What Size Tank for Betta Fish?

After buying a Betta fish, one of my first questions was how large of a tank I needed. A lot of people on the internet have suggested that you need a large tank 2 gallons or larger, with plants and "fish houses" for a Betta to hang out in.

In the last two months I've had the opportunity to try different tanks for my Betta, who I named "fish" (like everyone else in the world apparently). A friend provided me with a small quart-sized tank which is more accurately a bowl. My fish seems to have ADHD and he's quite a hyperactive fellow. He does an "intimidation move" when you walk up to his tank where he darts back and forth while snapping his mouth open and shut. It's quite hilarious to watch and I try to impersonate him around my friends, to the distress of other restaurant patrons. At first I believed that fish's hyperactive activity indicated that he didn't like his tank and wanted out. He seemed to attack the sides of the bowl and I didn't understand why.

So I moved my Betta to a larger, temporary tank which was actually a 1 gallon iced tea pitcher. He seemed to love this new residence and wasn't nearly as hyperactive as before. After a few weeks I decided to buy him a proper 2.5 gallon tank. Again he seemed to enjoy the new environment, and I even bought a fake plant for him to hide in! Apparently you can tell when Betta fish are happy because they create these "bubble nests" on the surface of the water. One morning I would wake up and find a ton of bubbles in one area of the tank!

Another month went by and I made an interesting observation: Fish always seemed to hang out in one small area of the tank, near the corner. The more time that went by, the more he seemed to reside in this virtual "fish apartment" of only a few inches. He also seemed to completely avoid the plant which I thought he would hide in. I made another observation as well: 2.5 gallon tanks are a huge pain in the ass to clean. I already have major OCD, so the last thing I feel like doing is cleaning a giant fishy-smelling tank for an hour every few weeks. Also, I've had nightmares about the glass tank breaking or falling apart, sending 2.5 gallons of nasty fish water throughout my apartment. I then started wondering if fish actually needed such a large tank!

I therefore decided to move fish back to his old quart-sized tank. I thought of this as an experiment.. If he seemed extremely unhappy then I would revert to a larger tank. It was also around this time that I discovered Bettas like to attack their own image in a mirror. Well the sides of the small fish tank are quite mirrored, and this seemed to explain fish's strange aggressiveness towards the side of the tank. To my delight, after moving fish back into his old bowl he was just as happy as in the larger tanks. He's energetic and loves when I walk into the kitchen to visit him. I tend to overfeed fish because he's just so charming.

Although I've only had my Betta fish for a few months, at this point I don't believe Bettas require a giant tank to thrive in. My friend also has a Betta (for over a year) and she has a small tank as well. She agrees and says that her own fish is quite satisfied with a smaller bowl. I think that a lot of people just assume a Betta needs a large tank to thrive because they are thinking in terms of their own preferences (well we don't live in closets do we?)