Pregnant Molly, I think?

[Tinnybear]

I'm completely new to the fish aquarium world, but LOVING IT so far. That being said, I had no idea one of my Molly's was pregnant and it broke my kids hearts along with mine that we saw babies one moment and the next, they were gone. I started researching and now feel a little more prepared but this Molly isn't delivering. Is there something I'm doing wrong?

 

[Fishobsessed7]

Is it a balloon or standard

 

[BBradbury]

Your Molly

Hello Tinny...

You need to prepare the tank for the fry. Livebearers require heavily planted surface areas for their fry. As soon as the fry are born they swim to the surface for a breath of air. If the surface is heavily planted, they're very likely to survive. If not, they become lunch for an adult. Hornwort is likely the best surface plant. The more single stems you drop into the tank, the higher the fry survival rate.

I keep large, heavily planted tanks of mostly Fancy Guppies and Platys, also fish that give birth to live young. When I see fry in the tank, I start to feed all my fish a little more and a little more often. Well fed adult livebearing fish are less likely to be interested in the fry.

B

 

[Angela1108]

Sometimes moving them into another tank or a box like that stresses them really bad and can make them hold the babies or drop them too soon

I second the poster who said add lots of extra coverage/plants. We go heavily planted and hope for the best with our fry


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[Tinnybear]

Thank you. I have added several plants, but will go back to the store and buy more. She does seem upset and I have been feeling terrible for keeping her in "the box". She is a balloon belly Molly but I can see the dark spots in her belly. I will release her and see what happens. Fingers crossed.


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[Tinnybear]

I'm so sad to say, that where I woke up this morning, I guess the Molly had delivered her babies and they are nowhere to be found. I also had THREE Molly's dead!! One male and two females. I have no idea what happened to any of them. I did at least a 30% water change and hoping for the best. I'm so sad. Maybe I didn't do the right thing by putting her back in the tank.


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[Angela1108]

Sometimes fry hide in rocks and plants. So they might be hiding. We had some that had burrowed themselves into the gravel and made an appearance a day or so later

If 3 died overnight though it makes me think something happened to the water. If the water had something wrong she might have aborted them.




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[Tinnybear]

I had just cleaned the water though just about four days ago. I don't know. I put the test strip in but haven't checked it as I was in a hurry to do a water change just in case.


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[Angela1108]

The test strips are actually not very accurate. Sometimes they miss stuff


And if you cleaned a lot you might have taken out too muchh good bacteria and had a mini cycle. It happens

And dead plant matter can trigger a cycle too. I've had just about everything bad happen to me at one point or another


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