Guppy and Sword Tail

[bozco]

Hi, I am new to the forum but have kept an aquarium for a little over a year. I currently have a 10 gal and a 5 gal going and hope to upgrade to a 40 gal soon.

About a week ago my friend set me up with a trio of guppies and a trio of sword tails to breed in a trade. My three sword tails and one ofhis females and one of my male guppies that I already owned are in the 5 gal. The male guppy has been displaying mating behaviour with the female pinapple swordtail and completely ignoring the female guppy. I know I could just seperate them but I'm not asking for a solution to the problem.
I'm just wondering if this has ever happened to anybody else. Do guppies take interest in other species often or is my fish just strange?

[PumaWard]

Male livebearers in general will try to breed with anything that looks remotely like another livebearer. It's best that you don't let it happen; though, you will most likely get hybrids which are normally unwanted in the trade.

[bozco]

He can actually have fry with her? Wow I didn't know that. I figured he would just show the behavior I didn't know it was possible for a guppy to actually breed with a swordtail. Will the fry be sickly if they do?

[PumaWard]

Probably not. In general, they will probably be okay health wise... kind of like mules.

[Grandmastr]

well probably not, just different color variations and diffent size mostly likely will hapen

[bozco]

Oh ok. Maybe I'll just move the pinapple swordtail into my other tank and leave the red brick in with the male pinapple and leave the guppies where they are too. Maybe then my male will start to pay attention to the proper fish. Thanks guys.