Guppies!!!?

Question

Okay, I am wondering about these beautiful fish.
Any info you can give me on breeding, tanks, and general care would be GREAT!!Also, where did you get your Guppies and what is your tank setup like?
I have tried searching the web, but I am getting websites on colors and genetics.
Thanks in advance!!!

Answer 1

Guppies are fun! I love keeping and breeding guppies. Generally, keeping them and breeding them is the same thing. If you have at least one male and one female in a tank, you have a pregnant female. Any tank 10 gallons and over makes a good guppy tank. A decent filter and a heater along with your favorite decor and your all set to keep guppies.

Breeding guppies really is just as simple as most people say it is but if you really want to be serious about and save the babies it there are a few considerations.

Tank requirements: You need to have two tanks at least 10 gallons in size. The first one should be cycled and all settled ready for your new guppies. The second should be filled with water and have a sponge filter running. It should also gave a heater and lots of hiding places for the babies. Set up both tanks and keep the temperature in both about 74-78 F, guppies will do well in that range. pH, hardness and other water conditions are not very important to guppies. They tolerant a very wide range of parameters.

Feeding: For the adults you need to feed a good basic flake food as well as the occasional treat of frozen foods. Buy a couple of them to swap between, blood wroms, mosquito larvae, brine shrimp are all good. For the babies you need baby brine shrimo to feed for the first few days and some cruches flake to start mixing in after that. Yes, you can just crush the flake you use for the adults.

The Fish: Get 1 male for every 2-3 females. No need to get many, after all you expect to breed plenty! Most you find at pet stores will already be pregnant so if you are really serious about getting just the right color you will need to by from a serious breeder or be prepared to work at it a while.

The mating: Just put them together and they will do the rest.

Once the female is very gravid (pregnant) move her to the empty tank and leave her there until she has the babies. Once she has them you can more her back to the main tank. Feed the babies fairly often, 4-5 times a day isn't too often and change 40 - 50% of the tank water every 2-3 days. The larger the babies get the more often you will have to change water until the babies are adults.

Raising the babies: Feed the babies fairly often, 4-5 times a day isn't too often and change 40 - 50% of the tank water every 2-3 days. The larger the babies get the more often you will have to change water until the babies are adults. Install a tank divider in the baby tank as soon as possible and once you can tell males from females start to seperate them. Most serious breeders end up using two tanks, so you might want to plan on that in the future. Seperate them as soon as possible! Also do not give up on the water changes! They are critical for proper growth! I cannot stress this enough!

Culling: Culling is removing undesirable fish from your stock. Remove any deformed fish you see as soon as you see them. It's not uncommon to have a few deformed fish. Humanely kill these as you certainly don't want them breeding. Once the babies are nearly grown you will be able to pick out the best looking male and best lookig females. This is where color choice comes in. You will most likely have fish of two or three different colors. Return you original fish and the extra babies to the pet store or donate them to another fish keeper, to a school, whatever. Place your best male and three best females in the now empty main tank. and let them do what come naturally. Then you will start the whole process over.

While you are raising the babies, you will have babies from one of the other females too if not both of them. You will have to choose, set up another tank for them or leave them with the adults to do as well as they can. Your call. As you can see, you could end up with tanks all over the house in no time at all, so be aware you can't keep them all! LOL

After a few generations you will need to add fresh breeding stock to your line. Try to find a really good looking male that fits your colors and breed him to some of your females for fresh genes in the line. Doing this every so often will improve your fish and prevent problems from too much inbreeding. Inbreeding fixes traits in the line, both good traits and bad traits, so bring in new stock from time to time.

If you really fall in love with guppy breeding you will really want to be a member of the IFGA (International Fancy Guppy Association). They can teach you so much more than this basic over view and the members are a great source of really superior breeding stock. You can find their website online.

Hope this helps.

MM

Answer 2

Hello! I'll answer the part on breeding

I use a regular bio wheel but I have it hooked into a undergravel filter. This keeps the tank clean for a very long time. You dont want to try and clean the tank when there are babies in there!!

You will also want to put a fines mesh screen over the undergravel filter, this will prevent the little tiny babies from getting sucked up in the filter!

Male guppies are the ones with the LARGE colorful tails. The femails have smaller tails with more of a dull color to them.
Put some males and females in the tank and they will do the rest themselves

The give live birth and it is important to have somewere the babies can hide. You can also put the mother in a seperate tank and remover her shortly after the babies are born. Adulat guppies will eat babie guppies

Hope this helps

Answer 3

I have two tanks and didn't intend to keep growing but it was just so easy. I started out with two males and four or five females. The care is sooo easy or I wouldn't have so many. Main thing about the tank is to make sure it is big enough and learn about the process the water cycles through when you first set up. After that, let nature take its course and you'll have babies in no time. I've been giving them away and I'm still over crowded with a 30 gallon and 10 gallon tank. As a rule of thumb I try to have one male to three females but they breed so fast I haven't been able to stick to that rule.

I haven't had any issues with my babies being eaten but in the beginning I would move the fry out into another tank. (I had a baby tank and big tank) Simple way to ensure the fry are safe is to have some plants so they have an area to hide. I was amazed the first couple of times I saw the females dropping their fry ;)

Answer 4

I love guppies, they are some of the prettiest fish.

To keep guppies your temperature needs to be around 75° f, with a ph around 7. If you are planning on breeding your guppies I suggest a tank with a lot of plants, (real or articifical), for the babies to hide in.

If you do not want to breed guppies, you can have only males (the really colourful ones are the males) but if you want to add females to breed there must be at least 2-3 females per each male. I'm not a fan of using a breeder tank or net, as taking a pregnant female out of her environment and placing her in a small confined unfamiliar space will only stress her out and often leads to a miscarriage. As said above I prefer to have lots of hiding places for the fry and most will survive. Don't worry, if you have male and female guppies you will have lots of babies.

I always get my fish at my favorite pet store, but if you do not have a pet store where you know you can trust quality, try looking for a pet store that has a fish guarantee and try to pick out slightly larger fish.

email me if you have more questions
Ally

Answer 5

Yay guppies! OMG that is one in each of those completely outstanding notice to declare! GUPPIES GUPPIES GUPPIES GUPPIES GUPPIES! super, now i'm saying it lots it would not even mean something anymore. geez.

Answer 6

i have 3 adult guppies + 18 fry.guppies are easy to breed we dont do anything they are just attracted to each other like magnets and have fry once a month.they are easy to keep water needs to be in between 22-28 degrees. i have a 55litre tank and 3 bigish fake plants. a heater and sponge filter. guppies are normally sold in every pet shop. you have to have a ratio of 2 females to 1 male. get a bright and colourful male so you get better fry. most females look the same. hope i have helped feel free to email me with any more questions.

Answer 7

Here are some sites to go to. I got my guppies at a local fish store. They were the wild ones used, I think, for feeding. They cost me 15 guppies for $1.They make a lot of babies quick so I hope your ready for some fun and good care!

http://guppyz.tripod.com/guppy_care.html
http://www.fishpondinfo.com/guppy.htm
http://www.aquahobby.com/gallery/e_Poecilia_reticulata.php

Answer 8

I've never kept guppies. I've only used them as feeder fish, but here is a site that has tons of information about them:
http://www.guppies.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=69&Itemid=56