Killer Guppies!

[Amber192419]

Right I need major help. Ive had my tank set up for about 6 weeks and started off with 3 male guppies in the tank to start it off.

I then decided to add a swordtail and a female. within half an hour of them being in my tank two of guppies harrased the female swordtail and killed her, she had like a fit it was horrible.

if that wasnt enough they started harrasing the male swordtail, he was getting so stressed it was horrible so i put him in a floating breeding box ill i could think what to do.

I let him out the next day thinking maybe the guppies will have calmed down abit but they were even worse.

So i thought right i have no choice iv got to take them back to the shop cause there probably going to do it with every new fish i put into the tank, then my dad suggested trying them in his tank. I was hesistant to begin with because he has a crazy amount of different fish which could put risk to them. Any way I put the two in which were causing the problems, all night they were fine anything that came near them they would chase off (they seem like crazy hard guppies! i thought guppies were soft fish?)

anyway they were getting on fine until when i came home from work today to see the purple guppies half of his tail gone and the red ones tail extremely short. I thought i cant bear this i know their bullies but i dont want to see them get eaten like that they look an absolute mess now, and plus i thought now going back into my tank they might be fine? because ive added to female platys.

Both seemed fine to begin with, the purple one hasnt been a bother at all however he is finding it hard to swim now cause of his tail which kills me cause his tail was so beautiful. but the orange one..oh my god, hes come back with a vengence. harassing my male sword again and was constantly harrasing my pregnant platy i couldnt bear to put the babys at risk and to cause her stress so ive had to put the orange guppie in the floating breeder box.. and now i dont know what to do!!!

please someone help!!

plus will the purple guppies tail grow back?

Advice will be appreciated! x

 

[nehpets81]

OK, so the first thing I should say is that male Guppies can be a little aggressive with other male Guppies, they will also spend pretty much all their time (apart from a brief pause when they eat) chasing and harassing female Guppies. For this reason it is always best to have more females than males so this attention is spread between more than one female. Mu male Guppies literally chase one female, then move on to another one, and then another one etc. They never give up!

Now, I have never kept Swordtails but I would imagine, being livebearers they are probably fairly similar fish and your male Guppies seem to be treating them like other Guppies.

So, what can you do? It seems to me like your Guppies and Swords are not going to live together so one of them would probably have to go. How big is the tank and what else do you have in it? It may be worth adding loads of plants and other tank furniture to see if that will help but from what you have said it sounds like this won't be enought to hide the Swordtails. Also, you don't mention what else is in your Dad's tank but that doesn't sound like a viable option either.

So, if your tank is large enough I would say your options were:


1. Find new homes for the male Guppies
2. Find new homes for your other livebearer fish
3. Give your Guppies some females to play with - two or three per male would be a decent ratio.

Whether the Guppy's tale will grow back depends on how much damage there is - if it very damaged I wouldn't hold out much hope. Also, there is the potential for it to get infected so keep an eye on him.

 

[snazy]

The two guppy mails are not being aggressive. You introduced a female fish into the tank and trust me the male guppies will chase any type of females regardless of whether they are guppy/platy/molly, etc... They don't care as long as it is a female.
You could have got male swordtails and male platies only or get the 2 male guppies 2 female guppies each in order for them to leave the rest of the non-guppy females alone

 

[Amber192419]

the purple guppie died