Male Mollies

[LittleMissDynamite]

I removed my male dalmatian molly from my large tank and put him in the tank i bought for all the babies he kept producing to give the poor ladies a rest.The male became very stressed on his own so i went out and bought two new male mollies to keep him company.within an hour the molly was fighting with one of the new males and they were really going for each other.I have had to put spot in to the breeding net to separate them but they are still trying to get each other.What did ido wrong and what should i do next please.Fish newbie

 

[K_Hedin]

Males will try and make themselves dominant. There will be less fighting or no fighting if they are back with the females. However, you usually need to keep them with a 2F to 1M ratio. There can always be more females. I have the same problem with my black mollies breeding out of control. Luckily I have a 55G tank with other live bearers in it and the 2 males aren't going at each other. The only thing I can suggest is to put the females back in and let them breed like crazy and eat the young if you are ok with that. I leave them all in the same tank and it helps them not have a population explosion. Otherwise you can try and get him some other fish to hang out with so he isn't so lonely. I am not entirely sure as I am pretty new to fish keeping myself. I am sure someone will be along with better advice shortly.

 

[LittleMissDynamite]

Males will try and make themselves dominant. There will be less fighting or no fighting if they are back with the females. However, you usually need to keep them with a 2F to 1M ratio. There can always be more females. I have the same problem with my black mollies breeding out of control. Luckily I have a 55G tank with other live bearers in it and the 2 males aren't going at each other. The only thing I can suggest is to put the females back in and let them breed like crazy and eat the young if you are ok with that. I leave them all in the same tank and it helps them not have a population explosion. Otherwise you can try and get him some other fish to hang out with so he isn't so lonely. I am not entirely sure as I am pretty new to fish keeping myself. I am sure someone will be along with better advice shortly.

 

[LittleMissDynamite]

Thankyou for your reply.I had spot in a 65 litre tank with two black females and two silver females. I also had one male guppy and four female guppies.There are three corys,4 dannios and 2 clown loaches in there.I have one balloon molly and three cardinal tetras. I have raised about a dozen guppy babies to 2 months old and never trap any of the mothers or babies.the tank is well planted with ornaments to hide in.I bought a 36 litre tank and filled it from the main tank,once it had cycled i put as many babies as i could catch without stressing them into my baby tank.I took twenty baby mollies and 6 baby guppies to a local fish store and he advised me to only keep males.I put the male guppy and male molly into the now empty baby tank.The male guppy was fine but the male molly was showing signs of stress.I bought two more male mollies and two more male guppies today with two yamamoto shrimps.They all got along okay apart from spot started to fight with the new dalmation molly that was his equal is size and they were really going for it.There must be at least three dozen baby mollies in my big tank and they dont seem to get eaten.I asked the at shop what i could put in my tank t keep the baby numbers down but they were not keen to allow the baby eating.All i can do now i think is put one of the mollies back with my females.probably the new one in-case it breeds with the babies.

 

[LittleMissDynamite]

Update. I kept my original male molly netted overnight and have tried re introducing them this morning with the tank light out.They did display to each other but were not biting at each other like a huge "cat fight" They have been settled for over an hour so the lights have jusy gone back on.Here s hoping or its back to the local pet store for the new molly.

 

[LittleMissDynamite]

Update. I kept my original male molly netted overnight and have tried re introducing them this morning with the tank light out.They did display to each other but were not biting at each other like a huge "cat fight" They have been settled for over an hour so the lights have jusy gone back on.Here s hoping or its back to the local pet store for the new molly.

I thought it was going well but no such luck.My older molly was submitting but was constantly attacked.Got the other one netted now.Looks like it s got to go back to the pet shop. Hope they will take it back.

 

[Mammabe1]

Update. I kept my original male molly netted overnight and have tried re introducing them this morning with the tank light out.They did display to each other but were not biting at each other like a huge "cat fight" They have been settled for over an hour so the lights have jusy gone back on.Here s hoping or its back to the local pet store for the new molly.

I thought it was going well but no such luck.My older molly was submitting but was constantly attacked.Got the other one netted now.Looks like it s got to go back to the pet shop. Hope they will take it back.

Hi There!

I too had the exact same problem.... At the time, never having Mollies before, I didn't realize that I had bought about 3 males and like 1 female.
Well, as you can imagine, my poor female was tired out and two of my big sailfin Mollies were going at it like it was a dual to the death!!

I then went back to my LFS and told them how I NOW realized I had 3 males and 1 female and how the 2 males were fighting. They suggested I buy more females
so there wasn't so much competition. I bought about 5 more females and the problem has gone away! The 2 alpha males now tolerate each other and can
swim with each other and they no longer fight because they have so many females to keep them busy they don't care about each other anymore!

So, my suggestion would be to add a few more females and let nature take its course on the babies and/or put them in the nursery tank to grow and give away
or sell them.

Anyway, good luck!! Keep us posted. I would like to know what you do next!

 

[XeroTolerance]

If I were you I would add some more females to "even" the males desire for breeding.

 

[LittleMissDynamite]

If I were you I would add some more females to "even" the males desire for breeding.

 

[fluttermoth]

I think adding even more fish to an already overstocked 65l is asking for trouble. Those clown loach can grow to over a foot long for a start; you need to re-home those ASAP.

Fish will fight if they're overcrowded.

 

[LittleMissDynamite]

If I were you I would add some more females to "even" the males desire for breeding.

Well,the male mollies are just about tolerating each other.I removed them from the females because i have too many babies for my tank to cope with.I have already rehomed 20 babies.I have 3 female mollies and 4 female guppies in my large tank and i am still getting more and more babies every week.Very few of them seem to be eaten either.There must be at least another 20 mollies ready for rehoming and a further 50 or more fry.I have some lovely young guppies developing.I bought three male guppies to share the home with my old male guppy and have three male mollies. the new guppies died within days of being bought and then my old guppy died too.Must have been a guppy disease because the mollies are okay.My aqua one 320 t now have 3 male mollies,six shrimp and 2 snails in.I dont really want to put anymore females in because the tank is small and the pump not great.I am going to buy it an extrenal pump from a lps.I hope the females stop giving birth soon but have read they can store sperm for a number of months.Most people loose their fish,i am getting to many to cope with.

 

[LittleMissDynamite]

I think adding even more fish to an already overstocked 65l is asking for trouble. Those clown loach can grow to over a foot long for a start; you need to re-home those ASAP.

Fish will fight if they're overcrowded.

Thankyou Fluttermoth.
The fighting mollies are in a small aquaone 320 t tank (all males) with 6 shrimp and 2 snails.The 65 litre tank is very overstocked because it is so full of babies.I am going to ring the lps to see if i can rehome more this weekend.I intend to try to rehome all the mollies and only keep a few guppies( 3 or 4 more.Out lps told me to buy the clown loaches to clear my snail problem,which they did a very good job.I plan to keep my 4 danios,six harlequins and three neons and one dwarf gourami with my clown loach.when the clowns grow i will rehome them or buy a bigger tank for them.Is this tank still overstocked as above please?
I want an external pump for my small aquaone.That was going to be a tank to grow my babies on in but i needed to remove the males to stop the breeding and have been unable to rehome them.

 

[colleen0309]

Good morning and welcome!

 

[LittleMissDynamite]

Good morning and welcome!

Well the two male Mollies have the aquastart320t tank all to themselves.An external Eheim classic pump has made such an amazing difference to the water quality i am going to buy on for my 100 litre tank too.The mollies still display to each other but do not go head to head in battle anymore.