i have been keeping guppies for ages now. have seen alot of fry getting eaten which is bloody upsetting to say the least. i have a tank in the kitchen i keep fry in when i'm quick enough to catch them. but today i was in pets at home and saw a tank full of mollies, males, females and loads and loads of fry. no cover, no plants, no nothing but a slight bit of gravel. these mollies were swimming around with not a care in the world and the fry were all very safe. i have seen my guppy fry twice the size of the fry in the molly tank be eaten. anyone know why this is? are guppies just evil or did i just manage to get psycho guppies? the only difference i can think of was their was alot of fry compared to my few fry that get eaten. if you could shed some light on this it would really help as its been eating my noodle bonce all day. thanks rich.
Guppy/molly
- Thread starter ripil
- Start date
helterskelter
Livebearer Specilest
Do you keep anything else with them?
What size is the tank?
How often do u do water changes?
What are you feeding them?
I rear all my guppy fry along side the adults, under feeding will make then more liable to eating their fry.
What size is the tank?
How often do u do water changes?
What are you feeding them?
I rear all my guppy fry along side the adults, under feeding will make then more liable to eating their fry.
Liquid skills
Fish Herder
It does sound strange but i cant talk my platies dont take any notice of their fery the mums acc very caring and the dad jst ignores them
U didnt get phyco guppies some just do infact most do just some dont
No how u feel on the fry thing tho
U didnt get phyco guppies some just do infact most do just some dont
No how u feel on the fry thing tho
This Old Spouse
TOTM Winner May 2013
I found that if I fed them all 3 or 4 times a day without overfeeding them, they left the fry alone. I'd start just as the mother guppy was delivering, because it seemed that she was most likely to eat the fry immediately. If there was food right there for her, she'd ignore the fry and eat the food.
its 3 and a half foot. around 250 litres. just guppies, swordtails and one golden gourami (saved the fish from a friends tank) feed them 2 or 3 times a day tropical flakes. the guppies seem to know when a drop of fry is coming and sit and wait for them then its a chase to eat them all. the tank has two large pieces of bog wood, 8 fake plants, slate and two caves. at first i thought it was the gourami but that really don't seem interested at all. i do a 30% water change every week i say 30% its usually more than that. i have a fluval 4, three 6 inch airstones. i've left fry in there before and ending up with nothing so set up a 2 foot tank in the kitchen to save them. after 8 weeks the swordtail fry was still getting picked on a nipped. so i got em back out and back in the kitchen tank dunno how big they gotta be to be able to go in there. is there any other food thats better for them then? well i say that knowing their is loads but not sure which is best. would be really nice to have all the live bearers in one tank as i wanted to use the kitchen tank for a bunch of tetras.
helterskelter
Livebearer Specilest
Golden gouramiwill defo eat as many fry as they can.
Fluval 4 will also easily kill fry if it's set to high, so reduce flow and if possible cover the the intake's with sponge or something.
If you can get some Java moss this is great for fry to hide in and their is lots of microscopic foods that grow on it that the fry will also eat.
As for foods, newly hatched brine shrimp is by far the best food, but crushed flake is still very good and i feed it for about 80% of their diet.
Fluval 4 will also easily kill fry if it's set to high, so reduce flow and if possible cover the the intake's with sponge or something.
If you can get some Java moss this is great for fry to hide in and their is lots of microscopic foods that grow on it that the fry will also eat.
As for foods, newly hatched brine shrimp is by far the best food, but crushed flake is still very good and i feed it for about 80% of their diet.
i've got two fake java moss balls in there. not as good i know but nothing grows in the tank well the two plants i had didn't. where the filter is the other side to where all the action takes place but yeah i'll turn it down. any ideas on why after 8 weeks the swordtails were still trying to eat their fry? thanks
They could honeslty be psycho guppies as well. I have seen a group of five scare 4 inch male sowrdtails into a corner.
But.....Livebearers think their babies are yummy. Your best survival tactic would to remove the fry before they are eaten. If they dissappear, this is normal in the world of livebearers. If you really want the babies to survive without you having to interfere, have a lot of flat rocks laying on top of the gravel, as well as plenty of plants for the fry to hide in.
This Old Spouse
TOTM Winner May 2013
If you do decided to take the fry out of the main tank, the best thing I've found is to use a turkey baster. Slick.
I used a net lol never though about using a turkey baster lolIf you do decided to take the fry out of the main tank, the best thing I've found is to use a turkey baster. Slick.
This Old Spouse
TOTM Winner May 2013
My turkey baster has a gazillion uses! Suck up the extra snails, rearrange the sand in the tank, suck up extra pleco poo (saves water), suck up the stuff around the base of the plants that my siphon is too powerful for, and you can zero in on anything you want to take out or put into a tank. All that for $.49!
I am on my way to the store now to get a turkey baster hehe
i must have psycho guppies then. i think i'll keeping using the net as the guppies would only get the taste for turkey. i could see myself cooking a twenty lbs turkey everyday and watch them eat it all, might have to get some nicer fish. i try to catch as many as i can. the fry tank is looking quite full at the minute. 10 black dragon fry and 30 swordtails all just colouring up.
Guppies do eat their fry, or at least the ones they can catch. One of the times I realised that my pregnant guppy must have given birth is because the other female was behaving like a shark scanning the gravel, swimming really low, and then I looked and I saw the poor tiny things trying to hide
Another time the male and some of the females were fetching straight from the "source" while the pregnant one was dropping them
Savages!!
yeah i really don't like it. i try to tell them off but it don't work. i've become a fish keeper and fisherman all in one go. i'm quite good at catching them now but i really wanted a nice looking tank that was relaxing to watch but i'm like a coiled snake on a hot frying pan every two weeks. lol
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