Guppies are beautiful and colorful, they have cute faces and are easy to care for. What else do you want from fish? If you are hoping that your tank will be filled with these little beauties, you need to learn how to breed them and care for the fry.
Steps
Part 1 of 2: Breeding guppies
Step 1. Select the fish from which you want to get offspring
Remember the number of fish you selected, the color of each fish, and the shape of the tail. If you select two fish of the same color, the fry will be the same color. The same principle works for the shape of the fins.
- Number of fish: Usually you should select one male and two or three females to breed. If the ratio is one to one, the male often becomes aggressive, hunting the female throughout the tank. With a ratio of one to three, the attention of the male will be divided into three females, which will make breeding more calm for them.
- Color: There are several main types of color in guppies. These are natural (gray or olive-colored fish), albino (light colors or white fish with red eyes), light (light colors interspersed with black) and blue (blue with a tint).
- Tail Shape: Guppy tail shapes can range from a rounded black fin to a sword-like shape. Guppy tails come in many different shapes and sizes, but the most common are deltoid (large triangle shaped), fan-shaped (fan-shaped tail), and rounded (small round-shaped tail).
Step 2. Choose an aquarium for breeding
You need to choose an aquarium with a capacity of 30-60 liters with a heater and a fine filter. We need a fine filter, because otherwise the guppy babies (which are called fry) can be sucked into the filter and killed. If you think your filter is too strong, cover the inlet with a fine mesh. The mesh will allow water to enter the filter and protect the fry.
Step 3. Set up your aquarium
Unfortunately, guppy parents occasionally eat their offspring, so you should provide guppy fry with places to hide after birth. Guppy fry prefer to swim at the bottom, so cover them with bottom algae. Shelter in the surface layers will also be required for healthy fry to float upward.
- Do not use a substrate. The substrate is the real / artificial rocks that cover the bottom of the aquarium. In a bare bottom aquarium, you can count the number of fry as well as how much they eat and are easy to clean.
- Javanese moss or spawning nets are good shelters for guppy fry.
Step 4. Adjust the aquarium according to the needs of your fish
Set the temperature to about 25 to 26 degrees Celsius while the females and males are in the tank together. Before placing the guppies in the breeding tank, buy more nutritious food to stimulate healthy breeding.
Step 5. Transfer the guppy to the breeding tank
From now on, all you have to do is wait for your fish to give birth. Transfer the male back to your regular tank after you notice your females are pregnant. You can tell if a female is pregnant by the presence of a black mark on her abdomen. This mark is called the "prenatal spot". It appears in all pregnant females and becomes noticeably darker as the eggs mature.
Step 6. Determine when your fish are ready to give birth
Pregnancy usually lasts 26 to 31 days. When your female guppy is ready to give birth, her belly becomes very large and the prenatal patch turns dark black (or dark burgundy if you breed light-colored or albino fish). Also, her belly will look more like a square box rather than round. Be prepared for guppies to give birth to live fry, not to lay eggs. You will need to keep a close eye on the pregnant female to be close and remove her from the tank immediately after giving birth (otherwise she may eat the fry).
Here are some signs of labor in a fish: very calm and in a secluded place, trembling (labor pains), swimming near a heater, or changes in appetite (refusing to eat or spitting it out)
Part 2 of 2: Caring for the fry
Step 1. Remove the female guppy from the breeding tank immediately after the fry are born
While it may seem cruel, guppies are actually born completely ready to live on their own. In addition, as mentioned earlier, the guppy mom can sometimes eat her own offspring.
If you are having trouble giving birth, be sure to provide the fry with plenty of aquarium plants so they can hide
Step 2. Keep the aquarium clean and at a suitable temperature
The fry should live in an aquarium that is heated to about 25 and a half degrees Celsius. Maintain this temperature until the fry are fully grown. Also, the aquarium should be cleaned frequently. Siphon the tank carefully every time it gets dirty and change 40% of the water every few days to keep it clean.
Step 3. Feed your fry the right food
Guppy fry eat brine shrimp, microworms and dry food. They should be fed twice a day. Guppies eat both meat and vegetable flakes. You should feed them vegetable flakes just like you would regular cereals. Remember that the fry tiny and if you put too much food in the aquarium, the spoiled excess food can cause them to become sick or even die.
Newborn fry should be fed with fresh brine shrimp - this is how guppies will grow best. If you want to pamper your guppies with a treat, add some boiled spinach to the aquarium
Step 4. Take measures to keep your fry healthy
This means removing all dead fry from the aquarium. Dead fry will float on the surface of the water and are easy to reach. Keep track of the number of dead fry. If you notice that too many of them have died, you need to figure out what is killing them. Change the water and switch to a different feed. Any accumulated debris is bad for the health of the guppy.
Step 5. Move the fry to a regular tank when they are large enough
When the fry are mature or at the age of one and a half to two months, they are ready to defend themselves outside the aquarium for reproduction. You can place them in a regular non-aggressive fish tank, sell them to your local pet store, or give them to friends.
How to make fish food from fish food
- Place some flakes / granules in a resealable plastic bag and close.
- Grind until they turn into a fine powder.
- Feed a little.
- Add different types of high protein foods to the mixture.
- If the powder is too coarse, the fry will not eat it. If this is the case, try a special food for fry.
- Take a toothpick and dip it in the water. Then dip it in food and again in water.
Advice
- If the male doesn't fertilize the female, try placing another male guppy in a separate jar near the breeding tank. This should encourage the chosen male to fertilize as soon as he realizes that he has a competitor. If this does not help, you should choose another male guppy for breeding.
- You should not put other species of fish together with guppies - they will disturb the breeding pair and will eat any fry they can find.
- Try to match females and males with the desired color and fin shape so that the fry look exactly as you expected.
- If there are too many guppy babies in your aquarium, sell or donate them, otherwise when they grow up they will eat each other's tails.