molly fry question

[Jaybird]

I've had mollies for a while now, but this is the first time I have had some survive! They usually just end up as tasty snacks.

I have five that are now about 5-7cm long. How large will they need to be before you can sex them. I don't want any inbreeding here

 

[lmw80]

Not sure how old they have to be, but I know with my guppies I can start to see the gravid spot on the females with in 2-3 weeks

 

[Zagz]

I am usually able to sex mollies by their fins in about 3 weeks or so.

 

[Jaybird]

Thanks, guys.

These all look female, so I wasn't sure as to when you would be able to tell. These five have survived long enough that they won't fit into the bolivan's nor the other female mollies' mouths.

 

[Puriti]

Usually when I have molly fry I usually find that it's not the mollies that eat them as much as...every other fish I own does lol. The mollies I have usually only eat a few of them if any cuz I've kept the mothers and babies together before and it's usually my bettas and gourami that eat them not the mollies.

 

[studmaster]

It's tough to sex mollies and sometimes they can change their sex. A lot of people disagree with me here, but I have bought an adult femail silver sailfin molly, a month later I had a male molly in my tank chasing after the females with his gonopodium going nuts. I watch my tanks closely and would notice it if it happened before. It was extremly weird but it did happen.

It takes a few months (3-4) before I can usually sex my mollies and I think it depends on how fast they grow and what you feed them. I feed my Baby Brine Shrimp and they grow twice as fast and you can sex them eariler.

 

[Jaybird]

I have them in with some bolivians and two female mollies. They are too big now for the bolivians to eat.

I would try feeding them baby brine shrimp, but the bolivians would get there first.

Guess I will have to wait to sex them when they are larger. Between the five, they go from nearly all black (except for a little white on the belly) to a honey/golden colour. I'm really interested to see what colours they develop as they grow.

 

[studmaster]

The colouring of the fry sound exactly the same as mine. I have a few pure black fry and some a golden brown colour. The mother was a black molly and the father was either an orange sailfin or a silver sailfin. It should be interesting to see how they turn out.

 

[Jaybird]

Well, they are now about 1-1.5cm long and I can finally tell the sexes. I have two males and three females.

The colourations are the only reason I separated them. I wanted to see how they would turn out, and it seems like I have a whole United Nations of colours

I don't know if I will keep them, but we'll see. Maybe the lfs will want some.