Guppy Stats
Minimum Tank Size: 5 Gallons (10 Gallons Recommended)
Care Level: Easy
Water Conditions: PH 6.5-8.5 and Medium hard to Hard
Temperature: 65-80°F (18-27°C)
Maximum Size: 2.5 inches (6.5 centimeters)
Introduction
The guppy (Poecilia reticulate) is easily one of the most popular fish in the aquarium hobby, and with their long flowing tails and striking colors, are arguably one of the most attractive.
The male guppy has been selectively breed for hundreds of generations, resulting in a huge array of tail fin variations and colors. The female guppy on the other hand, looks far more natural and normally only have a small tinge of color in their tails.
Guppies were originally found north of the Amazon river in South America and also on several Caribbean islands, but now can be found throughout the world due to escapes and releases into the wild.
The guppy is one of the smallest live-bearing fish, with the females growing to about 2 ½ inches, and the males being slightly smaller. Nearly all of the guppies in the fish trade are commercially bred, and wild caught guppies are exceeding rare. Because of this, they can adapt to a wide variety of water types, but prefer the water to be on the hard side with a pH in 6.5-8.0 range.
Housing
Guppies are a generally peaceful fish, and will do well in most community tanks. If a person plans a non-breeding tank, a few male guppies can live quite happily in a 10 gallon (37 litre) tank. Though this number should be limited to three or four to avoid the males fighting with one another.
If you decide to add some females into the mix, then it starts to get a bit trickier. For each male guppy, there should be at least two or three females. It’s not an exaggeration to say that the male guppy is always in “the mood”, and if there is only one female available for a male to mate with, the constant harassment may eventually kill the female. In the wild, female guppies will even choose to be near predators, rather than endure the constant mating attempts of male guppies.
Something else to consider when adding females, is that the guppy is also known by the name “million fish”. And this isn’t just an affectionate nickname – it has been earned by hordes of guppies who overran fish tanks and eco-systems alike. So when some females are added to an aquarium containing males, large numbers of baby guppies will quickly be produced. Unless there is a plan to deal with all of the fry, or a large hungry fish present (not for the faint of heart), then you should reconsider keeping males and females in tank together.
When it comes to choosing filtration, guppies don’t have any special needs, and thanks to their small size won’t put much strain on a tanks bio-filtration. Any quality HOB (Hang on Back) filter or sponge filter will keep the water in pristine condition. With that being said, if you plan on breeding guppies, then the equation changes pretty quickly. In that case, you should choose a filter that exceeds what is required for the tank, and choose one based on a heavily stocked future tank.
I would strongly recommend choosing an Aquaclear Power Filter
Feeding
Guppies are easy to feed, and will readily accept almost any food that is offered to them. They should be fed a high quality flake food daily, and it can be supplemented with frozen daphnia, brine shrimp and blood worms. Guppies seem to especially love frozen bloodworms, and you will often see them swimming around with what looks like a giant blood worm cigar in their mouths. I personally feed them Hikari Fancy Guppy
Like most other live-bearers, they will also benefit from some vegetable matter in their diet. Small medallions of zucchini, cucumbers and any flake or pellet for herbivore fish will be greedily eaten. You will often seem them picking at any algae in the tank, though they won’t actually do much in the way of cleaning it off a surface.
Breeding
When it comes to breeding guppies, it’s as easy as just adding water. As previously stated, the fish tank should have a minimum of 2 to 3 females per male guppy in the tank. Since the guppy is a live-bearer, the females that are purchased from the store may already be pregnant. So if someone is looking to breed a specific variety, it’s important to ensure that any females purchased come from a female only tank.
As a live-bearer fish, the female guppy carries her eggs internally, and will give birth to highly developed babies about a month after being impregnated. The easiest way to tell if the female is pregnant, is to look for a dark gravid spot near it’s anal fin, and an enlarged belly.
The addition of live plants to the tank greatly helps with breeding guppies. It gives the pregnant guppy a place to hide when it goes into labor, and once the babies are born, they will also instinctively hide in the plants. Some of the best plants to add are Java Moss, Water Wisteria, Hornwort and Duckweed. These all give the baby guppies excellent hiding places and have the added benefit of improving the water quality.
Since the fry are born with such small mouths, they should be fed fry specific food for the first few weeks. They can be fed newly hatched brine shrimp, microworms, or any of the commercial fry foods (I recommend New Life Spectrum Small Fry Starter Formula
I want to help you ..
I want to strengthen the guppies “Gobi” Fish tails I feel as transparent .. I want to be strong and attractive as the road so their fins ? Our thanks go to all of you .
what i like to do to get cheep guppies is get a bunch of feeder guppies and quarintine them and then but them into the tank
I’ve actually done the same thing before too to get natural looking guppies. There’s something to be said about cheap, natural looking guppies.
Do you find the fancy guppies in pet/aquarium stores to be delicate and sensitive to water conditions? How long do most fancy guppies live for? You have made an Amazing website!!
Most of the fancy guppies are very delicate these days,and I’ve actually had some fun buying feeder guppies, since they tend to be far hardier – though less colourful, and often ill when you purchase them.
As for their life span, they usually live somewhere between 1-3 years in captivity.
And thank you for the compliment. 🙂
Have you ever kept endler guppies? If so how do you find them when compared to other guppy species? I am think about geting some?
They are a great little fish, and I would highly recommend keeping them. But they tend to do best in a species only tank and they can be very sensitive to water conditions, so they may take a little more work.
Thanks for the advice. I think I stick with the fancy guppies.
Hello people
I would like to ask something. I am a new on these and i have 5 males and 6 males guppies. Is it alright or i have to give some away?
Thank you in advance
You should probably be alright, depending on the setup of the aquarium. As long as there are more females than males, and the females don’t appear to be being harassed too much, then it should work out. Also, make sure there are lots of plants and ornaments to break the line-of-sight, so they can escape from the attention of the males.
Hey Rob one of my guppies has really black eyes and isn’t swimming well. do you know what is happening and what I should do
Are the cloudy or bulging as well? Is there anything else, like wispy growths, or lumps? The black eyes by themselves are usually genetic I believe, so it’s not too much of a concern by itself. The trouble swimming could be though, so let me know if there are any visible problems first.
Unfortunately it died 10 minutes after I emailed that to you
Hi Rob, I have a couple questions. I’m witnessing 2 instances (2 different tanks) of the same issue: multiple smaller male guppies approx 1″ (raised from fry) all ganging up on a single larger male guppy approx 1.5″. All of the small male guppies are from the same litter of fry (they were in a separate baby tank until they grew), and when introduced to a new larger established tank the younger and smaller males appear to almost constantly be harassing the larger male (in one case the father–housed in a 55 gallon tank along with a 2.5″ molly, a 4″ algae eater, a 1″ blue moon platy, 3x 1.5″ very fat green Cory cats, and a 6″ pleco; in the other case a single unrelated male in a 10 gallon tank–his other male guppy tank mates had died over time). I’ve seen guppies harrass females before, and females try to get away; whereas these larger males do not seem to be overly disturbed by the attention so I’m unsure if they are unhappy or not (but would guess not?) Wondering why this would happen, and what to do to fix it? In the 10 tank, there is currently 6 total fish (1 larger, 5 brothers, 3 introduced initially and a couple weeks later 2 more). Since being introduced, some of them now have raggedy tails, which implies nibbling….thoughts on how to rectify? Also, one of the smaller males in the 55 is shaped oddly, almost like a balloon bellied molly…I am not certain but am pretty sure it used to be normally shaped. (Note; I do not live at either location of these aquariums but frequent them often. 55 is at my boyfriend’s, 10 is at my mother’s) Wondering if you think something is wrong/any thoughts on what?
Also just want to say thank you–I’ve perused many articles/websites, and yours is very thoughtfully put together and maintained.
First of all, it’s always nice to hear positive feedback about the site.
Now, on to the guppies: Are all the guppies the same type? Assuming they’re all the same type, they normally fight when there aren’t enough females present. When there are 2-3 females for each male, then the males will still fight, but they’ll be distracted enough by the females it shouldn’t be too much of a problem. If that’s not an option, then set up the tank with ornaments and plants so it’s divided into ‘zones’. If the fish can’t see each other, then the fighting will be reduced.
As for the on the with the swollen belly, it’s most likely bloat. You need to treat that as soon as possible (sorry about the delay in getting back to you), but it’s usually fatal to the fish and can spread to others. I would put it in a separate tank and then treat with antibiotics.
Let me know how it goes.
I need help choosing some fish for a community tank
What size is your tank? Do you know the water pH and hardness? If you don’t know and you get water from a municipality, they almost always have the water info on their website. Also, do you have any preferences? Large fish? Small fish? One centerpiece fish, and lots of small ones?
Its a tall 55 and i want small fish
while there is no water in it right now it will be about the same as my other so 7.0\
It already will have Guppies, cory cats, and a gourami
I have 2 males and what appears to be 2 females in my 10 gallon tank is that ok or should i add another female.
It’s a tough situation, because you definitely want some more females to spread out the males’ attention. But you have to worry about a guppy population explosion. As long as you have a plan in place to deal with the fry, then you should be fine.
Question? I have a 75 gallon I have 3 male guppy’s 5 females, 3 pairs swordtailS, 6 platys, 10 neon n 4 tiger barbs. Someone is nipping at my male guppy’s. Any idea who may be the culprit?
I can almost guarantee it’s the tiger barbs. They’re notorious fin nippers and are made even worse when kept in groups of less than six.