Will Bettas Eat Guppy Fry?

[tamara]

and i'm thinking of buying a betta, but i just want to make sure he'll eat gupppy fry, because i have way to many of them, but if he doesn't then he'll just be another waste of space[ i love them--but i don't have the space]

 

[lisie]

I think that guppy fry are too big for them to be killed humanely by a betta. A betta may eat them, but I think it'd take more than just one gulp to get them down. I'd say go for a bigger fish for culling purposes.

 

[tamara]

but i can't get bigger, because after i would just put him in a one gallon tank...because thats all i've gotbigger fish couldn't live in there.

 

[Amerce]

I'm sorry but your suggestion is just too awful, betta's shouldn't be bought just to cull your guppy fry.

Why don't you just remove the females from the tank and just have a tank of male guppy's they are far prettier, ergo practice safe sex for them.

Anyone who knows guppys know that they breed like "rabbits", if you don't have a shop that will take them then you have to do something, sell them on as feeder fish but don't buy another fish just to rid yourself of them.

 

[joycould]

Even if males are separated from females the females can still produce fry for at least 3 months if not longer. If a betta was used it would be death by gluttony if he was used to cull the fry.

 

[K.J.]

I've fed them platy fry before, but not consistently since I don't get many fry. Over 1 week old they start to get inedible.

 

[tamara]

I tried seperating the females/males...but they still kept having babies, then i went to move my tank since it was too heavy for my desk, then when i was cleaning it, i dropped it and it's got a crack..so now i'm down to one tank that's a 10 gallon tank...and it's got about 50 guppies in it sicne i've got to many.

 

[joycould]

Here is a couple of solutions a lfs that will be willing to take some off your hands possibly for store credit or get a big rubbermaid tub make it into an indoor pond and say "honey look what I made." I don't see one betta as solution to culling guppies. Even if you do separate males and females like I said before they will still have babies for at least 3 months if not longer.

 

[Amerce]

Good suggestion Joycould, far more practical than buying a fish to eat your fish

 

[lilfishie]

give them away if there that much trouble, i wouldn't dream of feeding my guppy fry to my bettas no matter how many i had, or you could return the females and your fry problem is the sorted, you can't have fry with only male fish

 

[dmarie04]

The topic of culling fry has come up many times (whether it be betta fry, guppy fry, or any other fry) and the discussion usually doesn't end well. Everyone has differing opinions on whether culling fry by feeding it to another fish is ok or not. That wasn't what the OP is asking, though. She is asking if a betta would be able to "handle the job". I think that if the fry were only a day or two old it would be ok. But the betta should only be fed one or two at a time and not every day. That will still leave you with guppy fry since the fry will continue to age (and get too big for the betta to eat humanely) in between the feedings. If you absolutely can't get a larger fish for your culling purposes then you should think of another option for getting rid of the unwanted guppy fry. A betta could have one or two as a snack (if they are very very young) but wouldn't work out as a full-time "culling machine".

 

[starrynightxxi]

yes, a betta could eat guppy fry if they were still very young, but it would be inadvisable to expect one betta to eat what sounds like a very large amount of guppies in a very short time. I fed one of my bettas live endler fry which are very similar to guppy fry, but at the age that a betta could eat the babies, it might have a hard time catching them. My betta ate from my hands so I would catch and hand feed him one baby and no more at a meal. One time i released the fry too soon and the betta was never successful in catching it, though he tried.

After a short time the fry would be too large for a betta to eat and if it did catch one, you'd have an ugly situation on your hands. they can really rip things to shreds when they want and probably wouldn't kill and eat one at a time so much as attack and bite any that were slow on the uptake. And then you'd just have a lot of injured guppies regardless of age.

Your best bet would be to find a store that will take your excess fish. Or if you don't mind euthaniasia, there are a number of ways. A very effective method for small tropical fish is dropping them in water that is nearly frozen (in other words, has been in the freezer until it develops a skin of ice or becomes slushy). They'll die of shock almost instantly.

 

[K.J.]

give them away if there that much trouble, i wouldn't dream of feeding my guppy fry to my bettas no matter how many i had, or you could return the females and your fry problem is the sorted, you can't have fry with only male fish

Unfortunately most people can't give away that many fry, and it's more humane to let them die in one quick bite than live their life in a cluttered aquarium.

 

[rdd1952]

Just leave the fry in the tank with the other guppies. They will eat their own fry before they have a chance to grow out. The other option, as mentioned is to seperate the males and females but the females will still continue to have fry for several months until the stored sperm is used up.

 

[Amunet]

I'd seriously just try to find a LFS.. or maybe a friend with large fish to give to them as feeders.
Even if a LFS isn't willing to give you any sort of store credit for them, well.. at least you've gotten rid of them if they take the fry off your hands.