Colourless Guppies?

Hi

I have a batch of babies approximately 2 1/2 months old of which a few of the females have no colour. Is there any particular reason why this happens? The father was a metallic blue snakeskin and the mother is an orange and black. Is this a throwback from wild guppies or a result of over breeding?

 

I have found that the females take a lot longer to colour up then the males. When colour starts to appear in the fry, most of the time, those are males.

 

@Irma - Thanks. Most of the females of the batch have coloured up, hence the question. I suppose I must just give them more time.:hmpf:

 

Guppies and their mystrious ways! We will never understand everything about them I guess. If you say colourless, do you mean normal grey females?

 

@len.weideman - They are guppy coloured - They look like fry before they colour up. Could be what you refer to as a grey guppy.

 

What are you feeding?

 

@Dirk Bellstedt - I am feeding them alternating Tetra Pro Colour, Ocean Free Guppy Flakes and Tetra Min Complete Tropical Flakes and as fry they received alternating Ocean Free Super Baby and Interpet Liquifry No2. Do you think this might be a problem or the reason for the lack of colour. I have 2 males from this batch that look a lot like they have Endler colouring/markings. The rest of the males look like a combo of mom (orange/black tail) and dad (metallic blue snakeskin).

 

OK, the one crucial thing that is lacking in this diet is freshly hatched brine shrimps. In spite of all the claims that dried foods are equivalent of better than live foods there is still no replacement for live bs and this would improve growth and colour. You do not need to feed a lot of bs but some every day are essential.

However, I do not think that this is your major problem with regard to colour development.

When you breed guppies you need to do a lot of homework about which strains have the same genetic base and which, if you crossed them, have the potential of combining genes of both parents that may lead to "improvements" or new color combinations. However, if the strains are distantly related to one another, then you will end up with colorless mongrels. From what you explain you have thrown just about "chucked everything into one pot" and then you will get the product = colourless wild guppy type.

My advice would be that you obtain strains of guppies that breed true, in other words the babies eventually look like the parents, and that you combine such fishes and then select which types may be what you think you would like to breed.

Throwing anything into the pot is going to only result in one thing = grey guppies.

Get yourself some good stock from members of TASA, do your reading on the genetics (check our Guppy Designer and other information) and then start from there, not this backyard breeding, it gets you nowhere as you have just told us. I breed and cross guppies from different strains in a targeted manner after having done a lot of homework and have a lot of new combinations which look promising and which I may release in the future.

Kind regards,

Dirk

 

@Dirk Bellstedt

Can you please recommend good books or articles to read on breeding, crossing an hybrids like the Endler Japan blue cross I got from you? I find this fascinating from the little I have read so far. Problem is that there are so much available that it's hard to figure out where to start.

Thanks
Francois

 

Hi Francois,

Phil Shaddock has written a book in the Designer Guppy series, and his books on colour forms are quite good, but there is no information about Endler hybrids as these have basically hit the guppy scene in the past two or three years. Check the Swamp River website for Endler guppy crosses http://www.swampriveraquatics.com/. It also means that you need suitable normal guppy types for crossing with Endlers and the flowing longtailed types from ATFG that have been imported into SA are not really suitable, smaller finned and colourful fishes are what you need. I have a few of these and am using them from crosses and will write a few things about them as I proceed with my crosses.

Kind regards,

Dirk

 

Hey guys. Try www.guppydesigner.com . Philip knows guppies and wrote a few very good books on the subject. I originally thought that he might lack knowledge due to him not having a tertiary qualification in GENETICS. ( Being bias because I do have) But I ordered his books, and I am impressed. He knows his stuff. Just got the Guppy colour manual, his latest book, and it is packed with information, might be daunting to those not interested in deeper genetics and biological facts though.

I breed 9 true-breeding strains ( although true-breeding is debatable with guppies, always here and there an odd little bugger)

 

Thanks Dirk. I am looking forward to your articles about the crosses. Its still early days for me and I am focusing on breeding the pure Endlers I got from you.

 

@Dirk Bellstedt - Thanks Dirk. I will look into Guppy Designer. Yes, you are correct that these are LFS bought guppies. I looked at the import guppies but at this point in the hobby I cannot justify the huge costs on a single fish. I will look at buying BS. Can I use the "Ocean Nutrition - Instant Brine Shrimp" or the "Instant Labs - Artemia Revolution" or do I need to do the whole live BS route?

@len.weideman - I saw your post the other day about the guppies you breed. Very nice. Maybe if I don't come right in Cape Town finding a decent breading stock, I could contact you to send me some? What do you generally charge for your guppies?

Anyone else in Cape Town reading this that has ATFG guppies or decent breading stock that are looking to sell a few, please let me know.

 

@MarcHawke I will PM you. I am not breeding guppies for the money, and will gladly help out.

 

Marc,

I am in Somerset West, so you would be welcome to come and see which fishes I have got and I do have some that have parentage from the ATFG fishes, however, these are not the only guppies which are good bloodlines that are in the country and I can show you quite a few that can stand up to the ATFG guppies any day but come from Germany.

Frozen bs are adult bs and are not suitable for guppy fry, for them you need freshly hatched bs to achieve really good growth rates, about that I have absolutely no doubt, but you can get good quality bs eggs from me as well.

Kind regards,

Dirk

 

@MarcHawke
If You want more than what my good friend Len has cooking up in Bloem...
OR you are really interested in going down the route of ATFG fish feel free to chat to me.
I do have great access to OTHER established strains, which are locally available OR imported bloodlines

I'm in CT
Every few months I strive to bring in a few new strains of Guppy.
The ATFG everyone speaks of would have originated as imports by myself over the last 6-8months

I maintain some ATFG strains currently.
Variety fluctuates ..sometimes as many as 10-12 strains...as I give in to fellow keen guppy breeders' demands:laugh:

Another special order arriving soon , from thailand, within 2weeks I guess.

There are a few strains I maintain, which nobody else has yet.

PM with your contact details and ideas of fish you are after.

Len, 9 strains (I lot count!) in Bloem, has an expansive, expensive habit...like we all do !!!!

cheers!
Liaquat

 

@MarcHawke yor thread was now properly hijacked and side-tracked LOL
@Altum - Uhu 9 - 5 ATFG ant 4 from your other buddy will email you the details

 

Thanks to @Dirk Bellstedt; @Altum and @len.weideman for the offers. I will take you guys up on the offers when my 100l has water in it. At the moment it is a very large paper weight. :bigsmile: