Female fry?

[platyperson]

All my platy fry appear to be females! Do they change sex?

 

[longhorn13]

check my swordtail topic--my 8-9 month old swortail fry, which i thought was a female, now appears to be becoming a male. i guess some take a while to develop.

although, i had about 30 molly fry who are 10 months old and they all turned out to be females.

 

[platyperson]

Oh! thanks

 

[vidiots]

They all look female at first. You'll be able to tell them apart at 3-6months of age. Keep in mind that the fast maturing ones can be sexually mature at 4 months, and the slower maturing ones will take about 6 months. I have read that the slower maturing ones start out smaller and growing slower than the fast maturing ones, but that by 1yr old the slow maturing males will often be larger than the fast maturing males. I dunno if this is the same for the females.

I have also heard of Livebearers changing sex. I don't know for sure if this happens naturally, but do know that this can be done diliberately artificially by adding hormones to the water. I have also purchased platies that I beleived to be sexually mature females only a couple months later to find out they were males. I don't know if this was an example of natural sex change or just late male maturing.