New Member

Posts: 2
From:england
Registered: Mar 2004

posted 03-07-2004 02:06 PM         

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Hi All, need some help! We have a male and female and the male keeps trying to hurt or what seems to be fighting the female, is this normal?? When the male goes for her she gets all stressed and tries to hide at the bottom of the tank, this seems to happen at feeding time???? We've also got white mollies of which we think one of them is having babies, what will happen when she gives birth? PLEASE HELP!!!!!!

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Member

Posts: 104
From:Austin, TX
Registered: Jan 2004

posted 03-07-2004 02:37 PM         

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The male is probably trying to mate with the female. They can be pretty relentless in their pursuit but the female is in no danger. Typical behavior (at least in my mollies) is that the male will "sniff" around the females anal fin and then get beside her and try to touch his gonopodium (livebearer male sex organ) to her gravid patch (opening to livebearer female sex organ) located near her anal fin. When he does this, he fertilizes the eggs she carries inside her and she should give birth to 10-30 fry in about 30 days. I use a breeding trap for my mollies to give birth. This is a small plastic box with grated separater in the bottom that allows the fry to fall into a separate chamber so the mother doesn't eat them. They are available at just about any fish store. You can release the fry into the general population about 5 days after the yolk sack has been absorbed as they will then be fast enough to elude capture by the larger fish. Good luck. My experience is that once they start breeding, you'll get a new batch every 30 days and soon you will have more fish than you know what to do with.

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New Member

Posts: 2
From:england
Registered: Mar 2004

posted 03-10-2004 05:15 AM         

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Hey there, Thank you so much for your advise. We have the babies now....they are so tiny!!! any way, we have managed to keep 6! Last saturday we brought two black mollies as you know but we had to take the male back cos the female just was not eating she was always stressed so we got another female. Now the female that we had problems is now doing the same to the new female as the male was doing to her...stopping her from eating. How can stop this or is this normal?

Thanks

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Member

Posts: 104
From:Austin, TX
Registered: Jan 2004

posted 03-10-2004 05:58 PM         

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I have never kept just two mollies. Are you absolutely sure that your new fis is a female? Do you know how to sex mollies. Don't count on the LFS employees to be right. We did that and wound up with five males and one female. If you're sure you have two females now, you might consider getting another male/female pair. This would give you a 3:1 ratio female to male which most fish experts say is good. The male will divide his attentions between the three females and then everyone can get a chance to eat. Be prepared for lots of fry with this setup. Female mollies give birth about every 30 days. I have 1 female mollie and she has given me over 50 fry (I use them as feeders for my cichlid tank) in the last three months and is due again any day now.

good luck

[This message has been edited by LeeTron (edited 03-10-2004).]

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