Breeding Age?

[Fishy_Friend11]

I was just wandering if there is a certain age or point in there life when they are more prone to mate. And will a signifigant difference in age affect whether they breed or not?

[Oscar Betta]

well dont do it too young, or they probably wont breed. i dont think they can be too old to breed. im not sure, ask Luis (bettalu&meg) hes a betta breeder and i bet he knows.

[BettaLu&Meg]

Breeding is my specialty and have been for awhile, Now breeding at different ages i don't and experimented with. I noticed that even tho at there pre-juvinile age they can mate which is from 6-8months, will trying to spawn or doing there spawning ritual, they tend to fight with each other more and chase, More than concetrating on spawning. Now my bettas that were 9months and over when promoting spawning in these guys, they tend to bubblenest, and promote spawning in each other alot more than the younger age. Thus my conclusion is that if you know the exact age of your bettas and want to breed these guys. the "after 9 month" age is when to do it!

[divy]

yep i agree with bettalu&meg, but i have breed bettas at 4-5 months old
i personally would breed anything older then 12 months but thats just me

[BettaLu&Meg]

Glad you agree divy

[bettalvr]

Hey Luis, could you expand on your reasoning for the "9 months rule" that you use? I am very interested in hearing more and am sure that others would also. Have you tried successfully/unsuccessfully spawning before/after that age? What were the spawns like? Small/large, healthy/unhealthy? How many spawns would you try to get from a pair since fertility drops after about 14 months? I wasn't quite sure from your post if you did or did not experiment with spawning ages for the pair. If you didn't and got info from your friends in Japan/Thailand, please share. Interesting topic! Thx bunches!

[BettaLu&Meg]

No problem betsy,
Personaly i wait for 9 months for this reason. When i have tried to breed my bettas and 5 months bubble nesting and intrest for each other was at a minimum. i tried different bettas, different pair and i got the same outcome. They where more intrested in the dominating the tank more than intrest in each other for spawning.

Now doing this and removing some females for the fry batch, I wasn't able to replace the females back with her sister, for the reason of seperating, introducing her back with the sibling made them feel as if she was an outsider, thus resulting in fighting amoungest all the females. After removing all the about 5 females in this certain batch of fry i had so keep in seperate contaniers as the males. which made it more difficult to care for seperate tanks and contanier.( i literally couldn't walk into a section of my room lol).
I did have success breeding one paritcular pair in about 7months of age.(one of the pairs i used at 5 months and had success. the others i tried using wasn't having it!
Breeding this pair, (by the way they were Veils) i have had a nest full of at least 100 eggs. But being that the male was still 7 months the eggs were eaten by him by the 2nd day of hatching.... This i felt was a result of early juvenile age.

So i decieded to wait after 9months to 10 and tried with them again. then success with the eggs reaching "free swimming" age, and the removal of the male. In this batch of fry out of 130 only 10 survived. and half were smaller than there other siblings. This is one reason i do not like to breed with there sibling. I feel that with mixed genes from other bettas you have a better chance of strong fighters being born/bred.

Now when i breed my bettas whether they are from a batch of fry that are over 9 months and a adult i already have, the success rate is almost immediate after doing the neccasary preping for there breeding tank.

If i didn't answer clearly Betsy please let me know, or if you have other questions... i'm a little busy today running around and trying to go on the forum in between that ....

[bettalvr]

Thanks Luis! I have wondered about the fry eating and whether it could be age related. Many breeders I know do start spawning at 4 1/2 - 5 mos and some will cull the male after a couple times trying - if he is an egg eater. Since they're culled at such a young age, it's hard for me to get info as to how these same fish would do at a later age.

Divy, have you experienced this egg eating at an early age and then no problems at a later age?

Oscarbetta, these guys do get too old to breed.

[BettaLu&Meg]

no problem i hope i answered your question.