Guppy Fry

[chelbel]

My fry will be 3 weeks and thursday and friday.
How long till they get their colours/markings???
1 had a yellow tiger tail already but the others have no signs of colour.
The little fellow that has his colour is the biggest, I'm thinking he is the one born on the thursday
1 is nearly all black with a bent spine but the rest are still very pale

 

[monica]

I dont know, mie are about 2 months now, and all I see are black tips. I heard it can take anywhere from 3 to 6 months.

 

[lilfishie]

mine started showing black around 4 weeks old but mine are always big for there ages the little piggies

 

[Alistriwen]

What are you feeding them? My guppies usually start colouring up within a week of being born... Certain colours come in first and others later but in every batch of fry there will be a few showing colour within a week. The rest will all have some colour by 2 - 3 weeks old. I feed bbs 3 x daily and spectrum grow formula powdered 1x daily for the first 2 weeks or so and then slowly switch to more of the grow formula. Water changes 25 - 50% M W F depending on the size of the tank.

 

[merry78]

i start to see colour on mine by about four weeks. I find black and yellow come through first, then red, then other colours. I can usually see most colours by 6-7 weeks, then they just become more pronounced as they mature up to about 3 months.

 

[chelbel]

What are you feeding them? My guppies usually start colouring up within a week of being born... Certain colours come in first and others later but in every batch of fry there will be a few showing colour within a week. The rest will all have some colour by 2 - 3 weeks old. I feed bbs 3 x daily and spectrum grow formula powdered 1x daily for the first 2 weeks or so and then slowly switch to more of the grow formula. Water changes 25 - 50% M W F depending on the size of the tank.

I have been feeding them liqifry 3 times day and have just started introducing crushed flake food (tetra pro colour) so dropping one of the liqifry

 

[Alistriwen]

That is likely your problem (if it is a problem for you). Liquifry is a great way to feed really tiny fry who cannot consume anything else but it isnt the best thing for raising pretty fish. Most livebearer fry are large enough at birth to consume baby brine shrimp and this is what you should feed them if you want them to colour up. Bbs have a good deal of carrotine in them which promotes the development of colours. The high protein content will also help them grow more quickly and aid in colouration.

Diet plays an important role in your fish's health and the flake foods in general are... poor. Many of them have as their first ingredient wheat or some other starch which as you can probably guess fish do not get in their natural diets. Look for a food that has krill or something like that as a first ingredient and check the nutritional information for the crude protein etc to make sure it is protein rich and has all of the other essential nutrients and vitamins. If you don't want to hatch bbs or keep frozen stuff, buying a better good and grinding it into a fine powder is your best bet. With livebearer fry you can skip the liquifry and go right to this powder and if the food is good you will see much more rapid growth and colouration.