Guppys harassing other fish !

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Paul Wadland - 20 Jul 2004 23:12 GMT

I have been forced to give away my last two male guppy's as they
continually harassed some of my other fish. They hounded my balloon molly
and today he died ! They were the last remaining pair from a group of six I
purchased approximately a month ago, the other four died after being hounded
for the few weeks they had in my tank. Is this normal guppy behaviour, I
like the colourful guppy but this experience has put me off getting any more
?

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Dave Painter - 20 Jul 2004 22:18 GMT

> I have been forced to give away my last two male guppy's as they
> continually harassed some of my other fish. They hounded my balloon molly
[quoted text clipped - 3 lines]
> like the colourful guppy but this experience has put me off getting any more
> ?

Short answer, yes.
Guppies are VERY sexually active (mine are anyway) and go for any other
livebearers. Swordtails, mollies guppies. I keep lots of females in a tank
(minimum is six) the more males the more females in there. Ratio is never
below three to one, females to males.

Some of the females are at least as beautiful as the plainer males.

HTH

Dave

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DerBatz. - 21 Jul 2004 02:27 GMT

Total Bullshine.... segregate male guppies as soon as you can idenify
them.They live longer and look better that way. <not using all their energy
trying to reproduce.>

> > I have been forced to give away my last two male guppy's as they
> > continually harassed some of my other fish. They hounded my balloon molly
[quoted text clipped - 18 lines]
>
> Dave

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Scott - 21 Jul 2004 15:12 GMT

I removed all the guppies I had except for one young male who started
harassing my female silver mollies straight away. so my guess is that if
there are fish in a tank like mollies they will treat them as if they are
female guppies when there are none present.

> Total Bullshine.... segregate male guppies as soon as you can idenify
> them.They live longer and look better that way. <not using all their energy
[quoted text clipped - 24 lines]
> >
> > Dave

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Dave Painter - 21 Jul 2004 20:03 GMT

> Total Bullshine.... segregate male guppies as soon as you can idenify
> them.They live longer and look better that way. <not using all their energy
> trying to reproduce.>

OK. All your options are.

Remove ALL female livebearers.
Just keep male guppies with egg layers and you should be OK.

Just keep the male guppies on their own and you will be OK

Or keep enough females to pacify the males you have and everything will be
OK.

Dave

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Scott - 26 Jul 2004 01:58 GMT

has the male guppies behavior got anything to do with them being bred to
have flamboyant colors and fins or are all guppies the same?

> > Total Bullshine.... segregate male guppies as soon as you can idenify
> > them.They live longer and look better that way. <not using all their
[quoted text clipped - 12 lines]
>
> Dave

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Dave Painter - 28 Jul 2004 21:27 GMT

> has the male guppies behavior got anything to do with them being bred to
> have flamboyant colors and fins or are all guppies the same?

All the guppies I have, from a variety of sources around the country, in a
variety of colours,
types and shapes from really fancy to quite boring really, behave in the
same manner.

but YMMV!

Dave

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Pet Forum / Aquaria / General / July 2004

Guppys harassing other fish !