Help Help Dont Know Which Fish Is Having Babies

[mandapanda080785]

dont know that anyone is up this late but hope so. my fish tank is only about 2ft from my computer and i happened to notice a pair of tiny eyes staring at me, apparently one of my fish had at least one baby just dont know who. i have 2 prego guppies one further along then the other my estimate was that one would have her babies within the week. i also have a very fat mollie, she never lost the baby weight from her last batch about a month 1/2 ago but i noticed my male mollie is really hassling her so i caught her and put her in the breeder net. i have also noticed that my female guppys are sticking close together. ive added several more spawning mops to my tank bc i have several bottom feeders.. if anyone has any tips that will help me identify the new mother it would b very greatly appreciated.

 

[zain611]

If your talking about identifying if a female gave birth is to see the size of its stomach

 

[mandapanda080785]

If your talking about identifying if a female gave birth is to see the size of its stomach

well, they all pretty much look the same as they did yesterday morning but as far as i can tell whoever it was only had 1 baby. i looked up pictures of guppy fry and molly fry and it looks more like a guppy but I cant find the baby now so its either hiding in one of the spawning mops or it became a snack(i hope its hiding). my neighbor offered me a little 5 gal tank and i'm going to use it for a preggo tank and put some of the mops in it, hopefully that will help.

 

[OldMan47]

No fish ever gave birth to just 1 fry. Not even a goodeid, which has a reputation for small drops ever gave a drop so small. I am going to differ from zain611 on your question. The only reliable way that I have found to judge a female is by shape, never by size. If a squared off female has suddenly gone to a more rounded shape, even if she is bigger than before, she is the "mother". It is not that I do not recognize the changes brought on by carrying fry, instead I focus on the changes that we can readily identify. A squarish shape is easy to identify and is an fairly reliable indicator of a female's state.

 

[LucyB]

No fish ever gave birth to just 1 fry. Not even a goodeid, which has a reputation for small drops ever gave a drop so small. I am going to differ from zain611 on your question. The only reliable way that I have found to judge a female is by shape, never by size. If a squared off female has suddenly gone to a more rounded shape, even if she is bigger than before, she is the "mother". It is not that I do not recognize the changes brought on by carrying fry, instead I focus on the changes that we can readily identify. A squarish shape is easy to identify and is an fairly reliable indicator of a female's state.

This is very true - I have a female platy who actually had fry yesterday and she never gets fat during pregnancy at all. Her belly sort of gets longer. It grows downwards rather than outwards. I can only tell when she is near a drop when her belly squares off. She also develops a very slight dark area behind her belly, but that is not always a good indicator. You just have to get to know your fish!

 

[mandapanda080785]

thanks for all the help i just separated out all my females and made my big tank the bachelor tank. i put bunches of eyelash yarn that i had made spawning mops out of in the 5 gal tank with my 3 females to try and protect the babies whenever theyre ready. one of the guppies has a very dark gravid spot but shes not as chubby as the other whos gravid spot went from black to orange but that female is definitely getting rounder.