Guppies Aquarium Fish

It's hard to find someone who has never heard of the guppy fish (Poecilia reticulata). It is one of the most widespread and popular aquarium fish around the world. For the vast majority of lovers, the guppy became the first fish to be kept, and the experience of caring for it became a pass to the big world of aquaristics. A characteristic feature of the guppy is egg production. Unlike most other fish, eggs are fertilized and developed not in the external environment, but in the body of the female. As a result, an already formed fry is born. This increases the fry's chances of survival. Guppies were also the first fish to be in space. They not only successfully adapted to life in zero gravity aboard the Salyut-5 orbital station, but also managed to give birth to offspring. Genetic scientists use them to study the transmission of hereditary traits. Also, guppy fish have rendered a great service to the world community. The fact is that these fish happily eat the larvae of anopheles mosquitoes, and to combat these parasites, guppies were settled in water bodies of  Guppies Aquarium Fish many countries. Guppy is a small fish from the Peciliaceae family. The average body size in the male is 3 cm, in the female - 6 cm. The scales are in the form of a rhombic mesh, for which the fish received the specific epithet from the Latin "reticulum" - mesh. Fish are characterized by pronounced sexual dimorphism. Females are much larger and thicker than males, do not have highly developed veil fins and are much more modestly colored: mostly the body and tail are gray, sometimes the caudal fin is colored or spotted. The most important distinguishing feature of males is the presence of a modified anal fin, which is called gonopodia. Thanks to him, males are able to place reproductive products directly into the abdominal cavity of the female, where fertilization already takes place. As for color, natural individuals cannot boast of a bright outfit: a gray body and small (albeit absolutely unique in location) spots on a rounded caudal fin. This allows you to effectively hide from enemies among dense thickets. A completely different matter is breeding forms, which have been bred by amateurs and professionals around the world for a long time. Several stable groups of fish are distinguished, depending on the shape of the caudal fin and body color. Guppies can be monochromatic, spotted, with a metallic sheen, etc. It is impossible to list all the colors and shapes of guppies that can be found on sale. One of the first scientists to describe guppies was the famous German zoologist Wilhelm Karl Hartwig Peters in 1859. He gave the fish the name Poecilia reticulate, which lasted until 1861, when the Italian researcher F. de Filippi studied the obtained alcoholic materials and isolated a separate genus Lebistes, and the fish was named Lebistes poeciloides. The fish got its second name "guppy" (originally "guppy") in honor of the English scientist and priest Robert Guppy, who brought it to England from the island of Trinidad in 1866. The fish endured a month's journey perfectly and were presented by Robert to the scientific board of the British Museum of Natural History. He assigned them to the new genus Girardinus, and named the fish after himself - Girardinus guppyi. When it turned out that seven years earlier, the fish had already been described by another scientist, it was renamed again, this time to Lebistes reticulatus. And only in 1963, after an extensive revision of viviparous fish from the Petsiliev family, carried out by ichthyologists D.E. Rose and R.M. Bailey, the guppy was returned to its former name - Poecilia reticulate Peters. Nevertheless, the name "guppy" is very firmly entrenched for the fish, both in English-speaking countries and in Russia. In the modern world, natural guppies are no longer caught in the wild. Numerous hybrids obtained on special fish farms are sold in millions of lots around the world. Guppy breed standards have been created at the global and national levels. In almost all countries there are huge amateur clubs that participate in regular exhibitions of these delightful fish. Historically, guppies live in Central, North South America and the Caribbean islands. These are countries such as Brazil, Venezuela, Guiana, Trinidad and Tobago. Thanks to their amazing endurance, the fish have settled in almost all possible freshwater biotopes: rivers, lakes, canals, swamps. Some populations can be found even at the mouths of rivers flowing in https://jiji.co.ke/karen/fish/guppies-aquarium-fish-kuMrMuRYGdp3fN22f1Rs3N5Z.html