Deformed fry...?

[MissD]

This is one of my batch of 32 that were born 3 and a half weeks ago. You can see he's pretty deformed, but keeping up very well with the others...is this just a deformity from being crammed in his mother (he has 21 brothers and sisters), or do you think it's genetic and I should prevent him/her from being able to breed?

 

[Tokis-Phoenix]

Yes its genetic- too much inbreeding in his genes im afraid. Does he spend his time swimming around the bottom of the tank alot? You can try and keep him, i've had inbred fry before from guppys i've bought in the past from lfs's, but he's highly likely to die from genetic swimbladder disorder even if you do keep him- naturally in the wild these kinds of fry would be eaten by prederters due to his un-stream lined shape slowing him up he becomes a prime target, so its best to put him down.
I would also avoid breeding from any of his brothers and sisters too as they will be carrying the same inbred gene and it is highly likely that their offspring will show the deformity even if they are not currently showing it, they still carry the bad gene which can be passed on.

 

[MissD]

Yeah, that's what I thought...thanks for confirming it. I have 1 baby guppy from the other female that doesn't have a perfectly straight spine. It looks fine, but you can see through the skin that it's not a straight line...is this going to be the same sort of situation, or does that sound more like it's from being cramped in his mummy?

This little guy's just too cute to put down...I don't think I could do it. Not having had him nearly a month. I can keep him and his brothers and sisters separate though...I've been looking for an excuse to start another tank

Sorry for the questions...I've only really kept bettas before. This is my first lot of guppy fry.

Edit: Nope, he doesn't just stick at the bottom like that. He digs around in the gravel, as do all the others, but he swims about the whole tank like everyfish else.

 

[Tokis-Phoenix]

Just sure make sure he doesn't get bred or any other guppys related to him basically, if he gets swim bladder disorder there's nothing you can do about it because it will almost definatly be genetic in this case and you will have to put him down if he does get it unless he cures himself of it .
One thing that will probably be worth doing is rehoming the mother or father as they are most likely related if they came from the same lfs or breeder, so exchanging one of them for a guppy that by no means is related will help bring fresh healthy genes into the bloodline.
The only way you can overcome inbreeding is by changing the mother and father fish alot making sure no one who could be posibly be related gets bred with one another, also stopping breeding any fish that shows physical signs of inbreeding is good

 

[Tokis-Phoenix]

One other thing i'd like to add on healthy genes is that long tailed fancy guppys or ones that show colors like blues/purples and pinks are often very inbred as they have gone through alot of inbreeding to produce these colors, if you want to try and add the healthiest genes into your guppy gene pool i suggest you go for the most "boring" colored guppys as they tend to be the least inbred; colos like greys, yellows and red cobra crossed guppys and black tuxedo female guppys tend to be very hardy and have good gened- i've been running a guppy gene/inbreeding project for some time now so if you need to know anymore info just ask

 

[MissD]

That's great - thank you, I really appreciate your help!

I knew a little bit about the inbreeding factor when I bought my guppies - that's why I bought the females from a store in one town and the males from a store in another. However, as livebearers are almost always pregnant, they were when I brought them home, so I don't know who the fathers of the first batch of fry are/were...that could be where the problem was. However, my females are now pregnant by one of the two males I have in the tank now, from the different store, so hopefully the fry they have this time around will be better. They're due any day.

As for the colours, I have one female who's black from halfway down her body to her tail, one that's all yellow, one that's got a black and yellow tail, and one with an orange and black tail and a blue dorsal fin. The black and the yellow mothers are the two I got these fry from, but if what you say about those colours being the sorta less inbred ones, the two deformities I do have must just be from the mothers and whoever else they were tanked with ("fish relatives", I would assume) inbreeding.

The (4) girls, spread over two pictures, and one of my two males:

 

[Tokis-Phoenix]

The one with the red on him/her i'd say has an inbreeding degree of 5-6 out of 10 and so has the the female with red/yellow/blue, but the others i'd say are 2-4 out of ten so are good but still keep an eye out on the health, numbers and activity of fry from each batch they produce

These are examples of a guppys that are very likely to be highly inbred and fragile;

http/www.usaguppies.com/images/Japanese_Medusa_Galaxy.jpg

http/www.ccg.org.br/images/guppy12.jpg

http/community-2.webtv.net/guphoto/HybridPingu/

good luck with your guppy breeding

 

[MissD]

I had nothing but he** whenever I brought the long tailed guppies home. They were always dead within a week, so I got the shorter tailed ones and so far (aside from the funny fry) I haven't had any problems in months.

The one with the orangey red tail is a male...snakeskin? One of the speckley ones...or did you mean the male in the middle of the top picture? Glad the others seem alright, though. The red/yellow/blue female, I must admit, I bought because she was pretty, but I also bought her with the intention of keeping her fry.

I'm going to see what happens, though. Like I said, the fish aren't going to be sold or anything; I'm going to be buying some tanks to set up for males and females separately and keep them for myself...I'm not going to be supplying anywhere with anything.

 

[Tokis-Phoenix]

Yes i've had grief over the long tailed fancy ones in the past too and have stopped buying them months ago- they are beautiful but extremely fragile due to inbreeding. Personally if i want a guppy that looks like a betta i'd rather just go for a real betta. Im glad you have chosen durability over looks

 

[MissD]

Personally if i want a guppy that looks like a betta i'd rather just go for a real betta.

Exactly, although I have 6 guppies and 15 bettas, so, umm...

 

[mlee0332]

I was told to euthanize deformed fry, even though they act fine now, it could cause problems for them later.

 

[Annastasia]

Ah...I once had a fry exactly like your's, MissD. He was fine until he got to be about a month old....and then he couldn't swim..because he always spun in circles.

By the way, you also have very pretty Guppies! I love the marble-tail female.

 

[MissD]

Thanks

He will be exactly a month old tomorrow morning. At the moment he's still keeping up alright, but I will definitely be keeping a close watch.

I'm terrible with euthanising anything though. Animals come above people a lot of the time in my books...it kills me to do it to them. Obviously if it's the only way, then so be it, but I would really like to see how we go.

None of my fry are going back to pet stores, anyway...I wanted a male and a female tank so I bought a couple of pairs to get some babies and then I'll be separating them up and filling the house with even more aquariums

 

[daudy_dojo]

its ok an normal to have deformities! i had 2 mollie fry that were deformed! the only thing that you would need to worry about is if ALL of the babies were deformed! then you may have a unfertile batch that will die soon! well back to my story my two babies! scar and lucky! ( they got eaten) scar had no eyes and lucky had no fins what so ever!

 

[Dragonscales]

I have also had deformed guppy fry. Most die within a few weeks but I have two atm who are around 3-4 months old. I seperated them from my other guppies (luckily they are both female) and they are both fine. One has the boomerang shape of yours and the other looks as though she was the dominant half of a pair of conjoined twins. You can make out the dead head and tail of her sibling protruding from her stomach. I too dislike euthenising my fish, but would in a heartbeat if I ever though either one was in pain or had a less than humane quality of life. As they are today, they have developed more slowly than guppy fry usually do but are both healthy and happy as well as having no problems whatsoever with swimming around and forraging for food all day every day (as guppies do).

If you ever do need to euthanise any fish though, please do it in a humane and quick manner. This means not pulling them from the tank and sitting them out in the sun, nor freezing them. I find that decapitation is the most fast, painless and absolute way to put down a fish as it instantly cuts the connection of the brain from the rest of the nervous system. It is alot more confronting a method and unpleasant for the owner, but ultimately is alot better for the fish and let's face it, a pet's last few minutes alive shouldn't be filled with pain or horribly slow extinguishment.