3 Lines of Breeders

Recently I've been selling off some guppies to empty the 4ft tank for new fish project( gonna keep datnioides heheh). It will be a sad news to the guppies as they won't have the luxury to live in a spacious environment anymore.

Realised that I've not controlled the breeding and resulted in a mixture of lines. Instead of producing quality, I've been producing quantity ! Anyway its good that the 4ft tank will be used for other fishes so that I could concentrate on producing quality guppies. That means -- mass culling !

Currently I've 3 lines of albino full reds.

1) YaikSin Line

Traits - Orangy red in colour with  nice sailfin dorsal, big caudal and average body size

2) YaikSin Outcross Line

Traits - Much redder in colour with reasonable sailfin dorsal, big caudal and average body size

3) ATFG HTD Line

Passed to me as offspring from WeiLeong.

Traits - Lighter red in colour with big sailfin dorsal, big sharp caudal and slightly thin body size

With these lines and limited tanks, only the best from each line will be kept.

Arofanatics Carnival 2011 Guppy Competition Class 2 Champion

Finally the big day arrived and this was the first time I participated in a fish competition. The guppy competition was organised by Arofanatics as it was their 1st carnival and also 11th anniversary.

The alpha male from YaikSin line survived (5.5 months old ) and I sent him to compete against fishes from class 2 category. The competition tank number was 2-14 and he won 1st in the placing. Sad to say he missed the grand champion title by an inch !

This was the video of the alpha male 2 weeks ago.

More videos of the alpha male

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lccI2TAg6eQ

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bv6un-olegw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eteeM6fmlDI

This was the prize for the class 2 champion winner.

Thanks to Arofanatics for organising this event.

Update of The New Breeders

Its coming close to one months for an update of the new breeders which I've posted earlier on. I've sold a few of them and shifted the rest to the 4ft tank. I did mentioned about the alpha male from YaikSin's F1 offspring and I'm still keeping him. How's his development now ? Currently he is 3.5 months of age and will he make it to the Arofanatics Carnival 2011 Guppy Competition on Sept 4 ?

Guppy See, Guppy Do

I've a group of matured full red males kept together with 2 females. They are housed in a 1.5ft tank. Everyday when I feed them, they seem like not interested in the food, even live food such as tubifex ! Most of them keep chasing the females and end up the females ate all the food. I've the females removed but the situation still look the same.

Okay, I had enough with this group of males. I once heard a saying Monkey See, Monkey Do. I wonder if it applies to Guppy See, Guppy Do. Decided to transfer the group of males into a 4ft tank which consist of sub-adult guppies. The sub-adult guppies are like hungry wolves. Any food that I throw in, they will finish it within seconds ! So... the saying Guppy See, Guppy Do works !

It's feeding time for the guppies. Enjoy the video !

How To Maintain The Albino Full Red Guppy

Many full red breeders encountered problems with their Albino Full Red line after few years of inbreeding. The line degenerated. Here's an article written by a famous breeder, YS, from Taiwan on how to maintan the Albino Full Red line. The article is written in mandarin and hopefully I could translate them into english.


紅魚至今的困難度
顏色紅體背較小
顏色淡體背較大

所以才需要一些工具魚維持
個人維持紅魚有用到
黃化佛朗明哥.紅頭.野生.白子

黃化維持體態
野生先加強他的黑色素

然後轉成白子
這樣顏色會較重點
但不是配野生全紅一代就能變成血紅
如果那麼簡單全台灣大家都有白子血紅大背了

你想要加強顏色跟體態
須先將你的野生體跟較紅的白子做結合
加強野生色的色度也讓他有白子基因
但有白子基因的野生色
顏色又會轉淡一點
而且體態也會差點
我會再導入條件好的黃化
加強他的體態跟顏色
但相對的他的白子基因會較弱

當你再將子代自交
生下的小魚條件就又會好一點
但出的白子變成個體
如此一直反覆這些動作
才能做出好魚
否則~再好的魚不懂用工具維持
早晚還是會弱化

更何況單純野生跟黃化也需要維持
黃化顏色變淡時
需要跟野生做結合讓他顏色變深

野生背鰭變小時我又會導入黃化
讓魚的背鰭變大

黃化體態變差時
我又會導入黃佛加強他的體背表現

So basically, you would need to have Golden Full Red, Flamingo Red and Wild Grey Full Red to maintain or perfect a line of Albino Full Red !!


More extracts on Reds from Taiwan forum.

http://www.guppytaiwan.com.tw/thread-468384-1-1.html

The New Breeders

After selling off most of my 1st generation breeders, I managed to have another batch of upcoming potential breeders. Two of them with wider caudals are from the 1st generation cross which now stands at 3.5 months of age. The others are from YaikSin's F1 offspring which was born on 25th March 2011 (2 months old). Could you spot the alpha male from YaikSin's F1 batch ? I will update them again in another month's time.



Raising the Fry

I guess this will be a pretty much interesting topic. Guppies breed easily but are you able to bring up the fry to adult stage ? Guppies are livebearers. Livebearers will not lay eggs, but give birth to free-swimming offspring.

When the fry is in newborn stage, their first source of food will be microworms. I choose microworms because its a live food ! The wriggling movements of these tiny worms will catch the fry attention and since the worm is so tiny, it even fits into the mouth of those egg layers fry.

Where to get microworms ? Very few local fish shops carry them as the culture really stink !! You may try PetMart located at Serangoon North Ave 2. Alternatively, many home betta breeders do culture them. It is priced at $2.50 to $3 for a container. Once you obtained the culture, you can keep culturing it and keep the microworms going. I will not elaborate no how to culture the microworms. Google has plenty of information on it !

I keep my guppy fry in shallow transparent plastic containers. Its easier for them to look for food in a confined space. Water changes including siphoning the feces is carried out daily. Besides feeding microworms, I will supplement them with daphnia occassionally. Some hobbyists advocate baby brine shrimps as they have no parasitic problem but I find its quite time consuming.

After two weeks of microworms and daphnia, the fry could try on tubifex worms and micro grandules fish food. The first month of feeding is quite critical to the development of the show guppies. Feed them frequently with small amounts will ensure a healthy growth of the fry.

1st Generation ys-y618 Breeders - Aquarama 2011 Grand Champion Line

Someone said guppies developed its full potential at the age of 4 to 5 months. I'm happy that I've still kept one of the 1st generation ys-y618 breeders for my own reference. He is currently at 4+ months old. I've put him into a 4 feet tank together with a bunch of virgin females. In the tank, there's also a very nice male offspring (F1) from YaikSin's male. Could you identify him (lighter red colouration male) ? He is currently at 4.5+ months old and is used to maintain YaikSin's line and future outcrosses.


1st generation ys-y618 breeder at 4+ months old and YaikSin's male offspring (F1) at 4.5+ months old as at 21th May 2011.

Guppy Housekeeping

The beauty of a guppy lies in its genetics. To maintain her beauty, you have to do regular water changes ! I siphoned the feces at the bottom of the tank daily. Its either early in the morning before I leave for work or late evening when I return from work. The bare bottom tank is always filled with feces and I really can't stand the sight of it ! I guess I'm really a cleanliness freak !!

I used a round transparent tubing of 8mm in daimeter to do the siphoning. The amount of water draws out at every feces cleaning is around 10% to 20% depending on the sizes of the tanks. If I do the cleaning daily, I wouldn't be performing weekly water changes then ! Last but not least, when you do your water changes please use aged water treated with anti-chlorine. I'm using the below anti-chlorine.

Besides doing regular housekeeping, I guess food plays another part in the beauty of the fishes as well. Here's a list of flakes and granules that I used to feed the guppies. Twice a week I do supplement them with tubifex worms !

The Grand Champion in Aquarama 2011 Guppy Competition

As the young 1st generation breeders matured in size and finnages, I decided to put them on sale as I see no point in keeping them for my admiration. They have gave me several batches of their offspring (still in fry stage) and I hope someone who purchased them will extend my line or enter them in competitions.

I've managed to sell 4 of the male breeders between 11th May to 21th May 2011. To my surprise, I received a message from one of the buyers that the 1st generation ys-y618 breeders won the Aquarama 2011 Guppy Competition grand champion !!  It also won the 1st placing in the category 2 solid colour (non-moscow) trio class !

This picture is taken by bro jest1081 from Arofanatics.

Update of 1st Generation ys-y618 Breeders

At 3.5+ months old, the young 1st generation breeders are catching up in colour and finnages !

The Culls

The outcross produced some very nice males but it also produced some culls. I regarded them as culls because the red colouration on the fish body is less then 90% covered !

The Outcross of YaikSin's AFR Male and Y618 AFR Female

Finally, YaikSin's albino full red males ferterlized Y618 albino full red females and produced a few batches of offspring. The objective of the outcross is to improve on the red colouration while retaining the size and finnages of YaikSin's line. Among them, I've selected a few males to be my future breeders. I will name this batch of breeders as 1st generation ys-y618 breeders.


1st generation ys-y618 breeders at 2.5+ months old.

Y618 Albino Full Red Guppy Update

Here's the update of the local fish shop albino full red guppy at 3 months old. He is among the best of the male siblings.

He is near to 4 months old.

At 4 months old and recovered from tail rot.

And I lost him one week later. May him R.I.P

Albino Full Red Guppy Trio Update

After few weeks of grooming, the two full red males have turned into beautiful fishes. The males' colour still remain orangy red but finnages are great. I guess this is the trait of YaikSin's full red guppy.

In order to have a better colouration, I've decided to add a few virgin full red females from Y618 offspring to try for an outcross. Wish me success !


Update of YaikSin's albino full red guppy after one month of grooming.

Local Fish Shop (Y618) Albino Full Red Guppy

As albino full red guppies are readily available in Singapore local fish shops, I decided to purchase a pair. The two local fish shops that worth a visit are That's Aquarium located at Yishun Blk 618 and Clementi Florist and Aquarium located at Clementi Blk 328. The albino full red guppies from both shops are from the same source.

I purchased the AA grade pair from That's Aquarium on 9th Dec 2010 and it costs me $30. There's A grade pair at $10 but the fishes weren't that great ! The AA grade pair has good red colouration but only normal finnages. The male passed away after two weeks and I'm blessed with some offspring.

After several weeks of tender care and diligent housekeeping, I managed to bring them up from fry stage to semi-adults and finally to fully matured adults !


A tank of  female offspring.

One of the selected male offspring for breeding.

My First Albino (RREA) Full Red Guppy Trio

Why am I back to guppies again ? I guess its due to my colleague's influence. He is an avid guppy lover from young and till now he is still keeping guppies. Lately, he just acquired a pair of red laced guppy from a famous guppy breeder in Singapore and managed to spawn some fry. The pair didn't come cheap and this is the first time he invested in a good lineage guppy. I told him that I will get a good pair to spawn as well and we will exchange them when our fry grows up. So I proceeded to surf the net for a pair of good lineage guppy. Since my colleague is keeping red lace guppy, I told myself I will get one that has red and maybe we could do an outcross later. Eventually, I decided upon a full red guppy.

Albino (RREA) full red guppies in Singapore are easily available in local fish shops and private home breeders. Btw, RREA stands for Real Red Eye Albino. I found a famous home breeder (YaikSin) that has a good lineage of full red guppy and got a trio ( 2 males and 1 female ) from him on 9th Dec 2010. His albino full red guppy lineage is a bit orangey. I was kind of disappointed initially but their big dorsal and caudal fins compensated its colour drawback.

Guppy Genetics

Talking about guppy genetics, I think its good for anyone who wants to venture into guppy fish keeping or breeding to have some knowledge of it. Not an easy to grasp topic and till now, I'm still half-past-six on this guppy genetics.

Below is a link to guppy genetics from Malaysia Guppy Club. Its written in mandarin and you might need to register with the forum before getting access to the articles.

http://www.myguppy.net/guppy/forumdisplay.php?fid=48&page=1

Alternatively, here's a link to Philip Shaddock's Guppy Genetic Primer. Enjoy !

My Fish Keeping Passion

I've been keeping fishes since young. I remembered the first type of  fishes I kept was guppy. During that time, it was considered the most beautiful and affordable fish. I do not know about tank cycling or water parameters and I just kept those little fishes in a container without air pump and filter. Needless to say, they don't survive after a week and most of them passed away.

Over the last 10 years, my hobby of fish keeping has grown in size and depth. Not only have I increased the number of fish tanks, I've also experienced with breeding of various kinds of fishes. I've kept Arowanas, Oscas, Guppies, Endlers, Apistogramma, Altums, Angels, Rams, Bichirs, Kois, Gold Fishes, Bettas, Betta Channoides, Tropical Fishes, Crystal Red Shrimps, Cherry / Sakura Shrimps and Marine Fishes over the years. Some were successful, some were not. I did not keep a single species of fish for long and 'fish-hopped' quite often. I'm not sure whether is this a good sign, but it does expose me to a wide variety of fishes. After one big round of fish keeping, I've come back to Guppy again !