Broody Male

[juliehainsworth]

Ok last night I tried to seperate my male from his fry but he was having none of it! He kept returning to the fry and looked awful when he was seperated from them! Since then I have managed to catch around 50 fry and seperate them from him but I couldnt catch the rest! The male is now guarding the rest of his fry dilligently! He's had some daphnia as he is looking stick thin!

I don't want to stress him out anymore by removing the remaining fry so I was wondering how long the male actually tends to his young?

 

[Pugbrat]

I'm no expert, but what I think it's only natural that the male will act freaky for a couple days once you separate it from the fry.

What I did as soon as most of the fry was free swimming was to carefully catch the male using my betta scoop (a very useful device this is!), minding the bubble nest.
Once I transfered him to his recovery tank, he started jumping and swimming like mad. He even bit me on the finger. After two days he still refused to eat.

I covered his tank and moved it away into a dark corner so he won't be disturbed.

He returned to his usual self after a few days.

From reading articles on breeding bettas, it's much better to remove the male, than to remove the fry from the tank and stress them out.

 

[Amerce]

Yep you should really have moved the male not the fry, next time try tempting him with some food and then cupping (not netting him) there by causing him less stress.

You now have 50 fry to handle, let the father be with the young ones he has and see if they survive, your first priority is looking after the 50 fry you caught now and let Dad and nature do the rest.

 

[juliehainsworth]

You've read my mind about letting nature take its course with the remaining fry! I will def try it a different way next time (as you can tell I'm very new to breeding bettas)! Thanks for taking time to reply!