You shall love them too.

Because Adam and I got a shiny new shipment of new breeding stock bettas in. I'm slowly trying to build up what I lost a year ago due to some mystery disease that took over my bettas. So now we're working on getting some new pretties to buff up the stock since all we really had was a couple of home bred darlings and Wal-Mart rescues, as well as a pair of rather misplaced Mahachais. Now that we have new pretties, of course I spent near all night working on getting decent pictures. Mind you, for every one decent picture I have, there are a thousand tossers. People have complimented me on them but I wish they were better. My flash washes out the color and my autofocus will not allow me to take decent fry pictures.

Anyway, bettas ahoy! Now if only the job Adam wants would be posted so he can snatch it up and then we'll know we'll be staying in SL for a couple of more years. Not moving to Colorado right away? Stinks. Making decent money and having our landlord merge our apartment with the other apartment so that we can have a betta room? Spectacular.

Dah girls (I don't take ANY credit for some of the names Adam has come up with):

Sylvia, blue steel butterfly halfmoon female and sib to Atticus Finch:



Powder, Adam's platinum white halfmoon female:



Gertrude, a fat Wal-Mart rescue:


Meeka, my Mahachai female:


Pegasus:


And here I am going to divert. There are plenty of breeders who have success in keeping females in community tanks. However, before anyone sets one up, think about the consequences. I lost two females to a large female who decided that she wanted to be the only one in there. Pegasus now looks like this despite well over a month of melafix treatment. So again, before you think you can dump a whole bunch of females together, consider the risks. It was touch and go with Pegasus for a long time, but she's pulling through. I'm pretty sure she's blinded in her left eye. It's a real shame because she's the mother of the current fry who are turning out amazing and chances are she'll never be in shape to breed again.




Viper, sib to Pegasus and Galactica. Super, duper aggressive.


....

Now the boys:

Pokey, a red crowntail Wal-Mart rescue:


Mika, Mahachai male:


Galactica, dad of the current fry:


Blue, veiltail Wal-Mart rescue, still healing from badly nipped fins:


Charlie, another crowntail Wal-Mart rescue that was in a bowl of water so shallow his dorsal fin had dried and stuck to the side:


Everett, yet another veiltail rescue, also suffering from horribly nipped fins:


Atticus Finch, a blue steel butterfly halfmoon male:


Black Baggage (an Adam name...), a doubletailed black orchid halfmoon male. Nipped his fins a bit in the transit, but they aren't too bad:


Dan, another Wal-Mart crowntail rescue:


Frecklebutt (Another Adam name), a overhalfmoon male of crazy coloring:



Aqueduct (Adam's final naming excursion), a marbled mustard gas halfmoon plakat giant. Our big boy, 2.8 inches and only 3.5 months old! He'll bulk up and get bigger. Its a shame our flash is so ridiculous, it completely wipes out his marbling.



The kids!

When they were itty bitty:


Now! There's four of them that made it through the process of natural selection. There's only two pictured because my camera hates me and hates their colors.


Of course, and in the memory of the ones that are gone:

Fanny, murderized by Viper and Gertrude:


Frida, died of unknown causes:



Betty, murderized by Viper and Gertrude as well:



So there. Fishes. Love them.