Interesting new Guppy information!

[Vengified]

So, while observing my colossal herd of guppy fry this evening, I noticed some of the fry seemed somehow, very different, from some of the other fry. Took me a while, but finally realized it was the eyes. Some had completely black eyes, some had a silver/white around them (so small, hard to tell).

After freaking out and scouring the internet, and concluding it is NOT popeye, I stumbled upon a neat article, new information seemed to be posted just 2 months ago (June 2018) on several sites. There was some vague speculation in the past, about guppy eye color, and what it meant, but it was all speculation until recently, someone performed experiments to find out for sure.

Link (to one of many articles):
https://www.earth.com/news/guppies-warning-eyes-black/

Basically, robotic guppies were made, some with black eyes, some with silver/black, and put in with live guppies. They then had the robots "defend" food, and compare reactions from live fish, based on robots eye color. It seems black eyes, are an "honest representation" of the guppies aggression/defensive behaviors, and others were less likely to try and steal food from black eyes, unless of course it was much smaller.

Just thought that was interesting new scientifically proven information about what their eyes mean, as opposed to just speculation that its stress or illness or possibly aggression.

 

[Colin_T]

Hey, everyone knows not to pick a fight with a bigger guy that has black eyes, he's already been hit in the face a few times to get the black eye

See, you have discovered and learnt something that I didn't know. And you want to get rid of your fish. Imagine all the new cool discoveries you could make by keeping large groups of them. You could write a paper on their social behaviours in captivity.

 

[Vengified]

Lol @Colin_T ! My wife says my eyes turn from a moderate brown, to black, but only when I am about ready to snap (which rarely happens, and has normally been towards doctors, regarding my son), but that's a whole other topic.

I don't honestly believe you didnt know about that! You are the fish compendium! My wife actually knows of you, on a first name (or handle name) basis. Whenever I am in worry mode, you always have the knowledge to solve it. Though I do usually search for hours, literally, before asking a question, which is how I found this.

Almost had to ask about a "scud" the other day, first time I saw one ever, and after hours of searching, couldnt find it, then came here, ready to post, and noticed there was a sticky with pictures in it, and scud was one of them! I even had the little guy isolated for those several hours, lol!

On another note, we have decided we aren't abandoning guppies altogether. I wanna see these little guys grow, especially the boys! I do plan on continuing to separate all the females out, and take them to LFS when big enough, since I have one that does store credit. I might keep a few in the 10g with the RCS that I'm trying to rebuild a colony in,(which is working AWESOME now that I added a huge chunk of driftwood and let the water turn brown, I see at least 3 different broods in the last 6 weeks) as long as the females dont cause issues for the RCS. I dont think they will, since hornwort taking over, and the driftwood takes up literally half of the tank!

But maybe a keep a few female guppies, and every once in a while, throw a pretty male in with them for a few days. Then I can actually somewhat control breeding. It certainly wont be often though. Might even have to put divider in for that day or two, and subject just one female to the harassment, so one boy doesnt knock up all 3, but that's a ways in the future. I certainly wont be doing the 100+ fry in a day thing anymore! And I doubt I have even close to the knowledge you or many others have about guppy or fish in general behavior, I just watch with an OCD intent (as I do possess this odd trait), and read with same intent, and retain all information with an idetic memory.

I would much rather have a school of honey gourami, but I worry that if I came home with a few more, there would be issues, since my one has been in there for a while as the only gourami. He has finally started taking charge too! Took him a few weeks to shake his timid nature some, and now he (or she since I'm not sure still) proudly roams the tank with dorsal fin fully open, mingling with the guppies, and poking them with his little sword pectorals when they get too rambunctious! It's so nifty!

 

[seangee]

But maybe a keep a few female guppies, and every once in a while, throw a pretty male in with them for a few days. Then I can actually somewhat control breeding. It certainly wont be often though.

Well maybe more than you expect. The females do store the sperm for future use so a single outing for the boy could result in 6 or more broods down the line

 

[Vengified]

Yea, that's why I said somewhat control, lol! I knew they could store sperm, and also replace existing sperm as they see fit, according to their perception of which male carries the best traits for survival.

On a somewhat related note... THAT DARNED ENORMOUSLY HUGE FEMALE IS DROPPING MORE FRY!!! ITS ONLY BEEN 21 DAYS!!! I know gestation can vary greatly, but last time was 30, and this one ALWAYS looks ENORMOUS! I had errands tomorrow, and was gonna drop her off at her new home... Just my luck she dumps them tonight... I need more fry like a hole in the head!

Just for kicks, here is two pics of her right now, she seems to be done dropping fry, but who knows? One is an odd shot, but I put it up, to show her in comparison to my other female, who is literally right next to her, less than an inch away from her. And on the other pic, for reference, you can see my honey gourami below, and a juvenile approximately 8 weeks old to the left of her (the enormous half black one if you couldnt guess):

I AM SOOOOOOOOOOOOO ANGRY AT HER RIGHT NOW!

 

[Colin_T]

Don't move the big female guppy for at least a week after she has given birth because you can cause internal damage to her. Once she has given birth, wait a week, then take her out and give her away or sell her to the petshop for store credit.

re scuds: These are amphipods/ gammarids and are relatively harmless. They normally live in plants and eat dead organic matter (dead fish, dead plants, fish food, etc). If there is no food for them they will chew on live plants. They breed readily and the babies make great fish food. There are species that live in fresh and salt water, some that live permanently in water and some that live on land and in water. Quite often if you see dead seaweed on the beach and pick it up, sand hoppers (gammarids) drop off the dead seaweed.

 

[Vengified]

I didnt take "Big Mama" to her new home yet. I remembered seeing something about them needing a day or two to recoup after giving birth, so I called her new owners, and told them she needs a few days. I ran into an old neighbor a couple weeks ago, at the LFS in fact. They were buying feeders for cichlids, and the LFS knew I was overloaded, and brought it up. The old friends cichlids doesnt like eating guppy for some reason? Or they say they dont anyways. But they do have a 125g for their kids, and said their kids want guppies, but they wont buy LFS fish, and hadn't ordered any yet. So after visiting with them a few times, they asked if I had any fully mature guppies I would part with, as well as a few dozen juveniles. So, that's where the one who just gave birth is going, with several of her brood! It's nice knowing they will have a good home.

And as for the beach @Colin_T I'm not very close to one at all, been years since I've seen an ACTUAL beach. In fact, decades now, man I'm old! Takes about 10 hours to get to the Puget Sound, near Seattle, WA, in the USA for me, and it's another couple hours to get to the open ocean with beaches. So I'll take your word on the scuds lol. I'm just happy to have found out what it was, on my own after searching and almost giving up. Now I just gotta hope my tanks hold out for a few more days, until I can get rid of a chunk of fish!

That big female dropped at least 80 again too... I physically separated 74, and I counted 6 more for sure, and I know for a fact, there is another 15-25 in there, uncounted, so could have been another drop of 100! I told her new owners, and they are excited, wished we had set up a day to bring them earlier, but I told them this is her second drop like this, I am confident she can keep doing it, and they actually have the room!

I need my tanks back though, cuz now I'm seeing detritus worms, and I know that cant be good. At least it's only in the small tank, and that's the least populated, 10 or 12 juveniles, none bigger than an inch (not including tale, all female) and then the RCS also breeding in there.

On a positive final note, some of my boys are really coloring up now! I'll have to try and get a shot of the one who has advanced the most so far, he actually has his gonopodium now, at 7 weeks, and has been starting to flex it, and chase the others! But he has a nice shiny teal/blue patch right behind his pectoral fins, and then half silver on the rest of the front, with half black on back half of body, with an orange dorsal, and orange and yellow on caudal fin. I'm hoping he gets some more teal/blue!

 

[Colin_T]

10 hours to the beach, damn that would suck. I am about 200 meters from the beach but we get lots of blue bottle jellyfish (portugese man of war) washing up at this time of year. And the wind is a bit rough coming off the ocean. Thought the house was going to do a wizard of oz last night.

 

[Vengified]

Oh man Colin, I envy you! On the beach part anyways lol. But you are in Australia right? If so, I certainly dont envy that part! Although I would love to visit, the fact that within 5 meters anywhere you go, something can kill you, is kind of frightening, lol. And wife and I watched a "72 Dangerous Animals: Australia" on Netflix, and OMG! I would not want a run in with a lot of those things, especially Funnel Web Spiders and that weird tiny Irukandji jellyfish you cant see!

 

[Colin_T]

Funnel web spiders are from the east coast of Australia (around Sydney in New South Wales), I am on the west coast. There's fewer bities here.

We have red back spiders all over the country. They look like the American black widow spider and are related. They are peaceful tho and have their webs in the corner somewhere out of the way and the only time people get bitten is if they try to pick one up or grab a pot plant or something with one on. Even then nobody dies from them.

We have white tailed spiders that have flesh eating bacteria on their fangs and they wander around and bite people when they sleep. I got bitten by one about 5 years ago and the doctor wanted to put me on anti-biotics coz my fingers started rotting away where I had been bitten. I put raw honey on the wounds and a week later went back to the doctor. No anti-biotics needed

The box jellyfish Irikanji (however it's spelt) is from Queensland on the east coast. It's regularly found around the Great Barrier Reef and there are crocodiles there too. In fact there are crocodiles right across the top of the country so you never swim up there. They live in fresh and salt water and eat anything.

The blue bottle jellyfish we have hurt but don't kill.

We have Tiger Snakes on both sides of the country and they are poisonous but nobody dies from them and they are rare now due to extensive misuse of herbicide that kills them and the frogs they eat.

The only really dangerous snakes to worry about are Taipans and they are from the east coast, up north and in the desert. WA is free of Taipans, thank the lord In Queensland there are rabbits that attack and kill taipans.

If you are in a city or town you are unlikely to encounter snakes and if you avoid swimming in the tropics you don't have to worry about chocodiles. Even in the bush around here I rarely find snakes now. Most Australian snakes are shy and prefer to keep away from people. The taipan is actually aggressive and will go after people, and tiger snakes have good days and bad days. If they are feeling grumpy they stand their ground and sometime rear up like a cobra. But if you see one you just back away slowly and give it a bit of space.

The really dangerous things in Australia are the motorists and drop bears.

----------------------
If anyone does visit Western Australia, do it in March and April (autumn). That is when the best sunsets occur in the southern half of the state and the weather is nice. Warm fine days and cool nights. Or visit in spring September, October, November and see the wildflowers.

 

[Vengified]

Are you just a nature expert in general?! I mean, is there anything you DONT know about living creatures, plant and animal and microbiology? Seriously a wikipedia bro! That's awesome though! I definitely try to learn new stuff each and every day, keeps life exciting.

I always seem to forget the backwards-ness of Australia though. Or from your perspective, our backwardness lol. Of course where I live, spring is last 2 weeks of May and all June, summer is July/August, and fall is September. The remaining 7.5 months is winter. I guess that's what you get when you live minutes away from an international park, Glacier International Peace Park, in northern Montana, and Southern Canada. Or as we locals refer to the seasons: Almost winter, Winter, Still winter, and Construction (Summer). Lol.

Good tip on the times and places for an Australia vacation though! Maybe someday, if I'm not dead by then, after we ain't broke from the kid we have now, and the one on the way, we will go visit. I remember watching "Crocodile Dundee" as a kid, on VHS, and thinking "I wanna see walkabout creek!" Maybe someday. Lol

 

[Colin_T]

look at walkabout creek on tv or dvd, then you don't have to deal with mozzies, snakes and chocodiles, or the 40C+ temperatures, or flies, or leaches, or scorpions, or ...

 

[NickAu]

the fact that within 5 meters anywhere you go, something can kill you, is kind of frightening,

Try the USA where just about everybody has a gun, In Australia only a handful of people are killed by wildlife every year,

Excluding most suicides, at least 15,549 people were killed by guns in the United States in 2017, according to data collected by Gun Violence Archive (GVA),

 

[Colin_T]

LOL, damn that's hilarious
thanks Nick, that is great

on a serious note tho, the video where they sing taipan, the image is of a brown coloured snake that is actually a death adder not a taipan. To see a taipan look for the snake near the end of the clip (about 1 minute 4 seconds).

 

[Vengified]

Try the USA where just about everybody has a gun, In Australia only a handful of people are killed by wildlife every year,

Excluding most suicides, at least 15,549 people were killed by guns in the United States in 2017, according to data collected by Gun Violence Archive (GVA),

I honestly never looked at it that way. But indeed, people are more scary than most wildlife. I cant say that guns scare me though, since I am in USA, in a gun heavy, hunting heavy state. I own a half dozen guns myself, nothing crazy, just a few pistols (protection) and a few rifles (hunting/traptarget) so the guns dont scare me. The people that get a hold of them though, that's the problem.

And by "protection" with the pistols, I dont mean from other people, although if the occasion arose, and it was my wife or son on the line, the choice is simple, but protection when out hunting deer, picking huckleberries, hiking, swimming, camping, etc, you dont wanna come across a bear or mountain lion, and have no defense, ESPECIALLY a grizzly bear.

But ya, 40°C is WAY too hot for my blood! I am sweating in anything higher than ~24°C, and dont dare venture too far from the AC if it's over 30°C so I wouldn't make it there. At least not outside of an air conditioned car or building lol. But if you stick me in sub zero temps, I flourish! And by sub zero, I mean sub zero F, which puts it at like -18°C I think?