Any idea roughly how long left??

[paulbrear]

My mickey mouse platy is pregnant and she is looking more square like now. I am a newbie to fishkeeping so just wondering if anyone knew roughly when we could expect fry?
We have had her 4 weeks today.

 

[DreD]

Expect some fry this week. Possibly up until next week. If you want the babies to survivor you're gonna need a either a net breeder or separate tank for the fry or else they'll get eaten, attacked, or sucked into the filter. Most likely you won't be able to keep all the babies unless you have a large enough tank to support them.

 

[paulbrear]

Thank you for your advice

 

[DreD]

So any fry yet? My mollies are gonna pop soon!

 

[paulbrear]

unfortunatley still nothing, she has a red/pink tinge around the rear or her belly, she is still eating and swimming around happily !!

 

[paulbrear]

Yay we have spotted 2 fry tonight so dont know whether she has started tonight and more to come or whether she has had some and they been hiding/gotten eaten etc

 

[Tim Wheatley]

Livebearers can be giving birth for up to 3 days I read from first fry to last.

 

[DreD]

Did you separate the fry?

 

[DreD]

My Mollie gave birth today! she had possibly more than 10 fry. I fished out 8 one of them died but i think there is still some hiding in the gravel (black mollies and black gravel...bad idea). I thought the dalmation would have hers first, but I guess not. Luckily the fry hid in the gravel cause only the dalmation is in the net. I think the black still might be pregnant though cause her belly is still kinda big. I expect to have some dalmation fry soon! C:

 

[Tim Wheatley]

Great.

Just wanted you to know it's fairly normal to get some deaths and the occasional deformity, especially on a first time mother. It can actually be possible to lose the mother during the birthing process too.

 

[paulbrear]

No we didnt separate the fry yet, gunna let nature take its course as we have nowhere to put them as we only have a small tank anyway, if we get a few survivors, we have a few friends who have tanks.
Still only have 2 at the moment but is is still fat!
Yay congrats on molly fry

 

[paulbrear]

so a quick update!!! one preggo platy has so far had (that we know of) 3 fry, as we managed to see one on wed pm then we have found one more thurs am then tonite fri pm we found the third !! in the mean time on wed after testing the water and finding all was cycled, we went out and bought two more micky mouse platy's and a bristle nose plec (cute lil thing) all is good so far we've got everything crossed and keeping an eye on fishy behavior