Betta Flaring At Other Fish - Community Tank

[Bluesand1313]

So before you go all "bettas are supposed to live alone" on me, this fish is pretty special. He's been housed with corys, cream-coloured platy, panda tetras... And he's been 100% fine with them. Never flared, never chased them, would eat along side them like no problem.
However, we recently introduced a Swordtail male and female. He is CONSTANTLY flaring at the female, and is now starting to flare at the cream coloured platy that he originally had no problem with. He still ignores all the other ones. He mostly focuses and flares at the female swordtail.
He has not attacked her, just flares at her and then swims away, flares and swims away. Kind of like breeding behaviour, but not quite. Still seems aggressive, but he's not attacking.

Anybody know why he's targeting just the female, and how/if we can stop it?
She's bright orange with black spots, and he's a red and white dumbo.

 

[NickAu]

Anybody know why he's targeting just the female, and how/if we can stop it?

The simple answer is.
Because he can its what Bettas do.

Slightly more complicated answer.

Its a new fish , The flaring might be just look at me Im boss, It may or may not stop, Keep a close eye on him he may or may not attack it. Bettas are unpredictable at best.
Basically thats the best answer you can expect,

The only way to truly prevent it is to separate the fish, You could add extra live plants to break up lines of sight and give the fish someplace to hide if it feels threatened but thats just a band aid solution.

I had a female Plakat that had 6 Hengeli Rasboras as tank mates and things were great for about 4 to 5 months and then she snapped, Killed 2 and fatally injured a third.

He's been housed with corys, cream-coloured platy, panda tetras... And he's been 100% fine with them. Never flared, never chased them, would eat along side them like no problem.

Hes used to them

 

[Bluesand1313]

Okay, thank you. We have coverage in the tank already, so maybe it will be okay. We've introduced other fish to the tank before and he didn't flare at them, so I just think it's odd he's decided to just go along and attack this female at random. But it is what it is, we will separate them if it gets too much for either fish to handle.

 

[snowflake311]

You are not going to stop it. Your male is trying to get her to breed with him. Has he made a bubble next yet? A female sword tail looks a lot like a female betta fish. He will start to hurt her the more frustrated. You will need to separate them live bearers and Bettas do not mix well.

I kept betta fish for 10 years I even bred them. I now have swordtails. I would set up another tank for the betta fish. If you want to keep the swordtails you should get one more female. 1 male to 2 or more females is best. Don't keep too many males the strongest one will kill the weak ones if you don't have enough females to go around. I had 3 males and 4 females. Now i have 4 females and one male.

 

[Bluesand1313]

That's what I'd figured, he's been separated and now lives with me until we can find him a good home.
I wasn't sure since he didn't seem to be doing any other breeding behaviour.. I guess by adding the female, his hormones started acting up which would explain why he started acting the way he did. I'm not sure.

Anywho, it's been dealt with and everybody is happy as a clam.