the last question

Question
QUESTION: also when i read that the females establish a pecking order i thought i would start letting the order be established and so i took out the divider. i quickly noticed that my smaller of the two girls,Ainiaan, was very dominating. her color which was a normal light blue/red quickly became a dark purple, flaring at Athena(my other girl), quick spirts of swimming, only ate about 4-5 of the pellets i gave her, tore her fan tail on her bush(which i later removed), stayed in a posturing state while swimming around, and she started curving her body. now while Ainiaan was doing this Athena was at first ignoring her. she is slightly longer than Ainiaan and to my inexperienced eye, more mature. but as i continued to check on them and researching i started noticing that Athena kept having those horizontal lines but she ate like 10 pellets, is not swimming sporadically, was not flaring at Ainiaan, and she only darkened her color only when i first removed the divider. i later replaced the divider and plan to keep the divider in place until i have the ten Gallon tank and further instruction. they are both fan tail bettas i believe but like i said i have only had males before and they never made bubble nests and i was able to put one in a tank with other fish. i have no experience with females or how to go about introducing them to each other, to provide enough space for them to get along, what to do if they fight, how to bred them to my friends male betta, just basically in a nutshell how to take care of them and how to obtain enough knowledge to properly take care of them. i am determined to be a good owner and want to learn everything i can to obtain this goal, and to make my new companions comfortable and to coexist happily. think of me as a newb who is determined to be a sponge for knowledge and training of bettas. thank you for reading extensive question.

ANSWER: Hi Nicole,
 Sorry for the delay in responding.  Breeding bettas is technically not that hard.  You put a male in a 10 gallon tank.  Then introduce a female but be sure that there are floating plants such as watersprite in the tank.  This will provide an anchor for his bubblenest, and it will also provide some protection for the female.  If the male likes the female, he will build a bubblenest. If he doesn't, he will attack her and you need to remove her right away or he will kill her.
Assuming he likes her, she will lay eggs and they will put them up in the bubblenest.  At that point, it is entirely up to the male to care for them, and you are best to remove the female because she won't care for the eggs and he will try to kill her.  

 After the eggs hatch, the biggest challenge is getting food small enough for the fry: they are very tiny.  Probably the best thing is stuff called green water. Basically, you take a bucket of water, put it outside in the sunlight for a week or so and the water will turn green with algae. There are millions of little organisms in that water.  Take a cup of that water and put it in with the baby bettas. I do one cup a day, you can do more if you have the time.  (Yes, it might turn your tank water green, but that is okay).  As the babies get larger, try feeding them frozen
baby brine shrimp.  

 Best of luck.

-- Ron C.
  rcoleman@cichlidresearch.com
  Cichlid Research Home Page <http://cichlidresearch.com>


---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: well actually my friends male betta died suddenly . we left for a walmart trip and returned to find him floating about dead. it was determined that he go sucked up next to the filter intake and was killed. but what my main goal has been is too have my two girls live together in the same tank. the tank i have is one of those that is divided into two halves and has a clear divider with a second solid divider that can be removed to allow flaring but no fight aka dead fish. i still plan on getting a ten gallon tank . so i was wondering if a 10/gal tank would be enough room to allow the girls each a territory. also some tips on how to get them more use to each other. i have been removing the divider 10 mins every day to see the responses and to see if they are improving or staying the same. well Athena who started out the much less dominate one is now meeting ainiaan flare for flare so to speak. and they have also discovered the slits in the solid divider that allows circulation but is not even big enough to get even half a face through. they are constantly "talking big" to each other. basically the information i seek now is not on how to bred them to males but how to go about getting my two female bettas to co-habitate. and its ok on the amount of time getting back i work till midnight almost every night so the timing was good. also is the green water also a good way to collect mosquito larvae
i heard its a real treat for bettas. is this true

ANSWER: HI Nicole,
 Hmm.... in general female bettas do not fight. I have kept lots of females together in a 10 gallon tank with no problems.  They seldom flare at anybody.  It is very possible that your "female" bettas are in fact young males. That would explain the behavior. Unfortunately, many places sell "female" bettas that are young males because young male bettas and female bettas can look very, very similar (i.e., small fins, etc)

  Yes you can collect mosquito larvae that way but you want to be careful that you don't start breeding all sorts of mosquitos all around your place.

-- Ron C.
  rcoleman@cichlidresearch.com
  Cichlid Research Home Page <http://cichlidresearch.com>


---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: oh goodie. I'm very glad i didn't stick them in the same tank then. is there a way to tell the difference between males and females when their fins are small or do i just wait until they are older? i went out for a run and forgot to put the solid divider back into place and when i got back they were still going at it. i was gone for over twenty minutes. so i think you may be right but is there an easy way to tell. would it help you if i managed to get you some pictures

Answer
Hi Nicole,
  There is no really easy foolproof way when they are young, that is why they get mixed up.  Females TEND to have more horizontal lines on them, but so do many young males.  The best way
to tell them is to watch how they interact with each other.  Males fight, females generally don't.

-- Ron C.
  rcoleman@cichlidresearch.com
  Cichlid Research Home Page <http://cichlidresearch.com>