Livebearer Selection

[CcJ23]

I have had a tank up for about a year now with guppies. I had almost no problems at all with them until recently, when I added 2 females that I think completely infected my tank. Needless to say, from all those fish and fry that I had hand selected and kept over the past year, are all dead except for 3. A nice male, a young female, and a large fry. All are in poor condition and I expect them to die within a day or two.
I am getting some Sachem Stability tonight and I'm going to add that to my 10 gallon and 20 gallon tanks to boost the bacteria. From what i've heard, with the addition of this, a tank can be cycled in a day or two? From there I want to get some more livebearers but I'm not sure what to get. I could get more guppy's but after this batch of bad luck I'm a little partial. I'm more interested in either molly's or swordtails. I could get platy's but I've always been more interested in the other two.
So hears where is goes out to you! Molly's or Swordtails? The 20 will be the breeding/ adult tank the 10 gllon will be the fry tank. I have some molly's in my 55 and they are cool fish. I heard swordtails take a long time to grow out/ reach maturity. Besides that, the swordtails around here aren't very colorful and I'm not confident enough in my tanks to order online. Eventually I think I might get some RREA swords, but I'm up in the air right now.
I've got another question about what will be my fry tank. I completely drained it today and took out all the gravel and the carbon in the filter. I cleaned it and put in new CLEAN water. I know the 100% change is a bad idea but that tank was nasy from all the dying guppies that were in it. They all died within a matter of a few weeks and I couldn't keep up with removing them, especially with all the plants that were in there. Now I'm afraid of putting the same gravel back in there. Would it be ok for future fry to not have any gravel in there at all? If not, I will figure something out.
THANKS FOR ANY ADVICE!!!!

 

[librarygirl]

So your 20 gal has been set up for a year and then the fish got sick? It should be cycled by now, I don't see the need for a bacteria starter (which most times don't work anyway). Have you tested the water lately? What are the parameters (ammonia, etc)? That will tell you if the tank is cycled and whether something is going on in the water that shouldn't be (ammonia, etc).

Do you know what killed the fish? What's wrong with them? Maybe the remaining 3 can be saved if you can treat whatever it is that they have. I wouldn't add any more fish yet, not until you know the tank is stable and is free of disease.

 

[CcJ23]

So your 20 gal has been set up for a year and then the fish got sick? It should be cycled by now, I don't see the need for a bacteria starter (which most times don't work anyway). Have you tested the water lately? What are the parameters (ammonia, etc)? That will tell you if the tank is cycled and whether something is going on in the water that shouldn't be (ammonia, etc).

Do you know what killed the fish? What's wrong with them? Maybe the remaining 3 can be saved if you can treat whatever it is that they have. I wouldn't add any more fish yet, not until you know the tank is stable and is free of disease.

No the 10 gallon was up for a year. I got the Bacteria additive and put that in. I just got the 20 gallon a week ago and began cycling it. My water parameters were pretty good and after a few water changes were up to snuff. While at the Petsmart where I got the fish ( I went there to get the bacteria stuff) I evaluated the tanks I am almost positive that the infection came from a group of fish I purchased from there. It really surprised me because they have a few fish specialist who really know a lot about fish! And they actually care. They always ask for your tank size, what its stocked with, and they tell you what will or will not work.
I'm thinking maybe they have more time off for the holidays and some of the inexperienced people may be working instead. Anyways, I tried treating the fish for fungal infections and even with an ick medication, even though I knew it wasn't ick and no results. If anything, they died faster. I think whatever it actually is, may be one of those diseases where once they get it, there's not saving them.

 

[CcJ23]

*bump. Anyone with any input on the two species?

 

[TidBitz]

*bump. Anyone with any input on the two species?

They are pretty much the same fish just changed the genes to look different that's it: I personally had molly and platy, I liked the platy because of the colors (sunburst wag being my favorite), It is your personal preference as to what you want, both breed like rabbits and will eat their babies. But are hardy my male sunburst got caught during a transfer and pinched half of his belly, healed up within a week with no problems.

 

[Pipedreamer86]

I'm not usually into livebearers, but if i were going to give it a shot id definitely do mollies. I think they are interesting, and enjoy the color variations.