Guppies are Fish too!

Although I had had Gold fish a few times back over the years, I had not gotten into Tropical fish until our last few months in South Africa back in 2002. And even then, as we were in a semi tropical climate at Port Shepstone, we kept them in a bowl in the lounge at room temperature.

Till then, I had also not known much about Guppies other than that they were very popular and easy to keep; and that unlike most fish who lay eggs, Guppies were among the handful of fish that give birth to live babies. It was during our brief time as Guppy owners in South Africa that we bred our own first little Guppies and became interested in them.

So it was no surprise then when we returned to OZ later that year, that when my niece asked if I wanted some of her Guppies that she was also rearing by the numbers, that I said Yes. Of course we still had to both get a fish tank and a house to put it in then, but eventually we did both and we started to go into Tropical fish a little bit more seriously.

These days we are more into little sharks and Catfish than Guppies, but when we first started out with the Guppies, we went to lots of trouble to raise the little ones and protect them from the other fish until they were big enough to be out of danger of being eaten as “Live food”.

However one thing we quickly learned, was that that really wasn’t that necessary as they soon started to fill and over fill the tank with their little ones. And it was only because the larger fish were eating a lot of the little ones that the Tank was not completely overrun with Guppies.

In fact some people breed Guppies simply as feeder fish for bigger ones, and many serious fish Fanciers hold them in contempt and distain as the mice and sparrows of the Fish World and do not take them seriously. One such person was my niece's husband, who liked his Catfish and cichlids and turned up his nose at his wife’s guppies. However I used to think that he was in the minority. Not so it seems now!

In June 11’s Herald Sun Newspaper there was an article about one particular Guppy at a fish show. The article read: “ A Guppy _$2 tiddlers often fed to more exotic fish _ has upstaged rivals 10 times its size to win “grand champion” at a country show. And rival fish breeders are in a frenzy.”

The article went on to showcase other fish breeder’s contempt of Guppies. Even the Guppy’s owner said he was surprised to win with a Guppy and said, “ I wasn’t expecting a guppy to get it. I had some nice cichlids, some catfish and goldfish … but I’m happy with the result.”

And so he should be. Although I have usually had to pay twice or even trice the $2 price mentioned, to buy my guppies, the prize money this Guppy brought home was $150. “Which is not a bad return on your investment”, as some one was quoted as saying.

And that is my thought for today. It doesn’t matter what you are into, whether the big things/fish or the small despised things/Guppies, but if you do your best and present your best, you too can be winners too. You may not always scoop the Grand prize, but you too will do all right in your chosen field, and get a good return for your investment, if you always give it your best shot. So this blog is dedicated to all us guppies out there. Keep swimming folks. We too, can be winners too if we persevere.