Female Form - What do you look for in lady fish?

[louu]

So I am considering breeding some time in the future and this question is starting to bother me.. Well it's bothering me because I don't know what to look for in female fish and I would be able to spot a good one if it hit me in the face (lets hope that never happens)

This is the first question amongst many to come. I am so curious about breeding but need to work A LOT out before I even think about when.

This is probably a no brainer but I thought I might ask as my birthday is coming up and I think I deserve some new fish!

I am interested in Hmpk.

Thank you for anyone who might answer me!

Oh! I forgot to add I think it would be more simple to get a sibling female but I would find it much more gratifying to actually know what I am looking at... :)

[Neffy]

Same as the males, the spread of the caudal which can be hard to see in a female since they dont flare as much as males, so you can count the rays at the end, an 8 ray female would produce a larger percentage of HM in a spawn. http://www.bettysplendens.com/articles/page.imp?articleid=1063 is a good read

[louu]

That is a good read! At first I was just more confused and overwhelmed, single tails, veil tails, and delta tails ALL LOOK THE SAME!!! apart from small differences which I should now be able to identify... Hopefully. At least I can tell the difference between those three and halfmoon which is really all that matters.

Thank you so much! That was very helpful!

[louu]

Also and this is more a general question, is it bad to have say two more ray branching on one big branch (if that makes sense) rather than all the same? Does it matter?

[Neffy]

Not sure, i have a few girls that will have 8 rays in the middle of the tail then 4 on the outer edges and in some of those pics on the site some of the HM girl examples have differing ray counts as well but they where more 8+ rays. So if you have mostly branches with 8 rays and then one that has 10 rays that would be a good thing beacuse u want spread and more rays = better spread ! AFAIK

[splendidbetta]

More ray branching is not necessarly a good thing, as it increases the probability of rosetails. 4 - 8 -ray females and 4 - 16 -ray males are ideal IMO.

Ray branching should be consistent across all the caudal rays, but this is not usually the case.

Superdelta or HM or OHM caudal spread is what you should look for in females, as well as short anal fins and broad dorsals.

Females should basically resemble males with female-length finnage and female-shaped bodies.

HTH :)

[Neffy]

but rosetail isnt necessarily a bad thing either -_^

[Chuckie]

watch out for the anal fin. It should be as oblong (NOT pointy) as possible if you're aiming for HMPK.

[louu]

ok next question I have spotted a new pair I would like to breed (Beautiful red Hm)and after I lost my others I really want to go for it!

BUT FIRST I need to work out what I am going to do with all the babies.

So my questions are:

1) Who do you sell your fish to? Ideally I would like to sell them to you guys if I can get away with it. I guess I will also have to get over my fear of phones and call up a few LFS's. Money isnt a huge factor for me, I would be happy selling them at around $15 each I think that's on the cheap side but I just want to make sure they sell

2)If I need to post I think I would be fine doing the actual packing (I think there was a useful sticky I saved first time round) My problem would be where to get materials for the postage and the actual courier to post with. Do Australian Air Express only go between airports? I went to their site and that was all I could gather that and that they appeared to be the only people to ship live animals

I will think of some more later I have brain block at the moment

Thank you!! :D

[fishbites]

Great discussion thread Louu,

re selling your fish - definitely advertise on here and also see if the group meeting in Sydney are interested (not that far to get them to Sydney really).... a lot will depend though on whether you get a spawn of 20 fry or 220 fry... also whether you get all males or no males.... also the spread of colours.... etc.... Make sure you keep a few of the best - sell a few of the best to others who appreciate quality bettas and sell off the deltas/super deltas to the LFS's for what you can get.....

Re LFS taking fish - unless they have a market for HM's or HMPK's they will only be looking at the fish as "fighting fish" and may not be keen on a $15 price when their normal "fighters" are around $2-$3 wholesale... All this means is you need to 'shop around' and find a LFS that recognises the quality of the fish available. I think from memory they can get at least SD to HM mixed colours from wholesalers but not sure on their wholesale price. Re females - most LFS will not recognise D/SD/HM females and probably only want to pay wholesale normal 'fighter' prices for them - remember though a quality female is important to your breeding line and to other breeders so again keep / sell the best to betta people and the rest can go to the LFS for what you can get. Remember too that some spawns don't result in a lot of males - I had one spawn of 2 dozen fish that had only one great male and the rest were females and couldn't give them all away, another spawn of 200 fish and about 100 females I couldn't give away - so keep the fingers crossed for a good proportion of males Also I had trouble with one large spawn that turned out all similar colours and the LFS's weren't keen on taking many at a time as they wanted a variety of colours in their tanks (although your plan for reds is pretty good as red is a very popular colour).

For shipping materials - ask your LFS if you can buy small fish bags and get some decent rubber bands for sealing the bags. For boxes - visit your local fruit & vegie shop - they will either give or sell you small boxes with lids... or go to the supermarket and buy a $3 styrofoam esky and add it to the shipping price.

Airlines charge like wounded bulls for shipping fish (around $60 - $80 for a small box) - necessary if you have to get fish somewhere fast but with bettas they can handle a couple of days in a good bag - I got some from Vic up to Qld via courier that took 2 days and the fish were fine. Also have received fish via Aust Post express post and they arrived from Vic in 2 days and were fine (despite the point that Aust Post don't legally allow fish to be sent this way). Locally, Air Express deliver freshwater fish but marine fish (have no idea why!) must be picked up from the airport.

Some courier companies require you to purchase books of vouchers worth hundreds of $ or you will have to pay premium prices for one off shipments. My LFS has an account with a courier company and has used them to receive fish for me and would let me use their account to send fish if I asked - check your LFS or other businesses you know and see if you can use their account for one off shipments (and just fix them up for the cost of their vouchers) as a way of not having to buy hundreds of $ worth of vouchers....

Short distances (up to about 400km) I have used Greyhound Coaches to transport boxes of fish - $17 for a large box from Gold Coast to here in Hervey Bay (8 hours in transit) - about half the price of a courier. Had to pick up from the bus terminal but that was no probs for me.

[jondo]

i found out that alot LFS dont really know their betta types. i went to four different LFS and asked them if they had any halfmoons, they all showed me delta's or super delta's and said that they were halfmoons. and they wonder why they cant sell any of their halfmoons

[fishbites]

Noticed that a lot too jondo.... if mum and dad were half moon then I think all are half moon ... LOL....

to most people a delta or SD are just like a VT only nicer and can't see the value in going from $7.95 for a VT to $30 for a delta / SD....

But after we've all had our laugh.... knowing we know more than them we should at least attempt to educate them.... my LFS is pretty good on bettas now... often has males in tanks with other fish / has an Aqua One barracks for extra males (never uses tiny plastic cups or bottles), distributes the leaflet Lisa and I put together, etc, etc.... together we can convert the world!!! :)

[louu]

Hey thank you both, the fish shop I had in mind sells a couple of delta tails at a time so I am hopeful they would maybe buy a few off of me Though they deal mostly with dragon DT's and might not be interested in something that looks so similiar to a VT. I was also very hopeful they would take some females too as they have a big tank of them as well.

So if I had a good quality Hm male and a female that is also Hm what can I expect from the spawn? I know its all down to luck but what would a reasonable percentage of Hm be?

Oh! That's great about the leaflets and everything. I have kind of given up with pet shops. My LFS is actually really good compared to the rest in my area but I learnt very quickly they do run a business and their job depends on them selling their stock. But maybe I will give them another go.

[jondo]

regarding breeding halfmoon, if both parents are hm only a small percentage of the fry will turn out hm and the rest will be delta's and super delta's. thats why i was saying alot of lfs sell delta's claiming they are halfmoons. maybe someone with more knowledge could explain it abit more to you as im still very new to bettas.

[Chuckie]

regarding breeding halfmoon, if both parents are hm only a small percentage of the fry will turn out hm and the rest will be delta's and super delta's

Not necessarily.

There are numerous genes for inheritance of what makes a fish a "HM" including genes for ray number, ray splits and webbing. A fish that looks HM may cary a lot of other genetic material, and produce non-HM offspring, but then again it might not. Unless you have seen all its siblings and its parents, and you know they were all/mostly 180*, you are taking something of a leap of faith when you spawn it.

If you cross 2 fish with a 180* caudal spread, you vastly improve the odds of producing "HM" offspring, but you do not guarantee it. Conversely, if you cross a male with 180* finnage with a female with less than 180*, or with rounded caudal edges, you vastly decrease the probability that you'll produce offspring with 180*. Those are the spawns where you tend to have 'only a small percentage' that are HM.

I believe Nick1960 and Splendidbetta have produced a lot of info re this, in the genetics forum and probably in the Gene Pool as well. It's worth a browse.

[louu]

I found this thread which I found incredibly useful/interesting, incase anyone else is interested -> http://ausaqua.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=2986

So I am sort of split in two the reason I have wanted to breed for so long (and it has been a REALLY long time) was becuase the thought of creating high quality fish really appeals to me. Ideally I would like to work on red HM, high quality crowntails particularly red and combodian (only the best will do, I am terribly picky)and some light dragons.

I actually have a few genetics questions I want to get straightened out so I might duck over that way some time soon.

Speaking of crowntails is there any demand for high quality CT's? I know they are less popular but they sound a lot easier to breed especially for a first timer. Because I do really want to work with them, maybe that would be a better place to start.

Though I fear I would have to import and that is a little scarey for me. How do crowntails fair being shipped? and also what are some good things to look for?

I think I have a good idea of what to look for but am a little unsure maybe what to not look for?

Thank you for all your help with my questions I am sure to have more :)