Cold Water Guppies To Tropical?

[LongS]

Hi guys, keeping a guppy in cold water at the moment (room temp), in a small 17 litre tank until i get my new 60 or 95 litre tank next week.

Today i was given a heater for the tank to start keeping the fish in warmer water.

Problem is i'm not so sure how to go about introducing the fish to warmer water.

Do i put the heater in and gradually raise the temp?

or just heat it to what i want straight away? will the time period in which this heats the water be gradual enough to not shock the fish?

Longfellow Shlong

 

[rocknurworld2006]

Hi guys, keeping a guppy in cold water at the moment (room temp), in a small 17 litre tank until i get my new 60 or 95 litre tank next week.

Today i was given a heater for the tank to start keeping the fish in warmer water.

Problem is i'm not so sure how to go about introducing the fish to warmer water.

Do i put the heater in and gradually raise the temp?

or just heat it to what i want straight away? will the time period in which this heats the water be gradual enough to not shock the fish?

Longfellow Shlong

wat size is heater>

 

[petertr]

Didn't even know you could keep guppies in cold water!

 

[sic0198]

Guppies are tropical therefore they should be kept in warm water. I would warm them up gradually.

 

[LongS]

Yeah i didn't know either, but i now know of 2 people apart from myself who keep cold water guppies. Guy at pet shop and the woman i get them off.
Apparently they are thriving and healthy. Same as mine.

Im not sure about the correct name as i was given it by a friend, but it says on it "rena cal, Basic 50 watt."

 

[Corleone]

Depending on how warm the house is, you can keep a lot of tropical fish in "cold" water. Without some kind of special attention (chiller or ice bottles or something), the tank will never be cooler than the room it's in, so if you keep your house hot in the winter and don't run air conditioning much in the summer, your coldwater tank might as well be tropical.

 

[backtotropical]

Guppies aren't 'coldwater' fish as such, but they can be kept comfortably as low as 18C, so they could be labelled 'sub-tropical'.

As Corelone says, this does allow them to be kept without a heater so long as the temp in the room is stable. Personally, in the UK, i wouldn't recommend it because the weather is so variable, but i wouldn't be surprised to hear people have done it successfully.

A heater only costs a few quid, and you could even set it to 19C, just so the little guys don't get too cold.

To answer the original question, don't heat the water too quickly, but don't underestimate the ability of the fish to stand temp changes. I'd recommend doing it over the course of a couple of hours. That should be more than adequate precaution.

Cheers

BTT