Loads of Guppy Fry !

[Grant R]

Well, as some of you know, now I have a new, bigger and better tank up and running, my priority with the 11 gallon was to breed guppies. Cutting a long story short, there are now about 10 - 12 small baby guppies in there happily swimming about - after just two days !!!!!!

The clear explanation is that the female in the tank, along with the two males, would of conceived in the main tank. Good timing though, a !!

G

 

[Guest]

You know Grant, she may well have had another brood or two back in the main tank. You prolly never saw them due to them being gobbled up by bigger fish! Hardly any fish in the world will not eat guppy fry (or any fry I know of, for that matter!

Congrats on the new babies!

Perhaps some others could chime in here for the best way to make sure they grow up, I've never been much of a breeder.

 

[Thaiboxer]

That's great! I just got some guppies, hoping to breed them eventually!

That's gotta be really neat to see the little babies swimming around!

 

[Grant R]

Yeah, it is a wicked site, gives you a good sense of acheivement too deep down. Any advice will be greatly accepted.
At the moment with regards to feeding, small, crushed fine flakes are going down nicely, as is a tubifex cube once broken down.

I've heard about the liquifeed stuff, but at the moment, all seems ok.

 

[hisc1ay]

What is tubifex? God willin' I'll have some fry soon too. I just put the 3 new guppies in with my other male, and all day yesterday he was trying to get at the bigger of the two females. I almost thought he had her at one point, but she was slightly too fast for the little guy. I can't wait to see what they produce together. I don't know guppy types, but he's got a multicolored body and a very bright warm colored tail, predominantly orange. She's got a blue tail and a blue/yellow body.

What do you use for your fry cage? I have a net I bought cheaply years ago, and I've also seen the nifty plastic container, with the insert that is like a V so the fry can go underneath but the mom can't...does anyone have a specific preference for what to use?

-j

 

[Grant R]

The colours that will be produced can only really be guessed, but expect brighter colours from the males and slightly less colours on the females of the new fry.

Tubifex Cubes are basically small, dried worms in a tiny cube. They are cheap and you get quite a lot in a packet. I allowed mine to soak and then gently broke it down for the fry to eat.

With regards to keeping them, once the mother had the young, I simply removed her and the other two males and left the 10 - 15 odd fry alone in the 11.1 gallon. All is going well at the moment too.

Good luck with yours !

 

[robertmarda]

I have been actively breeding fish now for about 10 months. What I have found seems to work best is I place the pair I want to breed in half of my 10 gallon tank. Once I am sure the female is pregnant I remove the male from the tank. The female fish appreciates the quiet time. The side she is on is full of many plants to give the babies shelter.

I check the tank in the morning before going to work and after I come home and my wife checks it during the day. As soon as I notice there are fry in the tank then I move the fry or the mother to the other side of the tank. Because there are so much plants (both free floating and planted) I end up with most of the fry surviving. I keep the mother fish alone for about a week, this gives her quiet time to recover from labor. At some point I move all the fry to a larger area in small groups so that they have room to grow and so that I can get an exact count on how many I have.

I've only fed the fry crumbled flake food and they grow fast and healthy.
I currently have very small silver lyretail mollies and red wag swordtails.

 

[Grant R]

That's a pretty good technique and way of doing things. Does anyone have a rough time it takes for the young to develop into fully grown adults ?

Mine have grown since their birth on Xmas Eve, but are still obviously very small.

 

[Guest]

Patience, Grant!

Guppies, obviously being a small fish are probably going to take awhile to grow up. I think flake and tubifex will do a good job. If they are growing, you are doing fine. See about one of those tank dividers like robertm. uses. Not really a guppy guy, but you never know when parents could decide those babies look yummy!

 

[Grant R]

Oy, I have plenty of patients thanks !

It's OK regarding the ' Hungry Guppy Mother ' , she is back in the 45 gallon tank, so the fry have the 11.1 to themselves.

 

[robertmarda]

On March 7 2002, a few guppies were born in my 55 gallon tank. We managed to get 3 out of the tank before getting eaten (this was before I had my other two tanks). Only one grew to maturity. Around July/August 2002 this female guppy was about the same size as her mother and so too me was full grown. So far I haven't had much luck breeding guppies.

I have noticed that fry grow faster (at least molly fry) when kept in smaller groups and in a small breeder net. I have a silver lyre tail molly that was born the 13th of September 2002. This molly is the same size as other mollies I have that were born 18 July 2002. The major difference I see is that there were 50+ born in July and they were all kept in the smaller half of my 10 gallon tank. I only found 5 mollies born on the 13th of September(the others probably got eaten before I discovered there were babies). I kept these in my small breeder net. I believe they grew faster because there was less competition for the food that I gave them and they had to expend less energy searching for the food since they were in a smaller area. I am considering putting another divider in my 10 gallon tank to take advantage of the possibility that a smaller initial space is better for fry in the first few weeks of their life.