Black moors and other stuff

Question
Hi. I am doing a science experiment on my goldfish. I have a small black moor and a goldfish. I have trained the gold fish how to jump through a hoop, ring a bell, and bump a ball out of the tank, but my black Moore just won't do it. do you have any suggestions for another smart fish I could use? Also how do I sex my black Moore? And in a separate tank, I recently got a female beta from the pet store I looked in her tank one day and there were little whitish pinkish things swimming around, are they babies?!!!!

Answer
Hi Meghann;

Moors really can't see very well because of their eye shapes so that might be the problem. Or maybe because of the added difficulty in maneuvering their bodies. The fancy goldfish like your moor all originally came from the common goldfish or carp. All the inbreeding and selective breeding that is done to develop those unusual body shapes, eyes, fins and different colors could indeed affect their intelligence level too. They are still very sweet, cute and friendly fish, just different than their "cousins" that they originally came from. You might want to stick with the regular goldfish for better results, or just include the information about "fancy goldfish" problems in your report. Here is a page about sexing goldfish. It's the same in all types of goldfish, no matter what type they are;

http://thegab.org/Articles/SexingGoldfish.html

Bettas are egglayers. Unless there is a male betta in with your female betta to fertilize and care for her eggs as they are laid, they aren't going to hatch so the little things are probably just some kind of water bug. She will probably eat them and it's good for her to do that. Those types of 'bugs' usually aren't harmful at all. They can be a sign of excess waste in the tank though. Excess waste can easily lead to "unwelcome guests" because it is there for organisms to eat. Sometimes they just grow in there anyway though, even in fairly clean tanks. Our tanks can be a home for part of the life cycle of many different types of bugs and other organisms that get into our homes. They can drop eggs, they hatch to a swimming stage, develop to the next stage and fly away or crawl away. It's all rather creepy but quite natural. ;-)

At Your Service;
Chris Robbins