Feeding guppies
(notice how happy they are – this is how they should be – if they aren’t happy to see you, you overfeed them)

Live food

The live food for guppies consists of tubifex worms, blood worms, micro worms, daphnia and baby brine shrimps (artemia). The most valuable and safe food is newly hatched artemia since it won’t bring diseases to the fish tank, like tubifex can do sometimes.

The tubifex worms are rich in nutrients and create a great show during feeding because fish simply love them. The fish grow fast but to make sure you don’t bring diseases to the tank, you’d better choose dried worms.

Baby brine shrimps are excellent, especially for the guppy fries since they grow extremely fast when fed with freshly hatched artemia.

Dried and frozen food

Dried and frozen food usually consists of daphnia and tubifex, granules and flake foods of different brands. You can feed the guppies exclusively with these but don’t expect to have great results in breeding them, since fries grow much slower on dried foods and also the fish immunity is lowered.

The size of the guppy tank

The tank for the guppies must be chosen based on the number of fish you want to keep. It is recommended to have 1 guppy per gallon of water. For beginners and people that don’t really want to breed show quality guppies but just enjoy their variety and have fun, up to 4 guppies per gallon can be kept, but make sure the aeration and filtration of the water are very good. Also water changes more often are necessary, at least once a week.

If you want to become a professional guppy breeder, you will need many tanks, to keep the fish separated by sex, color, lines, and so on…won’t go into details here, since this article is for the beginners.

When you buy an aquarium, just keep in mind that you will always want a bigger one :). So, PLEASE, start with a big aquarium, at least 20 gallons… it will be better for you AND the fish.

A big tank has many advantages, like:

• temperature remains constant during the night and day (smaller volumes of water change the temperature much faster)
• the bigger the space is, the better the life of your fish will be
• generally speaking, the aquarium is much more stable, and the water’s parameters vary slower which is very good for the health of the fish. You’ll also have to clean it less often

The plants for the guppy tank

You have 3 options, based on what you want from your guppy tank:

• aquarium without gravel and plants
• aquarium without gravel but with potted plants
• aquarium with gravel and plants (looks best)

1. The aquariums without gravel and plants – are the easiest to maintain, have more space for the fish and have less elements that can affect the quality of the water. If you don’t care about having a natural look for your guppy tank, this is your best choice. This is the option chosen by most of the guppy enthusiasts that are interested in breeding and selections of the guppy. This kind of setup offers them some advantages like: they can observe the fish easier, it is easier to change the water and much easier to collect all the dirt collected at the bottom of the guppy tank.

2. The aquariums without gravel but with potted plants are the middle way. It is for the ones that don’t want to get busy with the gravel maintenance, but also want to enjoy some live plants. The lack of gravel makes the cleaning process easier. It is also known that the live plants feed on the nutrients that might produce “the green water”.

3. Many of us get a tank just to relax and have a corner of nature in our houses, and this can only be obtained by creating the natural look of the aquarium with gravel and live plants. Such a natural tank looks excellent but it requires much more time for maintenance and care. The plants require a good light source and fertilizers and they also must be trimmed on a regular basis.

Filtering the water in the guppy tank

Filtering is necessary if you want a clean crystal clear water in your tank. The filters are chemical, mechanical and biological. You can keep a tank without filtering, but you’ll have to keep only a few fish and change water percents often. The aeration however, isn’t optional.

The temperature for the guppy tank

The optimum temperature for the guppy tank is between 22 and 25 C degrees ( 71 -77 Fahrenheit ). They can survive for some time in lower temperatures but it is not recommended. Same thing for higher temperatures, but these will speed up their metabolism a lot so they will live shorter lives (but will grow faster). Why would you do that? They don’t live too much anyway (not more than 2-3 years). The heater is necessary during the winter only, and that is only if your room temperature drops a lot. I am for simple things in life and aquarium, so I’ve never used heaters for my guppies – and they are just fine, because the room temperature doesn’t drop too low in winter. The temperature variations are really bad for the fish, especially for the fries and the pregnant guppy females, so keep this in mind please. When you add water in the tank, please make sure it has the same temperature.

The PH for the guppy

The PH of the water should be around 7. It is known that guppies don’t do too well in acidic water, so higher than 7 is anyway better than lower. If you change larger amounts of water, make sure you don’t change more than 50% of the water because this might produce a PH shock in your fish and will kill most of them.

The tap water is fine as long as you remove the chlorine from it. You can remove the chlorine from water by boiling it, by letting it sit in large buckets for 2 days or by using anti-chlorine products that remove the chlorine instantly (but why would you spend money when you can just let the water rest for 2 days?).