My Guppies Are Pregnet (need A Reply)

[koalaluver]

i went to the store to buy 2 female guppies for my male guppy the man gave me to pregnet girl guppies i am happy . well my ques. are should i use a breeder net or should i get a little tank w/ a heater and bubbler?

 

[Ddraig Goch]

A separate fry tank would be the best option as there is not much space for the fry to grow in a breeding net.

Bear in mind that you will need a lot of space if you intend to save all of the fry and grow them to adulthood.

Good luck.

 

[tonilee7]

I have a local tank and then a 2'ft tank for my babies, If you can get another tank and you would like to grow them into adult hood that is the best options, breed nets are good to keep them safe from the bigger fish but if you want them to grow you will need a seperate tank.I tried to rare mine in a net but they wouldn't grow. So I went out and brought a little tank and now I have over 300 babies but I don't keep them all I either sell them or they get fed to my oscar!!!!!

 

[Annastasia]

i went to the store to buy 2 female guppies for my male guppy the man gave me to pregnet girl guppies i am happy . well my ques. are should i use a breeder net or should i get a little tank w/ a heater and bubbler?

I'd go for the tank. However, you definitely need a filter too...if it is a small tank, a couple sponge filters might work. Then there is no chance of the fry getting sucked in.

If you do go for the little tank, you have lots of options. For substrate, you basically have three:

1. Sand. This is a fairly easy option. It's good because it's very safe for fry. And also, most of the waste will stay on the top of the sand, so it's easy to syphon off. However, you do need to stir the sand, but that's easy to do with the water changes.
2. Bare-bottom This is another pretty easy option. All the waste is easy to see, and you don't have to worry about any substrate at all. However, you could only really have fry in this tank, no Cories or bottom-dwellers, but that's usually not a problem in a fry tank anyway!
3. Gravel. Gravel is also fairly easy, though probably the hardest of the three. For two reasons. One - Sometimes fry can get stuck between pieces of gravel. And Two - Little bits of food and waste can fall between the pieces of gravel, which makes it harder to clean out, and you can miss some, which will deteriorate your water quality which isn't good for fry! It is pretty easy to syphon though, because you don't have to worry about it getting sucked up like sand.

So that's basically your substrate options. For decor, anything is good...rocks, wood, plants, little caves...basically anything that gives the fry something to hide in, and chase their brothers and sisters around.

Another thing with fry, is they need good water quality. I'd recommend you do at least twice a week water changes, but often is better. You can even do it once a day. Whcih brings me to water changes. They can be kind of hard with fry, because you're always worried about sucking them up and everything. There are 4 ways you can do it, or you can combine some together.

• Make a little syphon out or airline tubing. This usually works pretty well, because it's too small for fry, but it still gets most of the waste.
• Use a turkey baster.
• Shine a flashlight near the tank, but not in it. Most fry will eitehr go towards it, or away from it, and then you can clean where they aren't.
• Just syphon or do water changes as usual. Just check before you dump the water, that no fry are there. If some get syphoned up, it's not going to kill them. Just stick them back in the tank.

Now, for feeding. It's best if you can feed at least 3 times a day, preferably 5-6.
Guppy fry are born pretty small, you may want to start with Liquifry. Or you could just skip to some kind of fry food, like Hikari First Bites, or Tetramin fry food. This you can feed for about two weeks, maybe longer. You can also alternate in Live Baby Brine Shrimp.
When they get older, you can move on to finely crushed flakes. Remember to make them reeeeeeally small pieces! You can continue feeding the Brine Shrimp here if you want.
As they get even older, the flake pieces can get older, and you can start giving them little pieces of Freeze-dried/Frozen foods. Small things like Daphnia, or very finely crushed Freeze-dried Brine Shrimp works well. Don't feed this more then maybe 2-3 times a week, because too much can cause bloating and/or constipation.
And as they get even older, you can start feeding things in bigger pieces, and other bigger foods until they are basically eating what the adults are.

They are safe to put it with the other fish when they are too big to fit in the biggest fish's mouth. However, it would be best if you could seperate brothers and sisters to prevent too much inbreeding. If it happens, it happens. One or two generations won't hurt too much, but it's betetr if you can seperate them. Females will have tiny gravid spots, and males of course will get gonopodiums. Be aware, males can look like females for a long time, then one day get a gonopodium. So just remember that!

Another thing to remember, is Guppies have fry often. Females will produce fry about every month. If you have a small fry tank, you can't raise all these fry. Pace yourself. As you get more and more fry, you can always do a survival of the fittest, though I know it sounds mean. If you do this, just feed the tank as normal, and the fry will figure out a way to eat. Also, remember, even if you seperate the male from the female, once they female has been impregnanted once, they can store sperm for up to 7 more pregnancies! Basically, they can have 7 more batches of fry, with no contact with a male.


Anyway, I'll stop posting now, as I'm sure you are feeling over-run with information. Sorry. )

I wish you the best of luck with your fry! Keep us updated, and never ever hesitate to ask any questions!