How old do mollies need to be in order to breed?

I'm working on breeding a few balloon molly lines, and I don't think my "fry" (they're a ways past that stage, but not full grown) are quite ready yet. I'm curious to know how long I may be twiddling my thumbs before I can expect my "fry" to have fry.

This post has been edited by SnBMeg: Jul 13 2007, 06:39 PM

I looked everywhere on the internet and I can't find it! This is going to bother me. I'm going to look on another search engine.

about 9 -12 months depending on the type of molly, as ive never breed balloon mollies before dont know which end of the scale they breed at

That's the same quandary I've been in. Really, there's so little info online about mollies (except for cooking them ), compared to other species of fish, especially considering how popular they are!


Thanks, kewskills! Hmm, seems I still have at least...5 months. ...... Guess I won't get too excited just yet, in that case.

Many places say around 6 months is when the mollies finally become mature and ready to breed.

Sorry for dragging up an old thread, but my "fry" had fry! And the answer to the big question is:

About 4 1/2 months, from birth of 1st generation to birth of 2nd.

For females, anyway. The new fry look to be calicos, so their mother is that age, while their father is an unknown amount older.

I found 12 fry this morning, but the male was really getting up one female's rump, so it's possible that there could be more later. Coincidentally, just a few days ago I added some very small potted plants to the tank, but, unfortunately, they really don't provide much cover at all, so it's likely that I already lost fry to hungry semi-adults. I also found that the tank dividers I installed are not nearly as fry-proof as I had hoped--the fry can easily swim between the divider edges and the tank sides, and so get into other occupied areas of the tank, which makes it harder to definitively id the parents (though I'm fairly sure in this case)--so I'll be making some modifications to them in the near future.


In a little tupperware for counting and inspection.


The lighter colored ones--in this pic, the one on the far left and the two next to each other on the far right--show hints of orange, black, and white, marking this spawn as calico. The darker fry could turn out to also be calicos, or could be dalmations.

I don't have any recent photos of their mother, but here's one of their father from the day I bought him: