Is my Red Swordtail pregnant help

[adz]

Im a newby when it comes to fish. i have had it for just over 6 months.. I bought these fish about 3 weeks ago and today i noticed the stomach was swollen and i think she is pregnant. I have read about looking for a dark spot on the body, and a 'square' shaped body. I cant see any of these things. Is there any signs i need to look out for before delivery? Should i separate her into the breeding container now or later?

Please refer to my link below. Thanks

YouTube - Red swordtail fish ? is she pregnant

 

[Floyd R Turbo]

If it looks like she has a 'chin' then she's pregnant. If she's been around a male at all, she's pregnant. It's a pretty good bet she's pregnant.

I have a pineapple female and her eggs are always clear, not dark, so there's no gravid spot like you see on guppies. After mine drops, you can see the eyes on the next batch about 2 weeks later. She dropped her first batch on 3/31 and has every 28 days since then. I've given away over 350 fry and have 50 more from the last drop.

If you want to try and keep the fry, you probably want to set up a separate tank, like a 10g, and buy a sponge filter and run it in your current tank for a few weeks to build up a bacteria colony, then fill up your 10 and transfer the sponge, that will speed up your cycle. Bare tank, heater, sponge filter, light, that's all you need.

Or you could just let her drop in the main tank and see if any get eaten, some fish will leave them alone, just give them cover, buy some hornwort and let it float at the top so they can hide until they're smart enough to race away from the bigger fish.

I wouldn't get a breeder box, waste of $ IMHO the fry are going to get eaten when they drop through anyways, and it's stressful on mama. The only thing those are good for is using in a separate tank where the mama is cannibalistic and turns around an eats the newly dropped fry immediately, and you won't be able to predict that behavior.

Hope this helps. I've got lots of experience w/sword/molly/guppy/platy fry so ask away.

 

[mgamer20o0]

more impressed if it wasnt prego. most livebares people get come fertilized. since oyu have a male in there the chance is almost 100%.

 

[adz]

when its about the deliver, does the stomach look really big? We just want to know when its a good time to move the mother to another tank. When its about to deliver, does it hide or does it stay at the bottom of the tank in a stable position?

 

[johnny_zanni]

she doesnt look that far along probly wont drop for another 2-3 weeks. when in labour they are usually at the bottom breathing very heavily and as you already know they will be pretty boxed shape. dont move her till he is about to have them (within a couple hours) or as shes having them. if you move her to soon she will just abort the fry by having them prematurly but at least if shes about to have them anyway the fry will be healthy enough to survive.

 

[Floyd R Turbo]

I have had no problem moving any of my pregnant females about 4 or 5 days ahead, as long as you acclimate them properly. Last time my swordtail dropped, I moved her about 2 days before and she dropped 80 dead fry and 50 live ones. If in doubt, I'd say move her ASAP. It's pretty hard to know when she's going to drop unless you know when she dropped last. It's just one of those things you have to do trial and error. You'll have more than your tank can handle before you know it.

 

[always10791]

Ok, I'm new to this site. I found it by googling about pregnant swordtails. I have a red swordtail one male and one female. The females stomach seems to be getting a lil bit bigger and i was wondering if she was pregnant. i bought a breeding box but then found out that they are bad for the fish and really stress them out so i took her out of it. I have a few questions

first: I have 3 tetras and i was wondering if they specifically eat fry. I had a fry before and they ate'm w/in like 1 hr. and he was somewhat big too.

second: her stomach is a lil big but not square or nething. what do u guys think from your past experiences. I don't see any type of dark spot. i'm going to upload some pics of her later.

now i know her and male have mated because like the day i bought her (i had already had the male for like a month) he got "excited" and they were like unseperatable.

so what do u guys think i should do w/ her? i don't have another tank i can put her in and i think i'm so inexperienced w/ stuff like that if i bought one and put her in it i'd prolly kill the fry and her...

 

[Floyd R Turbo]

If you do what I did, and start up a 10g tank for just her & the fry with a sponge filter, heater and light, you'll just end up with a ton of fish to give away. If you get a large super fine net, then you could net the fry and just let that hang in the tank (open on top) and let them grow for a month or so and release them into the tank. It all depends on how big your other fish are (and how hungry). Or you could just save a couple, or just let them get eaten and maybe a few will survive. Give them lots and lots of cover with some live plants, Hornwort is a great one, just get a lot of it.

 

[always10791]

If you do what I did, and start up a 10g tank for just her & the fry with a sponge filter, heater and light, you'll just end up with a ton of fish to give away. If you get a large super fine net, then you could net the fry and just let that hang in the tank (open on top) and let them grow for a month or so and release them into the tank. It all depends on how big your other fish are (and how hungry). Or you could just save a couple, or just let them get eaten and maybe a few will survive. Give them lots and lots of cover with some live plants, Hornwort is a great one, just get a lot of it.

but i'm worried about moving her. i'm thinking about just getting alot of plants and letting her have'm in there but i dont know about it considering i have tetras in the tank and like i said before, i had a fry and those 3 tetra did nothing but chase it and eat it. the other fish left it alone cuz it was resonable size, but not the tetras! no they had to eat the dude.


my female swordtail looks like the dudes yellow one in the above movie.

 

[Floyd R Turbo]

Moving her isn't the big deal, it's having a cycled separate tank. As long as the water conditions are matched (pH, temp) moving is fine. You could even setup up a tank using water from your tank and a sponge filter, then do PWCs every other day and use the water from your tank (so you don't have to condition it, and do as much as you want) to offset the cycling problem, seed the tank with gravel or filter media from your established tank, etc. You could also get a tank separator but the holes will be small enough for the fry to get through, you could cover it with a fine mesh net so it would be like 2 separate tanks in one.

 

[Samuel-Bennett]

I've got a breeding box in my tank, I took out the separater so it was bigger. I let my fish give birth in the tank then I catch them and put them in the breeding box.

Is that ok for the fry? I assume it is, I got some swordtails, guppies and mollies in there at the minute, I'm waiting for them to grow big enough to release, I eventually want to get a seperate tank for them though.

I didn't even know my Molly or Swordtails were pregnant, they didn't look like it, I thought all livebearers had the black spot, obviously not lol.

I've got one at the minute and she seems really fat to me, bigger than any others I've had, I can see a light patch where the gravid spot would be, it's not as dark as on a guppy though. Does it mean when she's ready to drop that'll go darker or will she just drop without me knowing?

Sorry for hijacking the topic