Filtering A 10 Gallon

[winddancer70]

I keep 3 -10 gallon setups for my bettas. Two of which are divided for my male bettas into 4 compartments each tank. My females has the run of a 10 gallon. I've been running a 5-15 tetra power filter on all 3 tanks.Here's what I've noticed. When the filter isn't running the males build up their bubble nests....But when that filter runs (even with the flow slowed down by something) they do not build any bubble nests at all..Does this mean they are miserable with the filter running? If so, should I keep filters off and just do water changes? How ofter would you suggest I do them on a 10 gallon? I keep no gravel in the bottom.just a plant and cave for each..

 

[lisie]

Wow... that really makes sense... I have two bettas in tanks with filters. A few weeks back I went away for a few days without the filters running, and when I came back they both had bubble nests. I was pretty surprised, because one of them very seldomly builds bubble nests, and the other one never does.... and they couldn't have been very happy without food for 3 days. I didn't even think that it could have been the lack of a filter! Maybe I should consider getting rid of the filters too...

 

[Polardbear]

I think that the water movement produced by the filter (even when slowed down) makes it difficult for the bubblenests to stay together. I've noticed the same things with my males that are in filtered tanks. I've got one boy in a 5 gallon eclipse tank with a biowheel filter and he is very happy in his tank but never has a bubblenest, when I put him in an unfiltered tank overnight a week ago he built the largest bubblenest I'd ever seen. Another male that's in a divided 10 gallon with a simple box filter usually has a string of bubbles around the edges of his compartment but no real nest, when I spawned him in an unfiltered tank he nested with no problem.

I don't think it's that they are unhappy just that the nests are to fragile to take much water movement.