Now Sinyo called this Betta Fish here The Blue Demon, while I call it Putri Biru, an Indonesian name meaning The Blue Princess. It's weird having two very different name come from the same betta fish. Well, what do you think?

Now this betta fish is very cool. It has fins with color and shape of a bat. It's not a betta fish anymore. No Sir, it's not. It is now called The Batfish!

From today on, I will post regularly the coolest collection of my neighbour (he collects betta fish and with his permission I'm publishing it on the internet) and see if we have good feedback.

First thing you need to know is don't overfeed the fish. You should feed adult betta fish just once a day and for the babies twice a day. Once you've fed them don't just leave them. Spend your time for a moment to see your betta eat. A betta fish should take two to five minutes to make itself full.

The most common food for betta fish is water flea. Click here to see how to breed water flea. Betta fish prefer live food, but feeding them freeze dried food is a more convenient and affordable alternative. Never use worms caught from the garden or caught in the wild for your betta fish as they may have been subjected to pesticides.

Now here's some useful tips for you (thanks to aquariumguys.com for this tips):

• Just like most fish, betta fish can go a couple days without eating, so don't worry about leaving for the weekend. But if you leave for a longer period of time, be sure to have someone feed the fish (or use a time-release food block, or automatic feeder) and clean their water (if smaller than 5 gallons it will need cleaning at least once a week).
• It is good practice to skip a day of feeding once a week, as it gives the betta fish's digestive system time to recover and clean itself out.
• IMPORTANT: While betta fish will stop eating dried or frozen food once full, they will continue eating as long as there is live food in their aquarium. Thus it is extremely important not to overfeed them with live food, as they will literally eat themselves to death.
• If your betta fish develops a paunch, or an overpronounced belly, you may be overfeeding it. Conversely, if he appears gaunt or thin, he may have an infection or need more food.

When filling the tank with water, you have three options.

The first option is using tap water. It is generally safe for your betta fish, but should be left standing for 24 hours in order to condition it and bring it to room temperature. If your city has especially hard water, you may want water treatment chemicals to remove chlorine and other contaminants.

The second option is using bottled water. It varies as much as tap water does, and if you choose to use it, be sure to stick to one particular brand. If you do decide to change brands, then gradually change it by adding a bit of the new water to the old water over a couple of days. Using betta conditioners is still a good idea.

The third option should be avoided: using distilled water.

You should measure the PH level of your water source, and adjust it they way betta fish prefer. Although betta fish can manage in water that is between 6.5 and 7.5, try to make it as close to neutral water as possible (7.0).

The ideal water temperature for betta is between 72 and 82 degrees Fahrenheit (that's 22-27 degrees Celcius). Betta can adapt to lower or higher temperatures as well as long as the change is gradual. One way to tell if the water is too hot or too cold is by watching the betta fish's behavior. A sluggish, listless fish is likely too cold and a hyperactive fish (unless it is feeding time) indicates water that is too hot.

Gravel and plants
Betta fish likes to rest on the leaves, while people find it more attractive when a tank or bowl is filled with gravel. So if you want to make the fish and the people more comfy, you may want to consider buying gravel and plants for aquarium. Ordinary rocks from the street will not do, I tell you. And remember, before adding the gravel to the aquarium, rinse it in a separate container, repeat changing the water out until it is clear.

Tank maintenance
If your tank is smaller than one gallon, then change 100% of the water once a day or at least 3 times a week. If you have larger tanks, do partial water changes of 25% of water a week. Be sure to siphon or vacuum your gravel when you change your water.

Last thing, the water does not need to be aerated. Why? Because the betta fish breathes at the surface of the water. Aeration and circulation may create too much flow for your betta, and they're not accustomed to having to swim very hard.

Betta fish breeders usually have a problem related to the feed for the fish. They don't always have feed for their fish. Betta fish eats Daphnia (it's a planktonic crustacean a.k.a. water flea) and breeders don't always have this kind of feed. Without this water flea, little bettas couldn't stay alive long, because they can't eat silkworm or mosquito larva, yet. Sometimes we can't find water fleas in market. But let me tell you, we can find water fleas in ditches around our house.

When we look at water fleas using a microscope, we can see that its size is flat and ellips, with color that is reddish. An adult water flea is around 2 mm. It can be used for female betta fishes if you want to mate it with male ones.

Now, if we want to find water fleas, it's best to search for it before sunrise, because around that time water fleas usually gather in packs on water surface. So we can just look in the water surface - river or ditch - that is reddish. Water fleas go into the bottom of the water when the day is noon.

Water fleas feed on phytoplankton or other bacteria. Betta fishes love to eat water fleas, and for additional advantage, water fleas have a lot of nutrition and are easy to digested, making betta fish's color more bright.

You can breed water fleas sing dried chicken droppings and yeast. Here's how:

• have a bucket, a drum, or pool ready. Make sure it's clean and dry.
• Fill it with water, around 50-75 cm high. Count the volume.
• Put in the chicken droppings wrapped with cloth. One gram of chicken dropping for one litre of water.
• Put in the eggs of water fleas into the pool with 10-20 grams to 1.000 litres of water ratio.
• On day four, feed them with yeast. 5 grams yeast for 1.000 litres of water.

The best thing to do is to have a home for your betta fish ready to go before he arrives from the pet store. You can either choose one of this setups:

• an individual small tank for one betta fish, 1/2 gallon minimum
• a glass or plastic fish bowl for one betta fish, 1/2 gallon minimum
• a divided tank for several male or female betta fish
• a community tank for one male or several female betta fish

• a live plant or plastic plant
• a net and siphon or gravel vacuum
• a pH test kit
• aquarium gravel
• most important: betta fish food
  

• a separate bucket or container for preparing water
• basic freshwater test kits especially ammonia test kits
• A tablespoon of freshwater aquarium salt
• an aquarium thermometer, and if your tank is 5 gallons or above, a heater
• water conditioners, stress relief, and medications for betta care

You might need to know that people have classified Betta Splendens based on the shape of its tail. Here's the list:

• Half-moon (large tail fin that forms a 180-degree or larger circle segment)

• Short-finned fighting style (sometimes called "plakat")

• Double-tail (the tail fin is split into two lobes and the dorsal fin is significantly elongated)

• Delta tail (tail span is less than half-moon with sharp edges)

• Fantail (a rounded delta tail)

• Veiltail (non-symmetrical tail, only two rays)

• Crowntail (highly frilled, extended spiny rays)

• Combtail (less extended version of the crown tail)

When you're in somebody's office or house, and you see a small aquarium with one little fish inside, you might to ask the owner this typical question, "what kind of fish is this?" and the owner might reply, "well it's... I dunno, I just find it beautiful, so I bought it. It's a something fish that fights."

What he refer to is Siamese Fighting Fish! You will find a lot of beautiful fish in your life, and one of them is Bettas. Betta Splendes have unique characteristics:

• long-shaped body with primary or even hue-distorted color, like green, red, crimson, blue, navy blue, light yellow, grey, white, etc.
• Wide dorsal fin (it's on its back), all the way to its tail, decorated with colorful lines.
• Rounded tail usually has the same color as its body.
• Its neck is like wearing a tie has a wedding gown-like fin on its belly.

Breeding Betta Splendens a.k.a. Siamese Fighting Fish a.k.a. Cupang might profit you economically. You don't need a lot of space to breed Betta, and actually there's no special requirement. Many people like to see and to have Betta because of its beautiful color and shape. As its name tells, if male Betta meet another male Betta, they will fight against each other until one of them lose, or die. This is one of the reasons why people like Betta Splendens. The price usually depends on the beautiness of the color and shape of its body and fins. In my country in Indonesia, the price ranged between $5-10 each, and up to $100 for Betta that's ready for competition. The cheapest one (and most likely the one that's mediocre) is $1 or so.

Anyone can breed Betta Splendens. You can even use buckets, small aquarium, or even cans. They will live normally in small room, even inside a bottle of beer (drink up the liquid first, then fill the bottle up with pure water). But please don't breed Betta Splendens while you're drunk. ;)