I Ain’t Got No Type, Healthy Fish is the only thing that I like: Male Guppy Preference on the Health of the Female guppy

Abstract

Guppies (Poecilia reticulata) have different ways of expressing behaviors and preferences towards mates, or females. They use different mating strategies and behaviors such as the Sigmoid Curve and biting the female to get a mate. We decided to study whether a male guppy will prefer a “healthy” guppy over a “sick” guppy. We made two orange 3D-printed models of female guppies to test with the male guppies. On one of the models, we added a white mass to the side of it to make it look like fungus and show it is “sick.” We observed the time spent on either side of the tank where the female models were located and also observed how many courtship behaviors were displayed towards the guppy models.