Bettas with barbs ??

okay... for starters neon tetras are the tastey crunchy morsels of the fish world! (okay they aren't crunchy that are squishy) - and put them with a betta and let's call it a buffet!

females are actually very aggressive if you don't give them the right set up. a nice grouping a 5 females is wonderful with lots of floating plants. that way they all get to make their own little territory.

so if you want 5 females in a 10 gallon (IMO way to small) then you need to not have anything else in there except perhaps a few cories to clean up the bottom of the tank.

as for barbs... barbs, in nature, live in pools of water which dry up in the summer... so there can be hundreds of barbs in a very small area of water... with no food. so they nip each others fins and scales to stay alive. so it's not that they are aggressive... if you keep them in a school then they don't bother anyone else in the tank... they'll just nibble on each other.

keeping the two together is a recipe for disaster. i would not recommend it at all.

personally a nice 77 gallon community tank is perfect for a group of female bettas... and one male. (the reason you don't keep less females together with a male is because he'll pester her to breed till she dies... so you need lots of females so he spends time pestering each one and gives each female a break!)

hope that helps.

Double tails are not my favorite, but I saw a really nice copper green one.. super huge dorsal fin, it was quite pretty.

I have a real soft spot for crowntails.. I want a melano CT, (I like the melano with red butterfly patterning.. really neat looking) but I haven't gotten around to ordering any online. Opaque are super cool too..

I'd like to get a halfmoon sometime. Sure aren't going to find one of those in a pet store! I can't stand veiltails.. uuugly.

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Originally Posted by recycling goddess

okay... for starters neon tetras are the tastey crunchy morsels of the fish world! (okay they aren't crunchy that are squishy) - and put them with a betta and let's call it a buffet!

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I'd be very surprised if a betta could catch the much faster tetras, much less fit them in their mouth. I've never tried the two together but.. I just can't see a betta eating a tetra.

Perhaps cardinal tetras? They're slightly bigger, and prettier.

i have had them together... and watched the neon tetras get eaten!

angel fish looooooove neon tetras as well :D

Well maybe our neon tetras are on steroids.. they seem mighty big to fit in a betta mouth! Well, either way, I will remember not to try that combination. ;)

ah so that's your secret! ;)

lol.. well I actually haven't owned a neon since I was about 6. I meant the ones at petsmart are huge. Perhaps THEY are giving them steroids.. eh?

hahaha i guess it depends on where they are getting them. when i worked at the petstore most of the ones we got in were so tiny...

Nah, we get big suckers. Most angel fish would have a workout eating these guys even..

must be full grown. normally when you buy a fish at the petstore it's young. that way the breeder feeds it less... keeps it in their tanks shorter and can sell them for less $$ that way. ;)

the neons are, i believe, the smallest if not one of the smallest tetras out there. of course endlers are smaller but they aren't tetras.