16gallontanker
Fish Fanatic
What are the chances of one or all of my mollies having babies because I heard they can save sperm for weeks from males so is it possible they get pregnant from the fish farm still?
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4 female dalmatian molly pregnancy chances
- Thread starter 16gallontanker
- Start date
Did you only get females?
How long have you had them?
Any other livebearers in the tank, like swordtails?
Yes, there's a decent chance one or all of them have been exposed to a male at the fish farm or in the store (if males are in a tank next to females, they can easily jump into the girl's tank and have the time of their lives). There's also the fact that all molly fry look like females for the first few months, so if the breeder didn't separate out the males as they matured and developed quickly enough, the young males may have already mated the females.
Because you're correct that female livebearers like mollies store sperm packets, so can produce fry for months, even up to a year or more, even without a male around if they've had a male around them at any point, and it's common for people to buy a female livebearer then be surprised when fry begin appearing even without a male in their own tank.
But it sounds as though you're aware of that and prepared.
If you can post some decent close up photos of your fish, @emeraldking is a livebearer expert, might be able to spot if any are gravid if they're far enough along. But they can also delay releasing a sperm packet until they're ready to risk becoming gravid, so if you've only just got them, or they're in very early stages, it can be hard to tell, and it'll be a "wait and see" kind of situation.
How long have you had them?
Any other livebearers in the tank, like swordtails?
Yes, there's a decent chance one or all of them have been exposed to a male at the fish farm or in the store (if males are in a tank next to females, they can easily jump into the girl's tank and have the time of their lives). There's also the fact that all molly fry look like females for the first few months, so if the breeder didn't separate out the males as they matured and developed quickly enough, the young males may have already mated the females.
Because you're correct that female livebearers like mollies store sperm packets, so can produce fry for months, even up to a year or more, even without a male around if they've had a male around them at any point, and it's common for people to buy a female livebearer then be surprised when fry begin appearing even without a male in their own tank.
But it sounds as though you're aware of that and prepared.
If you can post some decent close up photos of your fish, @emeraldking is a livebearer expert, might be able to spot if any are gravid if they're far enough along. But they can also delay releasing a sperm packet until they're ready to risk becoming gravid, so if you've only just got them, or they're in very early stages, it can be hard to tell, and it'll be a "wait and see" kind of situation.
Quite often a well shaped or well fed female molly may look as if she's pregnant while not. A lot of female mollies won't even show a gravid spot because of a high density of color cells (chromatophores) at the spot where usually the gravid spot supposed to be. But as AdoraBelle Dearheart has already requested for, a close up photo from the side could say more...
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16gallontanker
Fish Fanatic
Nice molly!
She's certainly not heavily gravid yet, but that doesn't mean she doesn't have sperm packets saved.
Do you have any male mollies? Are you hoping for fry, or hoping to avoid them? Because if you're hoping to avoid, better to stick to just males.
She's certainly not heavily gravid yet, but that doesn't mean she doesn't have sperm packets saved.
Do you have any male mollies? Are you hoping for fry, or hoping to avoid them? Because if you're hoping to avoid, better to stick to just males.
Hello. Males and females are generally kept together, so females are pregnant as soon as they're physically able. That's why you never buy males. I've found them more expensive and when the females have the fry, you'll get a fair number of males. Mollies are a bit challenging, because they need their water near nitrogen free if they're going to reproduce. This fish can present a problem for anyone with a small tank. The water chemistry in a small tank can change more quickly than water in a much larger one. If you want to have a high number of fry that survive, you'll need to change out a lot of water and do it frequently.
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OP
16gallontanker
Fish Fanatic
I'm hoping for no babies but I think I probably will get some
Do you have any males?
As a rule of thumb with livebearers, if you don't want fry, stick to males only, simply because the females so often arrive in the store/your tank "pre-loaded". But you never know, you might be lucky and find that none of your four have been near a male and the breeder separated the sexes from their batch of fry before any females were mated.
If you've only just bought them, you might be able to return them and swap for males.
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