Lifespan of guppy fish is about 2 years in the wild and if the perfect parameters are maintained then 2-3 years in an aquarium fish tank.
After birth it takes about 6-7 weeks of time for a guppy fry to mature and live a normal adult life. During this there are several factors that can affect his lifespan. If you maintain and take care of the fry then there is less chance that bigger fish or even his own parent fish will eat him out.
Factors that can affect lifespan of a guppy
There are several factors that greatly affect how long a guppy will live. If you wish that he lives longer then there are certain rules that if followed can show better results.
1) Presence of genetically spread diseases
This is something you can’t control when you buy guppy fish. Genetical disorders can vary from fish tuberculosis to scoliosis, where guppies are born with bent spine. Some of these diseases are incurable and the only option left is to let them die slowly.
While buying guppy make sure that you buy them from a reputed breeding farm that really care about fish health and are sensitive about aquarium hygiene. A sick guppy fish will most likely transfer his disease to the fry and if you buy such sick fish, it will be really difficult to cut this cycle. Sometimes the diseases are even contagious, that contaminate the entire tank really fast.
2) Absence of fish tank maintenance
Many new comers in fish keeping forget than they are dealing with live creatures and they need care and healthy habitat to live longer and healthy. Maintaining an aquarium is not just partial water changes and you are done.
It requires proper knowledge of basic water chemistry and how to create a tiny Ecosystem of it’s own in your aquarium. This is not any difficult knowledge but even understanding the basics such as nitrogen cycle, beneficial bacteria and presence of harmful toxic gases will go a long way in creating a healthy habitat for guppies.
3) Overcrowded tank
This is another greatly neglected factor amongst aquarists when they are just starting out. Filling your tank with too many fish will look good visually from outside but it can create hell for fish really quickly.
A fish tank is a confined space and it gets filled with toxic gases every day because fish eat food and produce solid waste (poop) which gets settled down in the tank. This starts decaying turning water toxic almost every day. Another source of toxic gases is decaying of uneaten food that gets settled at the bottom of the tank.
When there are more fish, there is a normal tendency to put more food in the tank to feed all the fish equally. This leads to extra food and poop getting settled at the bottom of the tank giving rise to toxic dissolved gases frequently.
Overcrowding also produced privacy issued for fish. Fish love to have their own territory in the tank and when there are more fish, their privacy gets disturbed frequently leading to fights. Sometime these fights can lead to death as well.
When fish fight, normally the bigger and older ones try to dominate the smaller and weaker ones. This sends the smaller fish into stress and stress of any kind in fish lead to diseases sooner or later.
4) Male to female ratio
Male to female ratio is important because fish have mating instincts and when they see a female in the tank they will try to mate. The point here is if there is just one female in the entire tank of male fish then there are going to be fights over her. This can lead to great amount of stress and hence diseases.
Fish that are strong and better by immunity will try to attack fish that are weaker. Fights can lead to physical abuse, biting etc and this can be dangerous for fish health reducing their lifespan as well. Any reason that leads to stress of any kind will definitely reduce lifespan of a fish.
5) Wrong tank mates
Not all fish species can live happily with others and this is also true in the natural world. The only difference is, in the natural world fish have the liberty to move away from other fish that is being abusive, but since a fish tank is a confined space it becomes necessary that while picking up species you have a good idea about “fish compatibility”. Picking up wrong tank mates will quickly lead to fights and even death.
Precautions to avoid stress in a guppy fish tank.
As seen from above discussion it is clear that “stress” in fish is the primary factor of reducing their lifespan. Most of the times fish that are bought from pet store or even from a private breeding farm are already under stress because of many reasons such as transportation, lack of cleanliness, rude behavior of other fish in the tank, lack of following feeding schedules etc.
There are certain precautions that you must take to reduce stress in fish and create a habitable environment for them so that they live happy and live longer.
1) Always keep fish tank water toxic free
Just like humans need oxygen for survival, fish need dissolved oxygen for survival. But fish with suffer if tank water if filled with toxic invisible gases. It is necessary that a strict cleaning schedule is followed to keep levels of toxic gases under limits and fish feel safe.
You must always keep a water testing kit ready with you to test levels of dissolved gases and if you find the numbers out of control, carry out necessary actions to keep the numbers healthy. Fish like guppy are extremely sensitive to even smaller changes in water chemistry and any sudden changes can lead to great amount of stress leading to reduced lifespan of fish and even death.
2) Avoid overcrowding in fish tank
Overcrowding the fish tank can lead to serious trouble for each individual fish. When there are more number of fish in a tank there is a general tendency to feed extra food so that each fish can get enough and he or she doesn’t starve. But the fact is fish never eat all the food you feed them and a part of the food particles get settled down at the bottom of the tank. These uneaten food particles start decaying releasing harmful ammonia gas which can be extremely dangerous for fish.
Another disadvantage of overcrowding a fish tank is, fish produce solid waste (poop) once they eat food and this too gets settled down at the bottom of the tank and start decaying releasing ammonia gas. A water testing kit must be kept handy to keep checking levels of toxic gases and take necessary steps if you find the levels are getting serious.
3) Choose the correct tank mates
Picking up the correct tank mates is called as “fish compatibility” and it helps a lot for creating healthy and happy habitat for every fish in the tank. Aggressive fish species tend to attack weaker and smaller fish in the tank for dominance and this leads to stress. Since a fish tank is a confined space it is impossible for fish to escape from these situations and finally they surrender themselves to stress attracting many diseases. Some fish even try to jump of out the tank if the stress and bullying from stronger and bigger fish becomes unbearable.
4) Maintain male to female ratio
Many tank owners ignore this very important step. If you have just a single female and all males in a tank then there will be fights for mating purposes. Sometimes these fights can even be deadly. That’s why have, 2 females to 3 male fish in a fish tank. This is done to distract the males when they start chasing the female for mating or breeding. When they chase a particular female, the other females crosses them distracting his attention and this continues in a tank.
5) Try to imitate the wild habitat.
The key to creating a healthy and habitual guppy tank is to imitate what’s happening is the wild and natural world. In a fish tank since the space is confined it is impossible to accurately mimic the wild habitat, but it is still possible to carefully plan and study water chemistry and pay attention to every minute detail in the tank. The whole purpose of creating a healthy tank is to reduce toxic gases as soon as possible and keep them maintained.
How to increase lifespan of a guppy fish?
The easiest way to increase lifespan of a guppy fish is to keep water clean and toxic free always. Even water in a fish tank that look crystal clear need not be toxic free because sometimes there are dissolved toxic gases in the water column that are invisible.
By checking and maintaining a strict water cleaning schedule you can easily maintain levels of toxic gases in the fish tank. A water testing kit can definitely help to identify levels of gases that can harm fish life.
Creating a healthy fish tank is all about learning to keep water toxic free. There are many ways to do it and can be learned in a few weeks or so. May people have observed that having live plants in a fish tank helps a lot in reducing toxic dissolved gases in a tank because live plants absorb most of the toxic gases reducing contaminations drastically.
However growing live plants in a fish tank requires a learning curve and if you are just starting out then this may not be choice right away. Having live plats will always present different challenges and requires attention and knowing basics fish tank chemistry.
Once you learn to keep water clean and free of contaminations it becomes very easy to create a healthy fish tank and lifespan of guppy fish greatly depends of healthy and happy habitat.
Avoid deadly fights to increase lifespan of guppy fish.
The life of a guppy fish will end instantly if there are deadly fights and there are ways to avoid fights in a tank. Normally fights happens over several factors and there are triggers that encourage bullying in a fish tank.
If there are too many fish in a tank each individual fish is at risk of bullying. Normally stronger fish will bully the weaker one for dominance. To avoid these events it is necessary that there are correct numbers of guppy in a tank.
If there are less fish in a tank, then also the chances of bullying a single fish increase and that’s why the correct number of fish is important because when a particular weaker fish gets bullied the other fish will distract the stronger ones.
The chances of deadly fights increase drastically when there are only male guppies in a fish tanks. In the absence of females in a fish tank it’s possible that male fish start dominating other male fish for establishing dominance.
In a male only guppy tank the number of guppy plays a major role because each individual fish must get his own privacy and territory to swim freely and avoid fights as much as possible.
Also it is better if you try to create hiding spaces in the tank using decorations or plants so that fish can use these spaces to hide if they are feeling stressed because of other fish. These hiding spaces help a lot in reducing the stress temporarily.
If you observe a particular fish is constantly trying to hide in these smaller spaces in decorations or behind plants then it’s better to take the necessary action to tackle the root cause of this. Stress in fish is deadly and it can attract deadly diseases as well. If the attracted disease is contagious then the whole tank can get affected in no time.
Fish love to have their own territory in the tank and when they find their area is being encroached by other fish they either hide or get dominant depending upon his age and immunity. Fish with weak immunity will normally attract disease quickly and try to stay at the bottom or at the corner of the tank.