Ahouseofscales' Guppy Breeding Journal

Hi! So I'm picking up guppy breeding again! I had a strain going a few years back and I'd like to do it again with the males I have now. I'll be tracking my progress here.

So currently my six males are in my 20 g display tank. My friend and I are planning a DIY aquaponics setup and I will be keeping all of my adults in this system. I am planning to use a divided heavy duty storage tub to house my male and female breeders. That way I will be able to keep my males and females in the same tank while still being able to control breeding and I don't have to stick to the 1:2 male to female ratio. And, they will be pulling double duty since they will be feeding the aquaponics setup. I will be using my 20 g display tank as a fry tank so that I can watch their development and pull them quickly when they reach maturity.

I'm using store bought adults since I'm just doing this for fun and I don't really care too much about keeping a pure strain, I just want to see what I can create! Here are the males that I have currently:





This is Ezra. His is definitely one I want to breed because his coloring intrigues me. The upper half of his body is tinted orange, while the lower half is iridescent blue. His fins are metallic yellow, orange, and green. He will start line E.




This is Prince Swimmington (I didn't choose the name). His blue coloration is very pretty and I'm hoping to carry on the double sword that he has. He will start line P.



This is Aedion. He has a nice delta tail and coloration. He will start line A.



This is Dorian. He will start line D.



This is Cassian. I'm not entirely sure if I'm going to use him for breeding but if I do he will start line C.





Last but not least is Castle. He has absolutely gorgeous metallic coloring, and nice fin shapes. He will start line S.

I'm still learning about guppy genetics and figuring out some of their genes, but once I do I'll be getting some females for them. I might get a couple more males as well.

Here is my display tank which will become my fry tank.




I will post more here as I move further along with the project!

 

Small update! I got a new male and a female swordtail.



Kallias! He will start line K. I got two guppies but unfortunately the yellow and blue male you see on the left didn't make it.



Amber! She is my female swordtail, and she is the same size as my male king betta, maybe even a little larger! She will go in my stock tub with the female guppies once I have it up and running, and she will be eating my culled fry (kind of a sad way to end, but this way they won't go to waste).

I made a little bit of progress towards getting the stock tub set up today! I started running a sponge filter in my 20g to get it cycled quickly. When I setup my stock tub I'll be moving my internal filter into it and the sponge will stay in the 20g, and this way the stock tub will have an immediate cycle, and the 20g will stay cycled with a fry-safe filter.

I also divided my stock tub today. I cut a piece of window screen to size and siliconed it into the tub. It's drying tonight and then I'll be filling it tomorrow to test for leaks.

I have almost all of the males that I want. I'm going to get one more to replace the one I lost and I'm going to keep it at that. I think I am going to get 6-8 females depending on what my LFS has when I go. When I went on Thursday they had a couple of really nice females that I'm hoping will still be there!

 

Update! 6/3/2020 Part 1

I got some new males and females and I set up the stock tub!

Kallias unfortunately died the day after I posted my last update, and Castle and Dorian passed unexpectedly last week from and unknown cause. However, all of my other fish are thriving so I decided to go ahead and see what my local stores had in stock. The Petco local to me is starting to restock after quarantine so they had some new guppies to choose from. I chose the fish below.



This is Azriel. The black is actually a deep metallic blue that's quite beautiful. He'll start line Z.



This is Alexi. His coloration is very similar to Ezra but he has a large, bright yellow fantail, and he lacks the extended dorsal that Ezra has. I might try and see if I can combine their lines in the future. He will start line X.

Now the females:


This is Elia. She's very plain but she does carry the blonde gene and she looks yellow in good lighting.



Next we have Morgan. I'll most likely pair her with Azriel to start.



This is Amren. I'm not quite sure who I'm going to pair her to yet... we shall see.

That isn't all of the females I'm going to have. They were all Petco had so I decided to get them and I'll probably get three more females once they get more in.

While at Petco I also got drawn into looking at the bettas and I found a beautiful King HMPK male that I had to have. His name is Nikolai (Niko for short)!






He's living in the stock tub with the females and he's doing really well so far! He'll stay in this tub for the foreseeable future and he'll probably be put with the females since he's doing well with them so far.

 

6/3/2020 Part 2

The stock tub is all set up and is running with a pre-cycled filter and a heater.






It's been doing well so far except that my divider broke . When I siliconed the divider in I forgot that the tub would bow out on the sides. One side ripped off when I filled it.





I'm holding it in place right now with some fishing line but it's certainly not sealed. If anyone has any ideas for a permanent fix for this please let me know!

Last but not least, we have Dorito! The female swordtail (Amber) that I showcased last time I updated popped out a baby on me. I knew she was probably pregnant but I wasn't expecting her to drop so soon after I got her! I only found one, so she either only had one or the rest got eaten. He was born on 5/19 and he's been growing well since! I've been keeping him in a breeder box and he's been eating frozen rotifers and hikari first bites, and I'm slowly moving him on to larger foods like frozen cyclops and my guppy food. My friends and I named him Dorito because he is very orange.

 

6/10/20 Update!

I moved the male guppies and Amber into the stock tub! I managed to fix the divider with expanding foam so that it filled the gap and gave it enough give to allow the sides to stay attached when the tub is filled. Since it was fixed I moved the males and Amber into one side, and Niko and the females into the other. They are all doing great so far!




I am planning to start breeding tomorrow. I am going to pair Amren with Azriel, Elia with Alexi, and Morgan with Aedion. If all goes well we will have fry in a month's time!