My Guppies pregnant - HELP!

[naubelle928]

My guppie looks pregnant. We just got these guppies. What do I do? I have never had a pregnant guppie before. Please help. How can I tell if she's ready to have her babies?

 

[AquaNut]

Can you tell us a little more about your tank? How long have you had it set up? Are there other fish in the tank? How big is your aquarium?

Oh, how rude of me. Welcome to the forum. Answers to these questions will help people answer your questions with better advice.

 

[naubelle928]

We've only had the tank for about 2 weeks. It's a small 1 gallon tank with two guppies. I think the other one is a male but I'm not sure.

 

[Alien Anna]

Hi. Welcome to the forum.

I'm a little concerned about your guppy. She may be pregnant, or she may be reacting badly to your un-cycled tank. Please follow the link in my sig and read the article I've written on "Avoiding New Tank Syndrome". It is essential that your tank is cycled before you deal with any other issue.

 

[AquaNut]

The males are smaller, with much larger, more colourful tails.

Did you cycle the tank before you put the guppies in it? If not, you need to address that before you worry about guppy fry. Cycling is the term used to refer to the building up of nitrifying bacteria in a new tank. The Beginners section of this forum has tons of helpful information about cycling a tank.

If you did cycle the tank before adding the guppies, the next thing you might want to address is space. A one gallon tank doesn't really give you any room for raising guppy fry. Unless you have another tank or are wanting to get one, I'd just leave them be. She will get bigger and bigger, and when you're certain she's going to explode any minute, she'll continue to grow for about another week. Then she'll give birth in the tank, and she and the father (?) will eat most of them. This may sound horrifying to you, but it is really quite natural for them. Chances are that the one or two strongest fry may survive. It is truly survival of the fittest. If this is unthinkable to you, you need to consider a larger tank. I don't even know if a breeding trap would fit inside a one gallon tank. At any rate, unless her belly is ENORMOUS, you probably have another week or two to figure it out.

Edit - Sorry for the redundancy. Anna's post wasn't there when I started this little ramble.

 

[MountGuppy]

welcome to the forumdoes your guppy have a dark black spot on her belly

 

[cheirodon]

First, regarding sex recognition, the guppys are very easy to recognize: Males, usually smaller and more colorful, have a copulatory organ on their underside, called gonopodium, which is actually a modified anal fin, whereas females have their anal fin cleanly spread in triangular shape (it can be collapsed at will, but is usually clearly visible). Bear in mind that fertilization in these fish is internal, and the fry are alive at birth, not eggs (they are viviparous).

Second, regarding pregnancy: Their cycle is +/- 35 days, and they do develop a distinctive black spot ventrally, in front of their anal fin during this period. Towards maturity, the underbelly of the female looks almost square, as the fry are already formed "lumps", still inside. I've had females give birth to as many as 16 fry, but those where fairly large females (3 to 4 cm).

Third, regarding birth: The first time I (involuntarily, like you) bred guppys, I placed the pregnant female in a 1 gallon Mayonaise jar, filed with water from her original tank, and with big marbles on the bottom, and some floating plants. I had to wait almost 4 days, as I was to early in separating the fish, but better safe than sorry... In any case, as the fry are first expulsed into the water, they are somewhat deformed from their cramped previous habitat, and are not great swimmers. They will either float to the top, where they can hide in the floating plants, or, more often, sink to the bottom, where they will fall between the marbles to safety. Following this, I replaced the female in the original tank, and saw the fry stretch and begin active swimming almost the same day. Depending on the size of the other fish in your main tank, fry could be put in the main tank rather quickly. In my case, I waited 10 days. I don't know wether this is too fast or too slow on average, but it worked well in my case.

I hope your fish is not sick, but pregnanat, as the latter is a much more appealing alternative