Fighting Fish (Betta spp)

Hi! I've collected some fighting fish since early this year and some were kept alive at home. These two have been in tanks for many months now and I don't think I can breed them - for lacks of concentration and time constraint. So I decided to turn them into specimens instead.

The one on top is Betta chini, a recently described species from Klias swamp. The one below is B. unimaculata from Tabin Wildlife Reserve.

The are problems with describing bettas because the characteristics of all of them are conservative and almost similar. For exsample, they might have almost similar number of rays in their fins. S

So, you would stand up and say "Itu sinang maa, diolang punia kaler lain maa..". Yes! I thought so, but no, that is not the case. Colors depend a lot on the water quality, food, temperature, physical condition and also the psychological condition of the bloody fish.

If you looked closely, the shape of the mouth may give a clue. You can also see a black streak along the side of the head of B. chini. However, the size of B. unimaculata is almost twice as big!

Harnitta, a student from Nat uni of Singapore did the taxonomy of bettas from Peninsula, Sarawak, Kalimatnan and Brunei. I think he has finished under the supervision of Dr Peter Ng, NUS. There are 5 recognised species from Sabah - I wonder what they are.

Hamid.