choices of colours and fin types that are more tempting than last week's stock and the money that can be made selling them.

They don't care about the fishkeepers who see these wonderful fish, who take them home and do everything right to give these fish a good life and who then are devastated when that fish dies suddenly without apparent reason...and they certainly do not care about the welfare of the fish or what it took to get those glorious fins, tail and colours.

Fish sales and breeding can be mercenary. Placing Betta in those tiny cups is the ultimate "heart string tug" sales tactic, to entice you into buying that "poor little fish" and give it a home. It is heartbreaking to see fish in cups and its even more heartbreaking when once home that precious little fish dies so quickly.

@wasmewasntit what do you think are the causes of tail biting (their own) in bettas?

Naughts said:

@wasmewasntit what do you think are the causes of tail biting (their own) in bettas?

Click to expand...

It is likely one or a combination of things that causes this behaviour.

It would be a logical explanation for biting one's own tail/fins if they perceive it as a threat (ie another male fish on their territory), or if the fins/tail are causing physical pain due to their weight dragging behind them when they are in a deeper aquarium and they want to breathe air at the surface, it could even be a habit (like humans biting their nails) no actual reason for it but they do it anyway, or it could be a mental health issue, self harm through boredom or depression/stress.

It can't be easy to live with all that excess drapery, especially being a labrinth fish that faces a haul to the surface to catch a breath of air whilst dragging all that finnage and tail behind them, quite frankly I can understand the desire to get rid of a bit of it and lighten the load

Back when my dad had his Betta, we never experienced any tail/fin biting...but then the fins/tails were in proportion with the fish and didn't impede their daily life.

Sometimes I see some that hates their own tail...feels like watching them trying to function and swim but can’t….they are smart enough to know..what is this thing behind me ..eventually they resort to biting it off or other behaviors. Don’t blame them. They are just smart enough to know it’s a problematic thing back there.

7 yr lifespan sounds amazing…I do remember them being very hardy. So hardy ppl cycled tanks with them lol You commonly hear a betta 5-6 yrs old. But nowadays, they seem to be fragile..have more genetic related issues and tumors even..you name it. I don’t know anyone with a Betta pass 2 yrs old.

I did my own tests with different things on bettas...amongst it…the number of bettas a person buys from a petco & petsmart store until they get a healthy one alive…I’m probably gonna get slaughtered for saying this freely lol …but it can be as high as 13 bettas and still, all 12 die shortly upon brought home and 1 that did live a healthy life gets about 1.5 yr old then starts to have problems. Problems I might dare say has to do with genetics. It’s all those line breeding and I forget what’s that other method they call it. I don’t do those. I breed now but I only select the healthy ones to try to better them. None of that in line bred stuff. I only select the healthy ones with no genetics defects observing all the way to their siblings and parents before I pick and if they don’t meet the health standards they don’t get to breed. I doubt commercial would ever not breed bc it would hault their production. Often times id see a video on breeding but the bettas has a tumor while they are breeding it and I’m shock bc I always said I’m not backyard breeding leave it to the pros that knows what they’re doing. Yet I have seeked breeders for quality fish and for yrs I experience bad blooodlines.

So don’t feel bad. I’m sorry for your loss and I don’t think it’s you or the ppl I’ve answer this whole week everyday nor last week. A partial reason why I breed is for my family and friends to have healthy fish and hopefully a better genetic line so these lil guys can last a lil bit longer than a few days coming home. A lot of it is also food. Bettas do well and thrive on live foods. Some of these big box stores are letting them go as young “baby bettas”..merely a few weeks after finishing developing liver lungs kidney and fins..most haven’t even been conditioned to learn how to swim to any flow in an aquarium …they barely get enough to eat.
They get cup and sat there starving for weeks until they get sold. To grow a fry from an eyelash size with proper nutrition for full growth takes dedication. It’s essential they get the nutrition at the growing stages for development for fins legs and all completeness. But often they are underfed. Baby bettas only eat live. They are expected to eat a pellet in a cup when they have no idea what to chase. Sensory just goes dull living in a cup. Ppl often ask if bettas like to swim. Yes they most certainly do. They just can’t in a cup so most never seen them swim bc they never left the cup. For a Betta, it learns to swim a bit different than other fish breeds that’s all but they do swim.
These days you will see a lot really thin to where they only have a head left. The fish no longer can achieve a healthy bullet shape from above view. Some of those you can never plump them up. I’ve tried. It’s just too late. The health issues on this breed is not a lie. Not all but a good number. Bettas can be considered expensive bc of the live foods required and the frequent water changes. More often they are breed without enough water for housing. I really hate to see ppl ask why their Betta died after getting home from a pet store everyday this week. Often times it’s nothing to do with the fish keeper new or not. They use to be hardy that’s why it started selling as a first beginners fish. It was not easy to kill a Betta.

The best I can suggest is explore buying fish from a reputable breeder. Even then like the above person mention, if they don’t add new blood to their line then they are just breeding over. I actually experience that when I started buying from a breeder. The whole line..tainted. So I explore more but it was definitely an old bloodline dead end. There are good breeders out there you just have to look. Another suggestion to buy is to get them on arrival. What I mean is if you only have like a petsmart or petco or lfs and that is all your choice is for betta in your area then go to the location that has a high sale volume turn over rate. Go there the day they get their shipment. Most suppliers will give them the better stock then it ripples out to the smaller chains. That’s the best time to try and get a healthy fish and avoid it sitting in a cup 3 weeks before you buy and bring home. it improves your chances of having a healthy baby a lil bit. You can skip a body of water drop while at it..straight into your water and skip the pet store’s. Just call them and find out what day they get shipment. Go there early so you can get first pick. It makes such a difference on survival rate.

if you try an independent breeder expect that a good breeder tends to not have stock for sale so if you find one that’s good it’s usually worth the wait if you are patient to work with them. When I started buying from breeders instead of big chain store I notice a big difference. When I started buying from reputable lfs where breeders drop off, not a chain, it opened up another world for me. I hope this helps you navigate the market in your area.

Hi @pimudh
Your tank is nicely set

Did you quarantine them before putting them in main tank ?
Did you check water parameters (Ph GH KH NH3 NO2 NO3) before adding each Betta in main tank ?
What flow did your filter provide (liters/hour) ?
Were parameters close to these :
pH 6 to 7 maximum
GH-KH < 8
Temp. 25-26°C/77-78°F
NH3 ammonia = zero
NO2 nitrites = zero
NO3 nitrates = zero

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That said, yes, there are overbred Betta to be absolutely avoided : all those carrying "dragon gene", known for scales overthickening that causes cysts, tumors, opaque/veiled eyes even blindness on opaque white Betta..
Also, rosetail, feathertail, over halfmoon tail morphs make swimming difficult and more tiring.
A very sad price of fame.....