Can Bettas do well at 72 degrees?

[unoriginalNemo]

I know everyone will jump up and tell me I should get bigger tanks or heat my one gallons somehow, but I was just wondering if my two guys can do alright without a heater? Our house is kept at 72 degrees and both Nemo and Dory are super active, lots of swimming and flaring, eat well, build bubble nests, are interested and curious when I come to stare at them (LOL). But of course I want to do everything the best that I can for them and am wondering if I should try the heating pad method and see how that goes, or if I should leave well enough alone for now. I'd love to hear others' thoughts.

[abm]

I can only speak from personal experience - you have to decide what's right for you and your guys.

I also kept my house/room where the bettas lived as warm as possible. They acted normally, ate well, built bubblenests (small ones, but I had nothing to compare them to - looked fine to me). We had a cold snap and I got my heating bill - ouch! It was not cost-effective to try and keep the house/room warm enough to warm the bettas, so I broke down and bought "a" heater (I had 6 fish at the time - it was an experiment).

The change in personality and behavior was astounding. Activity, interaction with me and with flaring neighbors, everything went through the roof. It was like he hadn't been really alive before. I'm not exaggerating. I was flabbergasted and bought another couple of heaters. Same change in each betta as his tank temp was brought up to "normal" for tropical fish, around 78-80. It makes sense with my research on bettas and other tropical fish, but that a 6-8 degree temperature difference could make such an astonishing change in their demeanor was still amazing to me.

As I said, this is just my experience. But I can tell you I have all 8 tanks heated to 80 now, and all 8 guys build huge bubblenests, eat well, and are generally and obviously happier than they were before.

Let us know what you decide, and good luck!

P.S. My tanks are between 2 and 3 gallons, and before I upgraded to these tanks I successfully and safely heated 1 gallon tanks. I would not recommend the cheap little jr. heaters sold by w**mart - nothing against the store, but those heaters are not well regulated and temps fluctuate greatly. I swear by the Hagen mini submersible heaters, 25 watts and very reliable in my humble experience.

[starlight]

The change in personality and behavior was astounding. Activity, interaction with me and with flaring neighbors, everything went through the roof. It was like he hadn't been really alive before. I'm not exaggerating. I was flabbergasted and bought another couple of heaters. Same change in each betta as his tank temp was brought up to "normal" for tropical fish, around 78-80. It makes sense with my research on bettas and other tropical fish, but that a 6-8 degree temperature difference could make such an astonishing change in their demeanor was still amazing to me.

ABM...wonderful post, I wish that anyone considering getting a betta knew that much about them. The problem is most people's homes are not warm enough. What's comfortable to mammals is not always comfortable to Bettas.

Here's some interesting betta temp info that you may find useful. The ideal spawning temperature for bettas is 82 degrees. Few breeders will take exception to 82 being nearly ideal. Here's why:

(1) A slight elevation from 80 helps stimulate the pair to breed. It probably correlates with a change in season in their natural habitat.
(2) At lower temperatures betta eggs take too long to develop and hatch; fungus can become a big problem.
(3) Above 84 degrees, the eggs develop too rapidly and attempt to hatch too soon.

82 degrees seems perfect, since its exactly the ideal temperature for spawning and it's the perfect temperature for the tiny and delicate eggs to hatch.

Knowing this, I try to maintain my bettas at 80. I find that to be ideal. In the summer they're a bit warmer than that but it doesn't seem to bother them in the least.
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Regarding the heaters, I hope that you can shed some light on some heater problems that I recently I had.

Five gallon filtered tank set up for spawn with six inches of water, probably around 3 gallons. I used a brand new Rena Excel Cal Top Light 50W that I had bought for a larger tank but never used. I knew I had to watch it since it said for 5-15G and I was using it in 3. Sure enough it made things too toasty and didn't shut off when it hit 82. I kept having to unplug it. After that I bought a Visi-Therm 25W submersible. I placed it in front of the filter so it would get water current. It's set at an angle to the filter, in order for it to be submerged. (I don't want it on the bottom where it might interfere with the pair.)

The bad news is that even the little 25W visi-therm made things too warm. Whether I set it at 78,80 or 82, it wanted to overshoot the target.

Is it possible that both these heaters are defective? Or will they probably work when they are in the correct volume of water? Would the Hagen work better in these circumstances?

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ps. (long post IK)
Regarding the Jrs, I'm new to them and only heard about it here. There's no thermostat and you can't really leave it on all day; I've found it does have it's applications and bought a few. I just turned it on in a filtered 2G tank with a few 6-week old fry. I just want to raise the tank a degree or two, back to 81. It's good for that.

The last spawn attempt, I took out the heaters and place an old but trusty heating pad on one side. I put a Jr. in the tank. With that combo, I was able to maintain 82 very easily and without the hassles of the other heaters.

[palepinkvase]

I just wanted to share my experience with the jr. heaters. They have worked well for me. I do plan to upgrade to the Hagen, but that will be in the future. I don't exactly know why some people have trouble with them and others find them to work perfectly. Probably luck of the draw coming out of the factory.

[mndstevens]

I have been having the same trouble with my visi-therm 25 watt heater in my 2.5 gallon tank. I had set it at 77 degrees and it went close to 80. I turned it down to 75-76 degrees and it still was rising so I unplugged it. It is so frustrating because I paid alot of money for the heater. My husband thinks that being a 25 watt heater it is made to give off a certain amount of heat depending on what you have it set at. Since it is a smaller tank he told me to set it at 72 degrees and maybe the temp. would even out at 75-77 degrees. I plan to try that and see what happens. Anyone else out there use a visi-therm?

[Racoon]

I don't use a heater in Beta-1's tank since it's a little less than 1 Gal. (I change the water quite a lot though. )

So his "pad" is generally at room temp. My apartment tends to keep in the mid to high 70's, though sometimes it goes as far down as 72.

Beta-1 is an active boy, eats regularly, likes to flare at me when I feed him, and just made his first sizeable bubble nest!

He's made small patches of bubbles before, but the other day I went to feed him and this new one was huge! Perhaps it's because we're going into summer, so the average temp in my place is creeping up... He did well in the winter though, but then, I live in Southern California, near the coast. Winter in this part of the state probably isn't the same as it would be for others on this board.

Your mileage may very.