Questions about behaviour of Betta (Siamese Fighting Fish)

[meaningbuggle]

Hi,
Just reading through this brilliant forum and have looked at a few of the posts on bettas.

I was hoping that someone might be able to help me out with a question i have.

Since Betta were originally a grey / green colour in the wild, how and why have they become so diversely and brightly coloured? I understand that it is due to artificial selection and breeding but does the aggressive / territorial behaviour / breeding rituals have anything at all to do with the fact that they are such stunning colours?

I've had a look on the web but havent really been able to find anything that goes into that much detail into the evolution and behaviour of the betta.

Anyway, not sure if you guys can help but any ideas, suggestions or info would be a great help.

Thanks again

Kind Regards

Bug

 

[Allivymar]

heh, is your question about behavior? Or color

Actually, if you research some of the different betta species, you'll see theres a number of them with lots of color, even wild. The bettas we find in lfs are a mix of a couple of betta species (I think Xmasfish may be able to tell us which). If you check out the diff species on the International Betta page, you'll get an idea of the colors wild bettas can come in; click on species: http://www.ibc-smp.org/

 

[bettacove]

As betta splendens go: (which is what i asume you are talking about)
Years and years and years of selective breeding. All the fin types and colours are mutations from the original short finned browny/redish/greenish B.splendens.

ashley

 

[bettacove]

Oh as for behavior goes:

Some people do breed bettas to be nasty, these are the people that use them to fight. There has been some discusion about this, on wheither you can acutally breed the fight out of bettas. There was lots of mixed opinions, but most people think no, you can't go agaisn't natures instinct. But a lot of poeple agreed that you could indeed breed them to be lean mean fighting machines! Some of those thai fighters are down right MEAN!

ashley