Now for the excitement of adding your chosen ones to your new aquarium. The safest way is just to add two or three fish to start and get to feel comfortable managing the fish tank, sorting out any little glitches that happen and as we all are familiar with the famous” Murphy’s Law” it is best to be on the safe side. Increasing the number of fish slowly means you can watch for any health problems that may lurk beneath the surface.

What fish to buy is always a hard question, for someone starting with his or her first tropical fish and aquarium; I find guppies are hard to go past. These small colored fish (poeciliidae) come in all shades and colors, and belong to the class of fish called livebearers. The young are born alive as opposed to starting as eggs. The males have beautiful tails and have sex forever on their minds! The poor female is a plain colored fish and bigger than the male. Should you decide on these it is considered best to allow one male to two or three females. With the constant bothering by a male, other females distract him and all get to live quieter lives.
These little fish given the correct conditions produce copious amounts of babies, most consumed by the adults, but obviously some survive. My fish produced enough young fry to allow me to sell many fish on a regular basis.

When you have chosen the fish, you will bring them home in a plastic bag or heat retaining bag to keep the fish warm, remember they are tropical. Minimize the heat loss as best you can. Guppies are hardy little fish but do not push your luck. Shade or cover them so the stress of transportation is lessened. On reaching your aquarium, float the bags with the fish in the water for ten to twenty minutes depending on the size of the bag. After this time add some of your tank water to the bag and repeat. This is to enable the fish to be acclimatized to your water with out too much of a shock to their systems. If you have a light above the tank, leave it off for the first 24 hours to allow quiet exploration by the guppies of their new home.

It is best not to feed them during that time for the same reasons. Changing from one food to another quickly is not in the best interests of the fish, or any animal for that matter. New diets are always best done on a gradual basis to allow alimentary systems to cope with a new food or regime. Feeding fish is something that you learn by observation. Only feed an amount that can be eaten within five minutes. You will soon learn the correct amount, and once learnt then is the time to try other foods with them. It is fascinating watching them get into a favourite food or any food. If you have been to the Aquascene display in Darwin, you will know what I mean!