I just recently bought two (2) beautiful betta fish(Bonnie & Clyde).Now i have much experience with this type of fish.Unfortunatly many of them died.I recently found out from a friend of mine that putting them in fresh spring water was a very bad idea. They are more likely to die in freshwater so any of you betta lovers think of putting them in freshwater dont't,put them in tap water.Another thing is that i have noticed one my betta's named Clyde is producing bubbles like crazyy.Now a long time ago i asked one of the employee's at a local aquarium why that happens & he told me its because the bubbles contain baby fish. But now i said to myself,Clyde is a male how can he produce bubbles.Can anyone help me on this one?? One more thing to tell if your betta fish is a male or female simply just looks at its tail.If its long its a male & if its short its a female. DO not put your two betta fish in the same tank if you are possitive if they are both opposite sex.Or they will fight.

Having him in the kitchen window is questionable. It really depends on how much sunlight the bowl gets. I can't think of any situation in which a fishtank or bowl in sunlight is beneficial. In other words, get your fish away from the sunlight. Sunlight can and will raise the temperature very drastically as the day passes. In a bowl as small as yours, I wouldn't be surprised if the temperature climbed to the 90s during a sunny day. Temperature fluctuations like these will weaken a fish's immune system and make it very susceptible to disease. As for the gravel, because your bowl is so small, it's for decorative purposes only. Having that much gravel in a small bowl really reduces the amount of water you can keep in there, as well as trapping uneaten food and waste. A cycle is what happens when you grow a colony of beneficial bactera, otherwise known as nitrifying bacteria, to deal with ammonia levels. Because your bowl is so small, it is very difficult and very dangerous to cycle. Cycles usually only take place in larger tanks, like 2.5 gallons and up or 5 gallons and up. This is because the way a cycle goes about being established is very dangerous to the fish. The first part of the cycle is to get the ammonia to spike in the water. The bacteria feed on the ammonia, but in order to get the bacteria going, you need to seed the tank with them and provide a constant source of ammonia. This means almost certain death for your fish, should you choose to cycle with fish. The next step is to deal with the nitrites. The bacteria break the ammonia down into nitrite, which then is eaten by both plants and a second type of bacteria. Nitrites are also highly toxic to fish, and will kill them. The bacteria that eat the nitrites turn it into nitrate, less harmful compound that can be present in your water in small amounts. All told, a fast cycle will take about 3 weeks, and a slow cycle can take months. After a cycle is established, there will be no ammonia, no nitrites, and a little bit of nitrates. This cycle is self-sustaining and continuous unless you overstock the tank (put too many fish in it), never do water changes, or otherwise upset the chemical balance. There are a bunch of different ways to measure ammonia, but the most accurate method is to use a test tube and solution kit. Strips have a large margin of error and are easily misread. The most common test solution kit tests for both NH3 and NH4, dangerous and bound ammonia. There is no way to know how much dangerous ammonia you have. The best bet is to test for ammonia, and if there is any present, do a water change. 6.8 is just fine for a betta. Bettas will tolerate a pH from 6 to 8, but around 7 (neutral, neither acidic nor alkaline) is best. Brown algae is helped along by sunlight, so keep your bowl out of sunlight, like I mentioned above. When you clean your bowl, and this very thorough cleaning should happen once a week, rinse all decorations with scalding water and scrub down every inch of the bowl. That's the only way I know how of getting rid of brown algae. (Did this for a 50 gallon tank - not fun.) The best and cheapest water for your betta is tap water. Spring waters often are not really water from a spring. Tap water stays very constant. Be sure to test it to see what its makeup is, however. You need to know the parameters of your water so that you can set up a good schedule for water changes. Also, make sure your betta is warm. 78-80 degrees is optimal. In a bigger tank, you could use a small 25W heater and a thermometer; in a smaller tank, the only option I can think about is a heating pad and the ubiquitous thermometer. No fishtank should be without one! A ten gallon tank will require cycling before any fish are added. Lots of people use Cycle, BioSpira, or filter media from another person's fishtank to get some bacteria in the tank (seeding the tank). Once your cycle is established, then you can go and buy some fish. I would say 3 females can live very comfortably in a 10 gallon, but no more. Female bettas seem to do best with an odd number of schoolmates, and the basic rule of thumb for stocking a fishtank is 1 inch of slim-bodied fish per 1 gallon of water. Since females can and will get up to 3 inches, you're ensuring plenty of room and lots of clean water for your girls. I really don't know anything about how strong the filter of the tank is. Some people put a piece of pantyhose over the intake tube to make sure no fish get sucked up, though. I would say that's a good idea. Also, because bettas like still water best, have lots of plants, both silk and real, to break up the current as well as to provide shelter for the fish. The girls will use plants and hiding places a lot when the pecking order is being established (when you first introduce girls to a tank, they will fight among themselves to see who is the strongest, and then they will settle down. Expect torn fins and nips). A planted tank is something that's optimal for your fish. However, if you don't want to go through the extra hassle of having a planted tank, buying plants like Java fern and Java moss will be just fine. Both are free-floating, easy-to-care-for plants that propagate quickly.

Your still in the first stage of the cycle. Keep doing partial water changes so the ammonia wont go over 1.0ppm. The least expensive product to use is Prime by Seachem. It comes in a red labled bottle and is available at most pet stores (PetSmart and Petco even have it) When you do a partial water change, double the ammount of Prime. This will detoxify the ammonia. The battle of keeping your ammonia level under 1.0ppm will get a bit harder in the days (or weeks to come). When cycling with fish you should keep the ammonia level below 1.0ppm, but you must have ammonia present to initiate the second stage of the cycle. You will know when you are at stage 2 because overnight your ammonia problem will disapear and nitrites will start to be detected. Nitrites are a bit easier to deal with because nitrite is easily detoxified with salt. see the article in the link below for dosage. Also, you can feed even more sparingly and only once a day for 1 minute worth of food until the 2nd stage comes. Less food = less fish poop and uneaten food = less ammonia production. It is perfectly safe to double or even triple the dose of Prime, I believe it can be done up to 5 times the ammount as directed in the Prime bottles instructions and notes. Here is a link that might be useful: Using Salt to detoxify Nitrite

25 watts per 5 gallons is reccomended. Get one that has a control knob. The 7.5 says it is good up to 5 gallons and may be. But I don't think they have an adjustment on them. If a heater is overworked it will have a greater possibility to fail or worse over heat the aquarium. A 25 watt with an adjustment knob is the way to go. I like the freshwater master test kit by aquarium pharmaceuticals. I prefer the reagent type vs. multi test strips. In the long run the set is less expensive. The color cards are easier to read then some others, IMO. It has the vital tests you need pH, ammonia, nitrite and nitrate. The strips ammonia test are sometimes skewed and are not accurate in some instances. It's like a Jr High chemistry set. You can get a small bottle of Prime by seachem or amquel+ ( I use prime, again a price thing you need less to treat more then amquel+, so it goes a long way) even though this is mainly for dechlorination it also removes ammonia and other crap. It can be double dosed to keep very high ammonia in check. Zeolite also helps. Usually just frequent water changes will dilute the water. If you read any of the bio-chemistry articles in the link I gave you you can see how pH plays a factor in the toxicity of ammonia and nitrites. Having well water is nice but you "could" have other issues to contend with. One major factor is pH, not so much for type of fish but it can really mess with establishing a nitrogen cycle. Water parameters will determine What% water to change and how often. After it is established, for regular maintainance IME with smaller aquariums I have found it better to do a smaller% more often, rule of thumb is 25% every 2 weeks minimally. If you have a Bio-wheel then you can change the cartridge part as the directions for it state. If you want to save a little$, make a slit in the blue fiber and dump out the activated carbon and replace it with new from a bulk container. I never had a problem in the past ( when I was a kid) establishing an aquarium. When I decided to start it up again (after 20 yrs.) I had alot of trouble. The city supplied water in the town I grew up in was pretty good quality and all I did was keep buckets of tap water on hand for water changes. I only had one test kit, pH, the litmus(sp?) paper. When that ran out I never replaced it. The only difference was water chemistry everything else I did was identical. The things I am mentioning are not gospel as the only way to do this. However, down the road when you may want to try different fish, live plants etc. it really helps to know how your system works and what is needed to maintain it. The only time I test the water now is if I suspect a problem or it has been a while since the last test. I always test new aquariums until I'm satisfied that they are OK. If Victoria's doesn't have what you need maybe Fredrick's ?? Also, don't get me wrong, I support independent fish stores but the link below can help for some of the things you may need that they can't order for you. Just click on the fish when you get there. Here is a link that might be useful: The good Dr.'s