So I'm finally acceeding to my hubby's wishes & one of my tanks is going tropical (so we can have more fish - it's a 38 gal so...lots o' room!)

Anyway...we have platies in it & just got some fancy guppies from the petstore (we got 3 males & 3 females- we still have plenty of room so if you tell me my ratio is off - I'll go & pick out some more!) (I couldn't find any info on any kind of ratio - just that they like groups. The store employee was so uninformed...sooo no help there)

Anyway - anyone have any tips on their care? I have heard they like slightly brackish water - what salt concentration do they prefer?

Advice appreciated )as I'm a tropical newbie)

Thanks!!

Jenn

PS - New fish are currently in a 10 gal QT tank with media from a cycled tank. The 38 still has the platies in it from before (5 of them at various ages) & has been cycled for over a year)

PPS - I just started using Quick Cure for Ich. It has worked wonders for me with my goldies in the past - how is it for guppies? I currently don't have the tank salted so no worries there.

Fish like Guppies and Platies are best kept with 2 or 3 females for every male to help reduce the stress. You might want to pick up some more females to even out the ratio. You'll probably end up with babies though o.0

Yeah but we don't try really hard to save them (don't tell the kids tho'!!)It ends up working our just fine (we saved 3 of our platy babies (before all the males died) & they had sooo many siblings - we tried a breeder box for a bit but the ones who made it...made it in the big tank! The breeder babies by & large disappeared after they were released into the main tank. No matter how big they were.) We had 2 females to a male with the platies so I think I'll start with that with the guppies too.

No worries...I'll be so sorry to have to go out & get more fish (For once a 38 gal is a big tank!) (I am understocked in my other tank too - it's a 58 with only 3 goldies in it)

Hee hee hee

Any word on the salt issue??

Thanks!

Salting to .1% is fine with livebearers.
congrats on the new fish

Thanks!!!

I guess I should wait though until I'm done with the ich meds at this point. (& I'm sad to say my platies have never been in salted water & they've been OK up 'till now so I don't want to rush them & do more harm than good. I'll bet the LPS tanks don't have salt either).

Can I just go to .1% after the meds or do I have to work up to that (I've not salted except for my goldies when they were sick & that was up to .3% & I had to do that gradually)

Thanks for all of the advice!!!

Jenn

i would think salting gradually over the next few water changes would be better for the fish.

congrats on the new tropical fish as well