is there such a thing as molly roe

[mommacakes]

i recently set up a ten gallon tank. i started off with two molly's. the female is pregnant. this morning i thought she was in labor. but instead of live fry, she laid roe and then proceeded to eat the roe. is this normal? not wanting to really deal with many babies, i have left her in the tank with the other fish - 4 zebra tetras, and one male molly, he is no longer in the tank. He was causing too much stress on the female, so i retuned him to petsmart.
is her behavior normal, or is she really not fertile?
please help!

mommacakes

 

[heresmike]

Hi mommacakes, and welcome to the forum!!

Most likely what happened is she prematurely gave birth due to stress. It's normal for livebearers to eat their young, so I guess it would be normal for them to eat their preemies. To cut down on the females getting overly harrassed, you should have 2 females and one male in the tank. Males are such animals!!