What Do Betta Fish Eat
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Ah…the “What do bettas eat?” question! Usually followed by the ever popular “What’s the best food for betta fish” Or the “How much do bettas eat in a day?” query.
Answer? It’s best if your betta fish eats a varied diet. Prepared foods, freeze dried foods, frozen foods and live foods.
But that may be easier said than done since they are known to be finicky eaters. Food one betta will wolf down voraciously will be spit out summarily by another. Go figure.
Feeding Betas Basics
Now some betta keepers will tell you to go easy on the live food.
Others will suggest minimizing the pellets and flakes.
Others still will swear you should use freeze dried blood worms only for a weekly treat.
A better questions than “What do bettas eat?” might be “What will MY betta eat?” But let me take a whack at it anyway.
For one you want to go high protein. Some known favorites are
Freeze dried bloodworms – less chance of getting parasites from freeze dried grub.
Freeze dried brine shrimp even though the adults can be a mouthful.
Just keep in mind that freeze dried blood worms or brine shrimp alone do not a balanced diet make.
Live baby guppies — ummm-yum good. A special treat.
Frozen (thawed in one of those little dixie cups using tank water) bloodworms or brine shrimp. Like 3-4 bloodworms per betta per feeding is about right.
I’ve raised mosquito larvae for my fish as a snack. Thrash. Gulp. No more larvae.
HINT: These are easy to “raise” during the summer. Put a bucket out of sight of the neighbors. Add water. Maybe some old leaves. Let nature take its course. Net out a few for now. Put more in a gallon jar for netting later. Dump the water and start again. That way you’re not adding to the local mosquito population, you know?
Then there are special prepared foods for bettas. A good betta food has to be meaty, floats, and is fairly small. When looking for meaty ideally, given bettas are meat lovers, you want a pellet food that lists worms or shrimp or fish or something meat-like first in the list of ingredients.
Hikari Betta Bio Gold is a great food to feed to bettas. Plus it contains natural color enhancers.
Think these guys needed color enhancement?
Luckily feeding bettas comes down to offering them what they’ll eat. Whatever that may be feed very small amounts once or twice a day. And avoid leftovers. Uneaten food will pollute the water and ultimately kill the fish.
Remember too a betta’s stomach is about the size of their eye. (In some cases it’s literally true that their eyes are bigger than their stomach.)
But for the finicky in the crowd they may not take right away to whatever’s on the menu. Give ‘em a couple of days without food. Usually once they have eaten a new type of food, they’ll go for it the next time no problem.
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Putting a name with a face I'm Lucas Smatana. Like you I'm passionate about betta fish and hope to share my enthusiasm. The idea here is to make sure you get helpful info and useful ideas on betta fish care that really work. To insure your betta keeping experience is a good one both for you and your fish. So that you and your pet enjoy a long, happy and healthy relationship.
so can beta fish eat alge pelets?
I suppose they could but remember they are carnivores. You may slip them a green pea to relieve constipation but otherwise they eat meat – as was described in this post!
How long can they go without eating? If I go on a weekend trip, is that going to bother them?
Good question. Answered in two words. No worries. Fasting a day a week is a good idea anyway. And if you leave Friday night, come back Sunday evening and drop some food in the tank, your fish has only gone a day without food. Which is no different than a fasting day. Two or three days without food isn’t going to kill them either for that matter. Hope that helps.