Molly/platy breeding - Aquarium Advice

supagran · 01-19-2008, 07:46 PM

I have a tank with several different types of fish but I think I may have a problem. I have two female platys, one male molly and two female mollies. It looks as if one of my platys is pregnant but the only culprit large enough is the molly. Can anyone tell me if this is likely or, indeed, possible.

**Zagz** · 01-19-2008, 07:56 PM

It is possible. Livebearer's will cross breed. How long ago did you get the platy? Livebearer's store sperm so the platy could have been pregnant before you got her. They can have mulitple births from one male several months after being housed with males.

Mystical473a · 01-19-2008, 09:54 PM

I know platy and swordtail hybrids but a molly and platy? not that I know of but I guess its possible. The offspring is most likely sterile.

supagran · 01-20-2008, 04:14 AM

Thanks for your replies. The platy duo that I have were given to me as very young fry, we did not know if they were male or female, so I guess that they were too young to have mated. If she is pregnant, the offspring should be interesting.

theotheragentm · 01-20-2008, 08:13 PM

Platies and Mollies cannot cross breed. Platies and Swordtails can cross. Endlers, Mollies, and Guppies can cross. A Guppy and Molly cross is normally unable to reproduce.

Most likely the Platy is storing sperm. After mating, the livebearers can give birth on average of 6 times, once a month. I started out that way too with all female fish and fry on the second day I had my fish.

**Zagz** · 01-21-2008, 07:15 PM

After doing quite a bit of research, the general consensus is that anything is possible but there is no proof of mollies and platy's crossbreeding.
If she is indeed pregnant it will be very interesting. You must let uys know if she does end up having fry.

mossmouse · 11-19-2008, 01:31 PM

I know this is an older post, I found it on google since I was searching the very same question. I have a male hi-fin molly and a female platy that do breed. They have been all alone in the same 10 gallon tank for 3+ years and I recently moved them into my 55 gallon with giant danios, serpae tetras, black tetras, and pictus cats. So far none of the offspring have survived though. I'm going to get a breeding net and see what happens as now I'm curious.

mike47517 · 11-21-2008, 07:55 PM

Good luck. I just bred my mollies yesterday and she had about 40 or so babies. So far i hhave had no deaths except the couple that were eaaten before i saw that she was giving birth.

tkweldon · 01-06-2009, 01:37 PM

I have a (small to med sized) irridescent gold mollie male that has shared a tank with 3 female gold crescent platys and 2 white lyretail females for the past 6 months. During a recent water change I discovered platy fry and separated the babies from the adults. One platy and one lyretail died within 2 days but the 23 babies and other adults are doing fine.

Since early this year, I've set up several tanks (ranging from 16-38 gal) and had 3-4 mollie baby batches. The female platys were purchased 7-8 months ago and this is my first platy fry batch so is its possible they've cross-bred?

luvanythingthatswims · 01-10-2009, 07:26 PM

It is very possible that they could cross-breed. My female platy and one of my 2 male dalmation mollies have bred and I now have 3 what i call pollies swimming around! (the rest I suspected were eaten before I noticed them, because they were so small when I first discovered them!)

One is a cream colour with red fins, one is a peach colour, and one is the orange colour of a platy, all three have spots like dalmation mollies, and their tails are a cross between a platy's and a molly's!