Best shrimp for betta?

[fishtime!]

Hi everyone! I've had my lovely female koi betta for about 2 months now, and she's doing great. I was thinking about getting her some company to provide more stimulation. I would love the look of blue cherry shrimp but since she might just gobble them up I was thinking of getting a bamboo shrimp. Does anyone have experience with bamboo shrimp+betta, or prefer a different combo? She does love biting anything I put in the tank so I would assume she is aggressive (oh and I think she ate the eyes off of all my snails). Tank picture below!

Tank info:
size: 20G long
water params: pH 7.6 , ammonia 0 , nitrites 0, nitrates 0-5
inhabitants: 1 betta + some bladder snails
decor: live plants, driftwood
filter: hang on back filter with some sponges that prevent the flow from being strong (just a small ripple at the surface)

 

[AJ356]

I would say any shrimp that tastes best, preferably something that she can enjoy killing and gradually chewing up

 

[Back in the fold]

I would say any shrimp that tastes best, preferably something that she can enjoy killing and gradually chewing up

And that’s exactly what will happen . Bettas are hunters . It’s what they do .

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

A betta that will eat the eyeballs from snails is absolutely going to eat any shrimp you put into her tank. Even if she can only eat it a little at a time...!

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

Should have also added though - lovely looking tank!! a 20g long is certainly a roomy home for a betta, and I do really like what you've done with it!

For extra stimulation and since she likes hunting, you could expand into culturing live foods for her, perhaps? Make feeding time more fun for you both. Have seen clips of people who have trained bettas to do simple tricks before too, like swimming through hoops and stuff.

 

[WhistlingBadger]

Nice looking tank!

I've kept amano shrimp with bettas with good results. But Bettas have widely varying personalities, and yours seems unusually aggressive. I'd just keep her alone. She'll be happier, I suspect.

 

[WhistlingBadger]

I agree with Adora about live foods. Our Bettas go absolutely nuts for daphnia, brine shrimp, copepods, or any other live food we give them.

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

I agree with Adora about live foods. Our Bettas go absolutely nuts for daphnia, brine shrimp, copepods, or any other live food we give them.

I always said I wouldn't get a betta (not because I dislike them or anything! Because we see so many posted about in the forum with health problems, I was worried), but now that I have one? I get it.

Must get some better betta pics, this one doesn't really show how bright white the edges of all his fins are.

Anyhow, I harvested some live food the other day, as I do when I can and I find things like mozzie larvae in containers from my garden. So Levi got his first live feeding from me, and I had to grab each live bloodworm and mozzie larvae with tweezers to give to him one at a time, and he absolutely loved it! More fun for me, too.

He eats frozen bloodworms too, but when I've tried frozen mozzie larvae, he wasn't so bothered about them, and didn't when one went still. But when I poked it and it did the twitch thing they do, he was instantly after it!

Always enjoy giving live food to my fish, they always react in an even more interesting and focused way than with commercial or frozen foods. I remember gourami having similar, much more switched on "live food, hunting mode" behaviour when adding live food, and see the same with the betta now.

@CassCats I've only deliberately cultured micro/banana/walter worms before, small foods for fry... any ideas for live foods to culture for bettas?

 

[CassCats]

I always said I wouldn't get a betta (not because I dislike them or anything! Because we see so many posted about in the forum with health problems, I was worried), but now that I have one? I get it.

View attachment 349251

Must get some better betta pics, this one doesn't really show how bright white the edges of all his fins are.

Anyhow, I harvested some live food the other day, as I do when I can and I find things like mozzie larvae in containers from my garden. So Levi got his first live feeding from me, and I had to grab each live bloodworm and mozzie larvae with tweezers to give to him one at a time, and he absolutely loved it! More fun for me, too.

He eats frozen bloodworms too, but when I've tried frozen mozzie larvae, he wasn't so bothered about them, and didn't when one went still. But when I poked it and it did the twitch thing they do, he was instantly after it!

Always enjoy giving live food to my fish, they always react in an even more interesting and focused way than with commercial or frozen foods. I remember gourami having similar, much more switched on "live food, hunting mode" behaviour when adding live food, and see the same with the betta now.

@CassCats I've only deliberately cultured micro/banana/walter worms before, small foods for fry... any ideas for live foods to culture for bettas?

Live mosquito larva, scuds, baby brine shrimp if they care (I've had some like them, some not), can try harvesting grindal worms. Some others do flightless fruit flies.

I stick with mostly frozen and pellets, because I'm limited on live food options. Used to do live mozzie, but shared backyard and neighbours kept dumping my mozzie water bucket and then decided to start spraying pesticides so I'm out of luck on that front now lol

I've heard of some people even doing ant larvae. I raise ants as pets, but too slow a process for it to be a sustainable food source imo so hey could be easier collecting wild on that front. Ants themselves, some have stingers so best avoid those, and might be a little iffy for bettas. My old rainbowfish went bonkers for ants though lol

 

[Lcc86]

@fishtime! I had the same thought as you with my betta, thinking it would be good stimulation for him to add some shrimps. He had other ideas and hunted them incessantly until I netted them out and put them elsewhere! I took that as him saying he preferred the tank as his own domain! I buy live foods (I don't have room to culture my own) and he absolutely loves it, so you could give that a try. Really brings out their natural behaviour, only downside is I feel bad for him when I run out and have to give him frozen or pellets instead lol.

 

[kpewv]

it depends on the personality of your betta!! aggressive or food motivated bettas will often not tolerate shrimp in their tanks. with a tank that size if you provide ample hiding you might have some luck with shrimp, even with an aggressive betta. i in particular have had good luck with ghost shrimp for bettas! they are harder to spot and interesting little creatures. a good tip is that if you want to add a betta to a tank stocked with other inhabitants is to add them after youve stocked everything else. ive even had luck removing the betta, rearranging, adding the other species, and then adding the betta back. wishing you luck!!

 

[fishtime!]

it depends on the personality of your betta!! aggressive or food motivated bettas will often not tolerate shrimp in their tanks. with a tank that size if you provide ample hiding you might have some luck with shrimp, even with an aggressive betta. i in particular have had good luck with ghost shrimp for bettas! they are harder to spot and interesting little creatures. a good tip is that if you want to add a betta to a tank stocked with other inhabitants is to add them after youve stocked everything else. ive even had luck removing the betta, rearranging, adding the other species, and then adding the betta back. wishing you luck!!

thanks!!

 

[fishtime!]

@fishtime! I had the same thought as you with my betta, thinking it would be good stimulation for him to add some shrimps. He had other ideas and hunted them incessantly until I netted them out and put them elsewhere! I took that as him saying he preferred the tank as his own domain! I buy live foods (I don't have room to culture my own) and he absolutely loves it, so you could give that a try. Really brings out their natural behaviour, only downside is I feel bad for him when I run out and have to give him frozen or pellets instead lol.

Thanks!! I've been trying to keep a stock of live daphnia but they keep crashing, so I never get to feed her more than a couple every few days

 

[Lcc86]

Thanks!! I've been trying to keep a stock of live daphnia but they keep crashing, so I never get to feed her more than a couple every few days

Ah I'm not sure where you're based but you can sometimes order live food from online fish or reptile stores (its a terribly expensive way of doing it but for me it works aa I have no space to culture).

 

[Jinx_]

I started out with a betta, he lived with me for quite a while before he suddenly passed.

I started seeing less and less of him, gradually. I got worried, did a water change and this triggered his passing.

He was a rather chill boi, I kept him with a few amanos. He never attacked them, but would scare them a bit.