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I have two female guppies (plus one male), and although one has given birth three times (the other once) in the 2.5 months I've had them, none of the fry has lasted more than 48 hours in my community tank before being eaten. This month, I decided to suction-cup a couple plastic fine leaved plants to the sides in hopes that "a few" fry would make it, and of course, I now have 15 tiny pairs of eyes darting around my tank, LOL.

I know the main batch is a week old, since I was there when the mom dropped them, but in studying them, I realized that one fry is significantly larger than the others. At first, I just assumed it was the first one born, or maybe just naturally larger and stronger, but after a day or two, it occured to me that it's much too large to be part of this drop.

The 7-day old fry are very tiny, maybe 1/4 inch (including the tail) and transparent. This little guy, however, is at least 1/2 inch long, a good 3-4 times "thicker" in the body, and its tail is showing dark streaks of color. It looks like a minature female, complete with bigger belly and what could be a tiny gravid spot. But from reading other threads on this board, it sounds like you can't really sex the babies until they are a few months old, at least.

Any idea how old he/she is?

If you want the fry to survive, i would suggest catching the fry as soon as they are born, or put the female in a breeding net when you think she is going to give birth.
The age of the fry depends on your temperature. If it is warmer, then it would grow faster.

Last edited by von dutch at 19-Nov-2005 22:16

~elaine~

Thanks for the response. I'm not planning to catch any of them to raise in another tank -- it's a community tank and it will be "survival of the fittest". The fact that this one is clearly quite a bit older than the rest proves that there are enough hiding places for the occasional one to make it, even without any special treatment at all. I'm just curious to know how long he's managed to survive on his own ... I think it's pretty neat that I never noticed him before this week.

The tank temp is fairly high ... around 80 F. It's only recently gotten cold here and the tank has been reflecting those summer temps.

I was just hoping someone who has bred them before might be able to give me an idea of their growth rate, and how old this one might be.

Kathy

I would say about a month. At the bottom of this webpage, it should give you the approximate growth rates of guppies.

HTH

~elaine~

Ooo, a new website to comb through. Thanks! (And sorry for the last reply -- was offline for the Thanksgiving holiday. )

Kathy