Breeding guppies?

[dandaman]

Hey, i have a 20 gallon comunity tank that is pretty packed right now.   In that tank i have 2 guppies, a female and her son, a male.   I was wondering if i could take 10 ten gallon heated, planted tank, put the female and male in, buy three for females, and two more males to try to do some breeding.
Could i do this?
How long would it take for them to breed?
What would be a good price for a matture guppy?

Any suggestions are appreciated.

[Aiglos]

I was breeding guppies in a 10 gallon tank and it is FAR more work then it is worth, although I was breeding them for feeder guppies, So if you want to breed them to sell it might be a different story.

My strategy was 5 females and 2 males, The males will chase the females around quite readily so having too many males would be a problem, also a female can hold the sperm ( can I say that?  ) for up to 3-4 live births,  Female guppies are pretty much always pregnant.

Its about a month, I think 28 days actually. make sure you have a breeding net and you have to pay very good attention to when the mother is going to have her babies (large black dot at there anus) because the babies will be eaten by the parents and the other guppies around.

I don't know how much to charge for a guppy though, What do they sell for in stores ? 2.99 ? I doubt you could get even half of that though unless you have a beutiful unique strain, because of how easy they are too breed, there always seems to be an abbundance of fancy guppies in the stores.

[Aiglos]

http://www.aquariacentral.com/articles/guppies.shtml

Addition to my last,  this is a great article that I used to breed my feeders.

[Nerine]

petsmart guppies go for a pair at about 5.49 or something close to that. Guppies are so expensive in Ottawa, it's crazy! I used to live in the states and they were selling at about 1$ each, and fish shops couldn't keep them in stock! I was making a killing out there trading guppies for products!
Good luck with your guppies!! They are TONS of fun!

[dandaman]

Thanks a lot for all your information!
PS: So you think i would be best with 2m/5f?

[Nerine]

make sure you get nice males and females...I've had females with some very nice yellow, orange and blue fins! nice well formed females and males produce good fish (though you may have to do some culling)

[Aiglos]

also a point to remember, your first 3 births may not produce as desirable fish as you might have liked, because chances are if you've bought them in a pet store they have already been impregnated, oftentimes from a less desireable looking fish. to get your own strain it would take some patience.