How Many ?

30tooo · Oct 18, 2006

Just as a general rule of thumb , how many fry do silver mollies , swordtails , and guppies have . And also do guppies swap from being males to females .

Torrean · Oct 18, 2006

Welcome to the forums. This question is much more likely to get an informed response if you were to ask it in the beginners forum, tropical chit chat, or the best place would be the livebearers forum. I wish I could help you out but I don't know a lot about livebearers.

dabaers · Oct 18, 2006

30tooo said:
Just as a general rule of thumb , how many fry do silver mollies , swordtails , and guppies have . And also do guppies swap from being males to females .

Guppies can have from 10 to 100+ depending on care, and how many broods she's had before etc.
Mine have had 10, 27, 50 and 75+ progressively from one female over 4 months about once a month.
I don't know about mollies and swordtails, they are probably similiar just different gestation but I'm sure someone can help you with that.
And no, guppies do not swap from being males to being females.

30tooo · Oct 19, 2006

Torrean said:
Welcome to the forums. This question is much more likely to get an informed response if you were to ask it in the beginners forum, tropical chit chat, or the best place would be the livebearers forum. I wish I could help you out but I don't know a lot about livebearers.

At the moment I am still finding my round the forums and use the what I know works . Thanks though .

30tooo · Oct 19, 2006

Nice one dabaers :good:

. It is always the same . There always seems to be info about most things but never what you quite need . This forum is great . What you can't find on your own there generally is someone who knows and will pass on their knowlege . We think we had one or some swordtail babies the other day . We bought the fish on the Saturday and noticed "A" little one in the evening and the same on the Sunday morning . Unfortunately we were not witness to this event and was unprepared for it . Alass I think the poor little fellow(s) have become live food as we have found no evidence since . Shame

dwarfgourami · Oct 19, 2006

There are two issues involved here:

how many fry the mother has

how many fry she eats (or how many the other fish in the tank eat)

The unpredictability of these two together means it is very difficult to know beforehand what's going to happen in your tank.

mesapod · Oct 20, 2006

From me reading the internet and other things i know that swordtails have between 5 and 70+ fry but if you dont put them in a breeder trap or get to them fast enough you may only have a fraction of that amount.
My female had babies i didnt even know they were in the tank for like 24 hours before i got to them aand i only saved one.

rfisher · Oct 20, 2006

Hi All,

Over the course of the last three months my Male Black mollie and my silver female have had over 60 fry. The latest batch of 40 are now in the nursery tank. She had the last batch over the course of two hours, it was pretty cool to watch and lucky I guess.

Rich

mickiedee · Oct 21, 2006

My silver molly had at least 30 fry (all were put in fry tank) about a month or so ago. My dalmation molly just gave birth to 98! My kids and I had a ball catching and counting them. We saved 95 of them and added them to our baby tank. The other three died at some point in the main tank, and my kids have had "sightings" of a few more still hiding in the main tank. I have three more tanks in the process of cycling and I should be able to divide them up soon. I think I need a few more tanks! LOL