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Question: Guppies: Breeding + Food for Axolotls

psychoboyjack

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Firstly I have to say this site spoils us. I tried looking around for a good guppy site and could find nothing that compares to the knowledge of the site and the people on the forums! Then again I may have missed something - there are thousands of guppy sites! :( Just wanted to say thanks up front.

So my guys are getting bigger and with that their appetites are huge. I want to try guppies so I set up a little tank and bought some from the store. I read a bunch about people breeding them but for their purposes they were using them for show and breeding them for.. breeding. I couldn't find any information on breeding them for food other than what I found on this site.

I currently have them all in a tank and am wondering if they'll all be okay in there. I'm going to buy some java moss or some other plants for the fry (no pregnant ones yet, I just got them today!) to hide in but I read people going to great lengths to try and save them all with nets, other tanks, etc.

I'd rather put them ALL in the same tank but I have a feeling I'd lose all the guppies in one go. Is it even possible for them all to co-habitat together without them getting eaten? I have 29 gallon tank now that is just over half full of water with my axos in them. They're not fully adults yet, they're just under 7", but their mouths are damn big so I know they can eat them if they want to. But the question is, after quarantine, would they all be safe together and breed and the axos eat the fry no problem? Or is it better to keep them separate?

And if they're separate, should I be focusing on saving all the fry in a breeder's net or just let nature take it's course and have them survive and then feed THOSE to the axos?

I didn't know where else to ask this. I hope someone can help or point me to somewhere I have overlooked. :)
 

inkozana

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Re: Guppies and Monsters

My axolotl ate my guppy in 30 minutes :( I just put him in there while I went to find him a bowl and when I came back... no guppy!
In my experience putting a few boys and a few girls (guppies) together in one tank is a bad idea, all but one of the boys always dies (might have something to do with a dominant male stealing all the food) so I seperate mine into little bowls (containing one boy and two girls).
I also bought a little guppy breeder box, they are see-through plastic containers for the pregnant female to hang out in, when she gives birth the babies will swim down through slits into a smaller box, so she doesn't eat them (a common problem with guppy fry).

Depending on the skill of your little hunting axolotls, it may be safe to keep breeding guppies in the same tank as them, but like I said - for one tank try only one boy and two girls.
Some axolotls prefer to be lazy and like the hand-fed option, but others will easily jump up and all around to eat a guppy.
I suppose you can take the risk of losing a guppy or two just to see how active your hunters are :)
Good luck with the breeding! :eek:
 

gr33neyes

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Re: Guppies and Monsters

A hungry quick axolotl will eat several guppies in one night.
They will even eat very tiny babies if they get close enough.

Guppy fry will be eaten by their parents if they aren't removed from the parents tank.
You can add lots of java moss to the parents tank and this will help to hide the babies from them.

Another thing to try is putting marbles in the bottom of the tank so the fry can hide in among the marbles, and another tip is to buy some of those plastic scourers from a supermarket the little round ones and you can cut them so they open up a bit. The guppy fry can also hide under these.
You need to be quite vigilent with guppy fry if you want to raise them to a good size as I have witnessed them being eaten by other guppies literally within seconds of being born.
 

psychoboyjack

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Re: Guppies and Monsters

Hmm. I'll see which I can find at the pet store and take it from there! If I can't find anything or the boxes and moss is too much I'll just go get some of the cheap scour pads from a store.

Thank you much. :)

If I'm looking at them right I think all four of my females are pregnant. Woo! I do have 2 males and 4 females, as I thought that since the ratio was 1 to 2 for males to females I could double it. But I guess fish isn't like cooking, is it...? :D
 

psychoboyjack

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Re: Guppies and Monsters

Alright. I went to Wal-mart and picked up a cheap Marina Floating Breeding Trap 3 in 1.

Am I to believe that the inverted triangle will have all the fry fall down to the lower area, while the VERY bottom slits of the trap WON'T let fry out - despite looking very similar in size to the bottom of the triangle? Or should I be putting something else in here that I missed?
 

gr33neyes

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Re: Guppies and Monsters

Your breeding trap should be fine. You can tell if your females are pregnant as they will have very fat bellies and they develop a black spot at the rear of the belly. This is called a gravid spot.
 

NewDreamz

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Re: Guppies and Monsters

I too breed guppies for feeding, my guys love them! Just a tip.... once your female is done having her babies you remove her from the breeding trap and put her back with the male. Then carefully take out the V and raise your babies in the trap. Kinda like a tank in a tank. Wait a day after she has them just to be sure she is done before removing her.

Have you thought about mollies? they are very prolific breeders! If you have around 10 mollies or more in the tank, no more than 2 males, the multiply like crazy. Some of the little ones will get eaten but not all. Mollies are a little more hardy fish than guppy. I raise both together, they are bot live bearers.

Happy breeding!
 

Meshell88

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Re: Guppies and Monsters

I have tons of guppies, started out with 10 adults and 4 of them were girls... ended up with 10 times that much in 3 months time and now those babies are having babies. I found the best way to make sure the babies don't get eaten by the parents is to get a breeder. Its small and cheap. Just a plastic containter with holes on the sides to allow water circulation. It floats in the aquarium you have your guppies in. You just put the babies in the breeder and the parents can't get to them but you wont have to buy another tank, filter, etc... I doubt you could keep them all together in one aquarium, guppies and axolotls, even with a lot of hiding places. They will probably get eaten quicker than they can reproduce.
 

SUZY

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You can also add a little salt to your breeding tank, Guppy and all other livebeares like a little salt in their water. Not much, just below brackish.
SUZY
 
A

AmandaLyne

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I have been breeding guppies for years. I know everyone tells u to sue a breeding trap but my suggestion is not to use them. They thrive alot better without them. As long as you have tonz of plants in the tank they will breed like crazy. The babies grow and will breed as well alot better if they are left in the tank.
 

toffeebonbon

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I have a two year old Axxie, wild type, and at the minute there are 5 guppies in with him. they have been in with him for week now. we bought them for him as he has a big appetite but he doesnt go near them. He isnt even interested!
 

Bass

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My sister has guppies,
she won't let me feed them to my axie, but what she doesn't know won't hurt me ;)
From what I've observed, putting in enough plants will make reproduction rates skyrocket, no need for breeders or whatever.
Putting gups in with the axies seems less likely to be succesfull, if they're hunting-happy they'll eat faster than the gups can reproduce.
I'm thinking about putting a plastic divider in my tank myself, one part axies (about 3/4) and one part food-breeding-space. Any guppy escaping his designated area, will never be seen again :angel:
 

rick

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I use mosquitofish (Gambusia affinis) a family member of the guppy, they last longer in my tanks because they tend to swim at the surface of the water so the axolotls don't catch them as easy. They can also handle the cold weather a lot better than tropical guppies and I noticed that they produce more fry.
 

theHIguy

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i was born and raised in hawaii we use to get 50gal drums and cut them in half verticaly just add a airator and u have ur self a breeding machine i bred about 500 guppies in a month. but idk what the weather is like were u guys are at. but it really is a good method the trick is to just forget about them lol
 

pesco

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Never liked in-tank-hatcheries - they are stressing out females and using them require lot of work.
I used to use small, around 20l planted tanks as a hatcheries. When female is close to give birth I moved female(s) to that tank and give GOOD portion of live Daphnia and Cyclops. The trick is to keep females fed with easy to catch prey, so they are not really interested in eating babies which are more difficult to catch. Plankton is also excellent food for youngsters, so after removing female(s) such hatchery doesn't require maintenance other than topping it up with plankton every few days.

Plants in hatchery - Vallisneria in pots, so its easy to remove, Riccia and Java moss
Lots of snails - big daphnia not eaten by youngsters will die, if it wont be removed or eaten by snails it will polute the tank - having snails means the water change could be done once a week, without them once a week is not enough.
 

brianferriera

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I been reading for a few weeks but just thoughts I throw in y 2 cents here....Any one tried mosquito fish?? They get a little bigger then a guppy and breed just as fast if not faster and I also fairly cheep though seasonally available. Thier also allot more forgiving about water quality. Ok back to lucking
Brian
 

mabelsgift

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You ,might also try breeding mollies or platies. They are also easy to breed and they are larger, more interesting fish than guppies. If you have trouble keeping java moss, use plastic pot scourers for the fry to hide in and get them away from the adults as soon as you can.
 

CRITTERKEEPER

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I have had guppies for 1 mo and allready have 3 babies who are a week old! They are with the parents and are hiding fine so far! I transplanted a pregnant guppy into a breeder box and she died the next day so I decided to just let them do what they do... I have lots of plants and hiding spaces... I enjoy watching them too!

My axolotls did not like to hunt live prey until I started feeding them less... all of the sudden the guppies in the tank are dissapearing! They had to get off their rears and find the food! (Dont worry they are fed just enough, they did have a lot of waste before.)
 

SludgeMunkey

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I also use Gambusia affinis as feeders. There has been a breeding colony of them going for three years now in the tank I use for juvenile axolotls. Its chock full of artificial plants as I find the plastic plants make it easier to keep the rearing tank clean, but I have used live plants in the past. My adult axolotls are trained to also eat pelletd food from the surface, however adult gambusia dont survive more than a week or two in that tank. They seem to slowly dissappear over time...:D
 

doktordoris

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Poor guppies!

I didn't realise that the axie that I will be the proud owner of next week can eat guppies.

One of my adult tropical fish tanks has about 200 guppies in it!

And they are clever fry, when they are born they always find a way into the sectioned off corner of the tank that holds the filter cylinder. I suppose I better steel myself so I can bear to feed them to my axie. *sniff*

If I do this can I dispense with all other foods, or should the guppies just be a dietary addition?

Thanks.
 
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