Fish Are Being Bullied!

[turnnidge]

Hi all,

I think I have a few terrorists in my tank! I have a 2 male mollies always chasing after one of the females! It is never left alone the are always rubbing up against her. Any ideas on what I can do?

Also I have a 12 male guppies and over the past few days I have noticed that there lovely big tail fins are like being nipped although I have not actually seen any fish attacking them, could this be fin rot??

Thanks for any replies!

 

[Colin_T]

the male mollies are trying to breed with the female. They do that a lot. You are better off moving either the males or female into another tank.

Fin rot is commonly caused by poor water quality allowing bacteria to get in and destroy the fins. The guppy tails sound like damage caused by one of the other fish. It is probably the male mollies or another fish in the tank.
What else is in the tank besides mollies and guppies?

 

[turnnidge]

2 cories
2 male sailfin mollies
2 female sailfin mollies
2 female balloon mollies
1 male balloon mollie
2 clown loaches
6 threadfin tetras
6 emporer tetras
12 male guppies

I dont have another tank though to separate them

 

[Colin_T]

not sure what a threadfin tetra is but the other fish shouldn't be causing any problems to the guppies.

With livebearers (mollies, guppies, etc) you are best keeping 1 male and a group of females. If you want colour then just keep males. If you want to breed them then keep females and have a male preferably in his own tank.
If you add a heap of floating plants to the tank it will provide more cover for the female and the guppies and should help reduce the stress to them.

The other option is to get rid of the males or the females. Contact your LFS and see if they will take them back for some credit. You cna use the credit to buy some plants or something else.

 

[turnnidge]

Hi Colin,

I have quite a high planted tank, however I am interested in floating plants as that may help, is there a small lily like plant that can go in a tank, even better if there are ones that will flower!

 

[Colin_T]

Hydrocotle, Cardamine, banana lilly leaves, Lotus have lilly type leaves. The lotus and banana lily get bigger than the others.
Water Sprite is a good plant too but doesn't look like a water lilly.