How to Breed Guppies: The Complete Step-by-Step Guide..

Guppy fish is a species native to South America that is highly prized as aquarium fish. This is because guppies are easy to care for, reproduce very quickly, and look beautiful because of their intense color.

If you want to raise guppies fish, either because you like them or because you have an aquarium and want to include them, read this post, we are going to tell you everything you have to do to raise guppies.

What do you need to breed guppies?

Contents hide

1 What do you need to breed guppies?

2 Recommendations and steps for breeding guppies

3 Care of fry

4 How to identify male and female guppies?

4.1 Related posts:

To make your breeding of guppies, you have to take into account their particular characteristics of them, since there are behaviors and habits that determine their needs. Let’s see what you need to buy to breed guppies:

Three separate tanks or a single large tank of at least 150 liters with divisions. Male guppies are aggressive, they have behaviors that can stress females, therefore, they should be separated and only put together punctually.

A water heater for each tank, with its thermometer and regulator. Guppys need a temperature of 25°C to be comfortable, therefore, it is necessary to install a water heater for aquariums.

A filter for each tank, that of fry, as baby fish are called, should be soft, because if the filter is very strong, it can absorb newborn hatchlings. A mesh can also be placed at the mouth of the filter to protect the fry.

Plants, natural or artificial, are needed to serve as shelter for both females and fry.

A net with a handle, special to remove the specimens and change the tank.

Food for adult fish and fry

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Recommendations and steps for breeding guppies

The three ponds are distributed as follows:

Two medium-sized ponds, about 30 liters capacity, for adult guppies, one for females and one for males.
A breeding, gestation and calving tank. This should be larger, about 50 liters minimum.

If you want to have several females breeding simultaneously, you must have additional tanks for breeding and to house large numbers of fry.
It is necessary to choose the pairs to reproduce with the same color pattern, in this way it is known what the offspring will look like. A male and 3 females should be chosen, with this proportion, the minimum stress is obtained in the females and fertilization occurs better.
The specimens are placed in the breeding tank, it is necessary that the tank has plants so that the females can take refuge, since the males usually harass them.
When females exhibit a dark spot on the abdomen, it means that they are pregnant, at which time the male should be removed for his regular pond.
Gestation lasts about a month, to know if the female is in labor you have to observe the behavior: she tends to stay still, not eat and isolate herself. Also if you observe it carefully you can perceive the contractions.
At the time the young are born, the female should be taken out to the regular pond, since if they are left next to the fry they could eat them.

Care of fry

The fry of guppies are born with the ability to live on their own, but because of their size, they are susceptible to being eaten by larger specimens and also need tiny food that they can ingest. Let’s see all the necessary care:

The fry tank must remain at 25 ° C, it is necessary to monitor that this is the case and adjust the heater if necessary.
The water must be very clean, it is mandatory to remove any remaining food, because if it decomposes, it can get sick and even kill the fry. Changing 50% of the water in the tank daily is advisable.
Care should be taken not to overfeed the fry, placing food twice a day is enough, and the amount should be calculated based on what is observed to eat.
One way to adapt the feeding of the fry is to place food for adult guppies in a plastic bag and crush with a roller until it becomes powder, so that the young can ingest it.
If a fry dies, it must be removed immediately. It’s very easy to tell because dead fish float. It is important to check the feeding, water conditions, temperature, to determine what caused the death and correct.
Artemia salina is best for feeding newborn fry, as it is very nutritious and allows them to grow to a good size. It is convenient to offer it at least the first 2 or 3 weeks of life.
When the fry reach the size of their parents, they are ready for the pond of adults. This is going to happen at about 6 weeks of age. Before that you need to identify the males and females in order to be able to place themselves in the respective pond.

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How to identify male and female guppies?

Males are smaller than females. This is very noticeable; females can be up to twice the size of males.
Males exhibit intense color, females are more opaque and some specimens may be gray.
Guppy females have a round and much wider body, males are usually elongated and thinner.
Guppy females have a dark spot on the side of the body, this is called “gravid spot” and is a unique feature of them. When the female is pregnant this spot becomes even darker.
The dorsal fin is larger in males, when they swim the fin drags and shakes with the movement of water. Females have it much shorter. The caudal fin in males is wider and much larger than in females. The anal fin of the male, which is located under the body, is long, that of the female is much shorter and triangular in shape.