females as comunity fish

[guppler]

My very first female betta (Opal) lived with a pair of guppies named Jack and Jill O'Lantern. They seemed to get along Ok, but I haven't succesfully had a female betta live with anything but another female betta since then. Noel somehow got injured ahortly after she went in my comunity tank, and just when her wound was looking better, she died, maybe of infection. Anyway, all that was in my comunity tank for a long tim was male guppies, because i had so many there was no space for anything else. Now I have 5 danios, 5 tetras, 1 cory cat, and the other half of the fishes are male guppies, which are probably all part endler because they are on the small side (<1"), and I had one sneaky little endler.
My female gupps are really too crowded still, and if i want them to have kids, i think any betta would eat them all.
I have 3 boy bettas now and I just bought a female again. Right now she lives in a plastic critter keeper, the smallest one i've kept any fish in for more than a few minutes. She seems happy enough, especially when she can see her handsome neighbors, but i'm not ready for her to visit them, and they don't even have nests prepared. I have heard that female bettas are suposed to be comunity fish, but mine don't seem to last long in the comunity tank, and I'm afraid she might be too aggressive for the tiny fishes I would make her live with. I just read about one attackong her intended mate. I thought the boys were the agressive ones. Maybe that's not common? Maybe she would ignore other species? My betta females have always been smaller than my boys, even if you don't count finnage, but she is still lots bigger than my endlers, and I don't want them to be dinner.
I did have 2 female betas living together in a larger critter keeper for a while, but i noticed one had some serious fin rot right when I was going to put them both in with the boy guppies. She died, but even after a quarantine time, Noel looked OK until I tried to put her in the big tank.
Maybe they would rather be alone like the boys. I haven't even tried a male in a comunity tank, but whenever I hear of somebody trying it he get's thrashed, and I wouln't want him to mistake other species for rivals.
It seems like a betty should fit in about as well as a small gourami, but then i haven't gotten one of those yet either. They'd probably share tanks pretty nicely with them. I'm guessing.

 

[SMSBrunetteGirl]

Ohhh,well I got to tell you,NEVER PUT A BETTA WITH OTHER FISH.Trust me,because when I did,he kept biting at my other fish and ripped some fins (Thank god they grew back B)

 

[aloaring]

Well i have kept females in a community but you need to put about six of them in at the same time, that way they are only aggresive to each other and not other fish. and when you have six the agression is dispersed so no one female gets picked on!! also put plenty of plants and and hiding places in a community so they all have their own space. One female by herself in a communtiy will likely not work as she just beat on anything els in the tank! if you have 2 0r 3 females one will always be picked on usually until they die after much experimentation i found 6 is a good number . but the betta experts will be able to tell you more!

 

[endilliteracy]

I bought a baby female betta as she only had one "good" pectoral fin. The other one is very tiny, like Nemo. She was getting picked on a lot with the other fish she was kept with at the LPS. She is now in my 30 gal and does fine with all the other fish. The dalmation molly picks on her for some reason and lately she has been chasing the gourami around the tank. I am thinking about donating her to the LFS because she keeps having fry non-stop and I don't have enough room to take care of all of them.

 

[guppler]

hmm...
so judging by the varied experiences. it might not be a good idea to put plaid betty in the comunity tank, but it might be Ok if i'm lucky and careful.
I have been thinking about adding dwarf gouramis if they won't eat anybody. I wonder if they would play nicely with betty.
My danios might gang up on her or something. there are good hiding spots and plants because I want to be ready for coolies and hatchets, and my other critters like them, but the biggest fish in the tank can't go everywhere the little ones can. I think that might be how Noel got injured. She was a cute pinkish critter with red fins, kinda like a candy cane. I don't know if I'll find another girl as pretty as the original Opal, but my new little betty is pretty close, kinda between her and my little Opal2betty who was darker and probably not real healthy from the start. I got Frosty at the same time and he's doing great. He had a huge belly cist for months, but it finaly went away on it's own. He even has some beautiful pet snowball snails now. ( He does a couple of swoops past Betty's end to show her his big flowing turquoise fins and rosequartz scales. Usually she gets more excited about Sparkle, but she seems to like Frosty's show too. Sunspot actualy seems to show more interest in the blonde guppies in the breeding tank next door. Maybe he knows he doesn't have the biggest fins. I should see if he'll flare at a mirror.)
Look'n at what y'all have in yer tanks, it looks like they get along OK with some other critters, but I reckon I was just confused when it looked like the male & female bettas at the end were in the comunity tank.