Bettas settling in well

[Sylvan]

The new Bettas are settling in well now. The ammonia is under control again, think putting some of the floating plants from my other tank in has helped a lot, and now we're in the process of finding food that they'll all eat.
My original Betta Pisces (blue and red) will eat any pellet food you give him, though he likes pulling it under so he can chase it down, but when I offered him a couple of defrosted bloodworm tonight it was a flat no and he just spat them out so the shrimps have them to enjoy.
Of the new ones Triton (red/pink and white) will eat anything and I think if I let him he'd gorge himself to death so he's being nice and easy.
Aquarius (dark one) is fussy about pellets, he'll take a couple of the Fluval bug bites and either eat them or spit them back out, let them drop to the bottom then mangle them. He won't entertain the other type of pellet I've got but he went nuts for the bloodworm.
Poseidon (white one) is the fussiest of the four, he will not eat any of the pellets, he did take a couple of bloodworm eventually but so far the only food I've found he likes is shrimplets. I found one on top of my Fluval Chi filter so netted it and offered it to him to see if he'd take it and it was gone very quickly. Going to pick up some live food to see if he'll take that.
I've got some rearranging to do in the tanks. The gaps for the water flow are narrow but they can eyeball each other through them so while the two on the outside tank have a side without an other male, Aquarius who is in the middle can see both of them so I'm going to move a couple of plants around to break up the eyeline a bit more. I've also had to put the corner of a filter media bag over the pump outlet as the flow was a bit strong for Poseidon initially but with the bag in place it's broken it up enough that there's still water flow through all 3 tanks but without him being flung round the tank. Both Poseidon and Aquarius have made bubble nests, Aquarius has gone a bit nuts with his and they're huge. Now I just need to sort out my filter/light for the 5g, the light came back on so I thought great I don't need to replace it. It won't go back off now so I'm looking for a new light and filter to replace it.

 

[FishGuest5123]

Nothing more beautiful than a healthy betta.

 

[Sylvan]

So still not managed to get to the LFS for some live food yet. Tried again with the Fluval Bug Bites. Pisces was happy normal food service had resumed and his big bites were back rather than the bloodworms. Triton being the good boy he is ate them up quite happily, he's built his first bubble nest today. Aquarius took one or two of the smallest pieces I could find but that was it and Poseidon just flatly refused them again. In the week I've had them I've only managed to get Poseidon to eat once, I thought he had taken the bloodworms but caught him after I posted spitting them back out and since he has the harder job of swimming with having the pump in his side I do want him eating and I'd noticed after he had the shrimplet he had a lot more energy but had dropped off again the last 48 hours. So out came the net and I went fishing again. Live food is definitely going to be the way forward with him, as soon as a shrimplet went in he was on the hunt and has eaten again. I also caught a smaller shrimplet for Aquarius as he is using a lot of energy building his massive bubble nests and flaring at the other two through the gaps. Tomorrow I'm going to do the shift around in the tank plants to block his eyeline but it's clearly been inspiring him as his bubble nest stretches across the front of the tank to the point he's lost some through the gap and then continues into the floating plants.

 

[seangee]

I have been using this stuff Bettas Only Eat Pellets.
Its way more popular than bug bites in my tanks.

 

[Sylvan]

I'll have a look for some of that as well then because it would make life much easier if I had a dried food he'd take.

 

[Essjay]

I have had several bettas over the years. Some would eat pellets as soon as they were dropped in the tank, and if one drifted away and became soggy before they found it, they would spit it out. But I have also had a betta which refused to eat pellets until they were soggy. With this betta, I had to pre-soak the pellets then carefully place them one by one onto the water surface using a pipette. Perhaps Poseidon is like this fish, have you tried soaking the pellets to make them soft before feeding him?

 

[Sylvan]

I tried it last night before I gave up and netted a shrimplet. He is more skittish than the others so I wonder if the sight of my hand or tweezers over the top of the tank spook him and put him off eating.

 

[Colin_T]

If fish are nervous and skittish it is usually from poor water quality. Test the tank water and do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate every day for a week. Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it's added to the tank.