I'm getting real tired of my bettas

[Elisabeth83]

All 3 of my male bettas have chewed/torn fins. One of them got his fins torn up by my other betta when he jumped the divider but the other 2 in the last 2 days have chewed their fins!!

I'm so tired of them chewing their fins!! I'm starting to think this is too much to deal with. It's like they start looking real beautiful and then I look at them and they have chewed their fins off again. Then I have to deal with the possiblity of fungus showing up which I think one of them might have.

I've heard they do this because they get excited...but are there any other reasons? I want to keep them in the 14 gallon together. My dividers are clear but I've seen many others on here with the same kind of set up with clear dividers and I haven't heard them complaining about their bettas chewing their fins. I know that sometimes bettas chew their fins and it becomes a habit..but what are the chances of me buying 3 of them who do that?

Please help me figure something out...I'm considering taking them back to my lfs and getting a bunch of females for the tank instead if I can't get them to stop it then as least I wont have to deal with chewed fins

 

[shrks1fan]

Are you actually seeing them "chew" them or could their fins just be "blowing"?

Linda

 

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[GuppyDude]

that picture is hilarius! yea i never had that problem but i do hear about it alot, i wonder why they do that?

 

[Elisabeth83]

I haven't actually seen them chew their fins..but I've seen what blown fins look like and mine arn't that extreme. Hmm maybe I can draw a picture somehow it's hard to explain.

Now don't laugh...these are super quick drawings!!

This is how one of them looks. As you can see the top fin and the tail are chewed. But they are chewed funny because it's just chewed inbetween kinda and he left long bits.

Kinda like a CT but he's a veiltail.

Now I'm gonna draw the next one!

 

[GuppyDude]

i dont think their chewing them, i think theres some kinda disease u got in ur water or sumthing, i mean what r the odds they would all be chewing? u probably witch out water and equiptment between all the bowls so that would explain y they all got that

 

[Elisabeth83]

heres the other

 

[Elisabeth83]

I don't think it's a disease..it happened over night. Yesterday they looked beautiful (besides blue boy) and the one red boy had perfect fins no rips/tears or anything. He actually now that I think about it has never chewed his..but the other 2 have. Then they grew out with new finnage and everything. They weren't completely grown out yet...but all new clear finnage was starting to come in nice and now they did it again. Maybe they did blow them....I do see a small hole in the red ones fin which wasn't there yesterday.

My other red betta I noticed after I bought him that in some places you could see new clear finnage growing but I wasn't sure if he chewed them or what. Now since he's done it again here with me...I assume he must be a chewer.

They live in a divided tank not in bowls.

 

[Elisabeth83]

I was just reading through an old thread I posted a month or 2 back about how common bettas chewing their tails was. There were some replies I hadn't seen and someone said how when they started feeding their bettas less they started chewing their tails...and when they fed their bettas normally..they stopped chewing. Now I am seeing a connection between their bettas and mine because just this week Wednesday and Today I didn't feed my bettas.

I was starting to fast them 2 days of the week thinking it would be good for them but maybe it's gotten them more stressed. I think I'll go back to feeding them everyday and see if things improve.

 

[GP]

If they are next to eachother, I would seperate them so they can't see eachother. I did this with my male a while back and he stopped. They sometimes chew their fins because of stress, or over flaring.

HTH

 

[Elisabeth83]

Hmm...well they were all doing great...no chewing until the 2 got into a fight and in this same week I changed their feeding schedule.

They don't flare very often at eachother anymore only the occasional flare.

I don't want to move them to separate bowls. Too much work I set up this 14 gallon because it's too cold here in Sweden (winter), Doing less water changes, and they have a lot more room.

Ugh I'll just go back to how I was feeding them and see if that changes anything.

 

[f250fisherman]

It's just my opinion, but I think they are wanting to fight each other. If they see each other all the time, they are always wanting to fight. Then they see their flowing tails when they turn, and chomp. Thats a big reason why breeders that jar males, use a cardboard divider between the jars. It is natural for them to want to fight. They will chew on whatever is available. I had 2 males that would chew their tails within 24 hours of flaring at another betta male. I had to let them see females to exercise, rather than the males.

 

[Elisabeth83]

f250fisherman - I think your right! I thought about it all last night what I can use to cover up part of each divider. I came up with using a hard plastic place mat. Ones that are clear but blurry so they wont be able to see eachother fully.

I'm going to go to a couple stores today and see if I can find what I'm looking for

 

[Mike&Diana]

I've got the same problem as Elisabeth and it is very frustrating! However, I feed my betta everyday, and he still chews his fins. And it can't be the fac tthat he wants to fight another betta he sees because he is the only one I have. His tail starts to grow back real nice, and then he bites it off. I've actually seen mine chasing/biting his tail. I have no idea what to do. He could possible be seeing a strange reflection, I'm not sure!