Signs guppy is about to give birth

If you are keeping guppies in a community tank, probably you want to separate the female guppy from the rest just before giving birth.

You can put the female guppy into a breeding box or a separate tank.

But which is the best time to separate a pregnant female guppy from the main tank? How do you know if a guppy fish is about to give birth? What is female guppy behavior before giving birth?

In this article, I will give you some tips, which will help you know when your guppy fish are ready to give birth to young fry.

How to Determine if Guppy Fish is Pregnant?

First of all, you want to know whether your female guppy is pregnant or not. The good thing is that it very easy to know if a guppy is pregnant.

If you are keeping female and male guppies together, most likely female guppies are pregnant, unless they are infertile.

During pregnancy, female guppies will develop a big rounded belly. Their gravid spot, which is above their anal fin, will become darker and bigger.

Over the next few weeks, their belly will grow, until they release the fry.

Is Female Guppy Fish About to Give Birth?

Female guppies usually give birth 25-35 days after mating with male guppies. It is not easy to determine the exact date when they are going to give birth.

However, there are tricks from which you can know that your guppy fish is about to give birth.

Pregnant Guppy Signs of Delivery

Below, I’ve highlighted some of the most obvious signs of delivery of pregnant female guppies.

Specific Belly Form

A few days before giving birth, the female’s belly will get an angular shape. It is very hard to describe the form, but here is a great image to show you:

This shape is a great sign that your female guppy will give birth very soon.

At this stage, you can separate the female from the rest.

Female Guppy Hiding

Hiding between plants or staying in a corner of the tank is another sign that your female guppy fish is in labor and ready to give birth. This is not a normal behavior of guppies. So it is easy to spot.

Just before giving birth, she will separate herself from the rest. If you see this, you can remove the female from the rest.

Female Guppy Giving Birth & Eats the Babies

Here is a great video of a female guppy fish giving birth to lots of fry. Unfortunately, she will eat the fry once they are born:

How to Save & Care for Guppy Fry?

If you have lots of live plants in your aquarium, you can be sure, that some of the fry will survive.

However, if you want to save as many fry as possible, you need to remove the pregnant female guppy from the rest.

You can put your female guppy into a breeding box. I recommend using this breeding box from Amazon. This is a hang-on breeding box, which enables you to run aquarium water through it.

Most breeding boxes are designed to hold a certain amount of water, but do not let you cycle water through.

You should not keep your female guppy in a breeding box for too long.

Giving birth is already stressful, and being in a small space can increase stress. Some females might die during labor or after giving birth due to high stress.

If you have the possibility to put your pregnant guppy fish into a separate aquarium, you can avoid using a breeding box.

You should know that guppies will eat their fry.

Adding live plants to the breeding tank such as java moss, guppy grass or frogbit will increase the chance of fry to survive and not get eaten by their mother.

A female guppy fish can be in labor from 15 minutes to up to 1 day.

What to Do with Guppy Fry?

Ok, so the female guppy just gave birth to lots of fry. What should you do with them?

If you used a breeding box, you might want to keep them in it for 1-2 weeks. During this time, you should feed them powder food and change the water in the breeding box often. If you used the hang-on breeding box from Amazon, which I mentioned earlier, you can skip water changes.

In two weeks, they will become strong and fast enough to be released in the tank with their parents.

Although the baby guppies are stronger, they can still get eaten by larger fish. So please keep this in mind.

Add lots of live plants in the tank, to give your guppy fry enough hiding places.

If you have multiple tanks, you can use a tank to grow baby guppies separately. Feed them twice a day with high-quality food. Do weekly water changes and have good filtration on your outgrow tank.

Adding live plants are a big plus when growing guppies.

If you want to learn more about how to care for baby guppies, please read my other article.

Conclusion

Hopefully, this article has helped you to learn about the behavior of guppy fish before giving birth.

If you want to learn more about guppies, please read my other article.

Also, if you have any questions regarding guppies, please leave a comment below or feel free to contact me through the contact form.

Updated: November 23, 2021

What does a female guppy do before giving birth?

How do you know when a fish is about to give birth?

How far along is my pregnant guppy?

How long until my guppy gives birth?