Ivy and Her Pet Bettas

Betta fish? For pets? Who ever heard of such a thing? You can't possibly pet a fish, can you?" These are good questions. Very good questions indeed. One's that deserve answers. And answers I have. Good ones, from first hand experience.

First, I will need to introduce you to my best friend and love of my life, Ivy. She is something, I tell you what. Beautiful. Smart. Seductive. Adventurous Energetic. All of the above and more. We are each others fellow travelers, able to share in experiences, even in these troubled times our world is going through with the coronavirus pandemic.

Thankfully sometimes, even during the government ordered lockdowns, one doesn't need to look very far to observe something special and unexpected. By not very far I mean my living room. That is where our fish are, or part of them at least. We are the proud owners of not one, but five betta fish. All kept in separate bowls, all in their own paradise, all with their very own names. We have two in the living room, one in Ivy's office, and two in our bedroom. They all get rotated around to different rooms, but they are kept out of sight from each other all the time as they inherently want to fight with each other even though they have glass bowls separating them.

There is Al, short for Alpha. He is a blue veil tail that Ivy's sister Rebecca gave to us. She is the one that got us started on this betta fish kick. We just ran with it and now there are five. After Al came Red. Red is also a veil tail. And guess what? He's red and very lazy. Next up is Clowny our rose tail betta. Then there is Blackey, our black crown tail. And last we have, for lack of a better name, Flutters, also a crown tail. Flutters is the most interesting of them all. More on him in a bit.

Now to some people it may seem strange to call them pets. After all, they are just fish, right? Wrong. They all have a brain. It might be a small brain, but they have brains just the same. And with a brain comes a personality. And with a personality comes a need for a name, a name to give individuality to that fish. And with a name, that fish has now become our pet.

Now, every morning there is a ritual of sorts around our place beginning with two steaming hot cups of coffee doused with our favorite hazelnut creamer. As the caffeine starts to kick in, Ivy starts to play an assortment of bells and finger tambourines for our bettas to let them know it's time for their morning meal. Finger tambourines. Frequencies and vibrations. Wow. Who knew that a fish would react to finger tambourines. I most certainly didn't. I wouldn't believe it if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes. And here it was right before me. Over the last year or so I have watched with interest as Ivy has trained our fish, legitimately trained them. As soon as the tiny tambourines start, our fish start reacting to the frequencies created by Ivy. They know they are going to be fed and they all swim to the glass excitedly, waiting for the meal that is sure to follow. Not all that different from the pet dog waiting impatiently for their meal.

Now some people will still claim that an excited fish at feeding time is not enough to qualify calling a fish a pet. Fair enough. But what qualifies a pet as a pet? Is a pet something that you actually pet? If a person pets a dog, is that dog considered a pet because it can be petted? Or a cat for that matter. Well if being able to pet something is grounds for being called a pet, guess what? Our fish, all five of them, will let Ivy pet them. Literally pet them. Granted a couple of them appear to like the attention more than the others, but just the same they will all let themselves be pet.

Maybe a pet is something that can be trained. A dog can be trained to fetch a stick. And a parrot can be trained to say foul mouthed phrases. Both of these are considered pets. Well I have watched Ivy train our fish to swim into her hand. That's right, when it is time to change out the water in our fish tanks we use no net on the fish. No need to. Ivy simply submerges her hand in the water and within seconds the betta will swim into her upturned palm to be lifted gently into the holding tank. After the water is changed the process reversed with the betta fish swimming once again into her hand to be placed back into its cleaned tank, once again without a net.

How about putting the word comfort in front of pet. Now you have comfort pet. Many people have pushed this term to the limit. If it is acceptable to classify a peacock, a boa constrictor, or maybe even a pot belly pig as a pet because we put the word comfort before it, then our bettas are surely a pet because every day they bring Ivy and myself much comfort with their tranquil and peaceful existence. They don't whine about having to go outside like a dog. And we all know the before mentioned comfort pet, the pot bellied pig, in reality became comfort in the form of bacon and pork chops.

Ivy says the next thing up for our bettas is getting them to eat out of her fingers and maybe jump through a hoop. I'm sure this will not be a problem as our fish, or I should say our unusual pets, all have a willingness to learn. So check back I'm a year's time and see the progress that will have been made. And knowing us we will have more bettas as we continue our search for the illusive green betta. Until then…