Breeding Molly Fish

[Austin.brehun]

Hello, i recently went to the LPS around the corner. I wantto start breeding some molly fish. I have a 10g with 2 Female Mollys. (Black molly, orange colored molly) and 1 male (dalmation molly). In a tank nicely set up like this, how long do you think it will take before a female will lay her fry?

And is there any tips to help speed up the mating process?

Thank you.

 

[Reaper216]

Im going to follow along with this. I have 3 of my 6 female mollys i suspect to be pregnant but dont know when they will start to give birth.

 

[wildroseofky]

It takes around 30 days for a Mollie to give birth. The ten gallon is too small for mollies though. I started out with one but quickly realized I would need a bigger tank. You need at least a 20 long to have enough room for two mollies. They get up to 4 inches long when grown. Plus the fry it will put a big strain on a ten gallon tank. If you have a male than they will breed immediately. You need two females for each male or the male will cause the only girl to die from stress. They are relentless breeders.

You can tell they will give birth soon by how square they get. They will look like a box when they are getting close to the end of their pregnancy. The female will also start to rest on the sand more. Mine have even dug out a place in the sand to sleep when they got close to delivering. Make sure you keep the adults well fed or they will eat their young. Some still eat the fry. Make sure you have lots of hiding places that the adults cannot get into.