Molly Fry - Advice Greatly Welcome

[locust267]

Last thurs I bought 2 female mollies and on saturday I woke up to a little one swimming around. By the evening he had gone so I thought to check in the filter, there were 5 of them, 1 was dead.

The remaining 4 are really healthy in the breeder net I bought. The plan is to move them across to my new 35l tank I am cycling until they are old enough to move on to a friend etc.

I have been advised to keep them in the net until they are 0.5" and feed them on liquifry.

Only I also noted that feeding them baby brine shrimp will help them - should I do this?

Do you have any other advice on how I can raise them to become healthy? I didn't want to just let them die and am looking forward to them growing nice and strong

Also I done a little research online which says she will probably keep giving birth (each being more fry) every 5 or so weeks for up to 7 months - How likely is this considering this small lot (if loads wern't eaten) was probably her 1st and what should I do with the next lot of fry in terms of finding homes for them all?

Cheers

 

[OldMan47]

The female is probably carrying several batches of sperm and will likely keep producing fry. 5 fry is a very small crop for a molly, they are often 30 or more. They can be fed BBS, the liquifry or ground up adult flake food. Molly fry are larger than most other livebearers and don't require special food to be able to eat. A good balanced high protein diet should get their growth going quickly. They will be better off in the breeder net than in an uncycled tank. If you have the space in a community tank they can be put in with the adult mollies at between 1/2 and 3/4 inch. Depending on what else is in the tank, you may need to wait until they are larger. If you have no place for the surviving fry, you are not doing them any favors by raising them just to be discarded.

 

[locust267]

I will have room for this first batch as if they all survive a friend wants to take some if not all of them depending on how many fish she has in her tank already.

I wasnt expecting to have fry so saturday was a suprise, I cant really put them into the community tank as there isn't enough room, saying that I am happy with them being there at the moment as the water is looking good and am keeping an eye on the other tank which at the mo has 2 danio's in it and some water and filter media from my mother tank, so am hoping it will be ready for the fry in a few weeks although still in the breeder net until they are big enough to not be sucked up by the filter.

My main concern would really be what to do with any fry in the future as like you said 30 is alot and although this batch have a home either here or with my friend(s) I highly doubt 30 or more could be saved through friends alone so what would the chances of my LFS be at taking them? Are there any laws in selling them as although I dont want a profit I would want the money back to cover the food etc.

People who breed for a hobby, how do they cope with a huge amount, do they generally give to the LFS?

thanks for help

 

[OldMan47]

I am embarking on a breeding experiment to try to make some improvements on what started as wild bred endlers. My culls, the ones I don't keep, will still be high quality endlers and a local fish store expressed a desire to get some from me if I had any to spare so you could say I have a place to sell them. I'm not sure what the laws are in other places but I have sold fish here before and it was no problem. If you intend to sell off fish, you need to be prepared to raise them to a good selling size which for a molly would be at least 1 1/2 inches. That would make them about the size that most lfs get their mollies anyway. That will require some dedicated aquarium space so the problem remains housing the number you end up with. For me it means full grown because endlers don't color up nicely before they are adult size and even then the colors continue to develop for a while. I can't really make my breeding selections until I can see what I'm working with.