My First Fry! Hurrah!

[ccskitten]

Hi Everybody

I posted yesterday on my other thread "Another one of those questions" that my balloon molly is now looking quite skinny with no babies to be seen. I hunted high and low for my little fry but couldn't find any. Very sad I also said about my marbled molly still being huge. Well..........

I came home from work today to find my marbled molly looking very skinny indeed. I'd missed it again. . I sat infront of my tank for half an hour desperately looking for a little fry to show their faces.

Just as I was about to give up hope I looked by a floating plant that had uprooted itself and a baby fry!!!! I scooped him up in the net quickly before any of my evil fish could eat him and put him in the breeding trap. Then I looked again and another fry!!! yay!!

My daughter is staying at my mums tonight so I called to tell her the good news and guess what..........I saw another fry next to my filter housing. I hung up quick and popped him in the trap. yay 3 fry!!!

About an hour later I saw another within some plants. I tried to get him with the net but he darted. 10mins later he was there again. Blimey he was quick. zooom gone!! I saw him again by the roots, made a grab for the net but as soon as the net touched the water "munch" horrible "no longer pregnant" balloon molly snapped her up. I wish I hadn't witnessed that.

I ate my tea infront of the tank fry spotting and noticed another fry at the back by the roots of the vallis. Tea down, net in.... zoooom.... gone! At the same time a nasty platy darted to where he had just been. Noooooooooo not another one. Gutted. But.....looking closer......yay he was still there. Netted. Hurrah now I have 4 cutesy little marbled molly fry.

I know there is more in there somewhere but lights are off and I hope and pray that they can keep out of mischief until tomorrow.

Anyway thank you if you are still reading. I had to share!

However, I do now need a little bit of advice - I've noticed one of my platies has been flicking. The edges of her fins are also looking a bit white. I think she has fin rot. Is it safe to treat with primafix and melafix whilst the fry are in the tank? I also think one of my other fish has worms. She is an orange high fin platy that is looking a bit skinny and has a white blob on her bottom. It's not because she is pregnant. She is also trying to rub her bottom on the gravel. I am about to order some wormer online. Will this be safe with fry? Can I use this the same time as melafix/primafix?

Water stats are

(last water change 50% on Saturday)

PH - 8 (always has been)
Amonia - 0
Nitrite - 0
Nitrate - 20-40

Stocking is in sig.

Any comments or advice would be welcomed.

Kind regards

Cindy (new mummy!!) xx

 

[Victora1984]

congratulations on the fry

 

[ccskitten]

Thanks Victora . It's very stressful though!!!

 

[paul_219]

Congratulation on your new fry .

 

[OldMan47]

First congratulations on the fry Kitten. New fry are always a joy. On the subject of disease treatments, some fish are more sensitive than others to particular medications but the fry will usually tolerate medications in the water just as well as the adults of the same species.

 

[Colin_T]

Melafix and Pimafix are normally fine with baby fish but a bit of white edging to the tail isn't normally fin rot. Fin rot is characterised by the fins splitting and eroding away over a couple of days. A bit of white edging could simply be excess mucous caused by the fish being stressed out.
Do you gravel clean the tank when you do a water change? If not then it is probably a good idea to do a couple of gravel cleans over the next few days. This will remove the gunk from the substrate and help improve the water quality. Also if your filter hasn't been cleaned in the last month I would suggest you clean that too. Clean tank water will get contaminated with all sorts of bugs if it passes through a dirty filter. Make sure you wash the tiler materials out in a bucket of tank water and not under the tap.

Most fish wormers are safe for fry, however it is preferable to only use one medication at a time, ie: use the Melafix & Pimafix, then do a few water changes and treat with the wormer. Or use the wormer, do a few water changes and then use the Melafix & Pimafix.

To work out the volume of water in the tank
measure Length x Width x Height in cm
divide by 1000
equals volume in litres

When measuring the height, measure from the top of the gravel to the top of the water level. If you have big rocks or driftwood in the tank, remove them before measuring the height.

Before you treat the tank do a 50% water change and complete gravel clean. This will reduce the gunk in the tank and allow the medication to work more effectively. It will also lower the pathogen count in the water and mean there are less nasties around to infect the fish.

Remove carbon from the filter before treating otherwise it will absorb the medication out of the water.

Make sure any new water is free of chlorine and has a similar temperature & PH to the tank.

Increase aeration/ surface turbulence whenever you treat the tank. Medications lower the oxygen levels in the water and increasing surface turbulence will help to maximise these levels.

Mollies & Platies don't normally eat their young but will when they are hungry. Perhaps the next time the fish is nearly due to give birth, you can increase the number of times you feed the fish throughout the day. This will give you more time to find the fry and get them to safety.
Having lots of floating plants in the tank will give the fry more places to hide.
New born fry should not be removed from the water with a net. If possible scoop them out with a small bucket or cup.

 

[OldMan47]

I won't argue with Colin on medications ever. I basically rely on keeping my fish healthy because I have no idea how to treat diseases. I can't even diagnose them very well. Live bearer fry on the other hand are something that I well understand. They can generally tolerate anything and everything that their parents can. They are also adversely affected by the same things as their parents. My molly fry at a week old are doing fine with momma as shown in this picture.

The fact that momma is being fed well enough to not become a predator on her fry goes without saying.

 

[ccskitten]

Thank you Colin and Oldman.

I lost another fish yesterday. An Xray tetra. He showed no signs of illness. I suspect he was just old though. I got him second hand with my first tank and I believe the previous owners had him for a few years. However, I am now very worried about my other fish.

I religiously do a 25%-50% water change every week cleaning half of the gravel each week. I normally dip half of my filter media into a bucket of tank water once a month to remove debris. I hadn't done this for about a month.

Last night i did a 50% water change, dipping all of my filter media into one of the buckets (was very gentle as to not disturb bacteria). I removed the carbon from the filter, turned down the temp on my tank (previously 28 degrees, now 26), filled back up with dechlorinated tap water. With the last bucked I added melafix. The tank seemed quite happy this morning.

The melafix bottle says to redose daily and do a water change after a week. Would you recommend this? I wanted to do a 25% waterchange everyday to help my fry. I was also just going to add enough melafix to treat the amount of water I was replacing.

The other thing is I have struggled to find an internal parasite medication available to the uk. Do you know of any websites I can get this from in the UK?

Thank you very much for your help. It is greatly appreciated.

Cindy

 

[ccskitten]

Also forgot to say, my filter creates little ripples on the surface and I also have a large airstone so I am hoping airation in the tank should be ok.

PS. Oldman, that molly is lovely.

 

[Athena]

Just adding a little note about using medications with fry in the tank - I think the general rule is to use half doses in a tank with fry present. I recently had to use Melafix in a tank with convict fry and using half the dose was absolutely fine - didn't affect the fry and it still helped repair the torn tail fin of the mother fish (caused by a bullying male).

Very exciting finding fry, I know!

Athena

 

[Colin_T]

If you have an airstone bubbling away in the tank then there should be plenty of oxygen for the fish.

I can't help you with obtaining medications like wormers in the UK. However, if you start another thread asking where to get wormers in thew UK, I'm sure one of the members on here can help you out. Just put down where you are and ask away. Alternatively send Wilder a PM and ask her.

If you want to do a water change each day for the fry then do it and then re-treat the tank afterwards. I would do a 50% water change & gravel clean each day and then treat the entire tank.

You can clean the entire filter each month and as long as you wash it out in a bucket of tank water, you shouldn't have any problems wiping out the filter bacteria. You can also be pretty rough with the media and give them a good squeeze out.