Molly Hybrids?

[olevia]

About a year ago we work up with unexpected orange fry in our aquarium. At first, we thought they were surpe tetras because they matched the colors. However, as they grew older they started to develope large bellies like the baloon mollies and following the mollies around. However, they never grew as big as the mollies and after a while i noticed the male fry never got the belly, they were shaped more like a neon tetra. Upon colser examination I noticed that they didn't have molly fins either, but had neon tetra fins. Is is possible the two breeds crossed? They probably had over fifty fry over a few months time. Unfortunately, I don't have any of the babies anymore, or I'd attach a picture. I've been curious though, so any help would be great.

 

[saphphx]

Wild. I wouldn't have thought so. It would have been easier to tell by pics. Though I would think not as tetras are egg layers and mollies are livebeareres, so I would think the DNA would be different enough to prevent this, though don't quote me on it

 

[WildernessLofts]

About a year ago we work up with unexpected orange fry in our aquarium. At first, we thought they were surpe tetras because they matched the colors. However, as they grew older they started to develope large bellies like the baloon mollies and following the mollies around. However, they never grew as big as the mollies and after a while i noticed the male fry never got the belly, they were shaped more like a neon tetra. Upon colser examination I noticed that they didn't have molly fins either, but had neon tetra fins. Is is possible the two breeds crossed? They probably had over fifty fry over a few months time. Unfortunately, I don't have any of the babies anymore, or I'd attach a picture. I've been curious though, so any help would be great.

It's not possible for livebearers to breed with egglayers. There's no way for the sperm to fertilize the eggs.

Chances are, you just had some babies born from the mollies from previous matings and that's why they look so different. Livebearers can store sperm for quite some time, so you could own them for months and then randomly get babies even if you don't have males.

 

[helterskelter]

if the onlt livebearer you have is maoolies then it's safe to say that their just mollies, ballon's will happily cross with normale mollies and then it's possible to get fry of different coours and body shapes.

Unless their well feed from day one mollie rarely get to the true size of 5" in size, so not to worrie but their just small mollies

 

[olevia]

Let's see, at the time, we had a pleco, surpe tetras, neon tetras, a gourami, a couple baloon mollies. I guess all of those spawn except mollies, so I suppose they were just gimpy fish. I have since given all of the fry to other people. I had kept one, named Ozzy, but he died some months ago. Thanks for the help!