DonnBallenger
Aquarium Advice Apprentice
- Joined
- May 14, 2006
- Messages
- 36
About a month ago, i introduced 3 female and 1 male guppies (as suggested by the pet store) to my cycled 10gal tank in hopes of breeding them. I own 5 operating tanks ranging from 10gal to 50gal and have had great success with all other types of fish I've purchased.
I used the standard "float for 20 mins then drip-aclimate" technique every time. The first male impregnated all 3 females and died a few days later. I figured he was either weak or sick to begin with and didn't give it a second thought. The females had their fry a little earlier than I had been expecting, so I didnt have a chance to quarantine them, and all the fry got eaten by the females. No biggie. I purchased another male yesterday in hopes of rearing a second batch of fry that I could monitor more closely and hopefully save, but when I checked the tank this morning, my new male was dead. I had the pet store check the water as per their return policy, and they found nothing wrong (pH and nitrate/nitrite levels okay, water a bit on the hard side which i've heard from several sources is what guppies prefer). I got my money back, but I'm not going to put any more males into the tank until I get to the bottom of this.
Upon examination of the corpse, there are no signs of trauma (the females weren't picking on him) and he didn't seem too stressed when I released him into the tank. He actually spent the better part of the time I was watching him chasing the females around the tank, so I was under the impression that he would be okay. What gives? Are male guppies generally this hard to keep? Is there something I'm not doing right? Should I just go to a different store to get my males?
I used the standard "float for 20 mins then drip-aclimate" technique every time. The first male impregnated all 3 females and died a few days later. I figured he was either weak or sick to begin with and didn't give it a second thought. The females had their fry a little earlier than I had been expecting, so I didnt have a chance to quarantine them, and all the fry got eaten by the females. No biggie. I purchased another male yesterday in hopes of rearing a second batch of fry that I could monitor more closely and hopefully save, but when I checked the tank this morning, my new male was dead. I had the pet store check the water as per their return policy, and they found nothing wrong (pH and nitrate/nitrite levels okay, water a bit on the hard side which i've heard from several sources is what guppies prefer). I got my money back, but I'm not going to put any more males into the tank until I get to the bottom of this.
Upon examination of the corpse, there are no signs of trauma (the females weren't picking on him) and he didn't seem too stressed when I released him into the tank. He actually spent the better part of the time I was watching him chasing the females around the tank, so I was under the impression that he would be okay. What gives? Are male guppies generally this hard to keep? Is there something I'm not doing right? Should I just go to a different store to get my males?