Creating Disease-Resistant Livebearers

[Chad]

On 1/17/2022 at 11:50 AM, Hobbit said:

@Chad can you teach my platies how to kill my snails? 😝

I can't, but send a few over and my lil' gang will show yours the ropes 😉 

[Suz]

Chad, don’t be holding your breath. I don’t think they do that. My platys are eating the roots off the water lettuce. They love algae wafers but my roots are a wreck and bits and pieces of roots are floating around. I vacuum them up, but those platys are always one step ahead of me.

[Suz]

On 1/17/2022 at 9:29 AM, Chad said:

When I first started with guppies, I bought 5 males and no females. It was in a 9 gallon and there was bullying/aggression  issues amongst them right away. I got a bigger tank and tried raising fry. It worked, but wow did I have a lot of deaths. In a snippet of a PrimeTime Aquatics vid from a while back Jason mentioned that he just couldn't keep guppies. That they always die on him leaving him wondering if he was the problem. It struck a chord with me since that was exactly how I felt. I now believe guppies can be kept but you really need to know your stuff. Start slow and have a well-matured tank to make a success of it. Take a look at what @Guppysnail is doing to get an idea of where you need to be to make a go of it. Oh, and I now have Platies and am a big fan of them. Other than slowly killing off my snails, they're great.

Thanks for your comments and link, Chad. I will follow your suggestions. I didn’t know platys would kill snails! They are voracious eaters! 

[Chad]

On 1/18/2022 at 9:47 PM, Suz said:

Thanks for your comments and link, Chad. I will follow your suggestions. I didn’t know platys would kill snails! They are voracious eaters! 

To my knowledge @Suz, I’m the only person who has platies that do. Understand, they don’t just eat them. Well, kinda. Okay, so whenever my mystery snails try to move around my platies peck at them. Not their shell, but them. It caused my snails to hide in their shells all day, only coming out at night to feed. This isn’t sustainable for snails and two have died with two left that are dwindling. I’m not happy about it but I reached the decision that I like the fish more than the snails. I have shrimp too, my platies never bother them. I bought platies on four different occasions from two different fish stores, same results each time. 

[Suz]

Well, shoot! I wanted some snails, but this isn't the result I had in mind. Will try one mystery snail and see what happens. Appreciate the heads-up!

[ShawnG]

I feel that medicating everything "just in case", running UV sterilizers and even going so far as weekly 100% water changes like some discus breeders is doing nothing to help the hardiness of livestock.

If the fish don't build a healthy immune system early, they're not going to withstand stress well in the future.

I get healthy fish with good colour and finnage by doing small water changes weekly, using lots of fast growing live plants (water sprite), snails, scuds and microfauna in the tanks.

I have similar tap water to what Cory has and I use 1tbsp of reef salt per 5 gallons to help with minerals and keep parameters stable.

I don't get multiple hundreds of babies like some angelfish breeders do but I do get around a hundred healthy fish with very few culls by the time they're ready to go to the store.

It might not work for everyone but it works great for me.

 

Edited January 19, 2022 by ShawnG

[Torrey]

On 1/12/2022 at 8:58 AM, BettaQueen124 said:

@Levi_Aquatics yeah I think you're right about the cold resistance! It seems like they could also benefit from being adapted to softer water. They seem to do just fine when they go from soft water to harder water, but not the other way around. Someone should make a mega strain 😂

Livebearers need the harder water for sufficient calcium intake to support live births.

It's similar to certain egg layers needing acidic water to allow the eggs to hatch. Stronger fish, in this case stronger guppies, don't necessarily need to be exposed to specific diseases to be stronger. 

More effective [and more humane] methods for strengthening genetics include tub breeding outside, pushing temperature limit extremes, and allowing a predator to remove weaker / slower fry from the gene pool.

In Germany, meticulous notes are taken on breeding anything from cats & dogs, to fish, etc. Breeders are entered in a breed book, and if an unwanted genetic defect shows up, the expectation is for all animals of that line be euthanized or neutered....

I am not sure that is necessarily the best approach, and I do appreciate the dedication to include overall health as a deciding factor in breeding. 

I'm a huge fan of Guppysnail's approach,  and I personally have a turtle who helped ensure only the fastest, strongest, and most durable endlers went into my breeding.

My endlers are strong, healthy, and have a diverse genetic pool that I pull from.