2Nd Lot Of New Babies

Hi All

We got our 1st batch of fry (8 of) 6 weeks ago they are all thriving really well still can't make out their sex yet but getting bigger day by day really chuffed because this is our first time we have had any babies, well this morning we got up to the 2nd batch (8 of) again! is this normal that they are coming in batches of 8 or is it just coincidence that 8 are surviving each time??

Still don't know which fish is having these, as the fish that we thought would be having fry is still really fat and doesn't look like she's had any but has been looking big since before the first batch!!!!

Hope all's well x

Coincidence

Kitty Kat said:

Coincidence

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Yep just found another 2 making it 10

8 or 10 is a very small number of surviving mollies from a single drop. It is a number I would expect from a tank with either poor cover or a high number of predators. If I make an attempt to save molly fry, I expect to see somewhere around 30 fry per drop. To achieve that survival rate means that I must provide either a very good fry cover or I must move my gravid female to a separate drop tank. In this thread, I show pictures of my female molly's tank at every few days from one drop to the next. The female is left in place with her fry because I wanted to document the full cycle, not because it preserves the most fry. If I wanted to preserve the most fry, the female would have been removed as soon as she was done with her first drop.

Hi any advice would be very welcome as this is only the 2nd batch of fry i have had and have never done this before.. I went out yesterday and bought some plants for the tank that float on the top in hope that if i miss it again some might just survive in there!! I do have a problem though i have 3 females and the one that i thought was ready to drop isn't the one that i have just seen dropping this morning it is another of the females. I have a lot to learn about pregnant mollies and what i should be looking out for. I have read up on quite a bit on this site but the fish that i witnessed dropping this morning didn't look pregnant and i would never have believed it if i hadn't have seen it for myself.

On the upside of things i now have 21 fry and i am keeping an eye on things. The problem is i have 3 and i don't know who's pregnant!! confused haha

22

mollys said:

22

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Re- count 25

Can you get a shot of the tank? That would be easier to assess than a description

Hi

Here is a photo i don't know how good it will turn out though

mollys said:

Hi

Here is a photo i don't know how good it will turn out though

Click to expand...

Also a photo of the surviving fry
And one of the 6 week old fry which are in a tank of their own

That tank is bare! You want to get a large clump of Java moss and 6+ bunches/pots of undemanding plants.

Yes i know it hasn't got enough in there but i am just starting out... thanks for the advice i will go out tomorrow and buy what you have advised me to get. The 6 week olds would eat the new fry if i put them in the same tank wouldn't they?
Would you advice that i just leave the pregnant mothers to drop fry in the tank as i have said in a previous post i don't know which are pregnant because the one i suspected to have them is still big and it was another female that dropped this morning i don't want to stress the fish out really!!

Thanks

If they will fit in the mouth, they will be eaten.

I don't move females right before birth because it can stress them. If I am wanting to save all the babies, I will move the female into her own, well planted, tank well in advance.

Yes i thought so.... numbers have now gone up to 30+ O I am putting lots of plants and moss in today I think there's 2 females that have dropped as some of the fry are slightly bigger than others... got a mixed lot this time

If you have 30 fry in a small tank, it is time to sort out the living arrangements. The fry need space top grow to their potential. After I made that thread documenting my molly's drop, I moved all the fry from both drops to a 55 gallon tank, with no other fish. After about 4 months, one of the local fish clubs had an auction and I sold about 10 or 15. After another couple of months, my own fish club held an auction and I sold about 10 more. By this time the numbers were down to arou8nd 40 fry and I was able to raise what I had left, in that large tank, to adult status. That was over 3 years ago and I now have a single surviving male that I didn't end up selling. He is living in that same 55 with 5 nice African cichlids, some panda cories and a few bristle nose plecos. Tomorrow everyone in that tank gets moved to my big community tank because I need the 55 for a species maintenance tank. I am a member of the American Livebearer Association and got home from the convention today with some rather rare fish that need protection from extinction (they are presently considered threatened, not endangered, in the wild). Several of us are going to be breeding and rearing them so that a disaster in any one tank cannot wipe out the remaining aquarium population of that species. The problem the fish have in the wild has nothing to do with their reproductive capacity or even natural predation. Instead their habitat is being destroyed by human actions.
IMO some things are definitely worth doing right. When their natural water supply is gone, there will still be some surviving in people's tanks. The hope is that some day the habitat can be restored and there will still be some fish around for restocking.