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Well, I haven't actually measured anybody, but I have eight betta girls in a community tank. 4 of them I have had for several months, and although they all started ruffly the same size, they are not the same now. The biggest one is red, and it's body appears to be bigger than my 1 male betta (also red). I would guess she is actually even bigger than it appears because she is in a 46gal tank, and he is in a 5 gal, which should make her appear smaller, and him larger. I've had the male for about 1 1/2 years, so I assume he is older.

I've actually thought of putting them together and makin' some red-betta-babies, But I know NOTHING about breeding bettas, so I probably won't. But if I read up on it, and do put them together, I will report back on the size difference.


Bottom line, take away the fins, and my biggest girl is bigger than my guy.....but who would want to take away the fins!

-Dennis

Ok sorry kitten. was a bit confused lol.
I don't have this setup now. But at the time, I had 6 females and a male at a time (would alternate out males that were in their own containers). With the exception of one male that was TOO shy..scared to death in the big tank. But the rest..of the males..were pretty slow..not too active. The females just seemed to always be on the search for food. Would spend alot of time on the bottom scavenging.. and not go up for air much. The males were just more nonchalant..about life in general. Lazy lol. Maybe the females are made to eat more to fatten up by nature..

Maybe the females eat mnore cause they have to produce eggs. That can't be very easy for a little fish.

Hehe... actually I was replying to djtj... sorry, should have pointed that out. My girls are NOT fat (at least... not anymore ), they're just bigger than the males!

And I guess the girls must just naturally eat more if even in the same environment, they did? Interesting. I wonder why that is? Are their activity levels different in your tank, girlunderrainbow? I know my males all take it easy while my females are all over the place, but does the same hold true when they're all in a big tank? You'd think a male would have to expend more energy to drag around all those fins if he was going at the same pace as a female!

~Meow. Thus spoke the cat.~

And, my females and a male were kept in a 6ft tank..and the girls always had the biggest appetites.

Kitten.. I wasn't actually referring to YOUR posts. you never mentioned anything in relation to finnage,actually...some others did that is why I was wanting to point out that when talking about measuring I was talking about size all around, w/out fins, as I assumed everyone was measuring (even if eyeballing) without taking the fins into consideration..but a few other posters did mention fins..

There's no doubt that females seem to have a bigger appetite than males (perhaps because my girls are kept in a 20 gallon long and thereby get more exercise than the males kept in two gallons without filtration to work against?). But the size I'm talking about is the LENGTH, not the girth. The females are quite obviously LONGER than the males. That IS how I measure size, after all. I assumed that's what the question was asking.

Yes, they also seem taller than males (even when they don't have a bloodworm gorged tummy), but normally when people ask about size, they're asking for the length, from nose to caudal penuncle, so that's how I answered the question. Overall, the females are bigger in all proportions - except fin length, obviously - but the answer I gave was length.

~Meow. Thus spoke the cat.~

Back when I have all of my females in the big tank and they got big..and rotated a male in the tank with them at a time...I had them all about a year..and w/out fins, (which is how you're supposed to measure any fish anyway) the females were way bigger, in length and width, than the males. And ate ALOT more. They would take very small crickets..that were mean for the African Butterfly Fish.

I guess all the girls were spoiled so much they got chubby.

Actually, djtj... My eldest male is at least six months older than my eldest female. Assuming they were the same age when I got them, six months apart. Either way, Liberty (the male) was full grown when I got him, and my eldest females are all bigger than he is, though they began quite a bit smaller.

~Meow. Thus spoke the cat.~

Oh yeah, shes FAT too. Much fatter than him! But she is a pig, and likes to steal the catfish waffers off the bottom after she eats her floating food!


...unless your one of the catfish

:#(

-Dennis

Just curious..always see people saying how they are smaller than males, but when I used to keep a group of them in a 6ft tank..they'd get up to 3" and VERY fat..

that's cause they're probably older

Actually, all my girls are bigger than my males.

~Meow. Thus spoke the cat.~

exactly, only they look smaller because they don't have the long, flowing fins.

females can get to the same suze as males.

One of my chain store girls is actually quite like yours, Byrbenn... she's very beautiful, possibly one of the best looking girls I have (though I am partial to my twin pink cambodian girls ) and is also one of the larger ones. Perhaps because I got her the same day the betta shipment came into the store? *shrugs*

I'm a big believer that living in cups does lasting harm to bettas.

~Meow. Thus spoke the cat.~

my largest n best female was bot in a chain store she was the prettiest fish ive ever kept but she killed every male she lived to b just over 2 years at 2.5" shes the fattest n largest female common betta ive seen

Well, better late than never, but thought I'd add my experience in there.

I have had nine betta girls and in my experience, they range from just under 2" to pushing (and perhaps even over) 3" inches. The smaller ones were purchased from chain stores, where they were kept in cups, the larger ones were purchased from my fav LFS, from a community tank. Coincidence? Perhaps.

~Meow. Thus spoke the cat.~

2 inches is average in my experience.

Edit: poor reading skills on my part... I was really tired and commented on something that wasn't even written.

Last edited by Daniel at 12-Feb-2005 14:26