Can Guppies thrive in salt water?

[Hebily]

More Craigslist joy! I'm searching for a 20-30 gal tank for breeding feeder guppies. Looking through Craigslist, I find a 20 gal with stand for $30. Figure it's a little high, but they'll prolly settle for 25. I send the email asking for more info. They reply including this about the 'included fish' -

4. type of fish-guppies, salt water fishes...sea salt included

Now, I've heard that mollys can thrive is saltwater, so I wonder if it's possible for these fish to be doing well. (or if the owner means aquarium salt)

Also, if these fish are being kept in a marine environment, how would I go about acclimating them to fresh?

Would it be the same, despite the type of salt? Just do very, very small water changes every day for several weeks? Or should I do normal (+ salt)waterchanges, with slightly less salt each time?

[paperdragon]

I don't know about acclimating them back to freshwater, but I have heard of experiments involving keeping guppies in marine tanks - supposedly they can still breed in high salt concentrations. I very much doubt that it would be good for them though. I also wonder if the fish in the ad really are guppies and not some kind of goby or something - people get all kinds of fish names completely mixed up on craigslist. lol

[Hebily]

Yeah... I'll know for sure tonight... for now it's all a guess...

[vampie]

I know wild Guppies can do okay in salt, feeders possibly, fancies not so much.. I would assume the owner was using aquarium salt, it'd be a waste to breed feeder Guppies in salt. Perhaps you should email the seller a second time to be sure?

[Hebily]

Worst case, I have some needlessly dead guppies, and a tank that needs cleaning... I'd like to save them, if possible... mostly I wanted to find out if what she said is even possible, and how to attempt to reacclimate them if it is. I figure she prolly means aquarium salt...

[jasonmemo]

yes they can

[Lycanthropic]

I think guppies do best in brackish. I had quite a few... and they did horrible in freshwater... they were always contracting something. In brackish, one of mine died of old age and the other had to be euthanized due to dropsy. I had 5 more who lived happy lives.

[Hebily]

So, she did mean aquarium salt ( can we move this to the freshwater noob section, please?)... I have the tank set up (kinda) now... it came with three fish, and two inches of water. What is my best course of action for acclimation? I can't filter two inches of water. I want them to wind up in freshwater w/o aq salt. Should I just run a standard drip of conditioned unsalted tap? Should I acclimate them to my water (salted) and then acclimate to unsalted? Or should I just leave it unfiltered for a few days while I do an unsalted slow drip?

[Hebily]

Soooo, the guppies that came in the tank.....

one yellow, one blue with a red tale, and one that looks just like a long fin zebra danio.

[huffmagx]

Before I added Briggs to my guppy tank I used to routinely add salt to the water. I think my guppies were healthier with a slight salinity to the tank but I am talking a couple of tablespoons to a 55 gal here not full saltwater.
I am not sure about full saltwater acclimation or if they can survive like that , if your goal is getting them back to fresh ( with 0 salt) I'd try to determine the salinity of the water they are currently in if it is not very saline then I'd take my chances and drip acclimate them slowly to fresh with an airstone in the tank until you can get the filtration going.

If it is very saline .... I don't have any first hand experience with keeping them in salt water but they have a doohickey ( technical term when I can't remember the name of something - sorry ) to check the salinity of water perhaps you could mix some salt water solution and "step" them down slowly over time. Might take a while, hopefully someone with some salt water experience can help out here.

[Hebily]

That's the thing... it's aquarium salt... not marine salt. If it were marine salt, I would definately need to do a step down type acclimation. I've heard of people that get done treating ich, and remove the aquarium salt as quickly as possible... until I get further guidance, I am taking what I believe to be the safest course. Since I do not know the concentration of salt that the previous owner used, but I do know that she thought it was marine salt, I am going to assume that she followed the directions. This puts the dose at 1 rounded tbsn per 5 gal. Since my bucket is 2.5 gal, I am adding 1/2 flat tbsn per bucket (slightly less than directions) and dripping. After it's full, I will go a little less with every water change, until I am adding unsalted water. If anyone sees a problem with this, or believes it completely uneccessary, please let me know.

[excuzzzeme]

Guppies can withstand salinity 150% greater than what is in the oceans. This means marine salt - not table salt, not aquarium salt, not kosher salt.

You cannot drop them in and expect them to survive but must be acclimated slowly - a peroid of several weeks.