The Beginner Fish

The Guppy is considered to be the beginner fish for aquarists and if we certainly don’t go too far out on a limb when we say that we hardly know any aquarist who has not kept Guppies in the aquarium at some time in his career. Guppy is scientifically known as (Poecilia reticulta). Going back to history, originally, the so-called million fish Poecilia reticulata comes from South America, but in the meantime the robust, resistant small fish have established themselves worldwide practically everywhere where the water temperatures allow them to survive even in winter. Guppies belong to the live-bearing tooth carps. Guppies are colourful and are said to be extremely robust and therefore suitable for beginners. They reproduce with virtually no input from the keeper, and they have beautiful colours and great fin shapes. Healthy male Guppies grow to about 4 cm in length. Female grow even larger with a body length of up to 8 cm.

Guppies are group fish and should be kept in a group size from 10 fish upwards. The lively colourful guppies are great to watch because there is always something going on in an aquarium with them. In a mixed group, the males are actually constantly busy chasing after the ladies and hitting on them. Due to the great reproductive joy of the guppies – they bear the nickname as Million Fish. Guppies are true omnivores and they are not picky either. The males in particular can be quite greedy. The million fish has a so-called upper mouth, which means that the mouth opening points clearly towards the water surface. This does not mean that Guppies eat alone on top (even if they like to stay in the upper water layers), the whole aquarium is used for foraging. In doing so, the guppy also likes to pluck at tufts of algae.

The guppy fish is basically known for its colour. The colour is on the entire body of the Guppy. It can be covered in parts by the cover colour. The “wild” base colour of the Guppy is grey. It is inherited dominantly; all other primary colours are inherited recessively.

There are all kinds of colours – albinos with red eyes, lutinos with wine-red eyes,  blond guppies, golden or pink ones. Also a blue base colour is possible, or a white colour, cream or silver, or even mixtures like pink-blond or blue-pink. Even completely colourless, transparent guppies exist, the so-called super white glass or see-thru.  These Guppies have a dark, almost black pattern in the rear half of the body. Especially the males show great contrasts to the other colours and to the base colour. In the colour Japan Blue the eponymous blue top colour shines almost like metallic paint. It can also appear in combination with other top colours. In addition, there are also Guppies with a leopard pattern on the tail fin or a snakeskin pattern on the body. Guppies, which have drawing patterns, which remind of Koi carps, or the so-called Moscow Blue, which captivate by a beautiful intensive dark blue. There is no limit to the colours and shapes, and guppy breeding will certainly hold many surprises and spectacular aquarium fish in the future.