About Betta nutrition

[Lanpenn]

Hello!

Well, I intend to have a Betta splendens soon in my small tank that's still cycling (30 liters) and I would like to know about the nutritional requirements that the species requires. What should the main ingredients be? I even searched in Google Scholar (for some academic articles about it) and I didn't find anything. The only thing I know is that the crude protein should be above 30 % and the fat should be below 10 %. And about crude fiber and other items of food composition? Indeed, there're several other factors of food quality, such as palatability, size, and the quality of the ingredients used.

Here in Brazil, we don't have so many options, although I used Sera Bettagran with good results (the betta fish only accepted this food...), also giving live food (I have a small artemia culture and I intend to give adult artemias as live food up to two days per week). Should I fast the fish once day a week? I usually did this with all fish I had in the past.

Thanks for your attention!

 

[WhistlingBadger]

It sounds like you're on the right track. We feed our bettas a high quality flake food (around here, we have several that are formulated for bettas, with higher protein and less fat), supplemented frequently with freeze dried or frozen bloodworms, tubifex, and brine shrimp. Like many predatory fish, spendens will overeat if given the chance. I believe that fasting one or two days a week is beneficial; it certainly doesn't hurt them.

 

[GaryE]

Bettas are insectivores, so your food should mimic mosquitoes (or maybe be mosquitoes). That means high protein, but also high fibre. Bettas eat the entire insect, and their guts are adapted to the sort of roughage insects that light on the water provide. You'll see that upturned mouth that says surface predator, and their habit of hunting by waiting under the surface.

They would eat both adult mosquitoes they catch laying eggs, and more often, mosquito larvae when the larvae go to the surface.

I always looked at the fibre content and protein, and tried to get the food that provided both to supplement live food from outside, and the live food I culture.

 

[Lanpenn]

Indeed, I even got some bloodworms here (they appeared in my dog's water bowl, also). Mosquitoes are a good thing, but I never got larvae in these traps where the larvae when reaching adulthood cannot escape, and yes in open containers. A few years ago I got bloodworms but, also, I received the larvae that cause diseases (in this case, Culex sp.). I don't even know if's allowed to culture this here in Brazil (at least the mosquito larvae from Aedes and Culex, since the Chironomidae mosquitoes don't bite), which has a serious problem with diseases such as Dengue (that's almost absent in the US).

In this photo, there were some debris tunnels from bloodworms. Date: 2017.

Culex sp. larvae. Date: 08/31/2017.

Date: 09/16/2017.

This was a trap where I tried to attract bloodworms. Instead, I got several shore flies, as you can see below. Date: 09/02/2018.

Date: 10/07/2018.

Then, with this issue, I suspended the project. Probably I would need mild aeration or circulation, to allow only bloodworms and not Aedes and Culex. However, I also "culture" Hermetia illucens (black soldier fly larvae) and I can get the smaller larvae. I also tried giving small white isopods as well as small red wiggler worms.

I had bettas with different tastes, having bettas accepting flake food and others eating only pellets or granules (I don't know how could be this possible... I noted also different personalities related to aggressivity).

What do you think about this food? Well, that's in Portuguese, then I'll translate the first ingredients: fish meal (tuna and sardine), salmon meal, squid meal, brine shrimp meal, and flaxseed meal. Guarantee levels are 35 % for crude protein, 6 % for crude fat, and 2.5 % for fiber.

 

[Lanpenn]

Does anyone know if small white isopods would be okay for bettas as live food? I didn't find anything relating to nutritional value.

 

[WhistlingBadger]

That would probably be OK if they're very small. Not sure how much they'd like the shells.

 

[Lanpenn]

Well, usually my betta ate the isopods without any problems. This betta I didn't feed any live food, yet.

 

[GaryE]

Those little white isopods are snacks. There isn't much to them. They're good food, but it's hard to have enough of them. They could go into the mix.

 

[Lanpenn]

Today I fed him with some brine shrimp, but I realized that he's selective in some way (my zebra danios loved and ate even the largest ones). He prefers to eat the smaller ones, because the bigger ones he swallows and spits out.

I even thought about giving daphnia, but these organisms are uncommon here in Brazil and expensive. Usually, I have several Grindal worms in my composting, but nowadays I have only the red wigglers, besides springtails and isopods. With artemias, if the culture crashes out, I still have several cysts to start another culture. For daphnias, this doesn't apply.

 

[WhistlingBadger]

I admire that you raise so much of your own fish food. I always thought that raising my own would be satisfying, and I did try culturing daphnia and blackworms, but I'd rather put my energy into other things, like more fish. Frozen foods are affordable and fairly convenient, at least around here.

 

[Lanpenn]

Maybe for the fact that being a Biology student and being on fishkeeping since 2012, I like several organisms, of different kinds. I started with this hobby involving live food in 2013, when I started culturing Ulomoides dermestoides, but eventually, this thing collapsed.

Well, at least today the betta ate all the artemias I gave him. He chases with some speed. Is obligatory to wash the brine shrimp to remove the salts or if I gave them directly with my sieve, is okay?

My term paper (now I'm writing in results and discussion topic) is precisely about culturing artemias in laboratories. Live artemias here in Brazil for sale are very rare. I even sold some to nearby fishkeepers. I'm even thinking about selling some kind of low-cost course about culturing brine shrimp, fitting for Brazilian reality and other countries that face similar difficulties. I don't know how my shrimps are still alive, even with cold temperatures during the night, without aeration and feeding them only when I feel like it.