How Deep Should The Water Be For Guppy Fry?

A guppy fry first grows behind the water plants such as hydrilla and Vallisneria. Many fish keepers were surprised once they had seen guppies fry because they did not see fries before in the tank. Most of the time, they grew as hidden fish before becoming fast swimmers.

So fish keeper has no clear idea how deep their fish tank water should be. We all had the same question before we started fish keeping, and now we practically knew the correct answer.

How Deep Should The Water Be For Guppy Fry? The ideal water depth for guppy fry is 7 to 11 inches maximum. A broad and shallow tank will be good to keep guppy fry healthy. That is essential for guppy fry because deep water has a low oxygen level. When your tank is horizontally long, it will help to swim guppy fries due to more room.

When you visit pet fish shops, you can find various sizes of breeding tanks. The size depends on the number of gallons you seek. And sometimes, sellers also have no clear idea about the depth of breeding tanks.

So you find less depth and wider tanks when you visit the pet shops. Investing in shallow tanks will be the best idea because we need to assist them in growing up quickly.

On the other hand, you can put your guppy fry into the pond area. They will survive in the pond, and fish plants help to hide them. But the matter is ponds have fewer oxygen levels due to the deep, and you guppy fry always will have to run water surface to get the oxygen.

So we always recommend keeping your guppy fry in shallow tanks for better growth.

Why should you keep guppy fry in shallow tanks?
- These are the things you should avoid when you have fries.
What are the best tank sizes for guppy fries?
- Here are the numbers if you buy a shallow tank for fries
Final thought

Why should you keep guppy fry in shallow tanks?

Fries are still in the growth stage, and you should keep them carefully in the fish tank. A shallow tank helps to watch, feed and monitor them more quickly than deeper tanks, so keep your fries in broader and less deep tanks.

These are the things you should avoid when you have fries.

01. Show tanks.

People like to keep guppy fish in show tanks because these fishes are eye-catching and attractive due to their long fins and bright colors. So mistakenly, fish keepers are placing their fries into these tanks.

Show tanks are suitable for pet shops to display their fish to buyers. As you know, show tanks are tall and narrow too because show tanks are easy to display any type of fish due to narrow.

We never recommended keeping your guppies fry in Show tanks at all. It will badly affect your fry’s rapid growth. Fries take some time to get fancy colors and long fins, so there is no point keep them in show tanks.

And also, breeding tanks should not be show tanks. Experts say avoid show tanks when starts breeding. Show tanks are suitable for keeping parent fish before starting breeding.

Read More About :- What is the guppy fry survival rate?

02. Low oxygen Levels.

Oxygen is the critical factor if you keep breeding guppy fries. As a fish keeper, you should always pay attention to this.

If you keep your fries in show tanks, ponds, or any deep product, then fries get less oxygen level than they want. Natural oxygen always enters the tank through the water surface.

Unfortunately, if you are keeping fry in depth tanks, you must use an air pumper to pump the air into the tank, as you can use live aquarium plants to increase the oxygen levels in your breeding tank.

Do not use floating plants in your breeding tanks because floating plant helps to block the sunlight and surface of the water.

Using wide tanks, you can also get maximum oxygen exchange due to the larger surface area. This is another advantage of wide tanks.

Guppy fries are not always in the bottom of the tank and come to the surface whenever they want to breathe. This is not an abnormal situation. If you use shallow breeding tanks, fries are not coming surface often and often.

If you use show tanks to keep them, they always have to waste extra energy swimming up and down. This is not a good sign for small fries. So always try to increase the oxygen level of water, which will help keep your fish healthy.

03. Tiny Swimming space.

Due to limited space, many breeders try to keep guppy fry in tiny fish tanks. But keep in your mind this will helps to limit your fries swimming area. Most of the time, fries are not swimming vertically; they are swimming as horizontally. So they need more room to swim here and there in the tank.

Do not use tiny tall tanks for your fries. Always use wide space tanks for your guppy fries. A shallow wider tank gives them more freedom and space to swim.

Also, do not add too many live aquarium plants and decorations because it will help to cut free spaces. Do not limit their swimming space by adding unnecessary things such as decorating wood, stones, and plant pots.

You will not see any problem with these tiny swimming space tanks in the early stage. But after a few weeks, you will notice they start fighting for food due to limited spaces.

So always buys wide and shallow tanks to keep your guppy fry until they complete their early stage.

04. Low sunlight.

When baby fry starts swimming, they need good sunlight to enhance their body colors. Sunlight helps to grow body colors and long fins quickly.

When your tanks get good sunlight, live plants generate more oxygen, benefiting your baby guppies. But if you choose deeper tanks, you cannot trust that your fries will be exposed to sunlight.

Small guppy fries have no strength to swim from bottom to top to get sunlight. Baby fries have to put extra power due to this constantly.

You can use artificial LED lights if you have fewer sunlight breeding tanks. But we have not recommended this at all. It will not work like natural sunlight, and you will not get the same results as natural sunlight.

Always expose your baby fries tanks to the sunlight in the morning and evening. If you keep your baby guppies in wide and shallow tanks, they will get good sunlight. If you do not expose your tanks to sunlight, aquarium plants do not release more oxygen into the water and start absorbing oxygen and releasing carbon dioxide.

Why Are My guppy Fry Dying? Reasons And Practical Solutions
Tiny fish tank

What are the best tank sizes for guppy fries?

The tank sizes mainly depend on the amount of guppies fries. Before buying a tank for placing baby fries, you should roughly calculate the guppy fries amount.

Here are the numbers if you buy a shallow tank for fries

10-gallon tank good for up to 100 fries
15-gallon tank good for up to 150 fries

Keep in mind that if you properly take care of your guppies, they will survive more than 90% of the batch. Try to add an aquarium heater into the tank to grow them healthy. If you use a depth tank, you have to use more heaters to heat the tank, so don’t add your baby guppies into the deeper tanks at all.

Final thought

Use always shallow and wide tank to keep your baby fries. Depth tanks block sunlight, oxygen, and many factors which will harm and destroy the baby fry’s growth stage. Please do not use the depth tank; it is unsuitable for guppy fries.