# Two female bettas in a 50 gal community tank - can it be done?



## spleenharvester (28 Jan 2021)

I know this sounds absurd but hear me out,

My LFS has a big tank of female bettas together. Not only are they completely passive towards each other, but they like to jump between tanks. As a result there are females mingling with a dozen different species in that shop, including guppies. I bought one a month ago hoping she wouldn't get into any squabbles. It paid off, she's sweet as pie and there's no aggression at all between her and the others of the members of the tank  including 6 guppies, 2 kuhli loaches and 9 otocinclus. She was a tiny little baby when we got her, as were all the others in that tank.

I'm tempted to go back to the store and get another female as they are such great fish, and they all seem really passive in those tanks. But I know that when keeping females together, less than 3 is generally considered a no-no. With tons of plants to break the line of sight, and these bettas all being used to mingling with others, though, am I likely to get away with this? Has anyone had a similar setup?

Cheers!


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## BrysonZheng (28 Jan 2021)

I’m sure that if it was extremely densely planted and filled with other fish it could work out! 


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## alto (28 Jan 2021)

I’d advise against this - while unrelated females may seem to get along as young fish, they will often become less so once mature ... you can try of course, and as the tank is fairly large, and densely planted, may have some success
But if one girl decides she’s done sharing ...

In general, larger groups (10-12 not 3-5) do better longterm - though you often still have to do some adjusting of individual fish to establish a stable group, you can expect to see some disagreements but no endless harassment (until the subordinate fish jumps out or eventually dies)
This is easier to accomplish if you have multiple tanks, also a shop that will accept returns of unsuitable fish 

True “sororities” are females from a single spawn, these girls get along much better than the unrelated mixed groups which are put together at shops (but usually still requires some removal of unsuitable fish, eg, the most dominant, the most subordinate) 

In Bettas, aggression often follows color, and bloodlines - intensely bred HM and (very fancy) crowntails are often less aggressive than plakat lines (especially dark blues)
If you observe a mixed group in shop display tanks, you can select seemingly matched females BUT newly received (& younger) fish are often less interactive
Conversely I’ve also seen newly arrived mature females that cannot be maintained as a group 

Occasionally, one can also keep a couple males in the sort of tank you describe, but again it takes time and effort to find two compatible fish 

Giant Bettas seem more laid back, with people apparently keeping mixed sex groups, also all male groups 
But I wonder how many of these fish were still kept successfully 2-3 years later .....


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## Gill (28 Jan 2021)

The thing with female bettas, is that they can be more vicious than the males. And will rip each other apart if the mood takes them. 
Think of them like Tiger barbs with Diva Complex's. To be in a sorority they need to be kept in groups of 5 or more in Odd numbers, never even. And there need to be plenty of line of sight breakage and lots of cover for them in chill in. 
As long as you follow that, they should be fine. Also some females will build nests if they feel like it. So do please allow for some floating plants. They also appreciate broader leafed plants to rest upon. 
HTH


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## dean (28 Jan 2021)

The minimum I would agree with is 5 as they are just a vicious as the males so you need numbers to dissipate the aggression But there’s no guarantee you won’t get a serial killer 

Why not look at some other betta species that can be kept together ? 


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## spleenharvester (2 Feb 2021)

Thanks for your input everybody - we added some more neon tetras today, and our sweet little lady betta saw her reflection in the floating bag and started launching herself at it lol. I think that tells me a second betta would be a bad idea.


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## alto (3 Feb 2021)

spleenharvester said:


> started launching herself at it lol.


Yes there will definitely be a reaction, and multiple Bettas will always sort out a hierarchy - the desired outcome is a group of fairly evenly matched, laissez-faire personalities (the two boys I had, a third boy who was to be part of the experiment was not playing nice so he moved elsewhere)

If you did choose to add more female Bettas, it’s important to add multiple fish at the same time, so that aggression is dispersed; it’s also recommended to remove the “home girl” to a temporary accommodation (with lid!) to allow the new fish to suss out their new home and good “least in sight” places, before adding your original girl back 
(she will have convinced herself that the entire tank, regardless of size, is HER territory) 

Back when, I added a lovely male Betta to a densely planted 25gal aquarium with a very nice female Betta, no apparent reaction during the first couple hours, he mostly stayed in the upper level and she played least-in-sight ... in the morning he was dead 
and She was swimming grandly about 
Although this situation had worked well for a good number of (Betta forum) posters (and the shop even recommended it), it failed miserably in this instance as the female was very aggressive - if I’d introduced the male by placing him in a safe enclosure (such as a Lee’s Specimen Container which hangs on the tank), and observed over a few days rather than a couple hours ...


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## spleenharvester (9 Jul 2021)

Came across this thread again and thought I would update.

I did eventually get a second female betta about 5 months ago, and just watched the tank very closely for signs of aggression. The second betta came from the same (quite densely packed) female betta tank from the same seller (though they definitely won't have met each other before due to age). Observed the tank closely for a bit, and picked her based on lack of visible fin damage, lack of stress stripes, and no signs of aggression towards other fish. So far it's been a success 

For the first few weeks there was some chasing from Lipstick (the older fish), but no actual physical harm. After that they completely settled down, and would often sleep near each other (see pics). They've become a little more territorial as they've gotten older, they both tend to sleep in their own little areas of the tank that they've claimed, though still occasionally sleep together. Lipstick doesn't appreciate Princess entering her frogbit corner and will chase her out if she approaches, but no actual harm/fin nipping. They quite happily hover around together outside of those areas. I was a bit worried there'd be trouble recently as we unfortunately lost all 13 of our guppies in a very short space of time, which meant they were in a 50 gallon pretty much on their own, but they've been absolutely fine.

Thinking of adding a third, again from that same store, with the same strategy as before. Can always get a tank #5 if it doesn't work out!


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## spleenharvester (29 Jul 2021)

Unfortunately this one has come to a sad end. We found our Lipstick dead a few days ago at only 8 months old. No injuries or signs of disease. We snapped a photo of her begging for food at the top of the tank, then a few hours later she was just dead in one of her napping spots. We miss her dearly.





We tried introducing another female to Princess. Unfortunately they had to be separated in all of 30 seconds as they immediately started fighting. I think we probably just got lucky with Lipstick and Princess pairing up.


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## spleenharvester (10 Feb 2022)

An update - in this tank we've now started a sorority, this time with 3 beautiful girls, who are siblings but had been raised in separate tanks. So far they are behaving themselves - one is clearly the boss and it doesn't look like the others are going to argue over it! One was in severe distress after the journey to us and I thought she was going to die, but touch wood she seems to be recovering.



As for Princess - since she's been living on her own for so long, she has decided she no longer wants to share. So she now has her very own big boy tank all to herself


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## spleenharvester (13 Feb 2022)

Few days on, they are doing reasonably well. No aggression at all between Sparkle and Snow, it's only Star that is being bossy. When she's been particularly moody we've temporarily floated her in a breeder box so that she can argue through a plastic window, and both times she's settled down afterwards. Currently monitoring the tank really closely for red flags, so far no injuries other than a small nip on Sparkle's tail. 

We are committed to making sure the fish aren't suffering/stressed, and do have plans for separation/rehoming in place if they don't calm down within a few weeks like Lipstick and Princess did. 

Ever since we introduced them our one lone surviving Platy has been absolutely fascinated, and at all hours of the day is following one of them round haha. I think it's a good distraction because any time they get near each other they all seem to be like "wth is this fish doing here".


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## spleenharvester (17 Feb 2022)

Update to this, it's become quite clear that Star is not suited for community tank life and needs her own space. Rather than expose all the other fish to needless stress we've made the difficult decision to remove her. She'll be going to a loving new home on Saturday, in a tank of her own.

Snow and Sparkle seem really happy together as a pair, though. They have been sleeping side by side every night since Star was removed. Still being obsessively followed by the platy.


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## Hufsa (17 Feb 2022)

spleenharvester said:


> Still being obsessively followed by the platy.


Yeah that platy is trying to get it on but isnt exactly sure where to uhh.. put it


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## dean (19 Feb 2022)

Female Splendens are just as aggressive as the males, the fashion to have a sorority is a bad thing because there is always aggression present, this can be mitigated by breaking up sight lines and having plenty of plants to hide in but they have to come to the surface to breath therefore they enter the territory of the matriarch who will usually chase them away or worse. The fish live in an unnatural stressed state that must obviously have a detrimental effect on their health. How often do you read posts from someone who has had a sorority for longer than a year and it’s doing well with no fatalities?


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## mort (19 Feb 2022)

I've been asked a few times by newbies locally why if when I say, bettas are best as singles for people who don't know much about them, then why does the local p@h keep females together and sell them as 1 for 2.99 or 2 for 4.99. They look really good so I fear many a unwary newbie has made the mistake.

I think spleenharvester is obviously keeping a close eye on them and stepping in where needed, plus has a back up plan in a new tank design, so has a greater chance of it working, if only for a while.


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## spleenharvester (19 Feb 2022)

I've yet to need to intervene with Sparkle and Snow, they seem to be completely docile towards each other. Same was with Princess and Lipstick before Lipstick died (natural causes). From my experience (these aren't the only females I've had) females _can_ be as aggressive as males (i.e. Star), but they exist on much more of a continuum than the males do. So my personal contention is that the idea of it 'stressing them out' kind of disregards that the fish have really different personalities to one another. If I saw any signs of stress between Sparkle and Snow I'd split them up, but I've seen none to date.

We've had 8 so far (not all at once!), 6 were completely docile and 2 were aggressive (one was given her own tank, the other was rehomed).

EDIT - I think it's also worth noting that the only social studies of female bettas to date have shown that they actively prefer to swim in groups over being alone, so I'm not sure it's fair to describe it as 'unnatural' either - Social partner preferences of male and female fighting fish (Betta splendens)


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## spleenharvester (6 Mar 2022)

Girls are still happy, spent the whole of last night asleep next to each other in their new 3D printed house. This is from when I woke them up this morning.


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## dean (6 Mar 2022)

I’m sure if you were to locate a wild stock of splendens you would see females lived apart from each other and would fight just like the males do 

Which is totally opposite how they are kept at the farms where females have a very low value and are not in such a demand as the males. The females are kept together in ponds / vats 

I don’t agree with keeping any fish alone in an aquarium there’s always a compatible species that can share it even if it’s a mollusc unless any thing you introduce is looked upon as food 


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## spleenharvester (13 Apr 2022)

2 month update, girls are still happy. Still being followed around relentlessly by platy.


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## spleenharvester (5 Jun 2022)

Still getting on fine. Tend to sleep in separate apartments now though


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## seedoubleyou (5 Jun 2022)

My in-laws have 3 females all living together, they have done so for a long time. The tank is sparsely planted and only a 30cm cube. 
Other inhabitants are 4 otos.


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