# earthworm for bettas?



## alexcb

i tried giving my bettas small pieces of earthworm from our backyard. i cut it small enough for bettas mouth. i enjoyed doing this morning ang afternoon. i almost forgot giving them their flakes. would it be harmful for the bettas? im planning to breed them and im a newbie. hope to have some replies...


----------



## Chickadee

I do not think I would do that as the earthworms that you get from your yard are not run through the process of cleaning and disinfection that the ones are that you buy for feeding to fish. I would be afraid of contamination and/or disease processes being introduced into your tank. If you want to feed your fish actual food from a store get a small piece of liver from the grocery store or even some chicken livers and cut very small pieces of raw liver and allow the betta to have a couple small (half of his eye sized) pieces of it a couple times a week or so. But the bettas MAIN diet needs to be his bloodworms or pellets that are made for his consumption and not many of those. Remember that his stomach is the size of his eye and it is not to be overstuffed. Overfeeding of bettas, although done with the best of intentions, is one of the main causes of their death.

I have honestly had emergencies come up where I was not able to arrange for my fish to taken care of and been gone for 5 days with the fish getting no food for that length of time and they are fine. They really require very little food and can find microrganisms in the tank that we cannot even see to keep them fed for a time. I will say that I had some very clean tanks when I returned! They were very happy to see me but I only gave them enough to feed them one small meal. Discipline when feeding is so important in keeping your fish healthy.

You mentioned feeding your betta flakes. Their mouths are not really made for flakes but if you note that he is eating them then okay. They get along with pellets or better yet bloodworms or daphnia or some other form of food much easier. The brand name that I usually use simply because I have never had any difficulty with the size and/or quality of it is Hikari for the bloodworms or daphnia and Atison's by Ocean Nutrition for the pellets. Some others that work really well are:

Hikari Betta Bio-gold pellets
Atison's Betta Formula Pellets (bettas over 6 months old)
Atison's Betta Pro Pellets (bettas under 6 months old)
Hikari freeze dried bloodworms
Hikari freeze dried daphnia

I always soak the pellets for a few (up to 5) minutes as they swell in the bettas tummy and can be deceiving on how many should be fed and can get them overfull if you let them swell INSIDE the fish. The daphnia and bloodworms do not swell but you still need to control how many of them are fed at one time. 

Rose


----------



## Chickadee

LOL...sorry you are on your own....cambodian bettas male or female (and I personally think the females are more of a handful) are just plain like very naughty kids that have no off switch. But oh my, are they pretty! She needs her own tank, sorry to say.

Rose

 Misty was only 3 months old here and all the color was not in her fins yet. They were mostly cellophane but she was pure cambodian through and through. So I know what you are speaking of, she was a darling by herself but what a little demon when put with sisters.


----------



## Chickadee

alexcb, I am so sorry that we hijacked your post. Have we answered your questions to your satisfaction? Do you need further information?

Please let us know if you need anything else here.

Rose


----------



## alexcb

thanks for all the info. i really learned a lot but i think theres much more i need to learn. thank god there are guys like you who are willing to share their knowledge. thanks a lot!
by the way, its hard to find fbw in our area so i think im going to look for hikari. but for yhe meantime, is it okay to feed them crushed flakes and dried tubiflex?


----------



## Chickadee

If they will eat the food is the problem. Bettas are the pickiest of eaters and I thought I would go bankrupt before I found what mine would deign to put in their spoiled little mouths and eat. I would say if you can find bloodworms in any brand it would be better and I am not a fan of tubifex at all as they do not contain much in the way of nutrition for them and with those long flowing fins they need their protein to keep them healthy. But if it is a temporary arrangement with a different food in sight I suppose they will be okay but this cannot be a permanent arrangement as they are just not going to get all they need from them.

I really need to do a post like the one I have done on other forums that is a general guide for care of bettas. I did one on tips from other owners to avoid problems that I stickied today but I need to do the general care guide like I had before.

The easiest way to find what will keep your betta happy is to ask the people who sold him to you if they are a breeder or dealer. If you got him from a petstore forget that statement totally. They throw some food in the cups and if the fish does not eat it then too bad. But I have not ever seen a betta that will turn up his nose at bloodworms...and I have had a lot of bettas with many types of tempers and temperments. 

By the way I do not feed my fish FROZEN foods, they get the freeze dried. I know that a lot of owners will tell me that this is not the best but my guys and gals survived quite well on them and I felt that they did just as well with them and accepted them very well. I feel if you keep a lot of fish at one time perhaps it is cost effective to buy the frozen but I would end up throwing a lot of the frozen foods away and cannot afford to do that. So if the freeze dried is available to you it is perfectly okay to use it.

So a shorter answer, yes for a few days it will not hurt in moderation to feed those but do not be surprised if you end up fishing them back out of the tank when your fish will not eat them. Some will eat them and some will not eat anything but what they want. It is entirely up to YOUR fish and they do have a mind of their own. It is part of what makes them charming and part of what makes them exasperating. But it is also what makes them worthwhile. I do love most fish but bettas most of all because I feel they interact with me, make me love them and make me mad at them and make me aware that they are aware of what is going on around them. They are like naughty little children and I could not adore them more for it. I do get to the point of wishing that they could get their little selves scolded some days with their nonsense but at the most I put my hand on the front of Diablo's glass and tell him firmly that "Mother is not amused" and he sits there wiggling his cute fins at me and acting not at all penitent and my heart melts.

By the way I do not use FROZEN bloodworms on my fish. They are freeze dried always. I do not find the frozen cost effective or that much better. Unless you have a lot of fish, I find there is a lot of waste involved.


----------



## alexcb

i have only two bettas, a male and a female. they are from a nearby lfs. they are very thin and it seems they were not well fed. when i took them home, i gave them some crushed sinking pellet of my texas and red devil juvies. though their stress marks are showing, they ate heartily. i tried to give them dried tubiflex and flakes and they ate again until their tummy got relly big (wont do it again). until now, they eat like my texas, rd and flowerhorn. i hope you can post some guide how to breed them. thank you very much. i think im learning.
cant believe that bettas are picky eaters. maybe im just lucky to have bettas with appetite of a red devil.


----------



## Chickadee

It is unfortunate to the highest degree that your fish were so poorly taken care of but let me assure you that the betta is usually a very picky eater. If these fish were not so mistreated and hungry you would have had a time getting them to eat that way. Shame on those people! I would not buy fish from there again and depend on getting healthy fish if I were you unless you know the fish have just come into their store. They obviously care nothing for the animals put in their care.

You will have to feed these bettas very small amounts several times a day (like 3 or 4) to get them built back up. Even 2 or 3 pieces of food each time would be good as they are not used to having much and they are going to have to be gotten used to eating again slowly. It is like taking a starving human and trying to get them built up it needs to be done with patience and slowly. The fish will accept any food at this point but the best food for it will be food that it meant for it. Also at this point I would recommend the Vitachem vitamins if you can swing it. You put the food, preferably bloodworms in a small container even a plastic spoon and put a drop of Vitachem on them and then put the spoon in the water and let the food float off after they have soaked in the vitamins for about 3 or 4 minutes to absorb them (1 drop will do), rinse the spoon for the next time and you are set. They get the vitamins for one meal a day and the other meals just the food. If you cannot swing the vitamins, get some minced garlic in a jar at the grocery store with the juice and put a drop of garlic juice in their food one time a day. It gives their immune systems a boost and helps them get stronger.

If you need more help just ask questions on anything and we are here to help. Bless you for helping these bettas. I feel so sorry for them.

Rose


----------

