- Hey guys, it's Corey from Aquarium Co-Op.
Today I want to talk about fancy guppies.
My favorite fish!
I am a fancy guppy nerd, so I'm gonna tell you
about how to keep 'em alive and tips and tricks.
So, the fancy guppy is stranger to no one.
Everyone's seen fancy guppies in a store
at some point or another.
These are what we have here.
The things to know: they like hard water,
they like higher PH.
If you're not giving them that, they'll fall apart.
I usually want to see them in at least 7.2 PH, if not 7.5.
I want lots a hardness, they just do better that way.
The males have all the color typically.
You can get some females that have some decent color,
but the males have what's called a gonopodium, so a little
stick-like fin on the bottom of the fish.
The females are gonna be less colorful,
like this yellow one you're seeing here.
They also, on the bottom, they have a triangle fin
so, on the bottom...
Trying to get it on there for ya...
The bottom fin is a triangle,
as opposed to that little stick fin.
Like this tequila sunrise, little stick fin there,
as you can see.
And then, if I can find that female again...
Where'd she go...?
There she is. Right here. This yellow female,
triangle fin by the anal...
So that's how you sex them.
Color and that fin is a much better determination.
You always want to keep more females than males.
A good ratio to keep in mind is two or three females
for every male you have.
once you get up past 10, 12, 15 guppies,
that ratio doesn't matter as much anymore
'cause there's enough to spread it around.
These guys are a livebearer, so if you set your tank up
correctly with lots of hiding places and things like that,
you will produce babies typically.
Very easy to feed, will eat almost anything, so you can use
flake food, you can use frozen foods, you can use pellets,
they will eat almost anything.
They'll pick at algae, which that's nice,
you can see 'em doing that on the filter.
They're picking at some algae there.
Great for planting, 'cause they show off all that color
against your green backdrop.
There's also specialized things, like strains of guppies
that you'd be breeding that stay true.
There's basically a color, if you can think of a color,
there's a guppy out there that matches it.
They tend to be relatively cheap.
We've got 'em at four bucks here.
They can be as cheap as two or three,
or as much as a few hundred dollars
if it's a specialty strain.
I would say, smallest tank you want to keep guppies in
is a five gallon, and that's if you had just a trio,
a male and two females.
But really a 10 gallon or more, 20, 30, 40, 50 gallons,
all those are better.
A fancy guppy tank, whether you're a seasoned hobbyist,
or you're just getting into it,
it's gonna be impressive to everyone.
People say, "I'm not gonna do guppies. They're so overdone."
The reason they're overdone is because everyone loves 'em,
and it makes a great display.
The things you wanna watch out for,
is don't keep them too cool. Some people say,
"Well, you don't have to heat guppies." You do!
All theses guppies are highly inbred to get these colors,
so they really do like to be 78 to 80,
so keep 'em warm, keep 'em well fed, keep their water clean,
that's an important part.
A lot of people, they let it overcrowd,
they feed too much, they're trying to save all the babies,
and they get poor water quality.
Then you get bacterial infections and things like that,
and the guppies really just start going downhill.
So you wanna keep 'em healthy by keeping their water clean.
They do great with most types of fish,
corydoras, peaceful tetras like neons, stuff like that.
You wouldn't wanna put them with other aggressive species,
let's say, red-tailed sharks,
barbs, like tiger barbs, you wouldn't wanna put them
with any aggressive tetras,
nothing that's gonna tear at their fins.
This is definitely what you want for a peaceful aquarium,
lots of color, cheap, easy to maintain.
If you're setting up a tank for guppies,
my recommendation is,
go ahead and use crushed coral as a substrate,
add minerals to the water so that it stays hard,
and you'll have the best looking guppies
that anyone's ever seen.
That's a good thing.
You'll enjoy it, you'll make more, you'll never run out
as long as you keep 'em healthy and you don't kill them,
they will always reproduce even more,
you can hand 'em to your friends, things like that.
So, fancy guppies, one of the best fish.
My personal favorite fish.
If I had to pick one fish I could ever keep again,
it would be fancy guppies, because it gives me every color,
it gives me options, I can breed them, I enjoy it.
Every day I love my guppy tank.
So, if you guys enjoyed this video, go ahead and like it,
subscribe, and check out other species videos like this.
We do educational videos on bigger topics,
we go see people's fish rooms, things like that.
Thanks for watching, and we'll see you in the next video.