General information about guppies can be found on the guppies main page
How big are newborn guppies?
Young guppies Source: Picture on Wikimedia Commons License: CC Attr. SA 3.0 Author: Schumi4ever
When young guppies are born, they are almost fully developed. At birth or shortly thereafter, they are already 8 to 9 mm long. After about 2 days the young are thin, but can be more than 1 cm long.w
There can, of course, be variations in growth depending on the size of the young at birth, how often and what they are fed, what temperature the young are kept at, etc.
Some young are about 5 mm long at birth and only about 6 – 7 mm long after a week. The quite different information can also be based on estimation errors and should therefore only be seen as approximate information.
Food for young guppies
4 month old guppies Source: Picture on Wikimedia Commons License: CC Attr. SA 2.0 Author: Prattflora
In a well-established aquarium, there are microorganisms and algae that are eaten by the young, so additional feeding is not necessary.
If necessary, flake food can be crushed or rubbed with your fingers as food for the young. So-called dust food from the aquarium trade is also suitable. Cyclops, Bosmida and Artemia are suitable as live or frozen food.
Young fish need a lot of food. If possible, they can be fed up to 6 times a day.
1 time is enough. Only as much is fed as is eaten after a few minutes. Otherwise the feed will spoil and pollute the water. This leads to illness and death.
Fluval Hang On 2 liters
Anchoring at the aquarium?
suction cups and air cushions
suction cups and air cushions
Special feature:
None / Timeless classic
Steady water flow / Large capacity
Special feature:
None / Timeless classic
Recommendation:
Anchoring at the aquarium?
suction cups and air cushions
Special feature:
Steady water flow / Large capacity
Anchoring at the aquarium?
suction cups and air cushions
The parents eat their young.
Male guppy Source: Image on Wikimedia Commons License: CC Attr. SA 3.0 Author: Jdiemer
The young fish are also eaten by the parents as long as they fit in the parents’ mouth. It is mainly the females who prey on the young. The males seem to be too busy producing new offspring.
Despite the persecution by the parents, the young do not necessarily have to be placed in a separate rearing tank or spawning box. If there are some hiding places in the aquarium, some young will survive from each litter. Otherwise, guppies multiply too quickly. As long as the young are small enough, the fish are fed minimally. The young are then mostly eaten by the big one. This also results in a kind of natural selection in the aquarium, in which the healthiest and cleverest young survive.
You can try to sell guppies to dealers, friends, forums, classified ads, fish exchanges on the web, etc. But guppies usually abound.
It is only advisable to place the young in their own rearing tank if as many young animals as possible are to be raised. If the mother is placed in the tank before being thrown, a net can be hung through which the young fall and are protected from being eaten by the mother.
If the rearing tank is freshly set up, there is a risk that the young will starve to death without additional food because not enough microorganisms and algae have formed. It should be fed at least every 2 to 3 hours. Only small amounts are fed so that the water is not overly polluted. Frequent water changes are useful.
If a breeding tank is used, the young remain separated from the other aquarium inhabitants for about 3 weeks in the breeding tank. For larger roommates, the time must be extended accordingly. From 1 to 1.5 cm, the young are no longer eaten by their parents or other fish. When the young are 2 to 3 centimeters tall, there should be no more danger.
How the parents pursue the young depends heavily on how many hiding places are available for the young. In heavily weeded aquariums with many hiding places, e.g. B. java moss, floating plants, etc., the parents quickly stop hunting the young. In heavily overgrown aquariums, the young animals have plenty of room to avoid and hide. It is possible that at a certain point the effort involved in hunting becomes so great that hunting the young is no longer worthwhile. However, there are exceptional cases here too, in which young guppies hardly survive the persecution of their parents, even in heavily overgrown aquariums.
Older guppy females sometimes stop eating their young after the 2nd or 3rd litter if the aquarium is not overstocked. Males sometimes do not seem to eat the young at all.
When can gender be determined?
Female guppy Source: Image on Wikimedia Commons License: CC Attr. SA 3.0 Author: Monaco Kati
Females have a more rounded anal fin. Is the…