Guppies
Hi puffergirl,
There are many reasons why you experience your
LFS guppies slowly dying. There are raised by the millions in cramped quarters. The are given medications to hold down disease and hormones to promote rapid growth. They are shipped in large quantities which increases stress and illness. Rarely will they breed and they will never breed true, as all the various strains are mixed together.
The genetics is a tricky issue. By itself there is nothing wrong with inbreeding. Guppies can tolerate it for many, many generations and this is, of course, how fancy guppies are developed in the first place. It's unfortunate, but most
lfs's consider guppies a "garbage" fish. They pay at most 25¢ per fish, usually much less and don't feel that they are worth the trouble that goes along with selling them. It's rare that they live for 3 months. This is fine with the
lfs owner as he gets to keep selling them over and over, usually to the same people.
It's unfortunate that there isn't an alternative to the $3.50 to $5.00 per pair
lfs guppies and the $35 to $50 per trio charged by "show quality" fancy guppy breeders. Most people are looking for something between those two choices. It is one of the reasons I started my business. My goal is to supply local shops with extremely high-quality fancy guppies that retail for $15 to $20 a pair. That may seem high, but it is a fair price for a true-breeding, healthy pair of guppies that should live for at least a year and produce hundreds of healthy fry. Will they win "shows?" No. Is that what you are looking for? I doubt it. Will you get guppies that will bring you long-term enjoyment and pride of ownership? Yes, they will.
To expect to pay less for that type of quality is unrealistic. We get what we pay for - that's a basic tenet of life. If you keep buying crummy guppies from your
lfs, they'll gladly keep restocking them. "Just say, no!" - Guppyman
