Information to stay in Thailand
The gorgeous array of colours that Bettas have now were non existent when the species was first found. It is believed that at least since the 1300′s during the Sukhothai period, the people of Siam or Thailand as it is known today, had beensolely interested in these fish for their aggressive nature and often used to gamble on their fighting ability.It is thought that young children were the first to recognise the natural aggressive nature of these little fish while mating and during territory defence, particularly by the males of the species. It didn’t take long for the children to turn this into a sport. The boys would catch these wild fish and use them in battles with friend’s fish. As the fish fighting became popular amongst the young generations it started to get noticed by the elders.Soon the Betta fish fighting became widely popular in Siam and surrounding countries, people started to work on improving their fish’s fighting skills and also started to collect females to enhance the skills for stronger and better endurance. The original Betta Splendens (although not yet named as such) were short finned and much duller than what we have today. They were much more like their wild cousin the Betta Imbellis.As the sport grew in popularity, even the Royalty got into these little Fighting fish. The Betta’s fighting skills were recognised as a part of family reputation, and many men lost their family fortune betting on the outcomes of the fish battles, soon the state took over and began licensing the fights..In 1840, it is believed that the King of Siam made a gift to some fighting fish to a medical scientist called Theodore Cantor from Bangor. Cantor was fascinated by these little fish with such big attitudes and studied them for many years after.In 1849, Dr. T. Cantor created an article about them and described them as Macropodus Pugnax. Unfortunately this name was already used to describe another species in the Betta family as pointed out by Charles Tate Regan, a British ichthyologist who re-examined Dr. Cantor’s article almost 50 years after the original publication. Regan then coined the new classification as Betta Splendens.In these early times they were very plain but by the time they started appearing in North America and Europe they had already started to show some differences to the original wild caught forms. Their fins were getting longer and their colours were getting brighter.Due to the big attitude and personality of these little Betta Fighting Fish they have gained immense popularity over the years and in current times they are now bred for showing instead of fighting. Betta Splendens come in all colours of the rainbow and new colour variations are continually being created by breeders. There are now even giant forms of these fish!
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