Hardier selective breeding

[Duxe]

HEY!

First off, I'm new to breeding fish and after doing a fare bit of research I decided to breed guppies, and a few swordtails on the side (due to low start up costs). I have noticed in pet stores the varying colours and patterns that guppies can come in. After being intrigued by, and researching the whole genetics and evelutionary side of guppies I was hooked. So I went out to my trusted pet store and bought a few new males and female guppies to go with my 4 or 5 teen guppies who came from a previous tank setup.

Now, what I noticed was that my fish who didn't have much coloration at all were a lot hardier than the big colourful guppies I bought at the pet store. Blah blah blah I know I'm dragging on but basically does anyone breed for hardiness in a guppy rather than colour and pattern? So many forums on the web talk about how guppies just aren't as hard as they used to be. Can we reverse this in anyway through only 2-3 generations of guppies. Or is the guppy species destined to become too weak and fade out of existence.

Thanks for any comments, Jon

Edit: ( I will be attempting to breed for hardiness, as I think the modern age fancy guppy is negatively affecting the fish and aquarium industry, people are disheartened when they spend hard earned money on tropical fish and chemicals decorations etc...only to have 90% of the fish die within a few days to a couple months). Personally I don't think guppies are a beginners fish anymore.

[Bettarazzi]

Welcome Jon. Good points about hardiness. Suggest heading over to the Guppies section to continue that discussion.

[Dan_97]

Welcome to the forum!! This is a really interesting project and a very good one at that. I`m intrigued as to how your going to breed hardier guppies though, how will you tell which ones are hardier? Inbreeding is definitely the cause in some cases so maybe getting a large gene pool could help?

Dan.