I'm about to have black swordtail babies!

[Polardbear]

I think Nicky and Lucy have gotten into a contest to see who can hold out longest. They seemed to be squabbling this morning over who got the planted corner. So to ease the tension I moved all the teenagers I could catch to the 75 gallon and expanded the planted corner. The 55 gallon maternity ward now holds Donovan and Terrel (the fathers to be), Lucy, Nicky and Meri. Apparently Meri has decided to join in the game of who can hold them the longest. All 3 ladies have claimed their own little section of the planted end and are sitting in that classic swordtail pose that so clearly says "I'm fat, I don't feel good, go away and leave me alone". Donovan and Terrel are standing guard anxiously awaiting the birth of their fry. Well, actually, they are probably waiting for the girlfriends to resume their normal sunny dispositions and stop blaming them for their conditions.

Here is a picture of the newly expanded maternity wing in the 55 gallon.

And a picture of Terrel anxiously waiting for his Nicky to come out -

I would have updated this with pictures of the 3 mothers to be, but I did such a good job stuffing plants in there, I can't find them!

 

[WILDER]

I like reading your thread you make us all feel involved.

 

[Polardbear]

Nicky and Lucy are still battling it out to see who can hold those babies in the longest. Meri, on the other hand, decided to be a good little girl and take care of business. She quietly disappeared into the bushes this afternoon and came out several hours later with her girlish figure back. Donovan was quite happy to see her and has been happily frolicking with her since her reappearance. Can't tell how many she had yet though as they are laying low in the forest and I certainly don't want to upset Nicky and Lucy.

Meri is a good fish, Meri was rewarded for her good behavior with a nice portion of frozen bloodworms. (Are you listening Nicky and Lucy?) I can't wait to see what color babies she gives me this time. Meri produces some very interesting color variations. She is your basic bright yellow marigold wag, her last 2 batches of babies were fathered by Huey (deceased) who was a very handsome red neon. So far all of her babies are an interesting combination of their colors, they are a reddish orange on top that changes to yellow on their lower halves and then fades to white on the belly. All have been wags. I'm not sure who the father is of this months batch, she may be still working on stored sperm from Huey or they might be Donovans. Here is one of her 2 month old babies -

Hopefully her future babies will be fathered by Donovan a hi fin marigold wag -

Also making his first public appearance today is the last of the Spotty kids (Spotty passed away 2 weeks ago). This little fellow has been eluding capture in the 55 gallon and is now about a month old. Hopefully he'll start growing a little faster now that he's venturing out and doesn't have to worry about becoming a snack. He's (or she) is a little cutie -

Spotty's kids have all been red painteds regardless of who the father was. Here are some of her 4 month old babies.

And last, but not least, here is Lucy (about to explode).

 

[Angry_Platy]

Your fish are beautiful, as always

I bought some new fish today, against all advice. I got a pineapple sword girl, a gold wag platy girl, a sunset twinbar platy girl and a red twinbar (??) girl platy. The twinbar sunset platy....I'd been wanting for ages.....she is beautiful And the red twinbar platy...she is only young but has what look like small twinbars just before her tail.....

And the gold wag twinbar girl, well I had been looking at her for a while....shes not the kind of platy I would normally buy....but shes been in the LFS over 2 weeks now in a tank with discus...I hate discus (no offence ppl who like them) and thought she'd much rather be with platies Also she is HUGE so I thought she'd be happy breeding with my large swordy male

Sorry for hijacking yur thread but I just wanted to tell you

I hope yur other girls give birth soon.....damm fish.....

 

[Polardbear]

I love all those colors! How does the gold wag color compare to marigold? Is it a more subtle shade of yellow or is it the same lemon yellow? All I ever see around here is marigolds or marigold wags but I've seen the gold & gold wags advertised at some online places and was wondering what they looked like.

I was really surprised at the color Meri has been producing, the shading from orange to yellow to white is really striking but more like a color I'd expect to see on a platy than a swordtail. They're almost like the same colors you get on pineapples but really blurred together.

After getting Leah the new pineapple girl the other day I went back and got 2 more of them. A lot of the pineapples I've seen lately have been rather pale and washed out looking but these 3 girls have the most vibrant colors I think I've ever seen.

I'll be expecting to see pictures of your new kids soon!

 

[Angry_Platy]

And you will

I was going to say I was waiting for them to settle in but that would be lying...ever since I put them in there they have been cruising around the 10gal tank like they have been there forever

The gold wag platy is like a dull yellow.....the best way I can describe it. You will see what I mean when I post pics (tomorrow I promise)......

Have your girls dropped yet?

 

[Polardbear]

I can't believe it, I'd just about given up on Nicky having babies and decided she was just seriously overweight! I added some new plants to the tank last night before I went to work and not a baby in sight. This morning when I came home I decided it would be a good time to do a water change since there weren't any new borns to worry about. When I moved the first plant to clean the gravel up popped a tiny little orange new born! Now that really surprised me (the orange color) so I did a quick check of the ladies but Lupe is obviously pregnant again and it's to soon for Lucy. Nicky cruised by but she looked the same as she did the night before so I was rather puzzled. So I shooed the little orange baby down to the other end of the tank and went on cleaning. When I got to the corner up popped a little black new born. The more stuff I moved the more little black babies came popping out. So far I've seen at least 5 black babies and 2 orange ones and I only moved stuff around in one end of the tank. What's really strange with them to is that once they popped out of hiding they stayed out in the open cruising around. They didn't seem at all concerned about the adult fish that were considering them for a snack. Most of my fry is smarter than that! I just hope some of them survive, all my 10 gallon tanks are in use as quarentine tanks at the moment and I don't dare shuffle any of the quarentine fish around right now.

I went to the LFS Saturday night to get some new plants and came home with 4 new swordies. They had a great sale going on and it was buy one get one free on fish. I found 2 marigold lyretail females, a marigold hi fin male and a pineapple hi fin male. Oh, and the week before I found a brick red wag lyretail female. I'm getting a really nice little herd of lyretail swordies going!

 

[WILDER]

Congrats on the new arrivals, still debating if I want babies again.

 

[Polardbear]

Aw c'mon Wilder, you know you'll love them. How can you resist the cute little guys?

 

[WILDER]

I no, I do wan't them but my partner won't let me as he had to take the last 35 fry to the lfs.

 

[Jen21]

Congrats on the babies.... It always happens right when you give up, thats when they surprize ya.
((Nicky and babies))

 

[Joby]

Awww lovely little babies

I was only thinking about Nicky at the weekend and wondering if she did ever have her babies

 

[Polardbear]

I don't normally ever use net breeders but since I have no place to put Nicky's babies at the moment I decided to go buy one. I've waited to long for black babies to gamble. I then spent 2 hours looking for the little tykes, they were darn near impossible to find. I know swordie babies are good at hiding but I'm no novice at rounding them up, these guys are almost impossible to find even when you are staring straight at them. You take your eyes off them for one second and you can't find them again unless they happen to move. I captured 6 of the little black ones and the one little orange one and put them in the breeder net. (It's one of those fabric ones that you can hang on the lip of the tank). That was all I could find last night before I went to work but since I came home this morning I've spotted 3 or 4 more. They are on their own for now but they seem to be doing fine at avoiding their cannibalistic monster relatives. I'm going to try to pick up another 10 gallon tank this week for them, the net thing is ok for a brief stay but I'd rather have them in their own "safe house". It is kind of funny watching the adults gather around the net and stare at them in frustration.