Can I keep female betas in the tank together?

Most enthusiasts are aware that you can’t keep two male Bettas in a tank. They will fight to death, but most also seem to think that female Bettas will stay together amicably. This is not always true. Female Bettas have more personality and spunk and can be really aggressive.

It is, however, possible to keep female Bettas in the same tank and even though their plumage is not as beautiful as the male, they look amazing swimming together in one tank. Female Bettas can learn to live peacefully with each other.

Setting up the tank
Most important success factor is the size of the tank— the bigger the better. A large tank will provide ample swimming space and the females will feel less competitive. The other thing is number of fishes in the tank. Female Bettas form a hierarchy when placed together. Always keep more than two fishes to facilitate the process and to avoid one fish behaving like alpha and picking on the other! If all these plans fail you will have to separate out the alpha female and you must also have a hospital tank to treat the causalities of this experiment.

The get-together
You need to understand individual behavior of your fish before you bring them together. Quarantine them for a few weeks separately and observe their natural behavior. If they are healthy then allow them to come together. Put all the fish in the tank together so that no one fish has an advantage nor does anyone get a chance to form territory. Be careful and observant. Watch out for aggressive behavior and see that no one is getting hurt.

Signs of success
In a day or two your fish will start settling down. They may look aggressive chasing each other around but this is the natural process of formation of pecking order. Observe carefully and then judge the personalities of your fish.

Only if you see them biting each other and nipping fins should you separate them. Take the aggressive fish out, quarantine it and then you may try reintroducing it after a few days. If the behavior repeats you might have to take this one back to the pet shop, she is simply too aggressive to mix!

A trick you can use, is introduce lots of hiding places for your fishes. This will give them a sense of security around the aggressive female and once the pecking order is established the aggressive female will leave the other fish alone.

Community Betta tanks are a rarity and lot of fun but they require a lot of patience from you. Take all precautions stated above you might succeed.