# Anyone else successfully keep tetras with a male beta?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-successfully-keep-tetras-with-a-male-beta/633505>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [September 3, 2012, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-successfully-keep-tetras-with-a-male-beta/633505 "2012-09-03T01:52:14Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\
**Post date:** [September 3, 2012, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-successfully-keep-tetras-with-a-male-beta/633505/1 "2012-09-03T01:52:14Z")

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After a decade of 1 to 2 goldfish at a time, I’m getting a much larger tank I’d like to mostly be inhabited by tetras. I’m not sure yet if I’ll be going with neon tetras or cardinal tetras, but I’m definitely getting some glowlight tetras too.

I’d like to have a male beta as well, back like I did in high school. Simon the blue beta and his three neon buddies did really well in a 3 gallon tank for over two years\*, which is why I find it so surprising that so many fish boards say that tetras and betas shouldn’t be mixed.

Is it _really_ unusual that I had no problems, or are people just being…well, you know how some fish people can be. Did you try it? How did it work out for you? Am I insane to expect that with a place to hide like [this](http://www.tetra-fish.com/uploadedImages/TetraFish/catalog/29061_GFBOSm_03-12.jpg), things will go just as well as they did way back when?

Bonus question: what bottom fish go with tetras? Most people seem to have those tiny gray catfish, but I don’t know if there are other options.

\*they did not cope with being moved over 100 miles and all soon died after the move, or maybe they’d have been happy together even longer

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**Author:** ![Sam\_I\_Am](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e495f1/32.png) [@Sam\_I\_Am](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_I_Am)\
**Post date:** [September 3, 2012, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-successfully-keep-tetras-with-a-male-beta/633505/2 "2012-09-03T04:10:04Z")

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I think it depends on the betta and the tetras.

When I had a mixed tank like that I had to put a divider in because the poor betta’s tail was getting shorter and shorter from being nipped.