Volcano crowntail

[rain]

Hello. I am a new member here, a girl from Finland. And I have a question to you. I have good red and blue strains but three months ago I bought a volcano crowntail from my lfs. He had red finnage and dark blue body.

This is Reiska, the crowntail:


I paired him with one of my red females, Raija:


I only managed to get 11 babies because the female killed the male during spawning (my fault, I left them alone for two hours because the male seemed to be really gentle). The babies are now about 2 1/2 months old (born 15.12.2003).

Well, all of them seem to have starting crowntails, there are many red babies, some with pale body and red fins, some with pale fins and red body, some with red fins with black edges, one like this:


And one like this (I just fed him before I took the picture):


I know they are mutts, but crowntails are really rare here and crowntail females are almost non-existent, so I had to take the male and breed him with normal female.

What would you call those color variations? The last two are really interesting ones. I would like to breed the last one, but I'm not sure what kind of female I should use. A red one? Blue? One of his red sisters? I understand that it will take generations to get "pure" fry, but that's ok. I'm not trying to win any competitions (well, we don't even have any =)

What would you do if you were me?

[rain]

I got a better picture of the blue boy:

[Jenny]

Those are some nice looking fish you have. I especially like the red and blue baby. I don't have any idea on the breeding of them. I would suggest that you look for websites on betta genetics. They may have the info you want.

[Megan]

Babies would be either multis or bicolors. The first baby looks like a multi (three or more colors) but I can't tell from the pic whether the blue is irredescence on the black, or actual blue. If hes really red and black, with blue irredescence, then he's a bi-color (two colors) He's also a partial BF (Butterfly). The blue irredescence would be considered a fault in a red/black bi-color. (but so what, he's very pretty and your not showing him)

The colors on the first boy are very nice... but the tail is not so great. The rounded edges are a signal that as he gets older he will probably develope a veil type tail, or possibly a round tail. If I had him I would breed him, because I like to breed for color, and his are nice, but I would make sure to breed him to a female with good finnage, to hopefully improve the finnage in the next generation. I would spawn him to a sibling sister, one with BF traits if you have any, and one with the best finnage. You might also want to spawn him to a red or blue female from your other lines if they have good finnage.

The second boy has better finnage than the first boy, (straiter, delta type edges) but I don't like his color as much. From the pics he looks like a blue/black BF with red wash. I would breed him to a sibling with BF traits as well, to try and get more BF's, and again, would look for the one with the best finnage.

They're not bad looking fish for pet store stock. The father wasn't bad looking either. I think they have potential if you work with them... it will probably take some time to improve the finnage, but they are very pretty bettas. and its always fun to fool with your own lines.